5 Pesetas Barcelona; Preventori Judicial - Economat

The Preventori Judicial was Barcelona's pre-trial detention facility — what in English would approximate a remand prison. During the Civil War, Republican-controlled Catalonia saw a proliferation of internal camp and institution currencies, issued to allow detainees or staff to transact within the facility without handling standard Republican tender. This particular token note from the Economat — the internal canteen or commissary — dates to a period when Barcelona's institutions were operating under considerable administrative strain, with the city less than a year from Nationalist capture in January 1939.

The AL catalogue reference places it firmly within the documented Catalan local issues, though survival rates for prison and detention facility scrip are low; most were never redeemed and simply discarded.