20 Heller

Puchberg im Machland is a small agricultural commune in Upper Austria, and this Heller note belongs to the vast wave of Austrian municipal emergency money — Notgeld — issued from 1919 onward as postwar coin shortages made small-denomination transactions nearly impossible. Hundreds of villages issued their own, and most circulated only within the issuing community, redeemable at the local Gemeindekasse. The official stamp was the primary — often the only — authentication mechanism these municipalities had available.

The Jaksch catalogue documents over a thousand such Austrian issues. Puchberg's entry is among the more obscure ones.