100 Mark Reichsbanknote, red seals

The 1908–1910 series of 100 Mark notes represented the Reichsbank's effort to standardize and modernize its large-denomination paper following a decade of incremental design revisions. Reichsdruckerei had by this point developed considerable in-house engraving capacity, reducing German reliance on foreign security printers — a point of some institutional pride in Berlin. The red seal distinguishes this series from the later 1910-dated issues with black seals, a detail that catches out inattentive collectors more often than it should.

These circulated heavily through the final years of Wilhelmine prosperity and into the early war economy. Notes from this series that survived past 1918 were typically worn to rags.