500 Escudos

Banco Nacional Ultramarino occupied an unusual position in Portuguese colonial finance — it functioned simultaneously as a commercial bank and as the currency-issuing authority across multiple overseas territories, a dual role that made its notes semi-official instruments of state policy rather than purely commercial paper. This 500 Escudos was issued for one of those territories, with Bradbury Wilkinson handling the engraving and printing at their New Malden works, as they did for a significant portion of BNU's colonial output through the mid-twentieth century.

Bradbury Wilkinson's intaglio work on Portuguese colonial issues of this period is consistently fine, though the security provision here relies solely on watermark protection — no security thread, no fluorescent ink.