Ok, i need some more help with some world notes. I am not quite sure as to what these are. Notes, bank checks, money orders.. something else? I cannot read the langauge, so that does not help. Becuase the notes are a high resolution, i will post links to them instead of posting the huge images in the post. Note 1 obverse Note 1 reverse Note 2 obverse Note 2 reverse I do think they are checks as the title looks to say something about a bank credit or somethign like that. but if anyone can confirm or deny that it would help
They are a form of bearer cheque issued by Italian banks ca. 1975-1977 due to a coin shortage. Most of them are fairly common and were issued in large numbers. The best in my opinion were those issued in San Marino, which is a small independent country in NE Italy. They have to be one of the smallest countries to ever issue what could be marginally construed to be paper money, Monaco and Liechtenstein each issued small change notes ca. 1920 though due to coin shortages.
thanks for the reply! so were these cheques issued by an issuing authority? or issued by non-issuing authorities to solve a shortage in coin? In essance, did those who issued them have the authority to do so? The US has had that happen in our own past, making the isuances collectible, but not legal tender. Bascaly, i am trying to fiqure out if they are even collectible and if i should even keep them. I did get them in a large lot of world notes i had bought some time ago. But that is no indication they are any form of currency.
Think of them as a bearer cheque, payable to whomever is holding it, notice they look more like cheques than paper money. For a reason, because legally they could not issue paper money, but could issue bearer cheques which do not have the same legal obligation as government issued paper money, but are in effect promissory notes. In some ways currency in Britain and the USA during the late 18th and early 19th centuries were similar in that they were made payable to a particular person so noted on the note, or to the bearer.
Thank you. I like the term Promissary Note. I might just have to make a seperate page linkable from the Italy currency page, to show these. If they were just a form of check, i dont think i would keep or list them. But a Promissary note... well, it just seems more collectible to me Here is a definition i got from goolge on 'promissary note' - Thank you!!!
The note says and this is loosely translated "will pay on sight by cashiers check one hundred lira to" and it has a firms name typed in. The date is July 21, 1977 and Novara is a city in Italy. The words "assegno circolare" is considered to mean cashier check. I hope that help a bit. Lou
so, they are basicaly both cashiers checks, issued by a bank to a specific company/person? Are both note, or checks, the same? shoot! i was more liking the whole promissary note idea better.
They are both cashier checks or assegno circolares. There must be a collector base for these. Ebay-Italy has them for sale. http://cgi.ebay.it/ASSEGNO-CIRCOLAR...I-FERRARA_W0QQitemZ150191251171QQcmdZViewItem Lou
wow, i never imagined a bank issued cashiers check would be .. collectible. I have never heard of anyone here in the US even talking about them as collectible. I will keep them both, heck, neither one is in all that great a shape or worth much of anything. maybe someday lol thanks!
Checks like many other forms of currency are collected her in the US and in other countries. See below: http://www.asccinfo.com/ Lou
Lovely looking notes mate, I have a couple of British equivlents from the end of the 1800's that I nust get posted but no Italian (Must look for one now LOL)
More or less perminant till I go back to Brazil LOL I do hope to finaly do 2 months there and 2 months over here :smile
These notes are referred to as mini-assegni (mini-checks in Italian). There are hundreds of varieties and they are collected by currency collectors. Banks in Italy and Albania also issued circulating checks at the end of WWII. These are relatively scarce and are eagerly sought by Italian collectors. The mini-assegni are also an emergency currency. They were issued due to a lack of circulating small change in Italy during the mid-1970s. The coinage disappeared because its metal value exceeded its face value and it was melted. Some of the Philippine guerrilla currency also takes the form of circulating checks.
Similarly during the so called "Bank Holiday" in 1933 numerous communities, banks, business etc. issued circulating cheques that were in values of $1, $5 etc. I have a couple somewhere from Charleston SC that were made payable to an individual, or bearer. This effectively made them a form of short term circulating currency.
More on Mini-assegni I happened to be in Italy in the mid-70's and picked up quite a few mini-assegni. The banks and the government at the time made it clear that mini-assegni were not valid outside of Italy. However, since it was impossible to find coins, everyone used them to complete transactions. It's difficult to find any information on these notes in English. Probably the best site in English to establish a value for an individual mini-assegni is: http://www.atsnotes.com/local/l-italy.html. Hope this helps.
