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50 000 000 Mark
| Issuer | Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg (Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
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| Printer | Verlagsgesellschaft deutscher Konsumvereine m.b.H., Hamburg, Germany |
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| Obverse description | Brown-toned emergency note (Aushilfsschein) printed on plain paper, with an overall fine guilloche underprint covering the field. At upper centre, the Hamburg coat of arms (white castle on red ground) appears in two circular vignettes flanking the heading text, while a detailed intaglio vignette of a medieval Hanseatic cog under sail occupies the right panel. The denomination 'Fünfzig Millionen Mark' is set in large Gothic blackletter script across the centre, with '50 MILLIONEN MARK' repeated in bold letterpress along the lower margin, and two manuscript facsimile signatures appear above the official circular seal of the Hauptstaatskasse Hamburg. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Aushilfsschein der freien und Hansestadt Hamburg Fünfzig Millionen Mark Dieser Aushilfsschein wird von allen hamburgischen staatlichen Kassen und den Banken in Hamburg in Zahlung genommen. Hamburg, den 11. September 1923. Die Finanzdeputation: Die Hauptstaatskasse: 50 MILLIONEN MARK Verlagsgesellschaft deutscher Konsumvereine mit beschränkter Haftung, Hamburg 5. |
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| Comments |
Hamburg, like other German states and municipalities, was forced into emergency currency production in 1923 as the Reichsbank's printing capacity collapsed under hyperinflation. By the time denominations reached the fifty-million mark range — summer into autumn of 1923 — notes were losing purchasing power faster than they could be distributed. The Verlagsgesellschaft deutscher Konsumvereine was a publishing cooperative primarily serving the German consumer cooperative movement, pressed into notgeld production simply because it had functioning presses.
The cooperative-press origin is the detail worth noting here: this was not a bank printer or a specialist security printer, but a trade publisher turned emergency currency producer by circumstance.