Madagascar had no locally established bank of issue in 1916 capable of responding to the wartime coin shortage that gripped French colonial territories across the globe. The metropolitan solution was a simple one: emergency cardboard or paper notes, known as bons de caisse, authorized by the colonial government itself rather than by any banking institution. This series was part of that broader improvisation, issued under direct governmental authority as small-denomination coinage substitutes while metal was being absorbed by the war effort in Europe.
Turlot's engraving credit suggests plate work done within the French printing establishment, though attribution to a specific press for Madagascar's 1916 emergency issues is not always clean-cut.
Madagascar had no locally established bank of issue in 1916 capable of responding to the wartime coin shortage that gripped French colonial territories across the globe. The metropolitan solution was a simple one: emergency cardboard or paper notes, known as bons de caisse, authorized by the colonial government itself rather than by any banking institution. This series was part of that broader improvisation, issued under direct governmental authority as small-denomination coinage substitutes while metal was being absorbed by the war effort in Europe.
Turlot's engraving credit suggests plate work done within the French printing establishment, though attribution to a specific press for Madagascar's 1916 emergency issues is not always clean-cut.