bavarikon4UPaper money in Poland
Poland’s eventful history is reflected in its paper money. After the second partition of Poland in 1793, resistance formed in the country under the leadership of General Tadeusz Kościuszko (1746-1817). During the uprising named after the general in 1794, the first Polish paper money was issued. With the suppression of the uprising in early November 1794, the notes became worthless after just a short time.
State paper money was issued in the Duchy of Warsaw in 1810. The Duchy of Warsaw was a satellite state established by Emperor Napoleon (1769-1821) in 1807. It existed until 1815, when the Kingdom of Poland (Congress Poland) was created. Another state paper money issue followed in 1824. The Bank Polski, founded in 1828, also issued banknotes from 1830.
During the First World War, Congress Poland was conquered by the German Empire and Austria-Hungary in 1915. The area was divided into two "Generalgouvernements" administered by Germany and Austria-Hungary. Finally, in 1916, a Kingdom of Poland was established under a Regency Council (Regency Kingdom of Poland). During this period, banknotes issued by the "Polska Krajowa Kasa Pożyczkowa" (Polish Loan Bank), which had been established by the German occupation in 1916, were in circulation. Even after the establishment of the Second Polish Republic in 1918, the Polish Loan Bank’s banknotes remained in circulation. From 1922 inflation set in, leading to devaluation of the currency.
Bank Polski was designated as the central bank again from 1924. With the German invasion of Poland, Bank Polski’s activities ended and it went into exile in London. The Generalgouvernement, which was directly under Adolf Hitler, exercised rule in the occupied Polish territories. It initially issued Bank Polski banknotes in circulation printed over. On 15 December 1939, a new issuing bank was established with head office in Krakow. It issued new banknotes in Poland from 1940. In the spring of 1945, Russian troops defeated the German army throughout Poland. Even before that, the People’s Republic of Poland had been founded under Soviet influence. After the end of the Second World War, Narodowy Bank Polski began operating as a state bank.
The "Poland’s paper money" sub-collection also includes the city of Gdansk’s paper money. The city of Gdansk, located in the north of Poland, was the capital of the Prussian province of West Prussia from 1819. Due to the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, Gdansk was declared a free city in 1920 and was granted the status of an autonomous Free State of Gdansk. In 1939 the town was annexed to the German Reich again, since 1945 it belongs to Poland.
>> This collection is part of the holdings of "Paper money in Europe" of the Giesecke+Devrient Stiftung Geldscheinsammlung (Giesecke+Devrient foundation: collections of bank notes).