At the end of the 18th century AD, there were several hundred private provincial banks in England. Each one issued its own paper notes. In order to make the notes distinctive and to prevent forgery, more elaborate designs began to be used. Civic coats of arms provided attractive and easily recognisable local symbols which appealed to local pride and loyalty and probably suggested that the notes were more ‘official’.

Notes produced by the bank of Great Yarmouth (Norfolk) in the 1780s, would have been easily recognised by its inhabitants because they bore the town’s unusual coat of arms. It dates back to the medieval period when English towns first began to adopt coats of arms. The shield contains the front halves of three lions (symbols of England) joined to the tails of three herrings. Yarmouth’s ancient herring fair was controlled by the Cinque Ports of the south coast. The arms of one of the ports, Romney, displayed the fronts of three lions joined to the sterns of three ships; Yarmouth adapted the Romney lions to suit its own industry of herring fishing.

During the 19th century, the number of private banks, and the many attractive notes they produced, were greatly reduced. The last private bank note was issued in 1921.