Cover from Italy no. 27

And another beautiful cover from Italy... with a magnificent engraved stamp showing the monastery La Trinità della Cava near the city of Cava de' Tirreni in the province of Salerno in southern Italy. And it goes with a very special cancellation 11/11/11 from Treviso - The European City of Sports 2011. Grazie di nuovo, Giovanni.

Cover from Italy no. 26

So, here we go again with a bunch of new covers and postcards... This cover was sent from Treviso in northern Italy on 14 March 2012, and has a EUR 0.75 stamp from a two-stamp series issued on 18 November 2011 dedicated to postal savings. Thank you, Giovanni!!

Cover from Italy no. 25

Here's another excellent cover from Giovanni, with a stamp from 2010, from the classical Italian series "Tourism", showing the town of Viggiano in the province of Potenza in southern Italy.

The stamp was cancelled in Pulsano (Taranto) with a special postmark commemorating a feast of the Madonna of Lourdes held on 11 February 2011.

Grazie, Giovanni!!

Postcard from Italy no. 6

Here's a great postcard with the higher value Italy's Europa 2011 stamp, postmarked in Pisa on 23 August 2011, showing a marble quarry in the Alpi Apuane Mountai Range in Tuscany...






As always, my sincerest thanks go to, Giovanni from Milano:)

Cover from Italy no. 24

After the Spanish Europa stamp here are its Italian cousins, on a cover with the set of two stamps issued on 9 April 2011, with no less than four first-day-of-issue cancellations from Roma Filatelico. Grazie mille, Giovanni!!!

Covers from Italy 21, 22 and 23

A set of three great covers received recently from Giovanni. Here's a registered letter sent from Milano, Via Rimini post-office, with a sheet of 4 abstract stamps issued on 10 March 2011, dedicated to the state's Fiscal Agencies (Land Registry, Customs, State Property and Revenue), and 4 stamps issued on 7 January 2011 on the occasion of the 150th Anniversary of the Italy's unification...

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... this stamp is featured also on the above a cover with a special first-day-of-issue cancellation from the Presidential Palace in Rome (il Quirinale)...

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...and the same special cancellation can be seen used also on the souvenir sheet (7 January 2011), with the symbolic Italian flag, also part of the commemoration of the Italy's Unification.

Grazie, Giovanni, for these covers, and also for the fantastic surprise from the Pitcairn Island which I will show shortly:))

Covers from Italy no. 19 and 20

Two nice covers received from (and via) Giovanni. Both with a 0.65 euro stamp issued on 2 July 2010 commemorating the 100th anniversary of the death of Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli, Italian astronomer noted for his telescopic observations of Mars and for having detected the markings that he called canali (channels), later misinterpreted as "canals." He showed that meteor swarms travel through space in cometary orbits (Columia Encyclopedia). The planet Mars is also shown on the stamp.

The cover sent from Pisogne (province of Brescia) has a lovely special cancellation from 26 September 2010, commemorating the 60th "festa del fungo e della castagna" (mushroom and chestnut holiday).

Grazie mille, Giovanni!

Cover from Italy no. 18

Another lovely surprise from Giovanni, special cover with a 0.65 euro stamp from a sheet of 4 issued on 5 May 2010, commemorating, according to wikipedia, "the Expedition of the Thousand (Italian: Spedizione dei Mille) was a military campaign led by the revolutionary general Giuseppe Garibaldi in 1860. A force of volunteers defeated the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, leading to its dissolution and annexation by the Kingdom of Sardinia, an important step in the creation of a newly unified Kingdom of Italy". The set of stamps is part of the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of Italy's unification (2011).

This stamps shows a scene when the volunteers from northern Italy reached Sicily at the town of Marsalla (sbarco a Marsalla).

Apart from that, there is a nice special postmark from the town of Valdobbiadene near Treviso, in Veneto, in a winemaking region (home of Prosecco Conegliano-Valdobbiadene), which is mentioned also in the postmark: "brinda la vita" - "toast to life".

Grazie, Giovanni!!

Cover from Italy no. 17

Received from Giovanni at the end of 2010, with many wishes for 2011. The playful 0.65 eurocent stamp, issued on 29 October 2010, shows a toy train in a winter landscape, and there was another stamp in this Christmas series, with the painting called Adarazione dei Magi by Sandro Botticelli. Giovanni, grazie! E tanti auguri a Te!! In gamba!

Cover from Italy no. 16

Another fantastic cover received from Giovanni, with an embossed 0.85 euro stamp (and three new 0.20 euro definitives) commemorating the Men's Volleyball World Championship held in Italy from 25 September to 10 October 2010. The stamp, issued on 24 September 2010, has an old-fashioned feel, it is engraved, and I find it very interesting.
One of the venues of the tournament was Milan where the special cancellation on the cover was used on 24 September. And the winner was Brazil (the Czechs ranked 10th in the final standing). Grazie, Giovanni!

Cover from Italy no. 15

Giovanni has just sent me this fantastic cover with a souvenir sheet showing the Basilica Santa Maria di Collemaggio in the city of L'Aquila, capital of the Abruzzi region in central Italy, in April 2009 hit by the destructive earthquake. The basilica is an important example of Romanesque art in Abruzzo. And there is also a special postmark from Florence, commemorating the 2nd Salon of Arts and Restauration, with the head of Michalangelo's David.

Grazie, Giovanni! Yesterday I sent you a special cover; I hope it arrives safely even with this terrible snowing.

Cover from Italy no. 14

Another great surprise from Giovanni, a variation on the theme of Inter Milan, Italy's football champion in the season 2009-2010 after this special postcard and this cover with a special postmark. The cover above with the commemorative Inter Milan stamp was sent on 7 August 2010 from Terracina, province of Latina, near Rome, with another special football postmark. Grazie mille, Giovanni!

Cover from Italy no. 13

A fantastic cover from Giovanni: with a stamp of Piazzale di porta Pia in Rome (the stamp is dedicated to the capital of Rome, in a series of pictorial views started with the Foro romano in 2007) cancelled on 20 September 2010 by the day-of-issue postmark used at Roma Filatelico counter, with another pictorial postmark of Roma Spazio Filatelico cancelling the small 0.05 euro definitive making up the rest of the postage. This is truly great! Grazie, Giovanni!

A set from Italy no. 12

Here is a fine set of two envelopes and a slightly rained-soaked:) promotional postal card featuring this year's EUROPA stamps issued in Italy on 7 May 2010. Italy, as usual, issued two stamps, and for the topic of children's books chose the famous Pinocchio and the talking mouse Geronimo Stilton, introduced in 2000 and celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. Therefore, Geronimo Stilton had also a special postmark used on 10 October in Milano, where Giovanni lives.

On the large registered cover sent in May from Milano, there is also a lovely 0.80 euro stamp with a space motif, showing a satellite around Mars, celebrating Italy's participation in the Mars exploration programme.

Grazie mille, Giovanni, per tutto quanto!!

Cover from Italy no. 11

The latest cover from the great Giovanni, with a miniature sheet issued on 8 May 2004, showing Castel del Monte in the Province of L'Aquila in Abruzzo, and a herd of sheep, and a map connecting L'Aquila and Foggia, two points on the Tratturo Magno, the longest path in Italy used for transferring cattle or sheep from one pasture to another. Besides the sheet, the cover bears a special postmark used in Marsure (Provincia di Pordenone) on 8 September 2010, showing the sanctuary of Madonna del Monte commemmorated on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Apparition of the Virgin Mary. Grazie, Giovanni!!!

Cover from Italy no. 10

Zvětšit mapu

Another surprise from the unrivalled Giovanni. The splendid Alfa Romeo Giulietta stamp (with a coupon from the "blocco mosaico") issued 20 March 2010 in the series "Made in Italy", commented earlier here. This time the stamp has been cancelled by a special postmark used in a mobile post-office at the Rho-Pero Fair (Province of Milano) on 26 June 2010. There is also a 5 eurocent self-adhesive definitive to cover the rest of the international postage, cancelled by a normal hand stamp.

Grazie mille, Giovanni!

Cover from Italy no. 9

Another surprise from Giovanni! This year's Inter Milan stamp PLUS a special postmark used in Florence on 13 June 2010, commemorating 2nd Grassroots Football Festival on the youth level which stresses the importance of having a large base of footballers on the community level. Of note is also the new small Italian self-adhesive definitive of 5 eurocent.

Grazie, Giovanni, come sempre:)

Cover from Italy no. 8

Zvětšit mapu

And another greeting from Giovanni, this time from Umbria, from the town of Foligno, where the knight historical ring jousting tournament Giostra della Quintana has been held annually since 1946. This event has been commemorated in 2010 by a special postmark, used here together with a stamp of the Roman Odeon in Patras (Greece) taken from the booklet issued on 25 October 2009 on the occasion of "The Day of Europe" (Giornata dell'Europa). Grazie, Giovanni:)

Postcard from Italy no. 5

Hello again! After a summer pause, I am back...

... with this splendid postcard and stamp celebrating the victory of Inter Milan in the Serie A 2009-2010, issued on 24 June 2010. There are two special postmarks: the first "Giorno di emissione" (first day of issue) with a footballer reflecting the footballer in the stamp and the other one, cancelling definitives, of a philatelic counter in Milan. Thank you, Giovanni, for this great souvenir!

Cover from Italy no. 7

I am back after a hectic week or so, with another fantastic registered cover from Giovanni! With the set of two engraved stamps issued on 31 October 2008, in a series dedicated to the Italian UNESCO protected sites... in this case, it is Val d'Orcia (0.60 euro), Tuscan landscape modified in Renaissance times to reflect the ideals of good governance and celebrated by many painters of that period, and the historic centre of Urbino (2.80 euro) in the Marche region, a walled city, another Renaissance place of independent culture and education. I find this light blue Urbino stamp magnificent!

Grazie, Giovanni:-)