| Dimensions: 4.4 x 8.8 x 1 inches (11 x 22 x 2.5 cm). Bears in Russian steam bath of 'banya' (Mother-bear 'washes' the Baby-bear on the manual move of the upper part of the toy). The toy is made in a traditional style of the Bogorodskaya toy - hand cut from linden wood and hand assembled. Author: Oleg Isaev. Bogorodskaya toys are in many ways symbolic of Russia. In their majority, they depict bears (traditional Russian wild animal, if you want) at various tasks, pecking chicken and hares playing musical instruments. Bogorodskaya toys are excellent educational material for the little ones. Being very inexpensive - and yet, truly unique - they make wonderful affordable gifts. HISTORY: The history of Bogorodskaya toys starts from a legend. The story tells of a poor peasant family that lived in a small village Bogorodskoe (some 40 miles outside of Moscow; founded in the late 16th century) and had many kids. Their mother made a doll for them from cloth rags. But it lasted only a couple of days. The kids ripped it into pieces. So she wove one from straw. That one didn't last very long either. So the woman took a piece of wood and cut a wooden toy for them, which the children called Auka. They played with it for quite a long time, but eventually got bored with it and their father took it to a fair. At the fair he met a merchant that liked the toy and ordered several hundred of them from him. Since then, the story says, most villagers became toy makers. |
