Common, scarce and rare Costa Rica currency (paper money; bank notes [also, banknotes]) at Mintmark.com.
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"The colón (named after Christopher Columbus, known as Cristóbal Colón in Spanish) is the currency of Costa Rica. The plural is colones in Spanish, but English-speakers often say colons instead. The ISO 4217 code is CRC. The symbol for the colón is a c with two slashes. The symbol ₡ has Unicode code point U+20A1, and the decimal representation is 8353. In HTML it can be entered as & # 8 3 5 3 ; [note: no spaces in previous; include the semicolon]. The colón sign is not to be confused with the cent sign (¢), which has a code point U+00A2 in Unicode (or 162 in decimal); or the cedi sign ₵, which has a code point U+20B5 in Unicode (or 8373 in decimal). The US Dollar is also accepted unofficially in many places throughout Costa Rica. The colón was introduced in 1896, replacing the Costa Rican peso at par. The colón is divided into 100 centimos, although, between 1917 and 1919, coins were issued using the name centavo for the 1/100 subunit of the peso . . . Four private banks, the Banco Anglo-Costarricense, the Banco Comercial de Costa Rica, the Banco de Costa Rica and the Banco Mercantil de Costa Rica, issued notes between 1864 and 1917. The Banco Anglo-Costarricense was established in 1864 and issued notes from 1864 to 1917. It later became a state-owned bank and in 1994 went bankrupt and closed. Notes were issued in denominations of 1, 25, 50, and 100 pesos as well as 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 colones. Some 1, 5, 10 and 20 colon notes (unsigned and undated) were released in 1963 when the bank celebrated its 100th anniversary. Some had Muestra sin Valor (sample without value) printed on them in order to nullify the legal tender status and to prevent people from selling them. Most, however, didn't have that printed on them, which makes it harder now-a-days to find notes with the seal. The Banco de Costa Rica was established in 1890 and issued notes from 1890 to 1914. It is currently a state-owned bank. Notes were issued in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 100 pesos as well as 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 colones. The government issued gold certificates in 1897 for 5, 10, 25, 50 and 100 colones. Between 1902 and 1917, it issued silver certificates for 50 centimos, 1, 2, 50 and 100 colones. In 1914, the Banco Internacional de Costa Rica introduced notes in denominations of 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 colones, to which 25 and 50 centimos, 1 and 2 colones were added in 1918. Although 25 centimos were not issued after 1919, the other denominations continued to be issued until 1936. After 1917, the Banco Internacional's notes were the only issued for circulation. The Banco Central de Costa Rica began issuing paper money in 1950, with notes for 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 colones. The first notes were provisional issues produced from Banco Nacional notes (unsigned and undated). The Central Bank printed on them the corresponding signatures and dates, and the legend BANCO CENTRAL DE COSTA RICA over BANCO NACIONAL DE COSTA RICA. Regular issues of notes began in 1951, but a second provisional issue of 2 colon notes was made in 1967. [error note for iPhone: 1967 and 1000 separated by a period is not a phone no.] 1000 colon notes were added in 1958, followed by 500 colones in 1973, 5000 colones in 1991, and 2000 and 10,000 colones in 1997 . . . In 2010, Costa Rican banknotes will undergo a reform and be replaced by a new model. Two new denominations will be introduced; 20,000 and 50,000 colones. The current notes will all be destroyed and replaced by new ones. The new banknotes will have different colors, shapes and images than their predecessors. All the denominations will have a different length so that blind people can also recognize the banknotes. This is expected to occur in the first trimester of 2010, and currently discussions are being held on the color, image, shape, material and security measures for the new banknotes . . . On May 18, 2009, the United States dollar was worth 563.38 colones . . ." — Costa Rican colón at Wikipedia
