1 Pfennig

Magdeburg's 1630 coinage was struck under extraordinary duress. The city was then enduring the opening stages of a siege by Imperial and Catholic League forces under Tilly — a blockade that would culminate in May 1631 with the sack of Magdeburg, one of the most catastrophic single events of the Thirty Years' War, killing upward of 20,000 civilians. Small silver pfennig issues from this period were almost certainly emergency municipal coinage, minted to keep local commerce functioning as the city's fate hung in the balance.