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100 Francs
| Issuer | Banque de la Nouvelle-Calédonie |
|---|---|
| Year | 1874 |
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| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Franc (1873-1945) |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | BANQUE DE LA NOUVELLE-CALÉDONIE IL SERA PAYÉ À VUE ET AU PORTEUR CENT FRANCS Le Directeur CH-CABASSON INV ET DEL 1874 CH J. ROBERT SC. |
| Reverse description | Black letterpress print on white paper, largely mirroring the obverse composition. A portrait vignette of Mercury appears to the left and Ceres to the right, with anchors at the lower corners and a maritime vignette of a ship at sea along the bottom border. The promissory text from the obverse is repeated across the upper portion of the note. |
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| Comments |
The Banque de la Nouvelle-Calédonie was established in 1874 as one of the colonial banks created under French imperial banking legislation, with a note-issuing privilege tied directly to the territory's developing settler economy and penal colony administration. That dual economic reality — free colonists, transported convicts, and a nascent nickel sector not yet dominant — shaped the modest circulation demands the bank actually faced in its early years.
Charles-Jules Robert and Charles Wullschleger were both accomplished engravers working in the French tradition, though the division of labor between obverse and reverse engravers on a single colonial issue of this date is worth remarking — it suggests the plates were not a single commission but assembled from separate workshop contracts.
Pick 4 is among the earliest surviving issues from this issuer, and the 1874 date places it at the bank's founding year itself.