Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
20 Pounds Bank of Ireland
| Issuer | Bank of Ireland |
|---|---|
| Year | 1915-1919 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Pound (1826-1971) |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Allegorical figures of Hibernia stand at left and right margins, each rendered as a classical female figure in intaglio. The centre of the note carries the bank title at top, followed by a promise-to-pay text, the denomination "Twenty Pounds" in large script lettering, the date and place of issue in red, and a panel of five lines listing the Bank of Ireland branch network. The lower portion bears the legend "For the Governor and Company of the Bank of Ireland" in copperplate script, flanked by "TWENTY" panels at each lower corner. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Bank of Ireland I Promise to pay to the bearer on Demand Twenty Pounds Dublin For the Governor and Company of the Bank of Ireland |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Log in to see details |
| Protection description | Log in to see details |
| Variants | Log in to see details |
| Comments |
Bank of Ireland's £20 notes from this period occupied an unusual position: large denomination paper in a market where most commercial transactions at that scale still preferred bills of exchange or cheques. Actual hand-to-hand circulation was minimal, and surviving examples with heavy wear are rare for that reason rather than because of scarcity at issue.
The 1915–1919 window straddles the Easter Rising of 1916 and the subsequent political turbulence, though the Bank of Ireland — headquartered in the old Parliament House on College Green — maintained uninterrupted private note-issuing rights throughout, a privilege that survived partition in 1922 and persists to the present day.