50 Pfennig, Stadt Marburg, 1918
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This copy
- Accession
- OM-00446
- Series year
- 1918
- Actually issued
- 1918
- magistrate
- not read unread
Printed as a facsimile; the engraver's reduction has lost the letter forms.
- Grade
- XF (IBNS)
Light toning; soft corners. Estimated from the 600 dpi archival scan, which shows folds, soiling and edge condition but not paper crispness, pinholes, pressing or small repairs.
- Estimated value
- $5.5 indicative
Category benchmark scaled for grade — an order of magnitude, not an appraisal. Priced 2026-09-26.
- Dimensions
- 91.6 × 60.4 mm (±1, from the scan)
- Themes
- NotgeldSerienscheinWeimar RepublicHesseUniversity town
The type
- Type
- 50 Pfennig, Stadt Marburg, 1918
- Printer
- Not established
- Rarity
- common
Symbology
- July 1918
- Issued during the last German offensives in the west, and redeemable within six months of a public announcement. A town assuming the situation was temporary.
- The Rathaus of 1512
- The gabled town hall on the sloping market place, drawn in line between two panels of text.
- A note with no picture on the back
- The reverse is plain. This is Kriegsnotgeld: the decorated reverse belongs to the collectors' issues two years later.
What was happening
This is Kriegsnotgeld, the earlier kind: war emergency money rather than the collectors' issues of 1920-21. Silver and nickel disappeared from circulation within weeks of mobilisation in 1914, and the Reichsbank could not print small notes fast enough to replace it, so towns and districts filled the gap on their own authority and against their own treasuries. These issues look like what they are - functional paper, serially numbered, with a validity tied to a redemption notice rather than a picture on the back.
Marburg an der Lahn issued this in July 1918, four months before the end of the war. The university had been there since 1527, the first Protestant university in the world, and the note shows the market square below the Rathaus with its stair tower.
This account belongs to the type, not this copy — it is shared by every 50 Pfennig, Stadt Marburg, 1918 in the collection.
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