Ajman, an emirate in the Middle East that is part of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), issued its own stamps beginning in 1964. Very few stamps were made that year and in 1965 that are considered ‘official’ Ajman stamps.
However, there were hundreds of other stamps produced in Ajman from 1966 until 1972. These stamps are somewhat controversial among collectors, because the vast majority of them were never used for postage — they were issued especially for the international collectors’ market as a moneymaking venture.
These unofficial Ajman postage stamps came in two basic varieties — some from Manama (now a city in northern Ajman) and some inscribed Ajman State and Its Dependencies. Manama stamps include several unique gold foil stamps.
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All of Ajman agreed to form the United Arab Emirates in 1972, at which point the they used the new stamps of the UAE exclusively. However, original official Ajman stamps from 1964-1965, and the unofficial stamps that followed, are very popular in the collector marketplace. In the case of the unofficial issues, canceled covers are particularly valuable since so few of the stamps were actually used (or even allowed) for postage.
