COVER N. 602 -  FRANCE

Postmark: Camille Flammarion 1842-1925  1er Jour  13 Marseille  06.06.2025

Received on the 27th June 2025

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"Flammarion?... of course I'm familiar with the name"... a publishing house, mostly because J'ai Lu editions were part of the Flammarion universe and these were not that expensive, so in the days when books were to be read in paper (I'm still largely in that era, anyway...) I did read quite a number of the French classics I had to go through at university, among others,  in the pocket book configuration proposed by the J'ai Lu collection.

"No, not the publishing house... The astronomer, Camille Flammarion..."

"No, I have to confess my ignorance. Never had I heard about him..."

"Ah but you're not that off the mark. Camille, the astronomer  became known by the general public due to the efforts of his brother, Ernest, who founded the publishing house that bears their family name to divulge his brother's works. Quite successfully, it seems, for Camille's  Astronomie Populaire, published in 1879 was a true best-seller, with 100,000 copies having been sold by 1900... quite a feat for the time".

Nicolas Camille Flammarion was born in 1842 and passed away in 1925, that is to say, a century ago.

(Now, writing this boggles, awes, surprises, discomforts me - I really can't find the right word -  somewhat.

 I remember the time when  a century to me was just a step before infinity... now I look back and write about last century, which was already 25 years ago, as if it was yesterday..... just to think that I've already lived well past half a century....

 Better forget my sudden mid-age crisis and get on with the text....)

Camille was quite an interesting fellow, for although being a mathematician and a astronomer, he would also be deeply interested in spiritism, something very fashionable in the late 19th century, while also theorising about extraterrestrial life and reincarnation and authoring some science-fiction works.

Celebrating the centenary (oh... that word again...) of Camille Flammarion's demise, La Poste issued an amazingly beautiful in-taglio printed stamp with a face value of 2,10 €, that I got on a First Day Cover - 06JUN2025 - courtesy of Eric. Un grand merci, Mon ami!

The stamp, designed and engraved by Louis Genty, features the effigy of Camille Flammarion with a section of a star map in the background, showing part of the Taurus and Leo (?) constellations.

The equally attractive first day postmark, issued at Marseille, was also conceived by the same artist and it shows Flammarion at work with a telescope.

As it is usual for the French postal services to show little respect for first day or commemorative covers, by doubly obliterating the stamps with a mechanical postmark on top of the celebratory one, Eric went through the trouble of sending me this cover inside  cover #601 (see the double obliteration there???), so that I could get it in all its glory. 

It would really be a shame to have such a beautiful piece of philatelic art spoiled by a totally unjustifiable double obliteration and I am really grateful to Eric for his care and attention.