Types / 1921
50 Pfennig, Stadt Freiburg in Schlesien, 1921 (Fürstenstein)
Notgeld der Stadt Freiburg i. Schles.
What was happening
By 1921 Notgeld had turned from wartime necessity into a collectors' market. Towns, firms and clubs commissioned lithographed Serienscheine - sets printed far beyond local need and illustrated with whatever a place was proud of.
Freiburg in Schlesien - today Świebodzice in south-western Poland - is a small Lower Silesian cloth and weaving town. Immediately above it stands Schloss Fürstenstein (Polish Książ), one of the largest castles in Silesia and the seat of the princely Hochberg family, who held the title Fürst von Pless (Pszczyna). The castle and its wooded gorge were the great landmark and tourist draw of the district, and Freiburg was its nearest town.
The back of this 50-Pfennig note shows Schloss Fürstenstein with a hot-air balloon aloft, under the motto Lasst uns der Himmel kosten (roughly "let us taste the heavens"). It belongs to the town's September 1921 set printed by Grube & Schneider, whose shared front shows the two-towered town skyline; its sister notes are [[notgeld-freiburg-schlesien-50-pfennig-burg-eingang]], [[notgeld-freiburg-schlesien-50-pfennig-burghof]] and [[notgeld-freiburg-schlesien-50-pfennig-tal]].
