Great Britain's Fabulous Millennium Series Postage Stamps

The postal administrations of many countries issued postage stamps in connection with the advent of the new millennium (the turnover from 1999 to 2000). We've already discussed America's popular Celebrate the Century series of 150 different stamps and the challenge that collecting postally used copies of these stamps pose.

Here's another very popular set of stamps that isn't quite as difficult to complete as the Celebrate the Century stamps, but were issued at roughly the same time: the Millennium Stamps of Great Britain. There are a total of 100 different stamps in this series, all of which were issued during 1999-2001. Like all GB stamps, they are beautifully designed and beautifully printed.

Collecting all of these stamps as postally used stamps can be challenging, but despite their large number (1oo altogether), used stamps from this stamp series aren't quite as difficult to find as the US Celebrate the Century stamps. There are a couple of reasons for this.

1. The United Kingdom only issued two other commemorative stamps during the entire 2 year and one month "Millennium Stamp period," so any Brit wishing to use commemorative stamps for mailings during that time was almost forced to use a Millennium stamp.
2. There are 50 fewer stamps to have to collect in order to complete the entire set.

Now that we've told you that these stamps can be challenging to collect as a postally used stamp set, here's a bit of information about them.

The 1999 British Millennium Stamps:

In 1999 Royal Mail issued a series of stamps that were grouped into 12 different sets of four (known as "tales"), including Entertainment, Science & Technology and Sport. One group of four stamps was released during each month of the year, for a total of 48 stamps that year.

The set that was issued in September 1999 was called The Farmers’ Tale, and contained a 19p stamp that doubled as Royal Mail’s contribution to that year’s Europa postage stamp issue - another popular thematic stamp topic with collectors - but we'll discuss Europas another day.

One of the most notable stamps in the British millennium collection was a stamp commemorating the life of the lead singer of the British rock group Queen, Freddie Mercury. The issuance of this particular stamp caused some controversy because Roger Taylor (who was still alive) was in the background at the drums. Normally the only living people allowed to appear on British stamps are members of the British Royal Family (which Roger Taylor is not).

Other stamps in the 1999 stamps featured English football hero Bobby Moore; a picture of the structure of DNA; and a fossil of Archaeopteryx, the first known bird.

The 2000 British Millennium Stamps:

These stamps commemorated a variety of projects throughout the UK which had received funding from the Millennium Commission. As in 1999, the stamps were released in 12 monthly sets of 4 stamps each, for a total of 48 stamps.

The stamps featured such projects as the Eden Project, the Tate Modern art gallery, the National Space Centre and the Scottish Seabird Centre.

The 2001 British Millennium Stamps:

These four stamps featured painted faces of children. They were the only British Millennium stamps issued in 2001, and they brought this beautiful stamp series to an end.

100 beautiful, colorful commemorative stamps. Remember that although postally used stamps can be tough to find, they are also extremely rewarding when you're successful.