The Stamp Issuers: Alaouites

Alaouites / Alawites State

LOCATION: A district of Syria, bordering on the Mediterranean Sea
GOVERNMENT: Under French mandate
POPULATION: 278,000 (est. 1930)
AREA: 2,500 square miles
CAPITAL: Latakia

FIRST STAMPS ISSUED: 1 January 1925
LAST STAMPS ISSUED: 1930

CURRENCY:
100 centimes = 1 piaster

The Alawite State, listed in most stamp catalogues under the French name Alaouites, was a region in western Syria bordering on the Mediterranean Sea. It was part of the Ottoman Empire at the start of the twentieth century but was occupied by France at the close of World War I. Growing anti-French sentiment in the region led to the establishment of the Arab Kingdom of Syria on 7 March 1920. The League of Nations issued a mandate on 5 May 1920 for France to govern the area of Syria and Lebanon. France divided the area of its mandate into territories and the Territory of the Alawites was formed on 2 September 1920. The coastal city of Latakia was the administrative capital. At the end of 1924, the territory became an independent state while still administered by France under mandate.

The first stamps issued for Alaouites were overprinted French stamps and were available in Latakia from the first of January 1925. This initial regular issue included twenty-one definitive stamps, four for airmail, and five French surcharged stamps intended for postage due. All included an overprint of the denomination and state name in both French and Arabic. Beginning in March 1925, Syrian stamps were overprinted for use in Alaouites. There were a total of twenty-five regular issue Syrian overprinted stamps released between 1925 and 1928 as well as thirteen intended for airmail and five for postage due.

The total count, then, for Alaouites stamps is forty-six general issue, seventeen airmail and ten postage due stamps.  Because every issue is  an overprint, almost every stamp issued has variations of the overprint. Some have multiple copies of the overprint, but the most common variation is the inverted overprint.  Most of the stamps are reasonably priced with only ten cataloguing at US $10 and above.  The most expensive is Scott #49, 4p on 25c olive black issued in 1928 and valued at US $75 mint and $50 used.  Collecting doubled impressions or different colored overprint variations is much more expensive.

In 1930, the Alawite State was renamed the Government of Latakia and Syrian stamps overprinted with “Lattaquie” were released the following year.

To date, I only own one stamp from Alaouites, but it’s a beauty – Scott #C17, 50 centimes yellow green with red overprints, perforated 13½.  In June and July 1929, the Alawite State released three airmail stamps, applying an additional overprint of an airplane on previously overprinted stamps in either red or black. The 50 centime value, with its initial overprint of country name in French and Arabic on the Syrian yellow-green type A4, was originally released on 1 March 1925. The view pictured is the harbor area of Alexandretta, to the north of Alaouites.  The Scott catalogues lists three varieties for this stamp with minor numbers: #C17a features a doubling of the airplane overprint; #C17b has the airplane overprint on both the front and back of the stamp; and #C17c is a listing for a pair of stamps with the airplane overprint tête bêche, a philatelic term from the French for “head-to-tail” describing a joined pair of stamps in which one is upside-down in relation to the other.