10 Ducati

The Banco Giro di Venezia was one of Europe's older state-backed institutions, but by 1798 it was effectively a dead bank walking. Napoleon had dissolved the Venetian Republic in May 1797 with the Treaty of Campo Formio, handing Venice to Austria — and the banco's notes, already under strain from wartime financing, entered a period of profound institutional uncertainty. This 10 Ducati note was issued into a city no longer governed by those who created it.

The watermark security is typical of Venetian paper practice, relying on the established local papermaking tradition rather than any foreign printing house. Pick S181 places it among the final emissions of a centuries-old monetary system that simply ran out of political ground.