10 Gulden Siege money, Arad

Among the most historically compressed pieces of paper in Hungarian numismatics. The Fortress of Arad issued these notes during the final weeks of the 1848–49 revolution, when the garrison was entirely cut off by Austrian and Russian forces. With no connection to the Kossuth government's printing operations in Debrecen, the fortress commandant authorized a purely local emergency emission — hand-signed by the two garrison officials whose names appear on each note.

Arad surrendered in August 1849. Thirteen Hungarian generals were executed there on October 6th of that year, a date still marked in Hungary. The notes predating that surrender by weeks are among the rarest products of the entire revolutionary period.