Catalog
2 Forint Philadelphia
| Issuer | Hungarian State Treasury (Kossuth emigration issue) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1852 |
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| Shape | Rectangular |
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| Obverse description | The note is printed in black on white paper in a fine intaglio style. Three allegorical female figures are arranged across the width of the note: Justitia with scales at left, Athena in armour at right, and a central seated figure beside the Hungarian coat of arms shield. The large legend KÉT FORINT appears twice in the lower register flanking the central vignette, with the numeral 2 at lower centre and the facsimile signature of Lajos Kossuth at lower right. |
|---|---|
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| Signature(s) | Lajos Kossuth |
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| Comments |
Kossuth's American fund-raising tour of 1851–52 generated enormous public enthusiasm but almost no usable hard currency — hence these notes, printed in Philadelphia by one of the premier American security printers of the period and intended to finance a Hungarian liberation army that never materialized. The issue had no legal backing of any kind: there was no Hungarian state in 1852, no treasury behind the signature, and no territory in which the notes could circulate.
Kossuth signed examples himself. That detail alone accounts for much of their survival, as American admirers kept them as souvenirs rather than spending them.