500 Mark

Hof an der Saale was a textile and railway town in Upper Franconia, and its municipal administration — like hundreds of German cities — was forced into issuing its own emergency currency in 1922 as hyperinflation outpaced the Reichsbank's ability to supply adequate small change and mid-denomination notes. This 500 Mark piece is Notgeld in its later, more desperate phase: not the decorative collector-oriented issues of 1920–21, but a functional stopgap produced under genuine fiscal pressure.

By late 1922, 500 Mark was already losing purchasing power fast enough that municipal treasuries were printing new denominations within weeks of each issue.