Ankh-Morpork Postal System

The Ankh-Morpork Postal System is currently run from the Ankh-Morpork Post Office. Recently revived by Postmaster Moist von Lipwig, with the help of Stamps and a good deal of gall.

Stamps

Stamps are avalible in various denominations. As the cost rises, so does the sending ability of the stamps. Distance and difficulty of reaching the address indicated on the letter also increase the denomination of the needed stamp. For example, a 1p stamp will send a letter anywhere in the city. Sending a letter to The Shades increases the required denomination to 5p, because of the armed guard.

Denominations

• Half Penny - Ankh-Morpork Post Office building
• One Penny - likeness of Lord Vetinari
• Two Pence - city coat-of-arms
• Five Pence - Morporkia with her Fork
• Ten Pence - Morporkia with her Fork
• 50p - A salute to the cabbage industry of the Sto Plains

• One Dollar - Tower of Art (rectangle)

• Five Dollars - Brass Bridge (triangle)

Flavoured stamp glue

Flavours include licorice, orange cinnamon and banana.

Cabbage-flavoured glue was briefly available but was swiftly withdrawn after a number of 'incidents' (but no one actually died).

Mistakes

Many mistakes have crept (or been introduced) into the various print runs of stamps.

For example, the Second Issue 50p stamp, known as the "Lovers", shows what appears to show a man and a woman sowing seeds in a field. Closer inspection shows them to be *ahem* sowing an altogether different kind of seed.

Annotation, or at least a puzzling anachronism

(Copied from Nanny Ogg's Cookbook)

On page 140, there is a short entry on The Significance of Stamps, in which Nanny Ogg discusses the hidden language connected with where, exactly, the stamp is placed on the envelope (if top-right, "the answer to your question is "yes""; if top left, "don't waste your time, boy": if dead-centre, "you've stamped it right over the address so it ends up going to the wrong house", et c). Nanny tells us that this goes back a long way.

Yet on the Disc, stamps as we know them are the fairly recent invention of Moist von Lipwig and Stanley Howler? Unless Lancre has been using stamps on its mail for a long time, which is highly unlikely, how can this be explained? (Although, prior to the stick-on stamps, ink stamps were used, which would work to the same effect.)

(Or could Nanny, inspired by seeing an Ankh-Morpork stamp, just have made it all up - well, all time-honoured traditions have to begin somewhere - to fill in space and meet a publishers' deadline?)