Richard Thouin a écrit :

In article ,
"rod allan" wrote:

ITALIE. Porte-timbre d'Emilio NERI - Négociant en TP à Florence.
Neuf. Sans charnière.

Porte-timbres were a fad in the early 1900s. They consisted of a
label with text surrounding a space for a stamp. They were designed
to be stuck on the enveloppe and the stamp applied upon them.

Nothing like an examp;e:
http://www.cijoint.fr/cjlink.php?fil...cijKV3dj7r.jpg

All kind of businesses and associations issued them. They were
particularly popular in France and I remember Yvert listed them in
older editions. They are still considered highly collectable,
specially on cover.

The ad you quoted is for a «porte-timbre» issued by an Italian stamp
dealer. Condition is described as «Mint, no hinge mark»

Regards

Richard


Bonjour Richard,
Hi Rod (and the others chaps ;-)

Richard is perfectly right. Some other examples here :
http://www.j257.fr/porte-timbres.htm

There are also what we in France call "Timbres-Monnaie".
You will find examples here :
http://collectiondemonnaie.net/timbresmonnaie/
You *must* click on the link (near the bottom of the page) labelled :

" En voici une vision d'ensemble ! (cardiaque s'abstenir...) "

to see and incredible number of these "coins" which advertised
for different companies.

They were used in France between 1920 and 1924 to replace
coins (after the 1st WW, aluminum and copper were so scarce
that it was not possible to manufacture enough low value coins)

Those "stamps used as coins" were 1st used in the US during
the Civil War (they were invented and patented in 1862
by John Gault) :
http://choyt48.home.comcast.net/~cho...ostage_run.htm

--
All the best,
Pierre