I have a couple of coins that I've found out (from the board) are Notgeld. I'm not sure I understand what exactly that is. I assume it is Regional Money from German States. Is it like when Banks issued their own money in the USA? Also, is there a good site where I can find out answers to questions like this without showing my ignorance to the learned members of this board? JonySky
Notgeld (literally `note money') is basically emergency money issued by local towns, co-operatives, industrial societies, regional authorities in Germany (and indeed France) during and post WWI. The term applies to both both paper money and coinage. I'm more into the French variety (1914 -1922) than the german stuff, but I can tell you that it is a fascinating aspect of numismatics...and can suck you in to becoming a collector quite easily. Sorry. I don't know any sites on the subject that I could readily recommend but a quick google search on `notgeld' hits quite a few sites that seem to have all that you want to know (and probably more). Try it for yourself. Ian
I am more into the german municipal issues. (The french issues are interesting and I do collect them but they are much tougher to locate.) As Ian said there are also notgeld issues from many other sources including private individuals and many merchants. There are also prison camp issues, porcelien issues, and issues produced in exotic materials that were sold to collectors. If you can't find the information you want through the google search your always welcome to come back here and ask us.
Thanks for that. My German isn't all it could be. It's certainly worse than it once was, and it's no longer a tenth as good as it might have been. As such, I am happy to stand corrected. Ian
i have some notgeld i purchased in a pack, ten for $5 from a local coin dealer. very interesting items and a great conversation starter... ( not coins, paper money about the size of a baseball card )
