Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
5 Livres LIBAN 1939
| Issuer | Banque de Syrie et du Grand-Liban |
|---|---|
| Year | 1939 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | P#13A |
| Obverse description | The obverse is dominated by an ornate Moorish arch motif rendered in multicolour guilloche, within which the denomination "خمس ليرات" (Five Livres) appears in bold Arabic script. Two handwritten signatures of bank officials are placed below the arch, flanked by serial number panels at each corner, with a black letterpress overprint reading "LIBAN 1939" at the lower centre. Arabic text bands above and below the arch carry the issuing conditions and anti-counterfeiting warnings. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | The reverse presents a large central vignette of the Azem Palace in Damascus, rendered in a delicate multicolour intaglio print showing the arched arcade facade with trees to the right, set against an elaborate geometric and arabesque guilloche border in muted greens, ochre, and rose. The bank title "BANQUE DE SYRIE ET DU GRAND-LIBAN" and the overprint "LIBAN" appear at the top, with the denomination "CINQ LIVRES" and redemption text in a panel at the foot. Engraver credits appear at lower left and right. |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Log in to see details |
| Protection description | Log in to see details |
| Variants | Log in to see details |
| Comments |
The Banque de Syrie et du Grand-Liban was a French concessionary institution — its currency authority derived from a mandate, not a sovereign state. By 1939 that arrangement was already under political strain: Lebanese and Syrian nationalist movements had been pressing Paris for independence for years, and the outbreak of war in Europe would soon make French oversight of the Levant an increasingly complicated fiction.
Soulas was among the finest intaglio engravers working for the Banque de France in this period, and his contribution to this note reflects the same technical standard applied to metropolitan French issues. Hourriez handled the reverse. The pairing was deliberate — mandate territory or not, the French authorities printed colonial currency to metropolitan specification.