Feather

The card says on the back "Canada owes much to its First Nation people the true founders of our country" but it doesn't elaborate on what tribe our dancer is from as he swirls into view in a flurry of feathers and fringes on the postcard, or what the dance celebration is although it is possibly the Grass Dance seen here

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Traditional Celebration at Connections to the World  

Post On The Move

1958:  Sea and Helicopter Mail

The mail is journeying across the planet and Sweden commemorated "the many hundreds of years of Sea Mail Services over the North Atlantic and the 10th anniversary of Helicopter Mail Service in the Stockholm Archipelago"  with the set of stamps seen on the FDC.

The featured ship was the Gripsholm II,(1957-2001) a cruise liner which today lies on the sea bed off Cape of Good Hope having avoiding the final indignity of being broken up by ship breakers.  I am not sure if the helicopter is arriving or departing but glad to see the postmaster is wearing his winter gloves.

1996: Mail Carriages 1862-1996

More Swedish mail transport, this time a sorting mail carriage.  The service ceased in March 1996 and carriages were taken out of use from 1st April 1996 as all the mail was then being sorted at terminals and post offices. The cover cancellation is from the Stockholm-Malmo line.

The stamp shows work in a modern mail carriage but the tradition was a long one as the first mail carriage was established in 1862 travelling between Stockholm and Gothenburg. The service grew and at its peak in the 1930s there were 258 of them.

An entry to Sunday Stamps theme - Commemorative - See It On A Postcard

Costumes

Dancing towards us resplendent in traditional costumes are women of Italy, Spain, Turkey and Germany.  There is no information on the back of the card of as to where the illustration is from and the only clue from the front is a plate number - 76 (or 16) which would indicate it is part of a series or perhaps from a very large book.

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Traditional Costumes - dress to impress at Connections to the World 

Places of Worship

1982-1988 Irish Architecture

This is a church built as a royal chapel for Cormac McCarthy which was consecrated in 1134 and today is called Cormac's Chapel.  Because of a crozier found in his tomb it is thought that Cormac was not only a king but also a bishop.  This Romanesque chapel in County Tipperary can be found on the Rock of Cashel, traditional seat of the kings of Ulster for hundreds of years.

1982-1988 (Drawings Michael Craig; Graphics Peter Wildbur)

A 6th Century Oratorium sits on the uninhabited rocky red granite St MacDara Island off the coast of County Galway.  MacDara is the patron saint of fishermen so every year in July people travel to the island from Carna for mass and a blessing of boats to keep them safe for the coming year. (Seafarers Pilgrimage photos here)

Churches, chapels and monasteries appeared on Brazil's Cultural Heritage definitives of 1986-88

St Lawrence of the Indians church, Sao Roque

St Francis's Monastery, Olinda

St Anthony's Chapel, Sao Roque

When the stamp below was issued in 1925, the illustration was referred to as the "new" Sofia Cathedral.

The gilt domed Alexander Nevsky Cathedral is the largest Eastern Orthodox Cathedral in the world, can hold 10,000 people and is also a symbol of the city.  Construction started in 1882 and was completed in 1912.

The oldest of the structures featured on my stamps today is

1931-41: Land and People

the square minaret of the Grand Mosque in Tunis which was built in 732. 

Lastly is a church with a beautiful view of Lake Lugano, the church of San Georgio Castagnola. In the background is Monte San Salvatore where you can ride a funicular to the top and find a 80m high TV tower and from whose viewing platform one can enjoy a 360 degree vista of lake, land and mountains.

An entry to Sunday Stamps II theme - Places of worship - pray visit See It On A Postcard

Embroidery

A fierce, if rather surprised looking, dragon from a detail on a silk Chinese dragon robe c1900.  Most dragon robes have a large dragon in the centre of the garment with smaller dragons on the sleeves and on the hem. Chinese emperors, court members and officials all wore dragon robes on special occasions but the types would be differ depending on status, only the five clawed dragon could be worn by the emperor.  The palace's tailor shop employed hundreds of artisans to cut the silk fabric, sew and embroider.  Happily many examples of Chinese garments survive from the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) in costume collections all over the world. 

One can be entranced both by the material and embroidery of Chinese clothing seen here on more informal wear -

Palace Museum collection, Beijing

a woman's riding jacket (magua) from the Guangxu reign (1875-1908) which is made of satin with an embroidered pattern of wisteria.  What a wonderful item of clothing to ride out in. 

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Traditional Craft Work - at Connections to the World

Royal Costumes

1963: National Symbols

Queen Nefertiti has appeared on many Egyptian stamps and I'm presuming the hieroglyphs are her name but then have little knowledge of  hieroglyphs at all but it must be one of the most beautiful of the written languages.

1973-79 Definitives (Engraver and Designer Czeslaw Slania)

Another queen, but this time of Denmark, Queen Margrethe, who is also the Queen of Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The stamp shows her at the age of 33 in Greenland's national costume and as the queen is an accomplished artist the crowned monograph is one she designed herself. 

1997: Queen Margrethe of Denmark. 25 Years

Here she is on a commemorative sheet of the Faroe Islands this time in Faroese national costume.  Each year she and her husband sail on a summer cruise to visit these northern islands mostly on the royal yacht 'Dannebrog' (which is named after the flag of Denmark).  Built in the early 1930s and with an overhaul in the 1980s it is still in fine shape to travel Danish waters following in the tradition of her sailor father

1950: Definitive (Design: Viggo Bang Engraver: Bent Jacobsen)

King Frederik IX who was educated at the Danish Royal Naval Academy and served in the Danish navy for many years and famously had many tattoos from his time at sea.

1964-68 Defintives (Designer and Engraver: Czeslaw Slania)

Here he is in a traditional Greenlandic anorak.

An entry to Sunday Stamps II - Kings and Queens - be royally entertained at See It On A Postcard.

 

Rivers in Season

An autumnal day with the mist lying on the fells obscuring them from view and the peat bog lying brown and benign above the waterfall, unless the unwary walker treads in the wrong place. This wet area gives rise to three rivers including the River Eden of which Hell Gill Force is its first large waterfall as it starts its journey dropping through a limestone gorge.  Like many rivers the Eden forms a boundary and this is one between the counties of Cumbria and Yorkshire.

What is nicer than an amble along a river on a summer's day? Here is the River Dove in Derbyshire where I suspect there must be a large car park nearby from the crowds of people taking pleasure from the day in all in one spot.  This is a Dennis postcard, a company who are credited with being the first producers of postcards in Britain (1894), but of course we are way down the line from that date.  They started to produce 'Photocolour' cards (of which this is one) in the 1960s and there is no doubt that our river walkers look to be from that era.  

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Any Water Form - splash around at Connections to the World