This publication provides a census of Squared Circle postmarks on the Canadian 2¢ Imperial Penny Postage Issue of 1898, the “Map stamp”, including strikes on off-cover Map stamps as well as covers franked with the Map stamp. This is the second edition of the census. The first edition consisted of separate publications for on-cover and off-cover Map stamps. The two publications were posted on the BNAPS website in 2020.

The Map stamp was issued in early December 1898 and used primarily in the 14-month period to the end of January 1900. In one study, 98% of used Map stamps were found to be from this period. Squared Circle hammers were issued starting in 1893, but by the time the Map stamp was available to prepay postage in December 1898, approximately 1/3 of the 313 towns/RPOs that had been issued these hammers (some of these towns/RPOs had multiple hammers or states) had stopped using them in favour of alternative postmarking implements. Thus, the short period of time in which the use of Squared Circle hammers overlapped with the use of the Map stamp has contributed to a relative scarcity of Squared Circle postmarked Map stamps and covers compared to, for example, Squared Circle postmarked 3¢ Small Queen stamps and covers. Currently, Squared Circle postmarks from 206 different hammers have been documented on Map stamps and/or covers.

For off-cover Map stamps, the census lists strikes from 197 different hammers. For 88 of them, there are less than ten off-cover Map stamp strikes. For on-cover Map stamps, the census lists 1,272 covers (113 more than in the 2020 census) from 164 hammers.

(Extracted from the Introduction)

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