500 000 Mark

Düsseldorf's 500,000 Mark note dates from mid-1923, when German municipal authorities were legally empowered to issue their own emergency currency — Notgeld — because the Reichsbank simply could not print fast enough to keep pace with hyperinflation. By August of that year, the mark was losing value by the hour, and denominations that seemed astronomical in January were functionally worthless before autumn.

City-issued Notgeld of this period was printed locally and often on whatever paper stock was available, which accounts for the variability in paper quality and ink saturation found across surviving examples of this series.