Catalog
3 Rijksdaalder
| Issuer | Gouvernement Generaal van's Konings Bezittingen in Indiën |
|---|---|
| Year | 1809 |
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| Value | 3 Rijksdaalder |
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| Obverse description | Letterpress-printed note with Dutch text at right certifying the bearer's entitlement of drie Rijksdaalders of 48 zwaare stuivers each at the Gouvernement Generaal, with Malay-Arabic text at left conveying the equivalent notice. A central circular handstamp bears an ornate monogram above the date 1809, while two additional VOC-style ink handstamps at lower left and lower right — one circular with the letters E.E.I.C. and one heart-shaped — serve as authenticating impressions. The heading reads "L.a C. No: voor Rijksd: 3: Goed" and the note is dated "Gezien Batavia den 13 Maart 1809. Rijksdaalders 3." |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Plain paper reverse bearing two large circular red wax or ink stamps at upper left and upper right, each enclosing an ornate monogram. A Chinese ink chop in a red rectangular frame appears at the middle left, with a further Chinese character inscription in black ink below it, indicating use or acceptance by Chinese merchants in the colonial trading community. |
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| Comments |
The Gouvernement Generaal van's Konings Bezittingen in Indiën — the Napoleonic-era governing authority installed after Louis Bonaparte made Herman Willem Daendels Governor-General in 1808 — issued this note under conditions of near-total commercial isolation. The British naval blockade had severed Batavia's trade connections with the Netherlands, and conventional specie was in chronic short supply across the colony.
Printed locally in Batavia rather than shipped from Europe, the notes relied on handstamping as their primary authentication — a pragmatic solution when sophisticated anti-counterfeiting infrastructure simply did not exist in the colony. The rijksdaalder denomination itself was already an anachronism by 1809, tied to a monetary system that Napoleonic reorganization was in the process of dismantling back in Europe.