5 Pfennig - Mühlberg a. E.

Mühlberg an der Elbe was a small Elbe river town in Brandenburg whose municipal government, like hundreds of others across Germany, issued zinc notgeld in 1917 when wartime metal requisitions stripped the Reich's coinage supply down to almost nothing. The imperial government had begun pulling copper and nickel from circulation as early as 1915; by 1917, even zinc was being rationed, which makes the municipal authorization to strike in that metal a narrow window that closed quickly.

Funck catalogues only a single variety for this issue, suggesting no significant die changes during production.