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1 000 000 000 Mark
| Issuer | Stadtkasse der Stadt Wetzlar |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
| Type | Local banknote |
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| Obverse description | Brown-toned Notgeld issue on plain paper with a guilloche underprint incorporating the Wetzlar municipal coat of arms as a central vignette. The denomination "Eine Milliarde Mark" is set in large ornate letterpress script across the upper central field, with the numeral "1" at each upper corner; below, the issuing text, the date "Wetzlar, den 18. September 1923", and the Bürgermeister's manuscript signature are arranged in successive lines. A serial number is printed vertically in red along the left margin. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | The reverse carries a rectangular letterpress vignette occupying the right two-thirds of the note, presenting a finely worked townscape of the Wetzlar Cathedral (Dom) with the Hauptwache in the foreground as it appeared circa 1850; a caption identifying the scene appears within the vignette. To the left, the word "Milliarde" is printed diagonally in large ornate script alongside the numeral "1". |
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| Comments |
Wetzlar's Stadtkasse was among hundreds of German municipal treasuries that issued their own emergency currency during the hyperinflation of 1923 — not by choice, but because the Reichsbank simply could not print fast enough to keep pace with collapsing purchasing power. By the time a note of this denomination was authorized, a billion marks would buy roughly what a few pfennigs had bought four years earlier. The velocity of depreciation during the September–November 1923 period was such that new denominations were obsolete almost upon issue.
Scharfes Druckereien, a local Wetzlar printer, handled production — which was the norm for Notgeld of this period. Municipal and regional issues were printed wherever capacity existed, with little standardization in paper quality or security features.