Katalog Popularnych Banknotów Polskich (Catalogue of Polish Banknotes) by Andrzej Fischer
90 pages, paperback, 150 x 205 mm, color illustrations, Polish, ISBN 83-88352-07-5

This new catalog was published in 2010 and covers banknotes issued in Poland from 1914 until 2009, including Danzig and German occupation notes. It is written entirely in Polish without translations, which isn't much of a loss because there is not a lot of text. The format of the book is pretty basic, with color illustrations of fronts and backs of notes, dimensions, dates of issuance, very brief descriptions including watermark and serial number, and values. This catalog is primary useful for identifying and valuing notes, not learning the historical background which puts Polish notes into perspective.

Tags: Poland, Danzig

For what it’s worth, Krause Publications has released a new 13th edition of the Standard Catalog of World Paper Money, General Issues, 1368-1960. I haven’t gotten a copy yet, but according to the press release, key features of the book include:

• 25,100 bank note varieties with current values in three condition grades.
• Enhanced note and color descriptions, allowing users to quickly identify varieties.
• More than 8,000 quality photographs to assist with identification.
• Historical details, grading definitions and numeral charts.

Like it or not, the SCWPM remains "the bible" for our hobby because its Pick numbers are almost universally used to identify notes. If you intend to get a copy despite its flaws, please support this site by buying the latest edition using this link.

Apples Are From Kazakhstan: The Land that Disappeared by Christopher Robbins (Order from Amazon.com)

This 296-page paperback book is a fascinating look at a country most Westerners barely know. The English author Robbins does a wonderful job of weaving his personal experiences in this former Soviet republic with rich historical background, from ancient times to repression under Russian rule in the last century. Of particular interest to banknote collectors is the chapter in which Robbins recounts the secret—and ultimately successful—plan to introduce tenge banknotes in 1993 to avoid being at the mercy of Moscow when it replaced the Soviet ruble with the new Russian ruble.

Tags: Kazakhstan

Catalog of Banknotes of the Civil War in Russia Volume V by Mikhail Istomin
452 pages, hard cover, 290 x 210 mm, B&W illustrations, Russian and English, published by XapbkoB, ISBN 978-966-180-084-6

This new catalog was published in 2010. It is written in Russian with English translations. All of the illustrations are in black & white. This volume covers official notes of the Turkestan Provinces, Bukhara, Khiva (Khorezm) from 1917-1923. For more information, or to purchase a copy for US$60 plus S&H, write to the author at istomin1956 [at] rambler.ru.

Tags: Russia

Bonos de Emergencia de Argentina (Emergency Notes from Argentina) by Eduardo Colantonio
140 pages, soft cover, 225 x 160 mm, color illustrations, Spanish, published by Eduardo Colantonio, ISBN 978-987-05-8331-8

This new catalog was published in April 2010. It is written entirely in Spanish, has color images of notes throughout, and includes information on signatures, series, issues, values, and different variations of emergency notes from 1985-2002. For more information, or to purchase a copy, visit www.monedasbilletes.com, or write to the author.

Tags: Argentina

World Paper Money Errors by Morland C. Fischer (Order from Amazon.com)
250 pages, soft cover, 230 x 150 mm, color illustrations, English, published by Zyrus Press Publishing, ISBN 978-1-933990-25-5

Reviewed by Owen W. Linzmayer

While there are several catalogs covering United States paper money errors, this book is the first attempt at a systematic approach to describing, documenting, and pricing errors on world banknotes. As such, it’s an important new addition to the world’s numismatics knowledge base, but it suffers from some shortcomings I hope will be addressed in future editions.

Author Morland C. Fischer does a very good job of explaining the various types of errors found on banknotes and has distilled them down to an eight-point FEN (Foreign Error Note) ranking system in which higher numbers correspond to more significant errors. Reasonable people might disagree over whether a missing overprint is more dramatic an error than an inverted back (FEN 4 and 7, respectively), but the codification of the taxonomy of errors is a welcome improvement to a subjective field of study.

The bulk of the book is devoted to illustrating the various error types, each broken into their own chapters. I found the introductory explanations of how specific types of errors happen in the production process particularly interesting. The book has color illustrations throughout, usually with the front and back of the error note at 50% actual size, along with a non-error note for comparison. This allows you to see the magnitude of the error and appreciate the artwork and intended design of the reference note, although some illustrations would have benefited by close-ups or annotations to highlight the affected areas of the note. There are lots of examples from many different countries and time periods, which is good overall, but it’s overkill for some types of errors, such as missing serial numbers, which are easy to understand without repetitive illustrations.

Personally, I would have liked to see more plate errors—also known as engraving errors—because I find man-made errors more intriguing than machine mistakes. As a writer and editor myself, I’m amused by the fact that central banks sometimes fail to catch embarrassing typos until after printing and issuing millions of notes into circulation. Alas, there are only a dozen such errors discussed. Entirely lacking are any examples of errors in security features, such as when a thread intended for one note appears in another, or the wrong watermark is used.

Anyone who has contemplated buying an error note will do well to first read the chapter on “pseudo” errors. At first glance these appear to be errors, but may have been intentionally created by unscrupulous collectors/dealers by miscutting individual notes from sheets or using chemicals to alter notes, for example. Sometimes they aren’t errors at all, but rather printers’ waste, proof notes, or remainders. Buyer beware.

Ironically, the author is not immune to making errors of his own. For example, he mistakes the front and back of Ukraine’s 20-hryvan note of 1992 (Pick 107), includes a 1,000-shilling fantasy note from Somaliland without mentioning its dubious origin, and the last few pages of the book are incorrectly set in fonts of varying size, resulting in a jumbled appearance. However these are all minor quibbles; for the most part the content is solid and unassailable.

My main complaint with this book is that author tries too hard to make the case that world error notes are undervalued. He provides a number of possible explanations for the disparity in prices between comparable errors on US and foreign notes, yet ignores what might be the most obvious explanation of all: differences in the values of the corresponding non-error notes. For example, he laments that a foldover error on a United States 10-dollar note dated 1969C (Pick 451d) is worth $1,000 - 2,000 whereas a similar printing error on a Mexican 500-peso note (Pick 69) is valued at $200 - 300. But when you consider that the SCWPM lists non-error examples of the former at four times the value of the latter, the price disparity between the errors doesn’t seem so significant nor unwarranted.

Judging by the passion with which he approaches his subject, it is apparent that the author loves error notes, but his insistence that world error notes are “undervalued,” with “considerable upside potential,” and “could be ready to explode,” comes across as a hard sell by someone with an agenda. I found cause for pause when reading “In some instances, a price may appear to be unusually high. However, prices were chosen to indicate what should be [emphasis mine] the fair market value…Moreover, the assigned price ranges reflect an extrapolation of expected prices over a period of five years from publication.” Pricing non-error world notes is fraught with difficulties (fluctuations in currency exchange rates and differences in foreign/domestic demand for a country’s own notes, for example) which are only compounded when considering far less common—sometimes even unique—error notes and trying to guess what they should be worth far into the future. The book would have greater credibility if it merely reported current free market prices and suggested reasonable premiums a collector might expect to pay for different types of errors.

World Paper Money Errors carries a list price of US$34.95 and can be ordered directly from Zyrus Press Publishing, P.O. Box 17810, Irvine, CA 92623. (888) 622-7823. www.zyruspress.com or purchased from Amazon at a significant discount.

Boggs: A Comedy of Values by Lawrence Weschler (Order from Amazon.com)

This book follows the twisted tale of the trials of J.S.G. Boggs, an artist who creates fanciful reproductions of world currency--by hand!--and then "spends" his artwork to buy real things. You'll be amazed at the beauty of Boggs' bills, laugh at the reactions he encounters as he tries to convince shop owners to accept his creations in lieu of currency, and cry at the heavy-handed tactics employed by the Secret Service and Bank of England to put a stop to his shenanigans. Along the way you'll learn about the long history of reproducing currency in fine art, and come to question the very nature of "value" as it applies to both art and money.

The Art of Money by David Standish (Order from Amazon.com)

This 144-page paperback isn't quite large enough or slick enough to qualify as a coffee-table book, but it's replete with hundreds of full-color images of gorgeous banknotes from around the globe. The author provides interesting anecdotes about why certain people, places, animals, and things appear on notes, and devotes chapters to national heroes, nudes, pastimes, crops, birds, and other themes. The main focus is modern world currency, making the section on U.S. notes uneven and weak. Still, this book is a must-have for any banknote fan, and will make non-collectors appreciate world notes as miniature pieces of art rather than deride them as "Monopoly money."

The 16th edition of Krause’s Standard Catalog of World Paper Money is now shipping. I just received my copy and wanted to share my initial impressions.

At 1,112 black and white pages, it's exactly as large as the previous edition, though its list price is now $60 instead of $55, and it does not come with a disc containing a PDF version of the catalog, which is a great disappointment.

Also somewhat disappointing is that values for VG conditions have been eliminated. Now only VF and UNC conditions are listed. While some will decry this change, I think it’s a reasonable change because most modern notes collectors insist on UNC anyway.

More troublesome is that this edition continues the trend of covering only a fraction of the new note types and varieties that have been issued in the past years, and illustrating almost none of them. It appears that the cut-off for inclusion in this catalog was mid-2009, but many, many notes issued well before then failed to make it into print (The Banknote Update contains over 80 pages of images and info missing from the 16th edition of the SCWPM).

In an attempt to appear more current than it really is, the catalog has assigned Pick numbers to a lot of "expected issues." The problem with this practice is that many such notes are never released, inevitably forcing the editors to renumber at a future date, much to the frustration of collectors and dealers everywhere (my cursory examination uncovered a half dozen notes that have been renumbered or deleted between editions). Furthermore, the information (such as dates) in the listings for these expected issues often proves wrong, adding to the general confusion.

Speaking of frustrating and confusing, some listings refer to non-existent signature charts, or the signature chart exists, but hasn’t been updated to include the latest signatures, making it impossible to distinguish between varieties.

I haven't done a thorough check of the entire catalog, but a spot check revealed some obvious pricing problems, such as listing Armenia's 100,000-dram note at $250 in UNC, even though its face value is $263. The 50,000-won from South Korea, featured on the cover of the new edition, is worth $40 at face, but is listed at $50 in UNC. Good luck finding dealers selling notes with negative or nominal mark-ups.

Like it or not, the SCWPM remains "the bible" for our hobby because its Pick numbers are almost universally used to identify notes. If you intend to get a copy despite its flaws, please support this site by buying the latest edition using this link.

Standard Catalog of World Paper Money: Specialized Issues Volume I, 11th Edition (Order from Amazon.com)

More than 50,000 updated prices for more than 17,500 notes are presented along with more than 10,000 photos of faces and backs for easy identification. This 1,200-page softcover provides helpful exchange and translation information. Published in 2009.