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50 Pfennig Monastery Series - Issue 2
| Issuer | Gemeinde Paulinzella (Municipality of Paulinzella, Thuringia) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1921 |
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| Currency | Mark (1914-1924) |
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| Obverse description | The face is rendered in a polychrome letterpress style typical of German Notgeld, with a central vignette of the Paulinzella monastery buildings set against a sunburst underprint in red-orange. Flanking the central image are two standing ecclesiastical figures in full episcopal vestments — mitres, crosiers, and red chasubles — one to each side, executed in a flat, medievalist illustrative manner. The large Gothic-script denomination numeral '50 Pf' occupies the lower central field, beneath which a text panel carries validity and issuing authority inscriptions; verse text in Gothic script runs along the upper and lower borders of the note. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | The reverse carries a dramatic, richly coloured vignette of the Romanesque interior ruins of Paulinzella Abbey, rendered in a dark expressionist palette of deep purples, reds, greens, and ochre; the view leads through a series of round-arched arcades toward a distant open apse, with autumn foliage visible at the upper corners. A horizontal panel at the foot of the design, in yellow with red Gothic lettering, bears the issuer inscription flanked by the denomination numeral '50' at each side. The printer's imprint appears in small Roman script directly below the lower border. |
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| Comments |
Paulinzella is a village of a few hundred inhabitants built around the ruins of a Benedictine monastery founded in 1105 — one of the more complete Romanesque ruins in central Germany. During the inflation-era Notgeld frenzy, even settlements this small could issue their own emergency currency, and many did so with obvious awareness that collectors, not local shopkeepers, were the primary audience.
The Johannes Arndt press in Jena handled a substantial volume of Thuringian Notgeld commissions in this period. The "Issue 2" designation confirms a prior series existed, meaning Paulinzella returned to press at least twice — unusual for a municipality with essentially no economic weight of its own.