Token France Besancon 5 and 10 Centimes /Jeton / Notgeld 1917

It was wartime in Europe. Many cities and provinces, including the French city of Besancon, issued their own coinage because official issues were hard to come by. Such tokens (also called jetons) fall into the broad category of notgeld or emergency money. We have a general page about notgeld at this CoinQuest link.

The Besancon 5 and 10 centimes pieces are made of aluminum. They are relatively common today and a search on eBay or Google ('besancon centimes 1917') produces many hits and very reasonable prices. There are, however, reputable web sites such as Coin Archives and Numista, that claim these tokens are rare. So the 'jury is out' on the values of these items.

Based on CoinQuest research, we believe these tokens are plentiful and available in good condition. Our estimate of catalog value runs like this:

worn: $3 US dollars approximate catalog value
average circulated: $8
well preserved: $25
fully uncirculated: $80
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