Central Lithuania 1921 – Poczobut Observatory
The first astro-stamp of the 20th century comes from Central Lithuania, a small
state with a short and troubled history. It consisted of an area in the
southeast part of Lithuania around the city of Vilnius which was seized by the
Poles in 1920 and given the name Central Lithuania (in Polish, Srodkowa Litwa).
It issued fewer than 50 recognized stamps in 1920–22 before being absorbed by Poland. The area eventually transferred back to
Lithuania in 1939.
This stamp from 1921 depicts Poczobut Observatory on top of the main Vilnius
University building. Founded in 1753, it was the fourth observatory in Europe
and the oldest in Eastern Europe (and was also the first observatory to appear
on a stamp). The observatory is named after Martin Poczobut (1728–1810) who became its director in 1764, serving for 44 years. His positional
measurements of Mercury were used by the French astronomer J.J. de Lalande to
compute that planet’s orbit. Poczobut is also of note for having invented the constellation
Poniatowski’s Bull, composed of stars in Ophiuchus and honouring King Stanislaus Poniatowski
of Poland. The constellation was not generally adopted, and has long since
vanished from maps of the sky. For a modern picture of the observatory, and
more about Poczobut, click
here.
The stamp comes in two versions, perforated and imperforate; the imperforate
stamps were evidently cut from a sheet by scissors, as in the example above.
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