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1/4 Million Mark - Westfalen Freiherr vom Stein

Issuer Provinz Westfalen (Province of Westphalia)
Year 1923
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Weight 1.3 g
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Obverse script Latin (Fraktur blackletter)
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Reverse script Latin (Fraktur blackletter)
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Additional information

Westphalia issued this piece in August 1923, at the precise moment when Germany's hyperinflation was accelerating beyond any rational planning horizon. Provincial and municipal authorities across the Reich were printing Notgeld not out of choice but necessity — the Reichsbank simply could not produce coin fast enough to keep pace with collapsing purchasing power. A quarter-million marks was a meaningful sum in early 1923; by November it would not buy a postage stamp.

The choice of Freiherr vom Stein as the honorific subject was deliberate regionalism — the Prussian reformer was born in Nassau but his administrative career was deeply tied to Westphalian governance.

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