10 Mark - Quedlinburg

Quedlinburg issued this porcelain notgeld piece during the acute metal shortage that followed Germany's defeat in World War I, when municipalities across the country turned to ceramics manufacturers — primarily the Meissen and other Saxon porcelain works — to produce emergency currency the central government could not. Porcelain notgeld occupies an unusual position in the notgeld canon: issued partly for circulation and partly for collectors who were already hoarding the paper issues, the ceramic pieces blurred that line from the start.

Quedlinburg's choice of white unglazed porcelain places it among the plainer examples of the type, without the polychrome decoration that made issues from some other towns more obviously collectible.