20 Heller

Austrian municipal notgeld of this type emerged from a straightforward practical problem: the postwar coin shortage was severe enough that small transactions became genuinely difficult, and the central government was in no position to remedy it quickly. Hundreds of communes issued their own emergency fractional notes between 1919 and 1922, Rabenstein among them. The Heller denominations were the workhorses of this system — low enough in face value that they circulated hard and wore out fast.

Coloured paper was a deliberate anti-counterfeiting choice at a denomination where engraved printing would have cost more than the note was worth.