See full images — free registration
Continue with Google — it's free or register with email

1 Peso Cédula de Tesorería; Provisional Issue

Issuer Tesorería General de la República de Colombia
Year 1919
Type Log in to see details
Value Log in to see details
Currency Log in to see details
Composition Log in to see details
Size Log in to see details
Shape Rectangular
Printer Log in to see details
Designer(s) Log in to see details
Engraver(s) Log in to see details
In circulation to Log in to see details
Reference(s) Log in to see details
Obverse description Black print on red guilloche underprint. A standing allegorical female figure occupies the left vignette, rendered in classical style. The centre bears the denomination and issuing authority inscription, with the bank name and portrait vignette deliberately obscured in this provisional issue.
Obverse lettering REPUBLICA DE COLOMBIA
PAGARÁ AL PORTADOR
1 UNO
UN PESO
ORO Ó SU EQUIVALENTE EN MONEDA LEGAL
BOGOTÁ, ABRIL 1º DE 1919
(Translation: Republic of Colombia
Will pay to the Bearer
One Peso
gold or its equivalent in legal tender
Bogotá, April 1st., 1919)
Reverse description Log in to see details
Reverse lettering Log in to see details
Signature(s) Log in to see details
Protection type Log in to see details
Protection description Log in to see details
Variants Log in to see details
Comments

Colombia's Tesorería General stepped in as issuer here because the Banco Nacional — the republic's main note-issuing institution — had been liquidated by law in 1894 following chronic over-issuance and the inflation crises of the 1880s and 1890s. Treasury notes of this type were a stopgap measure in an economy that would not establish its central bank, the Banco de la República, until 1923.

ABNC printed the series in New York on contract, as they did for a substantial portion of Latin American fiduciary paper in this period. The "provisional" designation in the title is not rhetorical — these cédulas were explicitly intended as a temporary instrument pending a more permanent monetary settlement that kept being deferred.