Fourth Shore

To understand better the colonization of Libya, it’s worth knowing the marketing campaign to sell the idea to the public, which included the Tripoli Trade Shows (i.e., the second set of stamps on this page).

The King and Mussolini worked to expand Italy to include colonies and occupied territories in the vicinity of the peninsula, including lands across the seas that surrounded Italy. Mussolini coined the phrase, the Fourth Shore (Quarta Sponda in Italian) to describe their expansion into North East Africa, south of Italy.

Since Italy is primarily a long narrow peninsula, it has two significant coasts: the east coast along the Adriatic Sea, which Mussolini called the First Shore; and the west coast along the Tyrrhenian Sea, which he called the Second Shore. He referred to the lands on the other side of the Adriactic Sea, across from Italy, which included the Balkans as the Third Shore. The Fourth Shore was the African coast along the Mediterranean, such as Libya, and further inland as far as Ethiopia and Somalia.

Note

The last stamp on this page is an air mail stamp that commemorates the fifth Tripoli trade show. The set above it is are from the fourth trade show. I probably should have put this air mail stamp on the next page with the other stamps from the fifth trade show, but I was trying to fill in this page more and wanted to put it with the other two air mail stamps on this page. I’m not sure what’s better. I may redo these two pages one day.

Contains 10 spots: own 10 – 10 unused, 0 used.
Page is finished.
Album or Web Page Last changed Jul 11, 2025

Stamp Details

The table below lists information about the stamps shown on this page of Lighthouse’s stamp album. For more details about a particular stamp, click on its description. That will take you to the related web page of Colnect.

spot

own

catalog

subject

description

comment

Air Mail

1.1	✓	A1	Vittorio Emanuele III	50c (oct 1928) air mail, carmine
1.2	✓	A2	Vittorio Emanuele III	80c (jan 1929) air mail, lilac & red brown

Fourth Tripoli Trade Expo.

2.1	✓	87	Banana Tree	30c (feb 1930) comm., brownish
2.2	✓	88	Tobacco plant	50c (feb 1930) comm., violet
2.3	✓	89	Venus of Cyrene	1.25₤ (feb 1930) comm., blue
3.1	✓	90	Water Carriers	1.75+0.20₤ (feb 1930) semi-postal, red
3.2	✓	91	Blackbuck	2.55+0.45₤ (feb 1930) semi-postal, green
4.1	✓	92	Car and Camel Drivers	5+1₤ (feb 1930) semi-postal, orange
4.2	✓	93	Rome Pavilion at Fair	10+2₤ (feb 1930) semi-postal, dark lilac

Fifth Tripoli Trade Expo. - Air Mail

5.1

✓

A3

Biplane over Desert

50c (mar 1931)
air mail, blue

Footnotes

Spot refers to the postion of the stamp on the album page (e.g., 3.2 indicates row 3, position 2).
Amt. is an abbreviation for the face amount of the stamp.
Own indicates the stamp status: ✓ for unused; ✗ for used or canceled; ⭑ signifies I ordered one; ; ✨ indicates it was bought recently; ✠ means an auction bid is pending; and ◎ is used, and it costs too much for unused.
To search by catalog number, go to the search box and enter it in the catalog number box. However, it’s a bit broken; I need to fix it.