CultureToys

Click here for Home

Global Culture in the 19th century

TOYS:

The 19th Century became a large market for toy theaters. The Toy Theater began when they made souvenirs of various real productions. A cutout miniature play would be printed and the figures and scenery would then be cut out and stood on end. Then an abbreviated version of the play was provided so children could act out and understand the most complicated of plays. This was a craze in 1815-1835 and was still popular 15 years later. Publishers all over Europe were beginning to print out toy theaters. These games led to puzzles, board games and jigsaws.

A 19th century Nursery (Source: Corbis)

Before the 19th Century, girl's dolls had been made of wood. The 19th Century brought about a more appealing variety of clothed dolls instead. Bodies were made of stuffed cloth or kid to make them softer and more realistic. Heads and hands would be made of wax or composition. A particularly popular doll was a tiny, finger-sized china doll called Frozen Charlottes. These were appealing to poor families who could not afford large, fancy dolls, since they only cost a ha'penny. Rich families owned the finest wax dolls produced by two Italian immigrant families-the Pierotties and the Montanaris. Heads and limbs were ceramic or china. Their faces would be very carefully decorated with-for the first time-glass eyes. They would come with numerous amounts of clothing. Golden ringlets, finely decorated dresses, miniature lace mittens, silk or flannel petticoats and kid shoes. They would have carefully curled hair made of either horsehair or human hair. Until the 1870's, all dolls represented adults. Baby or children dolls soon became popular, but not until the late century. Dolls houses were also very extravagant. They would be reproductions of Victorian houses of the time and would often be very tall. They were carefully carved with balconies, windows, doors, and even the smallest details like lights or doorknobs. They had carpets and furniture and pianos and clocks and all the rooms and minute portraits on the walls. They really included every possible detail and luxury that was to be found in a rich Victorian home.
Boy's toys were included animals. As the Colonial Empire spread, so did the variety of toys. There were carved wooden figures of elephants (Burma) camels (Egypt) tigers (India) zebras (Africa) and so on. They sometimes would use real skins but this was thought a cruel pastime for young children. They also had farm themes and more familiar animals. They would come in little boxes for each separate animal. Boy's toys were also influenced as the Industrial Revolution began. Transport toys appeared in every toy box across Europe, ranging from horse-and-carriages to pull-along wood or tin trains, to steamboats and elaborate models of clockwork or steam.

Tin toys abounded at the turn of the century, especially during World War I when boys were given collections of tin soldiers. Model telephones, telescopes, printing-presses, tool boxes, rubber bar balls, drums, trumpets, sleighs with real white Angola robes were all part of a boy's toy collection as industrialization and expansionism increased.

Toy Soldiers (Source: Corbis)

Other toys included music boxes and harlequin rattles. Tambourines, flutes, mandolins and other musical instruments were decorated with paintings and ribbons in a smaller form for children to play. This was also an age for the introduction of alphabet blocks that had elaborate decorations of every letter on the wooden sides. Jack-in-the-boxes became a craze in toyshops everywhere. Moneyboxes also became a popular thing. A coin was dropped into openings of hollow wooden models, usually animals, and became part of some scene. Example: the weight of a coin dropped into the beak of a wooden woodpecker makes it drop forward at a slight angle and appear to be pecking a tree trunk. Rocking horses were also a part of every child's nursery made of wood with real horsehair for the main

Rocking Horse, G&J Lines (Source: Corbis)

For the first time, the Victorians began producing optical effects in their toys. Kaleidoscopes were invented in 1816 and were often homemade using bits of tissue paper or glass. They were enthusiasts for geometrical puzzles, hydraulic toys, and optical toys that would help children to learn the laws of science. Another optical toy was the zoetrope, a spinnable cylinder with slits cut in its circumference. Into the inside of the cylinder could be placed strips with sequences of images showing, for example, a horse approaching and jumping over a fence. When the drum rotated, the images seen in rapid succession through the slits produced the illusion of fluid movement. Tops were popular; some working by electricity and the colours would change as you touched them.
There were other toys to be played with outdoors. Hoops became a craze as the use of wheels increased: they would be rolled and rolled down streets with the help of either a stick or the child's hand, and there were all sorts of tricks such as jumping in and out of the hoop while it was moving. Hobby horses were also a fashion: a cloth horses head was fixed to a pole and could be "ridden." Balloons were another innovation, as the hot-air balloons became so popular. Sailing boats were popular and it was a common entertainment for the whole family to go down to a park near the river and watch magnificently crafted model boats sail down the water.

THE VICTORIAN DIET:

The working class had a very poor diet. It was uncertain in supply, primitive in content and unhealthy in effect. Ovens were rare in poor homes so they would use either open fires, buy hot food right before mealtimes or-in the most poverty stricken-just eat it cold. At the turn of the century, social service was initiated and some of the workers who investigated poor homes found only one pot and that before their lesson in economy stews and soups could begin the pot would have to be cleaned with bath water or worse. They had few utensils and appliances. They had primitive cooking facilities, little or no fuel, poverty, ignorance and adulterated foods produced a working class that was undernourished, anaemic, feeble and literally rickety.
The standard fare that could be found was bread, butter, potatoes, beer, tea and bacon if they were lucky. There were disease problems with bad meat. They literally had to pick up the heads from the floor of the slaughterhouse, though many of them had never even tasted meat. It was simply too expensive. Stocking weavers, shoe makers, needle women and silk weavers ate less than one pound of meat a week and less than eight ounces of fats.
Between 1877 and 1889 the cost of the average national weekly food basket fell and it was easier to afford bread, butter, tea, milk and meat. The cheaper food products such as margarine served to increase both the variety and quantity of the workmen's diet.
The slightly richer classes would eat rabbit pie or meat stews with barley beans and carrots, since many owned farms. They would also make fruit lattice pies and suet pudding or bread and dripping. They would also make Yorkshire puddings, a pastry batter, or Toad In the Hole, Yorkshire puddings with sausage. The richest classes would eat much the same but much fancier and would frequent their diets with large legs of lamb or beef and ale.

(Source:) Sara Lyon, CAC, Egypt