50 Pfennig, Stadt Eilenburg, 1921 (Gustavus Adolphus lying in state)
Gutschein der Stadt Eilenburg
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This copy
- Accession
- OM-00565
- Series year
- 1921
- Actually issued
- 1921
- Signatures
- This issue carries no bank manager or cashier signature.
- Grade
- UNC (IBNS)
Estimated from the archival scan. Folds, soiling and edge condition are visible at this resolution; paper crispness, pinholes, small repairs and pressing are not.
- Estimated value
- $10 indicative
Category benchmark scaled for grade — an order of magnitude, not an appraisal. Priced 2026-10-09.
- Dimensions
- 86.4 × 58.5 mm (±2.6, from the scan)
- Themes
- NotgeldSerienscheinSaxonyThirty Years' WarGustavus AdolphusMartin RinckartWeimar Republic
The type
- Type
- 50 Pfennig, Stadt Eilenburg, 1921 (Gustavus Adolphus lying in state)
- Portrait
- Martin Rinckart (1586–1649)
- Printer
- Not established; the design is signed "Liersch"
- Rarity
- common
Inscriptions
Gutschein der Stadt Eilenburg. Der Magistrat. Dieser Gutschein gilt bis zum 30. September 1921.
Voucher of the town of Eilenburg. The magistrate. This voucher is valid until 30 September 1921.
Symbology
- Martin Rinckart portrait
- Eilenburg's great son (1586–1649), archdeacon through the whole Thirty Years' War and the plague of 1637, author of the hymn "Nun danket alle Gott". His likeness, dated 1586–1649, is the fixed front of every note in the set.
- Town arms (castle with towers and a star)
- The arms of Eilenburg, repeated either side of the portrait. The towers stand for the fortified town on the Mulde; the mark of municipal authority on a town voucher.
- Gustavus Adolphus lying in state (scene 3)
- The Protestant champion-king of Sweden was killed at Lützen, some 25 km away, on 16 November 1632; his body was laid out at the Roter Hirsch inn in Eilenburg before its long journey home to Sweden. The town's brush with the war's most famous death.
What was happening
Eilenburg is a walled town on the Mulde in the Prussian Province of Saxony. In 1921, like thousands of German towns, it printed decorative Serienscheine — emergency small change produced far beyond any real need, for sale to collectors. This set of six 50-Pfennig notes retells the town's ordeal in the Thirty Years' War and honours its most famous son, the pastor and hymn-writer Martin Rinckart (1586–1649).
Rinckart was born in Eilenburg, the son of a cooper, and returned in 1617 as archdeacon, serving through the whole war until his death. In the plague year of 1637 he was left as effectively the town's only remaining clergyman and is said to have buried the dead by the dozen — some four thousand that year, his own wife among them. Out of that catastrophe came the hymn for which he is remembered, "Nun danket alle Gott" ("Now Thank We All Our God"), set to music by Johann Crüger — a grace sung in the middle of the worst years of the war.
The front of every note in the set carries Rinckart's portrait between the town arms, over "Gutschein der Stadt Eilenburg / Der Magistrat" and the signatures of Dr. Belian and Vockrodt; the artist signed it "Liersch". The reverses, numbered 1 to 6, run through scenes of the war in and around the town. This note is scene 3: Aufbahrung der Leiche Gustav Adolfs von Schweden am 26. Nov 1632 im Roten Hirsch zu Eilenburg — the body of King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, killed at Lützen on 16 November 1632, lying in state at the Roter Hirsch inn in Eilenburg. The building survives and today houses the town museum.
Valid until 30 September 1921.
This account belongs to the type, not this copy — it is shared by every 50 Pfennig, Stadt Eilenburg, 1921 (Gustavus Adolphus lying in state) in the collection.
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