1 000 000 Mark Bergwerksgesellschaft Hibernia

Hibernia was one of the largest coal-mining companies in the Ruhr, and like hundreds of German industrial firms during the hyperinflation of 1923, it issued its own emergency currency — Notgeld — to pay wages when the Reichsbank could not supply sufficient physical notes fast enough to keep pace with collapsing purchasing power. By mid-1923, a million marks was worth almost nothing; within weeks of issue, denominations like this were already obsolete.

Corporate Notgeld from the Ruhr carries an additional layer of history: French and Belgian occupation of the region from January 1923 severely disrupted normal banking channels, accelerating the need for private issuers to step in.