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20 000 000 000 Mark

Issuer Stadt Freital (City of Freital)
Year 1923
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Printer Johannes Pässler, Dresden-Neustadt, Germany
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Obverse description The obverse of this German inflation-era Notgeld note is set in a plain letterpress composition with the issuing authority designation at the top and the large numeral denomination centrally placed. The face value of twenty billion Mark is rendered in both figures and text in keeping with the rapid currency devaluation of the hyperinflationary period of 1923. An official municipal stamp or validation mark would typically appear, lending the note its local legal standing.
Obverse lettering 20 000 000 000 Mark
Zwanzig Milliarden Mark
Stadt Freital
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Freital, incorporated as a city only in 1921 through the merger of several Saxon industrial communities, was barely two years old when it issued this note. The 20 billion Mark denomination places it squarely in the final weeks of Weimar hyperinflation, when municipal authorities across Germany were compelled to print their own Notgeld simply to meet payroll — Reichsbank notes were arriving so devalued that new denominations were obsolete before distribution was complete.

Johannes Pässler operated out of Dresden-Neustadt and handled emergency currency for several Saxon municipalities during this period. The note's sheer face value, routine by late October 1923, was functionally worthless within days of issue.

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