Setting a new world record, a British Guiana one-cent black on magenta stamp, one of the world’s first postage stamps, has fetched $9.5 million at Sotheby’s auction here, the organisers said.
The previous auction record for a single stamp was set in 1996 by “Treskilling Yellow” – a Swedish stamp that is a misprint of an 1855 shilling stamp in the wrong colour. It was sold for $2.2 million.
“This is a truly great moment for the world of stamp collecting,” David Redden, Sotheby’s vice chairman, said in a statement.
“That price will be hard to beat, and likely won’t be exceeded unless the ‘British Guiana’ comes up for sale again in the future,” he added.
This rare stamp from 1856 was rediscovered by a 12-year-old Scottish boy who was living in the British Guiana (now Guyana) in 1873.
Since then, it has passed through the hands of several stamp collectors across the world.