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10 Pfennig
| Issuer | Magistrat Benneckenstein im Harz |
|---|---|
| Year | 1919 |
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| Shape | Rectangular |
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| Obverse description | Black letterpress on pale violet-grey paper. The upper portion carries a bold Gothic-script heading reading 'Notgeld des Höhenluftkurortes Benneckenstein im Harz', flanked on each side by the denomination numeral '10' within decorative brackets above the inscription 'PFENNIG'. At centre, a vignette of Saint Laurentius — patron saint of miners and metallurgists — is shown standing in full figure, holding a gridiron, with the caption 'St. Laurentius, Schutzheilliger der Berg- und Hüttenleute'. The lower half presents a panoramic townscape of Benneckenstein set within a rectangular frame, with a deer vignette to the left and a skier vignette to the right, the whole dated 'Benneckenstein, im Oktober 1919' above a facsimile magistrate signature. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Black letterpress on pale violet-grey paper with an ornamental border of repeating geometric and foliate motifs. Two oval cartouches at left and right each bear the numeral '10'. The central field carries the denomination written in large cursive script as 'Zehn Pfennige', with the clause 'an den Einlieferer' beneath. A serial number is printed in red below the central inscription. A small-print legal notice at the base states the conditions under which the note's validity would lapse. |
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| Comments |
Benneckenstein is a small town in the Harz mountains, and its 1919 notgeld issue belongs to the first wave of municipal emergency money that flooded Germany after the war as coin shortages made small-denomination transactions nearly impossible. The Magistrat — the local civil authority — issued these notes on its own account, not through any banking institution, which was entirely typical for Harz-region towns of this size during the hyperinflationary run-up years.
The DeNG 6#B18 reference places this within Grabowski and Mehl's systematic notgeld catalog. Benneckenstein issues from this period are not among the heavily reprinted "collector series" notgeld that municipalities began cynically producing for the philatelic market from 1920 onward — this is functional issue paper, made because the town needed it.