10 Cents

The earliest paper money issued in Sarawak, this note predates the formal Brooke Raj banking infrastructure by decades. James Brooke had become Rajah in 1841, but the government treasury only moved to issue fractional paper currency in 1862 — likely driven by a chronic shortage of small copper coin in the bazaars of Kuching.

These are among the rarest surviving pieces of Bornean paper currency. The print run was small, the climate was hostile to paper, and Sarawak remained an extraordinarily remote administration throughout the 1860s. Fewer than a handful of authenticated examples are known to collectors.