A Collection of Historical and Art Medals, the Property of a European Collector

Occupation of the Saar and Ruhr, 1923, a silver medal or ‘Shame Thaler’, by Wittig-Friesen for Lauer, French colonial soldier holding a kneeling naked German female by the neck and threatening her with a rifle, reverse broken sword, DEUTSCHER NOT UND SCHMACH TALER, 38mm. Very fine (£40-60)

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Historical and Art Medals, the Property of a European Collector.

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The year 1923 was one of major crisis in Germany. Payment of reparations for the War, in both cash and kind, had placed an enormous strain on a bankrupt economy and, as inflation mounted, Germany suspended payment in 1922. In retaliation the French occupied the Ruhr in January 1923. Workers in Ruhr mines and factories resisted by striking, but such resistance contributed to inflation, which brought on German economic collapse by the summer of 1923