The Bombay Presidency's earliest coinage emerged from a factory settlement that the English East India Company had held for barely a decade — Bombay having been transferred from the Portuguese Crown to Charles II as part of Catherine of Braganza's dowry in 1661, then leased to the Company in 1668 for a nominal annual rent of £10. The "Copperoon" designation derives from the Portuguese cobre, reflecting the linguistic inheritance of a port town that had spent over a century under Lisbon's administration.
The Bombay Presidency's earliest coinage emerged from a factory settlement that the English East India Company had held for barely a decade — Bombay having been transferred from the Portuguese Crown to Charles II as part of Catherine of Braganza's dowry in 1661, then leased to the Company in 1668 for a nominal annual rent of £10. The "Copperoon" designation derives from the Portuguese cobre, reflecting the linguistic inheritance of a port town that had spent over a century under Lisbon's administration.