20 Zlotych

Bank Polski's 20 Złotych of 1919 was printed in Paris by the Banque de France at a moment when Poland had only just re-emerged as a sovereign state after 123 years of partition. The choice of the Banque de France as printer was pragmatic — Poland had no domestic printing infrastructure capable of producing secure currency, and France was the principal Allied patron of the new Polish republic.

The watermark was the primary anti-counterfeiting measure, a modest security provision by the standards of the Banque de France's own output, reflecting the rushed nature of the commission rather than any technical shortcoming.