Flaschenhals

Freistaat Flaschenhals

Inscription  : FREISTAAT FLASCHENHALS 1919-1923
               KAUB LORCH LORCHHAUSEN 10 TALER
Denomination : 10 Taler
Diameter     : 35.1 mm
Material     : Silver 
Mintage      : 1000
Year         : 1999

This coin was struck in 1999 to commemorate the 80th birthday of the Freistaat Flaschenhals, also called Freestate Bottleneck.
After world war I, the provinces on the west side of the Rhine in Germany had been occupied by the Allied Forces. They decided to create semicircular beachheads with a radius of about 30 km at Köln, Koblenz and Mainz. The beachheads of Mainz and Koblenz didn't overlap. There was a free space left which had the form of a bottleneck: the Freestate Bottleneck.
This freestate existed from January 10th 1919 till February 25th 1923.

Links

More information about these coins can be found on the links pages of Erik Victor McCrea.