Paper Money History: The 18th Century Paper Money Issues

The 18th Century continued to see many states and companies issuing paper money. Most of which never stood the test of time. In actual fact most of these currencies did not survive more than a year or so and therefore only receive a line of two in the scheme of things.

Here is a breakdown of some of these issues:

Denmark - In 1713, the government introduced notes for 1, 2 and 3 mark, 1, 5, 10, 25, 50 and 100 rigsdaler. The Exchange and Loans Bank issued notes between 1737 and 1804 for 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 and 100 rigsdaler courant. Between 1791 and 1797, the Danish-Norwegian Specie Bank issued notes for 4, 8, 20, 40 and 80 rigsdaler specie. So the notes in Denmark were first state issued and then the bank took over.

St Helena - The Council and Governing body issued paper money in 1722. Denomination of the notes was 2 shillings 6 pence.

Ireland - In 1754, Finlay and Co. Dublin issued paper money of unknown values.

Austria - In1759, the Weiner Stadt Banco issued paper money denominated in Gulden. The banknotes were not actually tied to the coinage system and therefore their values floated relative to one another for a long time. The notes were known to have a higher value than the coins to start with but then the value of the paper money plummeted in relation to the coins, until the value of the Austrian Gulden was later fixed in 1811 at one fifth of their face value in coins.