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5 Lire Vittoria
| Issuer | Campo Concentramento Prigionieri di Guerra, Vittoria (Sicilia) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1918 |
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| Currency | Lira (1861-2001) |
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| Obverse description | Green and cream letterpress voucher with an intricate guilloche border. At left, a seated allegorical figure of Victory in armour holds a standard and a cross; camp authority inscriptions and denomination occupy the right field, with two manuscript signatures below the printed signature titles. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse lettering | LA LEGGE PUNISCE LE FALSIFICAZIONI LIRE 5 |
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| Comments |
Vittoria was a small agricultural town in the Ragusa province of southeastern Sicily, and its prisoner-of-war camp was one of dozens that Italy operated during the First World War to house Austrian and other Central Powers captives. Camp-issued scrip like this circulated exclusively within the wire — it prevented prisoners from accumulating Italian legal tender, which could facilitate escape or black-market dealings with local civilians.
Printed locally rather than by a specialist security printer, these notes were produced under purely functional conditions. The entire Vittoria series is poorly documented, and surviving examples are genuinely rare — the camps were closed rapidly after the Armistice of November 1918, and scrip was withdrawn and destroyed rather than redeemed.