This is an interesting topic to say the least. of which i had no idea there was an actual term for until today upon reading Jubilee's great blog article "Marcophily - The Study of Postmarks - Part 2"

so after reading this great piece (and it is WORTH YOUR TIME TO READ!!!!) i did a cursory Google search and got this

from Wikipedia:

Quote:

Marcophily, occasionally called Marcophilately, is the specialised study and collection of postmarks, cancellations and postal markings applied by hand or machine on mail that passes through a postal system and applied by the postal operator through whose domain they pass. Commatology was a term used prior to World War II but is rarely used today.[1] Marcopholists are more interested in the details, style and design of the markings than the reason why and where a letter was sent. Large cities that have many post offices offer great study opportunities due to the vast range of handstamps or machine cancellations in use over any time period. It offers vast study areas to select a topic from for study or collection. While strictly speaking it is not a postal history topic it can be collected and studied as such.

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so as normal my interest is peeked so tell me MORE. and please share your experience if you participate in this study of postmarks,

Macrophilly sounds almost illegal!

Linn's Magazine has a section I think it's called "Postmark Pursuit" and one could build a pretty neat collection of cancels in no time using just the Linn's article to gather postmarks.