Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
27 Rupees Bikaner: Hundi promissory note
| Issuer | Bikaner State |
|---|---|
| Year | |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | 212 x 170 mm |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Plain cream paper reverse showing the mirror impression of the red letterpress hundi stamp bleeding through from the obverse, with sparse handwritten Devanagari notations and a brief manuscript annotation in black ink along the right margin. |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Log in to see details |
| Protection description | Watermark visible in the paper substrate. |
| Variants | Log in to see details |
| Comments |
Hundi instruments from the princely states occupy an awkward position in numismatic collecting — legally negotiable instruments, not government currency, yet issued under state authority and circulating as money in practice. Bikaner's treasury used the hundi format for internal transfers and merchant settlements well into the twentieth century, operating largely outside the colonial banking framework that had absorbed most major princely finance by the late nineteenth century.
The denomination of 27 rupees is characteristically non-round, reflecting the hundi's function as a settlement document tied to a specific transaction value rather than a face-value store of exchange.