Catalog
1 Pound
| Issuer | Standard Bank of British South Africa Limited |
|---|---|
| Year | 1864 |
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| Currency | Pound sterling (1694-date) |
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| Obverse description | Single-sided intaglio-printed note in black on cream paper. Upper left bears the serial number 'Nº 4051' alongside an ornate vignette of a seated classical figure with a flag and a lion in a landscape setting. The bank title 'The Standard Bank of British South Africa Limited' is set in elaborate gothic and script lettering across the upper portion, with the denomination 'ONE' appearing in an oval cartouche at the upper right and in a rectangular panel at lower left. A manuscript promise text reads 'Promise to pay the Bearer on Demand at their Office at Fauresmith: One Pound, Value rec.' followed by a handwritten date of 2nd March 1864, the serial number repeated, and the legend 'By order of the Board of Directors' above two manuscript signatures. |
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| Obverse lettering | Nº 4051 The Standard Bank of British South Africa Limited ONE Promise to pay the Bearer on Demand at their Office at Fauresmith: ONE POUND Value rec. 2d March 1864 Nº 4051 By order of the Board of Directors |
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The Standard Bank of British South Africa received its royal charter in 1862 and opened its first South African branch in Port Elizabeth in 1863 — making this 1864 note among the earliest issues the bank ever produced. The institution was incorporated in London and operated under British banking law, which shaped both its note designs and its conservative reserve practices from the outset.
Pick S116A is genuinely rare. Nineteenth-century South African chartered bank notes from the early 1860s had high attrition rates: the climate was brutal on paper, banking crises and branch closures meant many notes were called in and destroyed, and surviving specimens rarely passed through more than a handful of hands before disappearing into archives or private collections.
The Standard Bank eventually absorbed numerous competitors and became one of the dominant financial institutions across southern Africa — but in 1864, it was barely two years old.