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5 Livres
| Issuer | Banque Impériale Ottomane |
|---|---|
| Year | 1882 |
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| Shape | Rectangular |
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| Obverse description | The tughra of the reigning sultan is positioned at upper centre, flanked by serial numbers at left and right. The centre of the note is dominated by large overlapping guilloche rosettes in red and green, with multi-line Arabic calligraphic text set within. A blue fine-line border frame encloses the entire design, with denomination inscriptions in French reading 'CINQ TURQUES / 5 / LIVRES TURQUES' at lower left and Arabic numerals at lower right. Two manuscript signatures appear across the lower portion, with the French legend 'Remboursable à Constantinople.' at bottom centre. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | دولت عليه عثمانيه بنك امپریال عثمانی Remboursable à Constantinople. CINQ TURQUES LIVRES TURQUES ٥ |
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| Comments |
The Banque Impériale Ottomane — jointly owned by French and British capital and chartered in 1863 — held the exclusive right to issue banknotes in the Ottoman Empire, a privilege that made it deeply controversial throughout its existence. The 1882 date places this note early in the bank's consolidated note-issuing period, following the Ottoman state's catastrophic 1875 default and the subsequent Muharrem Decree of 1881, which restructured the empire's foreign debt under European supervision. Banknotes from this institution circulated uneasily alongside a population far more accustomed to metallic coinage.
P#60 is among the scarcer issues of this early series — survivor rates are low, partly because the notes were printed in relatively small quantities and partly because the political instability of the period was not kind to paper holdings.