Following the doubts and concerns raised by the II and III issue of Sardinia, Matraire set to work on a new, different typographic issue, designed to make the wording contained in the cartouche as readable as possible, including the face value of the stamps.
The 1855 issue already included the c. 40 denomination, which followed the pattern of the previous issues, where this face value had been “the High Value” (the other basic values were c. 5 and c. 20).
However, historical records confirm that no II plate was ever made for this stamp, but the 1855 plate, although cleaned several times, always remained the same until the end of the issue’s validity, namely 31 December 1863.
Of course, some sheets belonging to this plate were also perforated in 1862, giving rise to the c. 40 carmine of the I issue of the Kingdom (Sassone no. 3).
The colours of this issue are divided into seven subcategories represented by numbers and letters:
Printings of 1855 - Base number 16 (without capital letters) and with lowercase letters to identify the colour shades of the period (16a, 16b, 16c)
Printings of 1857/58 - Base number 16A, otherwise similar to the previous one.
Printings of 1859 - Base number 16B
Printings of 1860 - Base number 16C; this printing includes the most expensive stamps of the issue, namely the famous LILAC PINKS (16Ce, 16Cea, 16Cf, 16Cg).
Printings of 1861 - Base number 16D
Printings of 1862 - Base number 16E
Printings of 1863 - Base number 16F, also known as “Ministerial” printings.
Bye!
Paolo Cardillo.
