0 Euro - Sanctuaire Notre-Dame de Vassivière

The zero-euro souvenir note was introduced by the Union Européenne des Collectionneurs de Coupons (UECC) in 2015 as a legal novelty — technically valid currency under EU law but issued at a face value that precludes any practical monetary use. Oberthur Fiduciaire, one of the few security printers in France with a continuous banknote production history stretching back to the nineteenth century, produced the series with the same substrate and intaglio security features used on circulating euro notes, which is precisely what makes them attractive to collectors.

Notre-Dame de Vassivière sits at roughly 1,200 metres in the Massif Central, a pilgrimage site active since the thirteenth century with an unusual seasonal migration tradition: the statue of the Virgin is carried down to Besse-en-Chandesse each autumn and returned each spring.