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!

50 Escudos Banco de Moçambique Overprint

Issuer Banco de Moçambique
Year 1976
Type Log in to see details
Value Log in to see details
Currency Escudo (1911-1974)
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) Log in to see details
Obverse description Log in to see details
Obverse lettering Log in to see details
Reverse description Dark green intaglio on multicolour guilloche underprint. At left centre, the circular seal of the Banco Nacional Ultramarino encloses a vignette of a full-rigged sailing vessel on open water, surrounded by the bank's name and founding date "LISBOA - 1864"; the seal is set against an elaborate radiating guilloche pattern with acanthus scroll ornaments at the corners. To the right, a large denomination numeral "50" is printed in ochre within a scroll cartouche, with "PAGÁVEL EM MOÇAMBIQUE" and "CINQUENTA ESCUDOS" in bold letterpress along the lower margin.
Reverse lettering Log in to see details
Signature(s) Log in to see details
Protection type Watermark
Protection description Log in to see details
Variants Log in to see details
Comments

When Mozambique gained independence from Portugal in June 1975, the new Frelimo government needed circulating currency immediately but lacked the infrastructure — or the time — to commission entirely new notes. The solution was straightforward: existing Banco Nacional Ultramarino notes were overprinted with the new issuing authority's name, converting colonial paper into sovereign tender overnight. This 50 Escudos piece is a direct product of that transitional pragmatism.

Thomas De La Rue handled the overprinting in London, working on stock that had already been printed for the predecessor institution. The print run of over twelve million suggests this denomination saw heavy everyday use during the brief escudo period before the metical replaced it in 1980.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE