In philately

Philately

Philately is the study of stamps and postal history and other related items. Philately involves more than just stamp collecting, which does not necessarily involve the study of stamps. It is possible to be a philatelist without owning any stamps...

, a mint stamp is a stamp which is in its original state of issue, is unused, has never been mounted and has full gum, if issued with gum. The term applies equally to postage stamps and revenue stamp

Revenue stamp

A revenue stamp, tax stamp or fiscal stamp is a adhesive label used to collect taxes or fees on documents, tobacco, alcoholic drinks, drugs and medicines, playing cards, hunting licenses, firearm registration, and many other things...

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Variations

Variations of the term mint include:

• Mint hinged (MH) - the stamp is unused but has been previously hinged. Remains of the hinge or gum disturbance are visible.
• Mounted mint (MM) - the same as Mint hinged.
• Mint no gum (MNG) - the stamp appears to be unused but has no gum. It might have been used but not cancelled, or have been issued without gum.
• Unmounted mint (UM) - the stamp is unused and has never been mounted.
• Mint never hinged (MNH) - the same as unmounted mint but with an assertion that the stamp is not a formerly mounted stamp that has been tampered with to remove traces of mounting.

The hinging referred to in these terms is mounting of the stamp in a stamp album

Stamp album

A stamp album is a book, often loose-leafed , in which a collection of postage stamps may be stored and displayed.- Overview :...

 by the application of a stamp hinge

Stamp hinge

In philately stamp hinges or mounts are small, folded, transparent, rectangular pieces of paper coated with a mild gum. They are used by stamp collectors to affix postage stamps onto the pages of a stamp album.- Use :...

 to the back of the stamp. The highest grade is unmounted mint or mint never hinged. The term mint never hinged has developed to provide reassurance to buyers that the stamp has not been tampered with to remove traces of mounting, as the term unmounted mint was thought to be ambiguous. Strictly speaking, however, both UM and MNH have the same meaning.

Value

Mint stamps are often more valuable than used stamps as in many cases fewer mint stamps survive. A mint stamp may also be in better condition than a used stamp which has passed through the mail. Sometimes, however, used stamps may be more valuable than mint ones where higher numbers of mint stamps have survived, perhaps because large numbers of mint stamps were bought by collectors but few used on letters.

Tampering

Differences between mint and used values for the same stamp has led to a small industry in removing, or adding, postal cancellations to stamps. Another common practice is to attempt to remove fiscal cancellations, which are often pen cancels, in order to change a stamp used fiscally (for tax purposes) to one apparently unused. Stamps available for both postage and revenue (fiscal) purposes are usually worth more unused or with a postal cancellation.