50 Rupees

The Government of Zanzibar issued currency directly rather than through a bank — an unusual arrangement that persisted through the early British protectorate period. These notes circulated alongside Indian rupee coinage in a economy dominated by clove exports and Indian merchant credit networks, meaning the rupee denomination was a natural unit rather than an imposed one.

Waterlow & Sons produced the plates in London, but the two manuscript signatures — Sinclair as Chief Secretary and Cobble Davis as Treasurer — were applied individually to each note. At the 50 Rupee level, issue quantities were small, and hand-signed high-denomination notes from a minor protectorate across a nine-year window are rarely encountered today.