5 Francs

The Banque Cantonale Vaudoise was established in 1845 as one of the early cantonal banks created under Switzerland's post-1830 liberal constitutional reforms, which pushed financial authority toward the cantons rather than private banking houses. These 5 Franc notes from the late 1850s predate the federal banking consolidation that would eventually render cantonal currency issuance obsolete — Swiss federal unification of the note-issuing system was a slow, contested process that dragged well into the 1870s and beyond.

Printed locally in Lausanne rather than sent abroad to a major security printer, a detail that distinguishes this series from many contemporary Swiss cantonal issues that relied on French or German firms.