Saint-Mandé, a commune immediately east of Paris, issued these aluminium tokens through its Municipal Food Committee during the First World War, when metal shortages and the disruption of normal commerce forced hundreds of French municipalities to produce their own emergency small change. The Comité Municipal d'Alimentation was specifically a rationing body — these pieces circulated not as general currency but within the administered food supply system, redeemable against allocated goods rather than open-market purchases.
The two catalogue references suggest at least two die varieties exist for this type.
Saint-Mandé, a commune immediately east of Paris, issued these aluminium tokens through its Municipal Food Committee during the First World War, when metal shortages and the disruption of normal commerce forced hundreds of French municipalities to produce their own emergency small change. The Comité Municipal d'Alimentation was specifically a rationing body — these pieces circulated not as general currency but within the administered food supply system, redeemable against allocated goods rather than open-market purchases.
The two catalogue references suggest at least two die varieties exist for this type.