Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
50 Kopeken Ostbank für Handel und Gewerbe, Darlehnskasse Ost
| Issuer | Ostbank für Handel und Gewerbe, Darlehnskasse Ost |
|---|---|
| Year | 1916 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 50 Kopecks (50 Kopeken) (0.50) |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Darlehnskassenschein 50 Fünfzig Kopeken 50 Posen, den 17. April 1916. Ostbank für Handel und Gewerbe, Darlehnskasse Ost. Wer Darlehnskassenscheine nachmacht oder verfälscht oder nachgemachte oder verfälschte sich verschafft und in Verkehr bringt, wird mit Zuchthaus bis zu acht Jahren bestraft. |
| Reverse description | Light green note with a fine guilloche underprint, the central design consisting of a large oval guilloche medallion enclosing the numeral "50", flanked symmetrically by two circular rosette guilloche vignettes, all printed in dark brown. The denomination and issuing authority are rendered in four languages across the face: Lithuanian at top centre, Polish along the left margin, and Latvian along the right margin, each in bold serif lettering. Anti-counterfeiting warnings in Polish, Lithuanian, and Latvian are set in three parallel text columns along the lower portion of the note. |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Log in to see details |
| Protection description | Log in to see details |
| Variants | Log in to see details |
| Comments |
Darlehnskasse Ost was a German military-administered loan office established in 1916 to manage currency in the eastern occupied territories — a deliberate instrument of economic extraction rather than a conventional banking institution. The notes it issued were not redeemable in Reich marks at par, which kept local purchasing power artificially suppressed and German military procurement costs low.
Printed in Posen — itself under German control since the Partitions — the series circulated across a patchwork of occupied Russian and Polish territories where no single pre-existing currency remained viable. The 50 Kopeken denomination acknowledged the kopek-based mental arithmetic of the local population while keeping the issuing authority unmistakably German.