As the world's first, the Penny Black has probably been the subject of more prolonged and detailed study than any postage stamp issued since - and rightly so! Still considered by many to be the most attractive ever issued, it is certainly the one stamp which every collector would like to own. But in its short period of currency it was printed from 11 different plates, and with the two seperate states of Plate 1 making 12, and 240 corner letter combinations from each, thereare a total of 2880 different Penny Blacks to collect! Reference to the catalogue will show that a poor example from a common plate may be only worth a few pounds, but a superlative stamp from a scarce one will cost thousands - but how dotell the difference? There is no better guide than this book first published in 1922, with seperate pictures of all 2880 stamps, and detailed notes on the facing page to assist identification. First published by Stanley Gibbons in 1998 with some editorial amendments and a few foreword by Charles W Goodwyn LLB, RDP, FRPSL, then keeper of the Royal Philatelic Collection, the book proved to be a godsend to collectors chasing an ever-declining number of the original publication. This new edition is designed to meet the needs of yet another generation of Penny Black collectors; a description of each individual stamp of the eleven different plates, affording a guide to collectors in the reconstruction of sheets

The Great Britain Concise catalogue provides full colour price listings for all mint and used Great Britain stamp issues from the 1840 Penny Black to March 2011.

Included are definitives, commemoratives, regionals, postage dues, official stamps and booklets. Information for the more specialist collector includes priced listings of specimens, booklets, selected plate and cylinder varieties, errors (including missing colours, missing embossing, imperforates and phosphor omitted varieties) and inverted watermarks. More ‘popular’ fields covered include prices for gutter pairs, first day covers, presentation packs, yearbooks, ‘Smilers’ and much else.

Listings with prices for all GB stamps from 1840 to April 2011

Covers all GB Definitives, Commemoratives, First Day Covers, Presentation Packs, Booklets and Smilers

Also lists Errors, Varieties, Watermarks, Specimens, Officials and Regionals

Prices for used and unused stamps

360 pages with Full colour illustrations

Hundreds of price increases since last edition

There is a helpful introductory section, providing answers to many of the problems encountered by less experienced collectors, while additional help comes in the form of a full design index and diagrams showing the layout of Machin decimal booklet panes.

Prices are given for both unmounted and mounted mint stamps issued between 1887 and 1935 and on-cover prices are provided up to 1910. All are carefully checked each year to give an accurate easy-to-use guide to British stamps and their values, thus ensuring the continuing popularity of this widely used catalogue.