Provisional Postal Markings

	Provisional stamps and postal markings are usually a temporary measure, used either as a substitute for a regular issue or to indicate that additional postage (i.e., a surcharge) has been paid. During the early years of Ukraine's independence, there were several reasons why this was necessary:
	Rising inflation during these changing times made it hard to fix postal rates. Many old pre-stamped envelopes were still in use, and these now needed addditional postage. Regular mint stamps of the newly independent Ukraine were in short supply.
	As they had once done in the past, postal authorities overprinted soviet stamps with the national trident symbol and a new value. Other surcharges included those that were hand-written onto an envelope, various ink stamps, and those that were printed to look like postage stamps, cut from strips and glued onto envelopes. Different postal districts came up with different markings. As a result, an interesting and wide variety of provisional stamps and postal markings appeared during the first four years of indepentent Ukraine's postal history.