20 Leva

Bulgaria's post-WWI finances were in serious disorder by 1922 — the country had emerged from the war on the losing side, stripped of territory under the Treaty of Neuilly, and burdened with reparations its economy could not sustain. Printing new currency was partly a fiscal necessity, partly a political signal of institutional continuity.

Commissioning the American Bank Note Company placed this series among the better-engraved Bulgarian issues of the interwar period. ABNC's New York shop handled the intaglio work; the design credit to Gyudjenov and Kozhouharov — both serious Bulgarian painters of the period — reflects an unusual degree of investment in the artistic side of a note issued under genuine financial strain.