Had a nice package show up in the mail this morning from France. These notes extend my series of Common Designs from the BEAC (Banque des Etats de l'Afrique Centrale) that I posted an article about a couple months ago. This is a series of notes for the Central African States which were all designed by an artist named Raymond Vaudiau. A note in each of four denominations was issued for each of the five countries. The face of each note is different, with design depicting something relevant to that country, and the backs of each denomination are the same for all the notes. They were printed by Banque de France, as usual with a color lithograph overlaid with intaglio. Cameroon 5000F Cameroon 10,000F Congo 5000F Here's a blow-up of the vignette from the 5000F Cameroon note for those of you interested in railroads. I thought this was a pretty cool piece of machinery (and the artwork isn't bad either): Dave
Wow! Very nice! I don't know if it's because I'm just becoming aware of the "French-style" notes or if there is actually an increase in demand but it seems that a lot of these type of notes are shooting up in value. There seems to be a lot of notes in the $100 - $300 range. Have they gone up in price or have I just developed an appreciation for notes that happen to be in that price range?
Thanks, yes I think there's a pretty consistent rise in the French notes (not that it isn't the same elsewhere, I just don't track anything else). The same note printed by Banque de France is about double the price of those printed by FCO (many African notes were first printed by BdF and then later the same note printed by FCO), and even those FCO notes that a few years ago were thought of as common notes selling for $5-$10 are now $25-$40. Uncirculated "French" notes have been going up "forever" in my collecting lifetime - at least the last 15 years - and $100-$300 is probably a decent range for a nice note. Dave
Thanks, Dave. It's seems like anything I like is pricey. To think only a year ago my monthly budget for collecting coins/currency was $50 and now it averages $500 and more.:rollling:
DaveM What nice designs these have on them. What is the significance of the Z.5 - Q.1 and K.4 on the notes lower left and upper right corners? When were these printed (year).. Nice notes Dave! RB
Thanks Rickie! The numbering is hugely complicated on the French-printed notes, because the rules were changed all the time. But in a general way, those codes (Z.5, Q.1, etc) are the high-order counters for the serial number. For example, many French notes will start with A.1, and then 100,000 notes will be printed as A.1. Then they go to B.1 and print another 100,000, etc. A.2 comes after Z.1, and off they go. So one can get a feel for how many notes were printed by doing some math (assuming you have one of the later notes). You can see the full serial number at the top center of the note, and then the low 5 digits (the part that cycles every 100,000 notes) in the bottom right corner. If you stare at the high order digits of the s/n (chopping off the lower 5), and know that they don't use "I" so they have only 25 letters in the alphabet, you can probably convince yourself that you can equate the Z.5 to those upper digits. That is, if they didn't change the numbering scheme somewhere along the line... These notes were printed in 1974-1978. Dave
WHOA! Nice set! This classifies as a "haul" for sure. Don't have to tell you how nice these are - you know it and they say it for themselves. I will say Congratulations on the pick ups though!
