Bretton Woods fixed currencies to the US dollar, which was tied to gold at $35 an ounce. Persistent US deficits and inflation left more dollars abroad than gold to back them, and the system ended in 1971–1973.
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The gold standard fixed currencies to a set amount of gold. Countries left it in stages: war finance ended the classical version, and the Depression and the Bretton Woods strain ended the rest.
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Hyperinflation came from the Reichsbank financing large government deficits by creating money, driven by war debt, reparations, and the 1923 Ruhr crisis. Historians differ on how much weight reparations deserve.
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Ridged edges began as a defense against clipping and counterfeiting of gold and silver coins. Today they mostly survive through tradition, with a side benefit for people who identify coins by touch.
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