From my personal collection.

19 JAN 1922. 10,000 MARK.

The 1922 "Vampire Note" is the most popular German inflation bill on the collector market. The fellow at the right (subject of a famous Duerer portrait) has an unmistakable gash in his neck!! Some say you can see the vampire sucking his blood from the shadows in back. That may be be a bit of a stretch but what else could explain the strange dark lesion in the poor guy's neck?

A more logical explanation is this: Germany was in desperate straits economically, financially and morally due to its defeat in WW1 and the onerous terms of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, which lopped off huge chunks of German territory, ceding them to the Allies, while extracting draconian reparation payments (which would have continued until 1984 if not for a certain headstrong leader who gained power in 1933). This thrust Germany into a massive depression which, in turn, led to hyperinflation.

It is quite possible that someone in the halls of the German Reichsbank (Treasury Department), perhaps the engraver himself, slipped in this symbolic reminder of the "bite" that had been taken out of the Fatherland. What better way to express the bitterness and resentment felt throughout the German populace than by etching the mark of universal suffering and sacrifice into the very neck of the German Everyman depicted on the subject bank note?

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