5 Centavos Amecameca

Amecameca, a town at the foot of the Popocatépetl volcano, issued its own emergency coinage during the upheaval of the Mexican Revolution when the collapse of the federal monetary system forced municipalities and haciendas alike to produce local scrip. These brass pieces circulated within a tightly bounded geographic area, accepted by local merchants but worthless beyond the next town — a patchwork monetary reality that characterized much of provincial Mexico between roughly 1913 and 1917.

The State of Mexico attribution covers dozens of such municipal issues, many struck without formal authorization and in quantities that were never recorded.