September, School Days and Ancient Toys

September naturally brings children and school life to mind. For us at THETIS and ATTIC BLACK, it also recalls how our collection of ancient-inspired toys began.

In September 2003, my two-year-old son was about to start kindergarten. While buying his school things, I began thinking about a new direction for the work we were doing at THETIS. Until then, our work focused mainly on ancient ceramic technology, experimental archaeology, and the specialised reproduction of artefacts for museum shops and exhibitions.

I wanted to create objects that were still based on archaeological material, but could also be educational, playful and relevant to everyday life.

This led me to study objects associated with childhood in antiquity: terracotta dolls, rattles, miniature vessels, knucklebones, marbles and animal figurines.

Our bell-shaped plangones were inspired particularly by Boeotian terracotta figurines with articulated limbs. Important examples are preserved in the Louvre, including the Boeotian bell-shaped figurine CA 623, from Thebes, dated around 700 BCE, and the articulated figurine CA 1146, dated to the early 5th century BCE.

Louvre – Boeotian Bell Figurine, CA 623
Louvre – Articulated Figurine, CA 1146

In 2005, we created “Leon’s Toys” for the Museum of Cycladic Art, together with ceramic objects used in films accompanying an exhibition about the life of an imaginary boy in 5th-century BCE Athens.

In 2009, our toys and dolls were introduced at the shop of the newly opened Acropolis Museum. Within approximately one year, more than 10,000 pieces were sold.

From 2010 onwards, we developed further custom-made products for the Acropolis Museum, while our own collections became available exclusively through our retail brand, ATTIC BLACK.

Today our dolls and figurines are individually made, numbered and collectible, while our Ancient Toys collection continues a project that began more than twenty years ago.

For us, these objects remain closely connected with archaeological research, museum work — and with that September of 2003 when the idea first began.