Phillumenism
Encyclopedia
Hobby
A hobby is a regular activity or interest that is undertaken for pleasure, typically done during one's leisure time.- Etymology :A hobby horse is a wooden or wickerwork toy made to be ridden just like a real horse...
of collecting
Collecting
The hobby of collecting includes seeking, locating, acquiring, organizing, cataloging, displaying, storing, and maintaining whatever items are of interest to the individual collector. Some collectors are generalists, accumulating merchandise, or stamps from all countries of the world...
different match
Match
A match is a tool for starting a fire under controlled conditions. A typical modern match is made of a small wooden stick or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by frictional heat generated by striking the match against a suitable surface...
-related items: matchboxes
Matchbox
A matchbox is a box made of cardboard or thin wood designed to hold matches. It usually has a coarse striking surface on one edge for lighting the matches contained inside....
, matchbox labels, matchbook
Matchbook
A matchbook is a small paperboard folder enclosing a quantity of matches and having a coarse striking surface on the exterior...
s, matchcovers, matchsafes, etc.
Etymology
The word, derived from phil- [loving] + Latin lumen- [light], was introduced by the British collector Marjorie S. Evans in 1943 (at that time president of the British Matchbox Label & Booklet Society). A person who engages in phillumeny is a phillumenist. These two forms have been adopted by many other languages, e.g., philuméniste, fillumenista, Filumenist and филуменист. For some time (from the mid 1940s into the 1950s) parallel to Phillumeny there was in use the term Phillumenism, which is now out of use.Phillumeny worldwide
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
a lot of match factories worked in close contact with local phillumenists, issuing special non-advertising sets. The hobby became especially widespread from the 1960s through the 1980s. Widespread introduction of bulky (for collectors) cardboard matchboxes with less distinct images on them, much poorer quality of print and, also some social phenomena, made this hobby (like many others, not connected with commerce) much less engaged.
Use of the Internet, allowing enthusiasts scattered around the world to collaborate, helps a new generation of phillumenists break through, more than doubling the numbers by 2000. For example, in 1998 there were only 7 sites dedicated to phillumeny, yet in 2007, there were nearly 100 of them, and increasing rapidly.
Phillumenists
In JapanJapan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, Teiichi Yoshizawa was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's top phillumenist. In Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
, Jose Manuel Pereira published a series of albums to catalog and display matchbox collections called "Phillalbum".
External links
- Phillumeny portal
- Virtual Matchbox Labels Museum
- British Matchbox Label and Booklet Society
- Phillumeny online
- Glossary of phillumeny
- The Home of Phillumeny
- Russian and soviet matchlabels
- Phillumeny on Flickr
- http://www.angelfire.com/planet/kingqualasworldmatch/kingqualasworldmatch/