100 000 Mark Deutsch-Luxemburgische Bergwerks- und Hütten-AG

Deutsch-Luxemburgische Bergwerks- und Hütten-AG was one of the great industrial combines of Weimar-era Germany — a steel and mining conglomerate with operations stretching from the Ruhr into Luxembourg. Like hundreds of major German industrial firms during the hyperinflation of 1923, it was authorized to issue its own emergency currency, Notgeld, to meet payroll when Reichsbank notes became worthless faster than the presses could print them. Workers needed something — anything — that could be exchanged locally before the next denomination surge made it obsolete.

At 100,000 Mark, this note dates from a period when that sum was still a plausible wage packet, placing it likely in the spring or early summer of 1923, before the truly catastrophic zeroes arrived in autumn.