2000 Francs Nicolaus Copernicus

The Bank of Central African States periodically issues commemorative silver outside its monetary mandate — pieces that circulate as legal tender in member states including Cameroon, Chad, and the Central African Republic but are produced entirely for the collector market. Copernicus appears here in the 550th anniversary year of his birth, 1473, though the connection between a Polish Renaissance astronomer and the CFA franc zone is purely opportunistic geography on the part of a prolific issuing authority.

Copernicus published De revolutionibus orbium coelestium in 1543, the year of his death, having withheld it for over a decade fearing ecclesiastical backlash.