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10 Pesos

Issuer Provincia de Buenos Aires - Ministerio de Hacienda / Aduana
Year 1820
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Shape Rectangular
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Obverse lettering N.° 597
PAPEL FIRRETE O AMORTIZABLE
VALE POR DIEZ PESOS.
Admisibles en Aduana en introducciones marítimas y terrestres.
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Protection description Two wax seal impressions applied alongside handwritten signatures on the obverse as authentication measures.
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Comments

The Provincia de Buenos Aires was barely a functioning administrative unit in 1820 — the year is significant because it coincides with the anarchic collapse of central authority in the former Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, a period of near-constant civil conflict between provincial caudillos. That Buenos Aires was issuing customs-backed paper obligations at all reflects the province's attempt to leverage port revenue as a financial foundation when no national government existed to coordinate anything.

Attribution to the Aduana specifically matters: these were not bank notes but quasi-fiscal instruments, with the customs house acting as both guarantor and notional redemption point. The wax seal is the only authentication device — no engraved security printing, no serial numbering visible in most surviving examples.