Catalog
100 Franga Overprinted on P#8
| Issuer | Banka e Shtetit Shqiptar |
|---|---|
| Year | 1945 |
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| Printer | Bank of Italy (Banca d'Italia), Rome, Italy |
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|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | BANKA KOMBËTARE E SHQIPNIS BANCA NAZIONALE D'ALBANIA NJIQIND FRANGA CENTO FRANCHI ME TË PAMË TË PAGUESHME PRUSIT PAGABILI AL VISTA AL PORTATORE (Translation: National Bank of Albania Hundred Francs Payable to the bearer) |
| Reverse description | The reverse is dominated by a large central guilloche rosette in purple-blue, with the denomination numeral '100' superimposed over it, flanked above by FRANGA and below by FRANCHI in bold lettering. The outer border is rendered in deep red-brown with repeating wheat ear and eagle motifs in the side panels, denomination numerals '100' in the lower-left and upper-left corners, and two circular medallions at top and bottom centre bearing monogram devices. A tall rectangular blank panel at right, framed by an ornate border, carries anti-counterfeiting warning texts in Albanian and Italian. |
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| Comments |
This note exists because the Albanian state found itself in 1945 with a currency problem and an inventory of old stock. Rather than commission new printing, authorities overprinted existing Banka e Shtetit Shqiptar notes — the 100 Franga base design from P#8 — with new authorization markings to validate them for continued use under the postwar provisional government. It was a fiscal stopgap, not a planned issue.
The Banca d'Italia printed the original plates in Rome during the Italian occupation period, which makes the parent note itself a product of Albania's wartime subordination to Italian administrative control. The overprint layers a new political reality onto paper that carried a very different one.