1932 Health
|
|
Cat. |
Mint Unhinged |
Mint Hinged |
Fine Used |
1d |
Hygeia / Hygieia |
45a |
$108.00 |
|
$45.00 |
|
$45.00 |
|
|
|
|
First Day Cover - 18 November 1932 |
45b |
|
|
|
|
$540.00 |
|
|
… 1d (45a) |
The 1932 Health stamp shows the symbolic figure of Hygieia,
the Greek goddess of health, cleanliness and sanitation. While her father,
Asclepius, was more directly associated with healing, Hygieia was
associated with the prevention of sickness and the continuation of good
health (the word 'hygiene' is derived from her
name).
Hygieia is often depicted as a young woman feeding a large
snake that is wrapped around her body from a jar that she carries. On the
stamp, Hygieia is reclining on a pedestal holding a goblet high against the
rays of either the rising or setting sun and the serpent is going
hungry.
Unfortunately, all this classical mythology was lost on a
writer in the Australian Stamp Monthly who suggested that the stamp
depicted a scantily dressed young woman greeting the morning sun with an
upraised goblet having been engaged in an all-night hedonistic drinking
orgy - so potent that given there are no snakes in New Zealand, she had
started to hallucinate about them. The stamp, he noted, is appropriately
coloured a rich wine red!
This health stamp was the first to
attribute the surcharge to 'health' rather than 'charity' -
a more accurate term given that the funds were being used to establish and
maintain summer camps for children suffering from malnutrition and low
stamina.
The first two sheets printed were presented to the then
Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, on an official visit to the Otaki Health
Camp.
Bibliography
The Postage Stamps of New Zealand (Volume I)
Edited by R. J. G. Collins and H. T. M. Fathers B.A. B.Sc.
Published 1938 by The Philatelic Society of New Zealand Incorporated
The Postage Stamps of New Zealand Volume II
Edited by R. J. G. Collins FRPSNZ and C. W. Watts FRPSNZ
Published 1950 by The Royal Philatelic Society of New Zealand Incorporated
The Postage Stamps of New Zealand Volume IV
Edited by R. J. G. Collins FRPSNZ and C.W. Watts FRPSNZ
Published 1960 by The Royal Philatelic Society of New Zealand Incorporated
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