Depicts a camel postman image from the famous post stamp above dates in Gregorian (left) and Islamic year (right) in Arabic numerals.

Throughout the latter half of the 19th Century, Britain continued to develop their Empire, including Sudan. Sudan – the largest country in African became a colony of Britain in the late 19th Century.

One of the first tasks was to re-introduce a workable postal system that included postage stamps. Prior to the British losing control in 1884 the stamps were chiefly Egyptian and are collected for their Sudanese postmarks. Captain Edward Stanton whose job was to draw military maps was given the responsibility.

It was the arrival of the regimental mail by camel rather than the normal steamer that gave Stanton the idea for his iconic stamp design. He requested that a local tribesman dress in a war kit and ride the same camel around in front of him. Stanton also used two leather carriers as substitutes for mail bags which he filled with straw and inscribed on the outside the names of two towns Khartoum and Berber, even though both towns were actually still in enemy hands.

The first set was issued on 1 March 1898, by which time Berber had been captured, with Khartoum falling six months later. But the design simply went on and on and came to symbolise the country.

Sudan did not issue anything but ‘Camel postmen’ until 1931 when supplementary airmail stamps were issued, and the design did not finally lose its preeminence until a new pictorial set appeared in 1951.

Denomination between mirrored flower and cotton ornaments, country name above (Republic of the Sudan).