1 Mark Sparkasse

Arnsberg's Sparkasse — a municipal savings institution, not a central bank — issued this note during the acute small-change shortage that followed Germany's hyperinflationary spiral of the early 1920s. Thousands of local authorities, cooperatives, and private firms issued their own Notgeld during this period, but savings bank issues carry a particular administrative weight: the Sparkasse was typically backed by the municipality itself, giving these notes marginally more credibility than commercial scrip.

F. W. Becker was a local Arnsberg printer, and the engraver credit to J. Schweriner is uncommon enough that it suggests a deliberate investment in quality for a note of this denomination. The watermarked paper reinforces that — most 1-Mark Notgeld from comparable issuers skipped security features entirely.