20 Pfennigs

Eichstätt's municipal administration issued this Kleingeldschein during the acute coin shortage that gripped Germany from 1916 onward — hoarding of metal currency had stripped small denominations almost entirely from everyday commerce. Hundreds of German towns printed their own emergency paper fractions, and the Stadtmagistrat here was simply doing what local authorities across Bavaria were doing simultaneously.

The official stamp substituted for the security infrastructure a proper issuing bank would have used. That stamp — applied individually by hand — is what distinguishes a valid example from a contemporary counterfeit or a later fantasy piece.