100 Manat Üzeyir Hacıbəyov

Üzeyir Hacıbəyov composed Leyli və Məcnun in 1908, the first opera written in the Muslim world — a fact the Azerbaijani government marked precisely one century later with this issue. The centennial timing was deliberate; Baku had been actively constructing a cultural nationalism rooted in pre-Soviet intellectual figures, and Hacıbəyov, who also wrote the national anthem adopted in 1992, offered an unimpeachable symbol for that project.

The .999 fine standard and 31.1g specification place this squarely in the one-troy-ounce bullion-commemorative category that post-Soviet states favored heavily in the 2000s for international collector markets.