Dunes (stamps)

Dunes in philately refers to the many editions of stamps produced in the Trucial States (today the United Arab Emirates or UAE).

An American philatelic entrepreneur, Finbar Kenny, saw the opportunity to create a number of editions of stamps aimed at the lucrative collector's market and in 1964 concluded a deal with the cash-strapped emirate of Ajman to take the franchise for the production of stamps for the government.

[4] These stamps, luridly illustrated [5] and irrelevant to the actual emirates they came from (editions included "Space Research" and "Tokyo Olympic Games", with two odd editions issued from Umm Al Qawain including "British Kings and Queens" and, with summer temperatures in Umm Al Qawain reaching 50 °C, "Winter Olympics"), became known collectively as "dunes".

[1] The sale of postage stamps was for a short time a lucrative trade for the emirates, most of whom (with the exception of Abu Dhabi, which struck oil in 1965) had few other sources of revenue.

[8] Few collectors would realise Manama was a remote agricultural village consisting of a few adobe houses on a plain overlooked by the Hajar Mountains.