10 Para

Issued under wartime fiscal pressure, this note belongs to a series the Ottoman Ministry of Finance produced domestically after access to European printing houses was severed by the First World War. Earlier Ottoman issues had been printed in France; by 1917 that was no longer possible, and the quality difference is visible in surviving examples — the printing is noticeably cruder.

The para denominations of this series circulated heavily among the urban poor and in bazaar trade, where coin shortages had become acute. Small-denomination paper was widely distrusted and often refused outside major cities.