100 Birr Arms with plough, Purple sides

Ethiopia's Derg regime — the military junta that overthrew Haile Selassie in 1974 — needed currency that visually broke from the imperial iconography of its predecessor notes. This series, running through the revolutionary period into the late 1980s, was produced by Thomas De La Rue throughout, a continuity of printer that survived a radical discontinuity of government.

The 100 Birr was the highest denomination in circulation for much of this period, which made it a target for hoarding during the famine years and the intensifying civil war against Eritrean and Tigrayan insurgencies. Notes from the later end of the issue range tend to show heavier wear.