100 Escudos 1981, Portugal
| in Krause book | Number: 178b |
| Years of issue: | 24.02.1981 |
| Edition: | -- |
| Signatures: | Governador: Manuel Jacinto Nunes, Administrador: José de Matos Torres |
| Serie: | No Serie |
| Specimen of: | 1980 |
| Material: | Cotton fiber |
| Size (mm): | 147 x 74 |
| Printer: | Joh. Enschede en Zonen, Haarlem |
* All pictures marked 
are increased partially by magnifying glass, the remaining open in full size by clicking on the image.
** The word "Specimen" is present only on some of electronic pictures, in accordance with banknote images publication rules of appropriate banks.
Description
Watermark:
Manuel M. B. du Bocage.
Avers:
The engraving on banknote is made after this painting of Manuel Maria Barbosa du Bocage. It was dedicated to António Araújo de Azevedo, Secretary of State, Foreign Affairs and War between 1804 and 1808.
Manuel Maria Barbosa du Bocage (September 15, 1765 - December 21, 1805) was a Portuguese Neoclassic poet, writing under the pen name Elmano Sadino.
Neoclassical Portuguese lyric poet who aspired to be a second Camões but who dissipated his energies in a stormy life.
The son of a lawyer, Bocage left school at the age of 14 to join the army, then transferred to the navy at 16. At the Royal Navy Academy in Lisbon, he devoted his time to love affairs, poetry, and bohemianism. In 1786 he was sent, like his hero Camões, to India and also like him was disillusioned by the Orient. He deserted to Macau, returning to Lisbon in 1790. He then joined the New Arcadia, a literary society with vaguely egalitarian and libertarian sympathies, but his satires on his fellow members resulted in his expulsion, and a long verse war ensued, engaging most of the poets of Lisbon.
In 1797 he was accused of propagating republicanism and atheism and was imprisoned. During his imprisonment he undertook translations of Virgil and Ovid. Translations provided him with a livelihood during the few years that he lived after his release. He also translated Torquato Tasso, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Jean Racine, and Voltaire.
Bocage employed various verse forms, but he is at his best in the sonnet. Despite the Neoclassical framework of his poetry, his intensely personal accent, frequent violence of expression, and self-dramatizing obsession with fate and death anticipate Romanticism. His collected poems were published as Rimas, 3 vol. (1791, 1799, 1804).
At the top is the coat of arms of Portugal.
The coat of arms of Portugal was officially adopted on 30 June 1911, along with the republican flag of Portugal. It is based on the coat of arms used by the Portuguese Kingdom since the Middle Ages.
The Portuguese coat of arms is the result of almost a millennium of modifications and alterations. Starting with Henry of Burgundy blue cross on a silver shield, successive elements were added or taken, culminating with the complex heraldic design that was officially adopted in 1911 (after the Republican Revolution of 1910). The two stripes bear the colours of the Portuguese flag: red and green.
Quinas:
After the official recognition of the Kingdom of Portugal as an independent country in 1143 (it had been declared in 1139), silver bezants were added to the Burgundian flag, symbolising coins and the right the monarch had to issue currency, as leader of a sovereign state. Eventually, and given the enormous dynamism of medieval heraldry, it is believed that the shield degraded and lost some elements in battle, eventually losing the cross format. This is how King Sancho I inherited the shield from his father, Afonso Henriques, with no cross and the quinas (the five escutcheons with the silver bezants) in its place.
Later, the number of silver bezants in each escutcheon would be reduced from eleven to five by King Sebastian I, and modern explanations interpret them as the five wounds of Jesus Christ, although this is highly improbable.
Castles:
It was during the reign of Afonso III that the red border with golden castles (not towers, as some sources state) was added. Although the number of castles could vary between eight to twelve, Afonso IV would define them as twelve and Sebastian I would finally fix them as seven. They supposedly represent the Moorish castles conquered by the Kingdom of Portugal during the Reconquista. Their origin is probably Castilian, but unlike Spanish castles, which usually have their gates coloured blue (hence opened), Portuguese castles were always depicted with gold gates (hence closed). As a matter of fact, Afonso III was the second son of King Afonso II of Portugal and thus was not expected to inherit the throne, which was destined to go to his elder brother King Sancho II of Portugal. As a second son, the coat of arms of Afonso III included both the arms of his father and the arms of his mother Urraca of Castile, thus the Castillan red border with golden castillan castles, around the Portuguese shield inherited from his father.
Armillary sphere:
An important element of Portuguese heraldry since the 15th century, the armillary sphere was many times used in Portuguese colonial flags, mainly in Brazil. It was a navigation instrument used to calculate distances and represents the importance of Portugal during the Age of Discovery, as well as the vastness of its colonial empire when the First Republic was implemented.
Although it is commonly used as a "republican" element, as opposed to the monarchist crown in the blue/white flag (see Flag of Portugal), some monarchist flags, such as the flag of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves, already depicted armillary spheres. The incorporation of the armillary sphere into the 1816 flag of the United Kingdom of Portugal is related to the adoption of the first flag of the Kingdom of Brazil, an armillary sphere on a blue background.
The coat of arms sported different crowns during imperial rule of Portuguese and foreign crowns:
Pre mid-1500s the coat of arms had an open imperial crown,
Crown of the House of Habsburg,
Various crowns of the House of Braganza (1640-1817),
Crown of João VI (1817-1910).
Denominations in numerals are in lower left and top right corners. In words centered.
Revers:
The view from the early XIX century at the square Rossio (Praca Rossio).
Rossio Square is the popular name of the Pedro IV Square (Portuguese: Praça de D. Pedro IV) in the city of Lisbon, in Portugal. It is located in the Pombaline Downtown of Lisbon and has been one of its main squares since the Middle Ages. It has been the setting of popular revolts and celebrations, bullfights and executions, and is now a preferred meeting place of Lisbon natives and tourists alike.
The current name of the Rossio pays homage to Pedro IV, King of Portugal as well as first Emperor of Brasil (as Pedro I). The Column of Pedro IV is in the middle of the square.
In front of the crowd in the painting:
On this place was The Hospital Real de Todos os Santos (All Saints Royal Hospital). It was a major hospital in Lisbon, Portugal. The hospital was built between 1492 and 1504 and was destroyed in the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, along with most of the city.
After that, in 1755, the Marquis of Pombal presented the design of the new Palace of the Inquisition to the architect Carlos Mardel.
In 1836, the palace suffered a fire in 1846 and in its place was built the D. Maria II National Theatre.
The National Theater D. Maria II (Portuguese: Teatro Nacional D. Maria II) is a theatre in Lisbon, Portugal. The historical theater is one of the most prestigious Portuguese venues and is located in the Rossio square, in the center of the city.
The theater was built on the north side of Rossio square on the site of the old Estaus Palace, built around 1450 as a lodging for foreign dignitaries and noblemen visiting Lisbon. In the XVI century, when the Inquisition was installed in Portugal, the Estaus Palace became the seat of the Inquisition. The palace survived the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, but was destroyed by fire in 1836.
Thanks to the intensive efforts of Romantic poet and dramatist Almeida Garrett, it was decided to replace the old palace by a modern theater, dedicated to Queen Mary II of Portugal. The building was constructed between 1842 and 1846 to a Neoclassical design by Italian architect Fortunato Lodi.
The building is the best representative of Neoclassical architecture of Palladian influence in Lisbon. The main feature of the façade is a portico (hexastyle) with six Ionic columns reused from the Saint Francis Convent of Lisbon and a triangular pediment. The tympanum of the pediment is decorated with a sculpted relief showing Apollo and the Muses.
The pediment is topped by a statue of Renaissance playwright Gil Vicente (c. 1464 - c. 1536), considered the founder of Portuguese theater. Ironically, some of Gil Vicente's plays had been censured by the Portuguese Inquisition in the late XVI century.
The interior of the theater was decorated by many important XIX-century Portuguese artists, but much of this decoration was lost in a fire in 1964. The theater had to be completely renovated and was re-inaugurated only in 1978. 
Denominations in numerals are in lower left and top right corners.
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