5 Livres Turques

The Dette Publique Ottomane — the Ottoman Public Debt Administration — was a remarkable institution: a European-controlled financial body established in 1881 to manage the empire's defaulted foreign loans, staffed largely by French and British creditors operating from within Istanbul. That it was still issuing emergency currency as late as 1915, with the empire deep in the First World War and the regular banking system under severe strain, speaks to how thoroughly the OPDA had embedded itself in Ottoman fiscal infrastructure.

Wartime paper shortages and disrupted supply chains pushed many of these notes into genuinely rough condition during circulation. The watermark security was minimal protection against the widespread counterfeiting that plagued Ottoman paper money throughout 1915–1918.