5 000 000 Mark

Mainz issued its own emergency currency — Notgeld — because the Reichsbank simply could not print fast enough to keep pace with hyperinflation in 1923. By the time a five-million-mark note cleared the municipal printing office, its purchasing power had already eroded. Cities across the Rhine-Ruhr region were doing the same thing, but the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr from January 1923 placed particular pressure on western German municipalities, Mainz among them, which had been under Allied occupation since 1918.

The embossed seal is the primary security feature — modest by any standard, but municipal printers were not equipped for more.