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5 Rupees Chartered Mercantile Bank of India, London and China
| Issuer | Chartered Mercantile Bank of India, London and China |
|---|---|
| Year | 1870-1880 |
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| Currency | Rupee (1871-1972) |
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| Obverse description | Brown intaglio print on paper with green guilloche underprint. The British Royal Arms vignette is centered at top, flanked by Sinhala and Tamil denomination panels within guilloche cartouches. The promise-to-pay text is rendered in copperplate script, with the date "COLOMBO 1st. Jany. 1870" above the bank's full title. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse lettering | FIVE RUPEES Perkins Bacon & Co, London. Patent Hardened Steel Plate |
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| Comments |
The Chartered Mercantile Bank of India, London and China — incorporated in London in 1853 under a Royal Charter — was one of the handful of British exchange banks operating across the Indian Ocean trade routes before the era of nationalized currency control. It was absorbed by the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation in 1892, which gives any surviving note from the 1870s decade a hard terminal date relative to the issuing institution.
Perkins, Bacon & Co. printed for colonial banking clients and governments alike, using steel intaglio techniques developed partly from their extensive banknote and stamp work. Their plates wore well, making print-run dating without archival records genuinely difficult.