In an incredibly short time since its origin a book had become a phenomenon of our civilization. It gave rise to the spirit of readership, intellectual demand for this "treasure of wisdom and knowledge," the need for collecting and cataloguing; it created the science called bibliology, along with several theoretical branches, and, above all, it engendered an unusual kind of love which is "a science, an art, social activity and individual passion," the name of which is bibliophily.
A postage stamp, thanks to which there appeared a new collector's passion called philately, had also acquired in a short time, since its introduction in the postal circulation, the rank of a special "piece of paper." Besides its utilitarian significance, it was "granted the honour" of being not only an object of collectors' desire but also an object of educational, therapeutic, and even relaxing meaning. This is why philately has become one of the most popular hobbies in the world.
A bibliophile sees a number of aesthetic features in a book: elegant type, clearly printed pages, beautiful vignettes, also on title pages, richly ornamented initials, artistic bindings, beautiful author's bookplate. A philatelist, interested in thematic philately, pays attention mainly to the outline of a stamp because this is the element which basically qualifies a given stamp for the collection. Bibliophiles are the persons who value most collector's items, cimelia, beautiful editions, and, first of all, rare prints valuable owing to their provenance, or binding, or other details. Philatelists also look for unique specimens, stamps of the highest quality, which have travelled a complex postal way, and this also means specimens ranking among rarities.
Therefore, there is something unusual about the fact that the attempts are being made at combining these two different collector's passions: bibliophily and philately, all the more so because few factors induce to combine them. This is not justified by "material" similarity - a book and a stamp are both created of paper - or technical similarity - they are both printed things. There are also differences resulting from the time of development of the foundations of collecting. History of bibliophily reaches back to ancient times, while philately came into existence in the second half of the 19th century. Moreover, postage stamps connected with books as a subject appeared as late as 1916.
In spite of this, both bibliophiles and philatelists, as befits the collectors can find points of contact and areas enabling them to co-operate creatively. Even if these are peripheral issues, collectors can prepare unique collections, which is fascinating by itself. In this particular instance it also testifies to a comprehensive influence of a book on contemporary people in times when the twilight of Gutenberg's era, or "graphosphere" as determined by some researchers, has been predicted.
One of the examples of a connection between bibliophily and philately is the creation of a collection of postage stamps and other philatelic material regarding books and their history. This collection, along with the process of acquiring it, I have named bibliophilately.