Catalog
1.000 Livres Turques
| Issuer | Dette Publique Ottomane |
|---|---|
| Year | 1918 |
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| Value | 1.000 Livres Turques |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | The reverse is printed entirely in olive-green on white paper, with a geometric guilloche border composed of interlocking rosette and lattice motifs at the corners and sides. A large central oval panel contains multiple lines of Ottoman Turkish text in Arabic script setting out the note's legal and redemption conditions. The denomination 1000 appears in numerals at the top and bottom of the central field, with a circular cartouche bearing Arabic script text at the right margin. |
| Reverse lettering | ١٠٠٠ 1000 LIVRES TURQUES |
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| Comments |
The Dette Publique Ottomane — the Ottoman Public Debt Administration — was a European-controlled body established in 1881 after the Sublime Porte defaulted on its foreign borrowings. By 1918 the empire was in its death throes, fighting on multiple fronts, and these high-denomination notes were issued under conditions of acute fiscal stress. That the debt administration rather than the Imperial Ottoman Bank served as issuer reflects the degree to which the empire's finances had been effectively colonized by its creditors decades earlier.
The 1918 series is known for ink adhesion problems on the cotton substrate, causing surface transfer in stacked storage — a condition issue specific to this emission that affects a notable proportion of surviving examples.