500 Rials - Mohammad Rezā Pahlavī

This 500 Rial note belongs to the first series issued under Mohammad Reza Shah following his father Reza Shah's forced abdication in 1941, when Allied occupation effectively ran Iranian finances. Harrison & Sons had been printing Iranian notes since the 1930s, and the relationship continued uninterrupted through the transition — the new Shah's face replaced his father's with relatively little else changing in the production chain.

The watermark remains the sole security feature, which left these notes vulnerable to skilled forgery during the politically unstable late 1940s.