Bill of Five Hundred Pesos

Historical and Issue Context

Debt backed by salt:This bill was not a bank note, but a public debt title of the State of Boyacá, specifically backed by 20% of the gross income from the salt flats, in accordance with laws 40 and 46 of 1883, and intended to finance the construction of the road from Chiquinquirá to Magdalena.

Infrastructure and federalism:Under the federal regime of the United States of Colombia, each sovereign State —like Boyacá— could issue its own debt instruments to finance public works, backed by specific revenues from its territory, in this case the salt mines, one of the country's most valuable fiscal sources in the 19th century.

A second life as judicial evidence:The reverse preserves the seal and annotations of the Secretariat of the Superior Court of the Judicial District of Bogotá, dated March 5, 1940, which document the “breakdown in the ordinary trial followed by Belisario Ruiz M. against La Nación” —evidence that, more than half a century after its issue, this title was still the subject of litigation against the Colombian State for the payment of the public debt of the 19th century.

Key Details Visible in the Document

• Upper left vignette:classic steam locomotive from the 19th century, symbol of the railway progress that the payment order sought to finance.
• Header:“LIBRANZAS against 20 percent of the gross product of Salinas' income. (ROAD FROM CHIQUINQUIRÁ TO MAGDALENA) STATE OF BOYACÁ”.
• Fiscal promise text:“The United States of Colombia recognizes to the bearer the sum of FIVE HUNDRED PESOS, which is admissible in 20 percent of the gross product of the income of Salinas in accordance with the provisions of Laws 40 and 46 of 1883.”
• Guilloché ornamental border:continuous geometric frame generated with precision lathes, as a barrier against the falsification of high denomination titles.
• Reverse:purple seal of the “República de Colombia — Secretaría del Tribunal Superior — Bogotá” and typewritten text concerning the 1940 judicial breakdown, signed by Secretary F. A. Martínez Alcé.
• Numbering:serial number “00,114” stamped with mechanical numberer in dense blue/black ink.
• Color:black ink over an ornamental terracotta/pink security background on the obverse.

Notes

1. Chávez Salazar, Nelson David. “A Microeconomic Review of Free Banking in Colombia: 1865–1886.”Market Processes: European Journal of Political Economy, vol. XIV, n.° 2, Autumn 2017: Under the 1863 Constitution of Rionegro, each Sovereign State of the Union (such as Boyacá) enjoyed broad fiscal autonomy to issue its own debt instruments backed by local revenues.

2. Original text and seals of the document itself: Laws 40 and 46 of 1883 (State of Boyacá); judicial annotation of the Secretariat of the Superior Court of the Judicial District of Bogotá, March 5, 1940.