Revenue stamps aren't technically postal stamps. They are markings which governments and sub-national agencies put on products and documents to collect tariffs. Revenue stamps existed long before the introduction of the universal postage stamp. Indeed, one of the major rifts between the English government and the American colonies came about thanks to a dispute over revenue stamps.

The British Stamp Act taxed colonial goods and sent the collected revenues home to the Crown. The American colonists did not approve of such ''taxation without representation,'' and the reviled Stamp Act became a major bone of contention. Revenue stamps actually became more popular during the 19th-century, when governments and internal organizations sought to develop more efficient methods for tracking goods and services produced by the Industrial Revolution.

The presence of a revenue stamp on an object indicated that taxes for that object had been paid. Thus, there are no ''cancellations'' of revenue stamps. That being said, some governmental entities instituted hybrid postal and revenue stamps. These worked double duty as mailers and tax payment receipts. One of the more artistically interesting postal stamps from the 19th century is the U.S. Battleship revenue stamp, which was printed in 1898.

During the last quarter of the 20th-century, revenue stamps began to fall out of vogue. Computerized tracking systems and other advanced methods of keeping track of tax revenues took the place of revenue stamp posting. Some philatelists now collect the computerized successors to revenue stamps in hopes that these new pieces will be ''the next big thing.''