“It wouldn't be so much as the paper slipping, as the whole sheet would be doubled up. Nor just a part of the sheet as it would be creased where there was doubling.

It also would not be due to the accidental touching of the just printed sheet to the plate again, since the act of printing (under quite a lot of pressure) in the first place would have removed most of the ink from the plate. There was no ink in the design left to create a double.

I think these prints were due to the still wet edge of the sheet being dragged along a surface, possibly the blank edge of the plate. Maybe the blotting paper.

They should perhaps be called a drag print.”

Brian Perrett added:

“This is alternatively known to me as a pulled impression: where the wet sheet of paper wasn't placed flat to the plate, so that as pressure is applied the the paper settles to its final position. The initial 'kiss' produces the halo just as pressure starts to be applied, the main shot of ink is released from the engraved channel just after the release of maximum pressure.”

It hadn't occurred to me that it could have occurred before printing but Brian could be right. But this raises more questions. My copy of ‘Fundamentals of Philately’ (1971) by the Williams brothers describes a kiss print as “a variety exhibiting linear duplication in the design caused by the paper flapping against the inked printing base either before or after impression” (p.124). It also refers to a Slurred Print where “duplication [is] caused by the paper cockling, flapping or moving during the actual printing” (p.132).

So how does this all specifically apply to line engraved printing? We don’t know, but we can surmise. Let’s work through the stages of printing a sheet.

First job would be to ink the plate and then wipe it to make sure that the ink reached all parts of the plate as evenly as possible. The ink used was a thick paste, and was applied to a warm/hot plate, there being a gas burner below the printing bed. This helped to start the ink drying process so that the ink was already tacky when the paper was applied.

The paper used was hand made and damp. I always envisaged the handling of this paper as being somewhat akin to laying a thin pastry top onto a pie. The paper would tend to drape itself over the plate. The printer would have to get the lining up of the paper right the first time, as once it was on the plate that was where the print would be. Being twice as long as it was wide, the best place to stand to position the paper would be at the side of the press so that the printer could position the paper lengthways against the far edge of the plate and then gently let the paper drape over the plate. At the very start of this process, it is conceivable that the paper could slip on the surface of the plate until gravity and the friction of the tacky ink grabbed. A kiss print could result from this initial slip.

The nature of this type of line engraved printing using damp paper on tacky ink would to my mind inhibit any cockling or moving of the paper once it was in position. It is possible, especially with a faulty sheet of paper, but would probably lead to the wastage of half or the whole sheet. Another printing method using a thin, dry paper would be much more open to this sort of slurred print.

Once the paper and plate had been under the roller of the press, the printer would leave the press in order to place a sheet of blotting paper over the previous sheet printed. This means that the previous sheet would have had a couple of minutes to air dry and form a skin over the tacky ink, hopefully just about touch dry. He would then peel the new sheet from the plate, almost certainly from the side of the press. It is at this point that a printer could just catch the edge of the freshly printed sheet on the plates surface or another surface before he drapes it face up on the blotting paper topping the stack of printed sheets. This is the second point at which a kiss print would form.

I have to stress that this is no more than supposition, but if anyone has an alternative explanation I would be more than happy to hear it.

AP

February 2021