50 Zlotys

This note belongs to the insurrectionary currency issued during the Kościuszko Uprising — Poland's last armed effort to prevent the partitions from becoming permanent. The Najwyższa Rada Narodowa, the civilian governing body Kościuszko established in Kraków in May 1794, needed to finance a war against Russia and Prussia simultaneously, with no functioning state treasury and no foreign credit available. Paper money was the only option.

The Warsaw printing was organised under extraordinary pressure. Engravers and pressmen were working in a city that would fall to Suvorov's forces by November of the same year. Notes from this emission rarely survived the subsequent Russian occupation intact — confiscation and deliberate destruction were common.

The watermark is the sole security measure, a thin defence against forgery that the Russians themselves were reportedly not above exploiting.