10 Heller Kufstein, Purple issue

Kufstein's municipal government issued its own emergency currency — Notgeld — during the economic chaos that followed Austria-Hungary's collapse. These small-denomination heller notes filled a genuine void: coins had disappeared from circulation as metal was hoarded or diverted, and the central banking system was in no position to supply small change to a provincial Tyrolean town.

The "purple issue" designation distinguishes this from other color variants in the same Kufstein series, a common cataloguing necessity given how many municipalities ran multiple print runs with ink variations as their only meaningful differentiator. JPR0491g covers the full Kufstein group; the suffix identifies this specific printing.

Kufstein sits on what became the Austrian-Bavarian border after 1919 — the political uncertainty of that border region gave local Notgeld an added function as community identity markers during a genuinely unsettled moment in Tyrolean governance.