1 Mil Réis Thesouro Nacional, 12th. Print

The "12th Print" designation reflects Casa da Moeda's practice of issuing successive runs under the same authorizing legislation rather than designing new notes — a fiscal convenience that kept printing costs down during the chronic budget pressures of Brazil's First Republic. By 1921, the Thesouro Nacional series had been circulating in essentially this form for years, wearing heavily in the hands of a population for whom the mil réis was everyday small change.

Casa da Moeda's domestic production meant the entire lifecycle — plate, press, distribution, destruction — stayed in Rio de Janeiro, unusual for a Latin American issuer of this period still dependent on European printers for prestige denominations.