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50 000 000 Mark
| Issuer | Stadt Wattenscheid (City of Wattenscheid) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
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| Shape | Rectangular |
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| Obverse description | Printed in red on cream paper, the obverse carries a central oval vignette of a robed civic figure against a guilloche underprint bearing the city name 'Wattenscheid' in large script letters. The denomination '50,000,000' appears in the upper corners in bold Gothic numerals, with the issuing authority legend and payment promise text arranged in Fraktur script across the centre. The date 'den 1. Septbr. 1923' and a circular city seal are printed at the lower left, with a facsimile signature of the Bürgermeister at the lower right. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse lettering | Stadt Wattenscheid 50000000 Fünfzig Millionen Mark |
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| Comments |
Wattenscheid was an independent industrial city in the Ruhr — coal and steel country — when it issued this 50-million Mark emergency note in the autumn of 1923, at the peak of Germany's hyperinflationary collapse. By October of that year, the Reichsbank was printing denominations in the billions, and local authorities across the country scrambled to produce their own Notgeld to make payroll and keep commerce moving at all.
Municipal issues like this one were typically lithographed locally under rushed conditions, which accounts for the variable print quality seen across surviving examples of Wattenscheid's high-denomination series. The city was absorbed into Bochum in 1975.