Catalog
100 Drachmai
| Issuer | Ionian Bank Limited |
|---|---|
| Year | 1903-1919 |
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| Reference(s) | P#S152 |
| Obverse description | The Greek royal arms appear at upper left alongside the bank's combined heraldic vignette — incorporating the Greek cross and Union Jack — flanked by flags at upper centre, with the bank title in a circular legend reading IONIAN BANK LIMITED in both English and Greek. The denomination ΔΡΑΧΜΑΙ ΕΚΑΤΟΝ is inscribed in a bold letterpress panel below the central guilloche, with large numeral 100 counters at left and right. Two manuscript signatures and a date appear in the lower portion, above the printed role designations in Greek. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse lettering | BANQUE IONIENNE LIMITED 100 FRANCS |
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| Comments |
The Ionian Bank was a British-chartered institution founded in 1839, originally serving the then-British protectorate of the Ionian Islands. By the time this note was issued, the islands had long since unified with Greece — 1864 — but the bank retained its right of private note issue in Greece, one of several such privileges it held under successive arrangements with the Greek government. That anomaly of a British bank circulating currency on Greek soil persisted well into the twentieth century.
Perkins, Bacon & Petch produced work of consistently high intaglio quality, and their plates for the Ionian Bank series were among the more technically accomplished private-issue printings of the period.