50 Céntimos Xerta

Xerta is a small municipality in the Baix Ebre comarca of Tarragona, and this 50 céntimos note is one of hundreds of emergency local issues produced across Republican-held Catalonia during the Civil War. With the banking system effectively paralyzed and small coinage hoarded or melted, municipal councils were authorized — or simply took it upon themselves — to print fractional currency to keep local commerce moving. The handstamp served as the primary authenticity control, applied by whoever held the stamp at the ajuntament.

Turró catalogs well over two thousand such issues, and Xerta's are among the more obscure entries.