Catalog
1/2 Livre Turque
| Issuer | Dette Publique Ottomane |
|---|---|
| Year | 1916 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | ½ Livre Turque |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | دولت عثمانية ٢٢ كانون ثاني ١٣٣١ SÉRIE C No 443701 |
| Reverse description | The reverse is printed in a very pale rose-red, essentially appearing as a near-blank sheet through which the obverse design shows as a faint mirror image. The upper portion retains a ghost impression of the tughra and Arabic heading, while residual guilloche patterns and text panels are barely discernible, consistent with the single-sided printing convention used for this emergency wartime issue. |
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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 loans. That a debt-management organ rather than the Ottoman Bank issued wartime currency in 1916 reflects how thoroughly external creditors had penetrated Ottoman fiscal infrastructure. With the empire's finances under severe strain from the Gallipoli campaign and the broader Sinai-Palestine theater, these fractional notes plugged a gap left by the disappearance of coin from circulation.
The half-livre denomination was a practical response to hoarding — silver had vanished almost entirely from Ottoman markets by mid-war.