1500 Scudi

The Sacro Monte della Pietà di Roma was one of the oldest pious credit institutions in Europe, established in 1539 specifically to provide low-interest loans to the poor and undercut the usurers. By the late eighteenth century it had evolved into a quasi-banking operation under direct papal oversight, issuing cedole — large-denomination paper instruments that functioned more like notarial debt certificates than circulating currency. A 1500 Scudi cedola was not something passing through market stalls; it moved between institutions, wealthy merchants, and the Roman ecclesiastical establishment.

The entire series was wiped out financially when French forces occupied Rome in 1798 and the institution was effectively dismantled under the Roman Republic.