Backstamp 1371623 203003443 2008-04-03T08:45:04Z Beetstra 855858 Reverted edits by [[Special:Contributions/81.6.250.43|81.6.250.43]] ([[User talk:81.6.250.43|talk]]) to last version by 24.125.118.162 [[Image:Cover Canada 1932 Rae air back.jpg|right|300px|thumb|This reverse of a 1932 cover sent from [[Rae]] in the [[Northwest Territories]] to [[Toms River, New Jersey]] has a Toms River backstamp.]] A '''backstamp''', in [[philately]], is a [[postmark]] on the back of a [[cover (philately)|cover]] (almost invariably an envelope), showing a post office or station through which the cover passed in transit. The office of delivery may also backstamp a cover and this type of mark is also known as a '''receiving mark'''. Backstamps or receiving marks are sometimes, for convenience or due to local postal regulations, applied to the front of a cover. Backstamps are often applied as documentation of transit times, lengthy ones in the case of ocean crossings or short ones in the case of [[Airmail|airmail]] flights. [[Registered mail]] is often backstamped in order to show the [[chain of custody]]. Mail that has had complex routings can have a dozen or more backstamps; although such covers may look positively blackened with the overlapping marks, they are not common, and highly valued by collectors of [[postal history]] and are described as ''"well travelled"''. [[Category:Philatelic terminology]] [[Category:Postal markings]] [[Category:Postal system]] {{philately-stub}}