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The picture on this postcard shows a black and white photograph of Raphael's famous painting of The School Of Athens found in the Vatican Museum. At the time Raphael painted it, the room was the Pope's library. The room was used to house books on philosophy, theology, law, and literature. 
This postcard is from Aunt Fridy to her nephew Rico in Bern, Switzerland. She sends him and his family greetings and notes that the card includes some Vatican stamps for his collection. The postcard has four different stamps from the 1933 Vatican Garden and Medallions series: 5c - Arms of Pope Pius XI 10c- Apostolic Palace & Obelisk 20c- Apostolic Palace & Obelisk 30c- Vatican Gardens & Dome of St Peter's The postcard has several postmarks, none of which are very clear. However, with a little study and a magnifying glass, one can determine the features of these markings. Each has an outer circle diameter of 29mm. Measuring the distance between the inner and outer circle gets to be a little tricky because of the smudginess of all of the postmarks, probably caused by the pressure force used when applying the cancelations. The distance between the inner and outer circles is probably 6 mm. This would give a calculated inner circle diameter of 17mm. Unfortunately, all of the postmarks on this postcard are not clear enough to measure the diameter of the inner circle diameter. So, we will have to be satisfied with a calculated measurement. The postmarks appear to have 7 vertical lines with two corners in both the upper and lower moons. The postmark date line is in the format of 13.10.33 19 (dd.mm.yy hh), which would give the cancellation date of October 13th, 1933 around 19:00 (or 7 pm). Within the spacing of the inner and outer circles is the traditional wording CITTA' DEL VATICANO on top and POSTE on the bottom, separated by two six-pointed stars. 
Armed with all of the information above, one can then study of chart of everyday Vatican cancelations (found on the VPS website at https://vaticanstamps.org/cancels/everyday.php) and try to find an identification type match. Over the years Vatican Notes has published a lot of information about Vatican postmarks. Most of the postmark information published in Vatican Notes paralleled information done by a group of Vatican stamp collectors known as the German Study Group. Reviewing the cancellation information for the postmarks on this postcard they seem to match type I-9. A cleaner postmark would probably be required to narrow this down to the true exact type. 
Type I-9 Postmark
Looking at the postmarks found in your Vatican stamp collection can be a lot of fun. Hopefully, some of the information that can be found on the Vatican Philatelic Society website can help you do this. Reference • Antonio Paolucci, Raphael's Rooms, General Guide To The Vatican City, Jaca Books, copyright 2012 |
