150 Pounds, 8 Shillings & 8 Pence 1699 printed running cash note

Running cash notes were the Bank of England's earliest form of circulating paper money — partially printed forms completed by hand at the time of issue, with the payee name, date, and sum filled in by a cashier. This example, made out for the oddly precise sum of £150 8s 8d, reflects the Bank's practice of issuing notes for exact deposit amounts rather than round denominations, a system that persisted until the shift toward fixed denominations in the early eighteenth century.

By 1699 the Bank was barely four years old, chartered in 1694 primarily to fund William III's war against France. Notes from this period are among the earliest surviving examples of English paper currency and essentially function as bearer receipts.