Catalog
1 Peso Banco Nacional de Chile
| Issuer | Banco Nacional de Chile |
|---|---|
| Year | 1886 |
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| Value | Log in to see details |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Reference(s) | P#S331 |
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|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Printed in brown, the reverse centres on a finely engraved oval portrait vignette of Pedro de Valdivia enclosed within lathe-work guilloche surrounds, with the bank title inscription arcing around the oval. Symmetrical ornamental panels of interlocking geometric and floral guilloche fill the flanking fields, and numeral counter vignettes appear at left and right. The composition is executed in the high-quality intaglio manner characteristic of American Bank Note Company output. |
| Reverse lettering | EL BANCO NACIONAL DE CHILE (Translation: The National Bank of Chile) |
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| Comments |
The Banco Nacional de Chile was one of several private commercial banks operating under Chile's 1860 banking law, which permitted note issuance against specie reserves. By 1886 that system was already under strain — Chile had suspended convertibility in 1878 to finance the War of the Pacific, and private bank notes were circulating alongside inconvertible fiscal paper in a badly distorted monetary environment.
The American Bank Note Company held the printing contract for multiple Chilean private banks simultaneously during this period, which occasionally creates attribution confusion between otherwise similar series.