5 Drachmai

The "Ελληνική Πολιτεία" issuer name dates this note precisely: it was the administrative designation adopted under the Axis occupation government installed after the fall of Athens in April 1941. The Greek State, as distinct from the Kingdom, issued low-denomination notes like this one partly because the occupation authorities had stripped the Bank of Greece of meaningful monetary control, and small-change paper filled a practical gap left by hoarded and disappeared coinage.

Aspioti-ELKA printed this in Athens under occupation conditions — not an insignificant detail, given the material shortages and disruptions of that period.