When euro notes and coins finally become legal tender in 12 European nations on Tuesday, few people will bid farewell to their old currencies as reluctantly as Germans to their marks.
In the half-century since Germany emerged from the horror of Hitler's Third Reich, the mark has become an icon of strength and stability, rebirth and reunification.
For Germans, the currency is one of the country's few national symbols. It has been an icon of sound money, closely tied to Germany's ''economic miracle'' after World War II. Internationally, it has been a safe haven, similar to the dollar, for those fleeing economic instability.
Long before the 12 countries formally adopted the euro, nations as varied as France, Austria, the Netherlands and Belgium had already locked the value of their own currencies to the mark. For the euro, which will emerge from A.T.M.'s and cash registers on Tuesday, the rate is fixed at 1.955830 marks.
Not surprisingly, polls show that more than half of all Germans would rather not change. But they are not so much giving up the mark as exporting it to the rest of Europe.
The laws that underlie the euro and the European Central Bank are in large part a reflection of the ironclad German monetary policies:
Inflation is evil; fiscal and monetary prudence is good; and a currency must be managed by a politically independent central bank.
Though Germany has printed and minted marks since 1871, the deutsche mark that is now fading away was born in 1948, three years after Germany's defeat in World War II.
The notes bear the images of German cultural and scientific figures, and are balanced almost evenly between men and women. The 20-mark bill features Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, a 19-century writer; the 50-mark bill features an architect, Balthasar Neumann. The 1,000-mark bill, which is worth about $460 and is rarely seen, features the Brothers Grimm.
Before World War II, Germany provided textbook examples of how to misuse a currency in the pursuit of reckless war making.
To finance World War I, German leaders took the previous currency, the reichsmark, off the gold standard. An advertising campaign implored people to turn in their old gold-mark coins with the slogan, ''I gave gold for iron.''
By the time Germany surrendered in 1918, and was forced to pay reparations, the reichsmark had lost any anchor in real wealth.
