1000 Francs Elephant

Rwanda's central bank issued a handful of ultra-premium collector pieces in the mid-2000s, most tied to the country's wildlife conservation messaging in the years following the 1994 genocide, as the government worked to rebuild international relationships and attract foreign investment and tourism. The diamond-set series was produced by a European private mint on contract — almost certainly B.H. Mayer's Kunstprägeanstalt in Munich, which handled several comparable African novelty issues in this period.

Four actual diamonds are pressure-set into the field. The stones are typically SI-clarity melee, collectively under 0.10 carats total weight.