Catalog
500 Pesos
| Issuer | Banco Español de la Isla de Cuba |
|---|---|
| Year | 1896 |
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| Shape | Rectangular |
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| Obverse description | At left, an oval vignette contains a winged allegorical female figure in classical dress, holding a spear and standing against a guilloche border. The royal arms of Spain appear in the upper centre flanked by the denomination numeral 500 in each corner, with the bank title EL BANCO ESPAÑOL DE LA ISLA DE CUBA arched across the upper field. A promise-to-pay text in Spanish is printed across the centre, with two serial number panels below the bank title and signature lines for EL GOBERNADOR and EL CONSEJERO at the foot. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | EL BANCO ESPAÑOL DE LA ISLA DE CUBA QUIINIENTOS pesos fuertes a la presentacion de este billete pagará al portador en metálico Habana EL GOBERNADOR EL CONSEJERO 500 |
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| Comments |
By 1896, the Banco Español de la Isla de Cuba was issuing paper against a colonial economy under severe strain — the Cuban War of Independence had resumed the previous year, and Spanish military expenditure on the island was escalating rapidly. This 500 Peso note belongs to a series widely understood to have been issued partly to finance that war effort rather than to serve ordinary commercial banking needs.
High-denomination notes from this final period of Spanish colonial banking in Cuba rarely survived in quantity. The political collapse of 1898 left the bank's outstanding issues unredeemed, and most examples still in existence were preserved outside Cuba entirely.