20 Centimes - Ahmad II

Issued under the Bey of Tunis Ahmad II ibn Ali during the Vichy French protectorate period, this zinc piece reflects wartime metal rationing that stripped North African colonial issues of their traditional copper and nickel. France's defeat in 1940 cascaded directly into coinage policy across its protectorates — zinc was what remained available. Tunisia would change hands violently the following year, with Axis and Allied forces fighting across the country from November 1942 through May 1943, meaning many of these coins entered circulation into an economy already collapsing under military occupation.