Catalog
100 Tomans
| Issuer | Imperial Bank of Persia |
|---|---|
| Year | 1890-1923 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Qiran (1825-1932) |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Multicolour intaglio print on a guilloche underprint. Portrait of Shah Nasr ad-Din at right, with the Lion and Sun coat of arms vignette at left. Persian inscriptions identify the issuing bank and denomination, with a payability clause for Tehran appearing above the central design. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | THE IMPERIAL BANK OF PERSIA ONE HUNDRED TOMANS |
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| Comments |
The Imperial Bank of Persia was a British-chartered institution, established under a concession granted by Naser al-Din Shah in 1889, giving it the exclusive right to issue banknotes throughout Persia. That concession was deeply controversial from the start — Iranian merchants and clerics resented the arrangement, and public distrust of paper money meant high-denomination notes like this 100 Toman piece saw almost no genuine circulation among ordinary commerce. They were instruments of large mercantile and government transactions, if used at all.
Bradbury Wilkinson's printing plates for this series remained in service across an unusually long window, which is why notes dated across three decades can show nearly identical physical characteristics.