20 Mark

This note is a product of the Notgeld system — emergency municipal currency authorized as the German imperial government lost its grip on coin supplies during the war. Nuremberg and Fürth issuing jointly was itself unusual; most Notgeld came from a single municipal or commercial authority. The joint issue reflects the tight economic integration of the two cities, which shared industrial infrastructure and a common labor market long before their eventual administrative merger in 1972.

The watermarked paper signals an attempt at credibility above the average Notgeld issue, which typically relied on printed serial numbers alone as the only fraud deterrent.