1 Mark

Langenaltheim is a small village in the Altmühl valley, and like hundreds of German municipalities in 1917, it issued its own emergency paper money — Notgeld — to address the acute coin shortage caused by wartime metal hoarding and requisitioning. The Imperial government had effectively stripped small denominations from circulation, leaving local economies to improvise. J. P. Himmer in Augsburg handled a considerable volume of this municipal printing work across Bavaria, which kept unit costs low enough for even minor parishes to participate.

The official stamp is the operative security feature here — without it, the note carried no local authority and would not have been honored at the issuing municipality's cashier.