Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
10 Francs
| Issuer | Banque de la Réunion |
|---|---|
| Year | 1873 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 10 Francs |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| 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 | Monochrome green note with an ornate letterpress border of foliate scrollwork. The denomination DIX FRANCS is displayed in large bold letters at centre, above a clause stating payment on presentation of a group of five notes. Two allegorical seated figures flank a central vignette of a reclining female figure; the text BANQUE DE LA RÉUNION appears vertically along the left margin. Date arrêté is printed as 12 Septembre 1873 at lower right, with dual signature lines for Le Directeur and Le Caissier. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | BANQUE DE LA RÉUNION Il sera payé en espèces, à vue, au porteur DIX FRANCS Sur présentation d'un groupe de cinq Billets Le Directeur Le Caissier ÉMISSION autorisée ARRÊTÉ DU 12 Septembre 1873 Imp. Lith. A. Roy Fils |
| 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 |
The Banque de la Réunion was established in 1849 as one of the colonial banks created under the same legislative framework that reorganized French overseas banking after emancipation. By 1873, it held the note-issuing monopoly for the island, but its notes circulated in an economy still heavily dependent on sugar — and still recovering from the collapse of indentured labor schemes that had replaced slavery.
Printing locally through Imprimerie A. Roussin rather than contracting a metropolitan house in Paris made this issue unusual among French colonial notes of the period. Most comparable islands relied on Parisian or English printers. The result was more modest production quality, and surviving examples tend to show the vulnerabilities of tropical paper storage.