Lot 277
Bank of Scotland
An Exact State or Abbreviate of the Affairs of the Bank of Scotland
Auction: Books & Manuscripts | 01 October 2026 from 10am | Lots 253 to 285
Description
as they stand ballanced to the 27th March 1728, the Day upon which they were obliged to stop Payments, through Deficiency of Cash: and how the same stands this 18th June the said Year. [Edinburgh: no printer], 1728. Printed broadside (47 x 37cm) [ESTC T225153; Goldsmith's 6619; Hanson 3875]
Footnote
A very rare survival from a key moment in the history of banking (only three copies traced by ESTC), announcing the suspension of payments by the Bank of Scotland in response to the aggressive expansion of the newly founded Royal Bank of Scotland, an event which exposed the risks of paper currency, undercapitalisation, and the weakness of firms accustomed to operating in monopolistic conditions.
‘In 1727 … a second public bank, the Royal Bank of Scotland, was established by Royal Charter and began to issue notes. Almost at once the ’New' Bank set out to break the ‘Old’ by accumulating its notes and making substantial and unpredictable demands for payment … When, on the day of the Old Bank's annual general meeting on 27th March 1728, the New Bank presented £900 in notes, payment was suspended and not fully resumed for a year. Litigation between the banks followed … Relations … were to remain strained for many years until an emerging challenge from private banks in the third quarter of the century made co-operation seem desirable or even essential' (Fox & Ernst, eds., Money in the Western Legal Tradition, 2016, p. 557).