Definitive Postage Stamps of Ireland - Booklets

Booklets

Definitive stamp booklets were first put on sale on 21 August 1931. Booklet construction was a lightweight cardboard cover stitched on the left-hand side with panes of stamps (usually four panes), advertising panes and interleaving bound in. Until 1956 most booklets had half of the front cover devoted to advertising, and until 1963 booklets also had serial numbers on the front cover: two numbers indicated the year of issue and serial number (in that order on the early issues but with the order reversed for later issues), until 1963 when the serial numbers ceased. Since 1983, most booklets are no longer stitched; the stamp pane, or panes, are glued into a folded card cover.

Until 1988, when the Dublin Millennium booklet containing commemorative stamps was issued, all booklets contained only definitive stamps. Since then, An Post has issued both commemorative and definitive booklets, with three times as many commemorative booklets issued. In 1990 An Post issued the first booklet mixing definitive and commemorative stamps in one booklet and also on a single pane.

Many booklet stamps can be identified by one non-perforated edge, though a few are perforated on all edges. On booklets up to 1977, the printing plate construction enabled both upright and inverted watermarks in equal quantities owing to a gutter dividing rows 6 and 7 in the sheets of 12 x 10 stamps. The gutter was used for stitching during assembly, requiring rows 4–6 and 10–12 to be turned through 180 degrees so those panes could be stitched on the left of the booklet.