Following the departure of the
Ottoman Empire's forces in December 1898, the government of the autonomous
Cretan State, under
Eleftherios Venizelos, established the
Bank of Crete (
Banque de Crète) with the assistance of the
National Bank of Greece and Hambros Brothers on 30 September 1899. In addition to the functions of commercial and mortgage banking, the bank received the exclusive privilege, for thirty years, of issuing banknotes in the island of
Crete. The
National Bank of Greece wholly acquired, and subsumed the Bank of Crete in 1919. ==See also==