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!
500 Rials - Mohammad Rezā Pahlavī
| Issuer | Bank Melli Iran |
|---|---|
| Year | 1948-1951 |
| Type | Standard circulation banknote |
| 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) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Dark blue, purple, and red note with an elaborate guilloche border framing the entire design. A portrait of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in military uniform occupies the right portion of the note, set against a finely detailed guilloche underprint. The denomination پانصد ریال (Five Hundred Rials) appears in large Persian script at centre-left within an ornate cartouche, with the bank title بانک ملی ایران and serial numbers in red at upper corners. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Dark blue intaglio print with a miniature-style vignette spanning the full width of the note, rendered in the tradition of Persian manuscript painting. The scene shows a group of elegantly dressed women in a garden setting, gathering flowers and fruit among ornate trees and foliage in the style of Chehel Sotoun palace paintings from Isfahan. A blank oval reserve at right is reserved for the watermark, and the English inscription BANK MELLI IRAN appears at top centre, with the denomination repeated in Persian 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 |
Bank Melli Iran had relied on British printers since the bank's founding in 1928, and Harrison & Sons' contract for this series continued that arrangement through the early years of Mohammad Reza Shah's reign — a politically loaded period given Britain's dominant role in Iranian oil affairs. The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company dispute was building toward its 1951 peak precisely as these notes were in circulation, which gives the Harrison imprint a certain irony.
Pick 52 is the first high-denomination series to carry the new Shah's portrait following his father Reza Shah's forced abdication in 1941. The watermark is the sole security feature — modest for a 500-rial note at this value level.