Although I think it is irrelevant, just for you, I took an exacto knife and pried up (and broke) some inlays. The Arab chip inlay is like most others I have seen. It is very brittle and has a linen-finish underneath so it will stay "glued" into the chip. The surface is very slick (protective). I rubbed my fingernail over it some 50 times quite hard. It made no impression on the coloring. Thus, the surface could not be just untreated, unprotected paper. The fact that many Arab chips are quite nice on one side and unbelievably "washed out" on the reverse (some are totally white on the reverse) leads me to believe this could not occur from gambling use, but from either a manufacturing defect or deliberate abuse (maybe a vain attempt to clean them)...............Admittedly, they are not as well made as many other Crest and Seal chips. So what?...........And I will look into this, but I don't think a litho inlay poker chip could be made if the outer surface was pure unlaminated paper. I feel the manufacturing process (heat, pressure) would have destroyed the inlay. We should look into that.

I read over my post, and I like it even better now than before. I said, "The best advice is to call things (1) what most collectors are calling them already, and (2) what will not be confusing to collectors; one shouldn't need to be a scientist or a chemist to describe chips. Therefore, I DEFINE A CREST AND SEAL CHIP as (a) a clay chip with (b) a flat/plain mold and (c) a litho inlay."

I never worried what "crest and seal" originally meant. As Seymour says, it was often used as an advertising slogan. Sometimes they said "Crest OR Seal." "Seal" could mean the same as "crest" as in "seal of approval." "seal of good housekeeping," etc. If we think of seal as you like to, it could just mean "sealed in place." it needn't have an elaborate, thick, almost separate all encompassing seal over the chip. ........Anyway, as I said before, I could feel the point of contact of inlay and clay on the CCDM chip, which everyone says is a Crest and Seal chip.

These poker chips, including Crest and Seal chips, have been made for over 50 years. You can't expect all to be the same. You showed a picture of a litho inlay Crescent and Star chip that you say has an unprotected paper inlay. Well, I have one that has the thickest clear layer (celluloid layer?) over an inlay that I have ever seen. You could scratch it forever and do no damage! It is pictured below.

You say, "If it means that there originally was a relatively thick celluloid layer, then I would agree that it is a crest and seal as we
popularly know a crest and seal to be." You just said "relatively thick celluloid layer." The only ad I recall now that explains the way the inlay is formed --the Burt ad on page 31 of Seymour's book-- says the ".....private mark is printed on white opaque material and laminated with a thin layer of transparent material. This protects the printing from wear." You say "thick," and Burt says "thin." My point is that these things can be made in different ways.

Robert