1 Escudo

São Tomé and Príncipe remained a Portuguese overseas territory through the mid-twentieth century, and its coinage was struck in Lisbon under the Estado Novo regime — a colonial monetary arrangement that persisted until independence in 1975. The 1951 issue came during a period when Portugal was modernizing its overseas currency infrastructure while maintaining firm administrative control over its Atlantic island territories.

Copper-nickel replaced earlier bronze issues across several Portuguese colonial series during this postwar period, driven largely by wartime metal economics that had disrupted pre-existing alloy supplies throughout the empire.