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HEJAZ. Arabian National Bank of Hedjaz. 1929. All slightly used with payers (?) name at right edge, one in English (Daira Hoirs Prince Habib. Pacha Lotfal...), the others in Arabic and all signed by Michel Lotfallah. An interesting group, some in Arabic and some in French. Wm Rosenblum Sale 36C, lot 752
May 26, 2006  $100

Hejaz KM.26, Y.21  1/2 Piastre
 AH1334(1915) Year 8
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Reverse

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The Mecca coin above is the only known example of this piece, while the Hijaz coins is one of two known examples.
(1) This attribution has been questioned by an expert.

Hijaz banknotes are among the most sought after and rarest known to collectors. A complete SPECIMEN set is housed in the Jordan Central Bank Museum and just a few other pieces are reported in private collections.

King Farouk had a four pieces in his collection, three of which are now believed to be in North America.

The 100 Pound note above, P.6R was a scan taken from the 1981 Ted Uhl "Classic Pricelist". The scans of P.2R and P.2C  1 Pound were obtained from a CD purchased on eBay some years ago. No knowledge of the origin of these notes are known. I was informed by a North American numismatist, that the Uhl 100 had the watermark cut out and another watermark substituted. This it is assumed was done because of rusty watermark area resulting from pinning as is the case of 3 other North American specimens extant.

A few years ago a collector from Central Europe visited the museum and made a copy of these notes. He then reproduced them and sold them on eBay. The images above of a  £1 note is one of these reproductions.

Numismatists Peter Symes was also bitten by the Hijaz bug and wrote a wonderful book about these fascinating issues, referenced below. Peter has a unique ability to find obscure information somehow hidden for decades and portray it in a way that captures us all.

Hijaz had a brief period of political independence starting in 1916 when it was proclaimed by Hussein ibn Ali, the Sherif of Makkah. In 1925 ibn Ali's authority was usurped by ibn Saud of the neighboring state of Nejd and became known as the Kingdom of Hijaz and Nejd, later Saudi Arabia. Sherif Ali's sons were more successful becoming the first rulers of Trans-Jordan(Abdullah), Syria(Faisal) and Iraq(Faisal).

* We gratefully acknowledge numismatist, researcher and author Peter Symes for providing the above SPECIMEN banknote images.

ALM  We gratefully acknowledge ALM  for providing these coin images.