1 Centavo Gondomar

Gondomar's municipal chamber was among hundreds of Portuguese local authorities that issued small-denomination paper cédulas during the acute coin shortage that gripped Portugal from roughly 1917 onward. The shortage was a direct consequence of wartime metal requisitioning — copper and bronze coinage disappeared from circulation as the state prioritized military supply, leaving ordinary commercial transactions paralyzed at the centavo level.

These municipal issues were authorized under emergency decree but produced locally, with quality varying wildly from one câmara to the next. Gondomar, a small municipality east of Porto, produced modest runs that saw hard daily use and rarely survived intact.