5 Yen in Gold

The Bank of Korea was established in 1909 under Japanese protectorate authority, just two years before Korea was formally annexed. This note was issued by that institution — nominally a Korean central bank, but effectively an instrument of Japanese financial control, with the printing handled entirely by the Bank of Japan Printing Bureau in Tokyo. The arrangement was never designed to be temporary.

Gold-denominated notes of this series circulated alongside silver-denominated issues, reflecting the dual currency framework imposed during the transition period. After annexation in 1910, the Bank of Korea was reconstituted as the Bank of Chōsen, and much of the earlier Bank of Korea paper was withdrawn and destroyed, which accounts for the relative scarcity of P#14 survivors today.