5 Mark - Kirschau Vereinigte Spinnereien u. Webereien G.M.B.H.

Issued by a textile firm in Kirschau, a weaving and spinning town in Upper Lusatia, this is notgeld — emergency money produced by private companies and municipalities when the Reichsbank could no longer keep small-denomination coins in circulation during the inflationary spiral of the early 1920s. Factories and employers often issued their own scrip partly for payroll convenience and partly to keep workers spending locally, since many pieces were only redeemable at company-affiliated stores.

Aluminium was the material of necessity by 1922 — copper and zinc had been swallowed by wartime requisition years earlier.