The small mountainous region of Nagorno-Karabakh, located within the borders of Azerbaijan, is a disputed area that issued two banknotes in 2004. Both notes are collectible, for obvious reasons, but not hard to find for sale. Fans of both Armenia banknotes and Azerbaijan banknotes will usually have the complete set (of two!) Nagorno-Karabakh banknotes in their collections.
The Nagorno-Karabakh paper money came in two denominations:
2 dram (2 դրամ)
10 dram (10 դրամ)
Note that the dram unit is the same whether singular or plural. Nevertheless, some sellers of banknotes will use the term drams, and some will even use alternate spellings such as drahm or drahms. The word is related to the common currency term diram.
The 2-dram note from Nagorno-Karabakh has a reddish orange hue, while the larger 10-dram note features a greenish turquoise color scheme. Both notes depict Christian imagery.
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Identifying Nagorno-Karabakh Banknotes
There is no English on the two Nagorno-Karabakh banknotes; the only recognizable script to many Western collectors will be the 2 and 10 of the value, plus the date of 2004. Everything else is written in the Armenian script.
A line at the top of the bills begins with Լեռնային Ղարաբաղ, which is the Armenian name of the area (pronounced and written Leṙnayin Ġarabaġ). Note that differences in fonts styles can make the text on the bills appear quite different than the text on this page, however. Careful inspection may be necessary if you’re unsure about whether or not a bill is actually from Nagorno-Karabakh.
An alternative name for the area is Artsakh; this is written in Armenian as Արցախ and seems to appear in the eagle emblem on front and back of each of the two bills. The name “Nagorno-Karabakh”, incidentally, means “Upper Karabakh”.
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Collecting Nagorno-Karabakh Banknotes
With only two notes in the series, and since they are modern issues, finding both Nagorno-Karabakh banknotes for relatively cheap is generally no problem for buyers of banknotes. It’s a great way to secure some unique issues for your collection from a relatively obscure corner of the world.
There are other ways to buy these notes than simply “one of each” if you’re interested. Multi-bill sales are common, and you may also be interested in looking for 00000000-serial number type specimen notes.
