Ref: DR20576
- £75.00
Ceylon. 1885. Ceylon postal stationery envelope 'Five cents on four cents' grey/ blue cancelled by '58' numeral with adjacent Bogawantalawa/ Paid date stamp 'Jy 24 85' addressed to Slave Island, Colombo with Slave Island/ Paid and Colombo arrival on reverse.
In the eighteenth century the Dutch East India Company housed its enslaved people on the island. The name was coined during the period of British Colonial rural and was a reverence to the usage of the island under Portuguese rule as a holding area for African slaves.
