50 Heller, Gemeinde Pichl, 1920
Gutschein der Gemeinde Pichl, Oberoesterreich
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This copy
- Accession
- OM-00319
- Series year
- 1920
- Actually issued
- 1920
- mayor
- not read unread
Signed by hand in ink; the hand is not resolvable at 600 dpi.
- Grade
- AU (IBNS)
Strong impression on coarse buff stock; light corner wear. About uncurrent: bright and unfolded, with light handling - a corner bump or a faint edge tone. Estimated from the 600 dpi archival scan, which cannot show paper crispness, pinholes, pressing or small repairs.
- Estimated value
- $5 indicative
Category benchmark scaled for grade — an order of magnitude, not an appraisal. Priced 2026-09-26.
- Dimensions
- 76.1 × 50.9 mm (±1, from the scan)
- Themes
- NotgeldEmergency moneyUpper AustriaLocal designWoodcut designFirst Austrian Republic
The type
- Type
- 50 Heller, Gemeinde Pichl, 1920
- Printer
- Not established
- Rarity
- very common
Inscriptions
Die Gemeinde haftet fuer die Verbindlichkeit, diesen Schein in gesetzlichem Bargeld einzuloesen und hat hiefuer eine eigene Deckungsruecklage bestellt. Gueltig nur bis einschliesslich 1. November 1921. Die Nachahmung dieses Scheines wird gesetzlich bestraft.
The commune undertakes to redeem this note in legal tender and has set aside a cover reserve for the purpose. Valid only up to and including 1 November 1921. Counterfeiting this note is punishable by law.
Symbology
- The village from above
- The reverse takes the high viewpoint that Upper Austrian Notgeld returns to again and again: the whole parish laid out below the viewer, every roof drawn. It is a portrait of a place made for people who already knew it.
- Valid to November 1921
- Eighteen months of life, where most communal notes were given six or eight. The later the expiry, the less the promise was worth by the time it fell due.
What was happening
Austria in 1919 was a republic of six and a half million people left holding the currency of an empire of fifty. The Austro-Hungarian Bank was in liquidation, the peace treaties had cut the country off from most of its coal and much of its food, and small coin simply vanished: hoarded against worse to come, melted for the metal, or carried across the new frontiers where it bought more. Shops could not give change, and a country that cannot give change cannot trade.
So the communes printed their own. A council resolution, a local printer, a redemption date and the pledge of the commune's entire movable and immovable property - that was the whole legal apparatus behind several thousand separate issues of Heller notes between 1919 and 1921. Vienna tolerated it while it solved a real problem and moved to stop it in 1920, by which time the notes had found a second market: collectors would pay more than face value for a complete set, so a village could raise real money by printing money it hoped would never be presented. The artwork improved as the need receded.
Pichl is a commune in Upper Austria, and its note is the plainest kind: a black band of hand-lettering across the head, the legal formula beneath it, and on the back a broad woodcut of the village seen from the hill above, roofs and orchards running down to the valley.
Its validity runs to 1 November 1921, which is late. By then the Austrian government had been trying for more than a year to end communal issues, and the Krone had lost most of what value it still had in 1920.
This account belongs to the type, not this copy — it is shared by every 50 Heller, Gemeinde Pichl, 1920 in the collection.
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