Travel in Imagination

Object: Rocking Horse, 19th century

Accession #: 2002.9

One of the most loved toys in a child’s nursery is the rocking horse.  This one, in Wilton’s collection, looks as if it might have seen a lot of adventures at one time, by many excited children. Covered with tanned animal hide and adorned with a tail made of real animal hair, this wooden rocking horse looks out of glass eyes.  Its wooden snout also has red nostrils and an open mouth. One historian states that, “Posed imperiously on their curved rockers, many horses do exude quite an aggressive air, and probably taught the small child something of the respect he would later need in dealing with a living horse.”

Charles Lavallen Jessop (Boy on a Rocking Horse), 1840
Sarah Miriam Peale 

Children's toy horses goes back as early as the Middle Ages with the popular hobby horse- a fake horse’s head attached to a stick.  Early construction of rocking horses consisted of two boat shaped plank sides attached to sides of the bottom half of the horse’s body.  These toys were carved by hand until the late 19th century when they began to be mass-produced.

Horses were made to look realistic by being covered in animal skin.  Reference to these types of toy horses are made as early as 1561 when a young Bathasar Paungartner writes in a letter requesting from Frankfurt Fair a horse covered in goatskin.  These rocking horses were, by 1880, the more the more expensive types which also included manes and tails of real animal hair.  Queen Victoria’s children would not go on a trip to Osborne House, the royal residence in the Isle of Wight, without the desire to bring along their skin covered rocker.

 

Rocking Horse,
Victoria and Albert Museum Collection

The toy horse was seen as a valuable tool to teach skills to children they would need in adulthood.  James I, of England, told his young son that “the honourablest and most commendable games that ye can use are games on horseback.”  William Long, who was a carver and cabinet maker from London, boasted in the Pennsylvania Packet, in 1785, that his rocking horses were made “in the neatest and best manner to teach children to ride, and give them a wholesome and pleasing exercise.”  A wooden rocking horse in the Victoria and Albert Museum is thought to be the oldest in the United Kingdom. Charles I, who was the possible owner of this 17th century rocking horse, was a “delicate child” having trouble walking and speaking.  He suffered from rickets, a disease characterized by softened bones due to lack of Vitamin D intake, and it has been suggested that a rocking horse may have been used as treatment and to provide exercise while strengthening his legs.

Knowing the importance of learning how to interact with a real horse through the use of a toy rocking horse could have been evident in the Randolph household, especially with five boys. One historian adds that “to have the concept of a horse brought down to one’s own level when one is little opens wide the doors of unlimited travel in imagination.”  The children throughout the generations of the Randolph family living at Wilton would not have been any different, as a rocking horse similar to this one would have provided hours of limitless play and exercise. 

Bibliography

Barenholtz , Bernard and Inez Mclintock. AmericanAntique Toys: 1830-1900. Harry N.

Abrams, Inc. New York, 1980.

Gaffney, Dennis. Pbs.org. “Tips of the Trade:Galloping for Rocking Horses?”. 11 October 2002.

1 February 2013. < http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/roadshow/tips/rockinghorses.html>

King, Constance. Antique Toys and Dolls. RizzoliInternational Publications, Inc. New York,

1979.

Simpson, Margaret. Powerhouse Museum. “PowerhouseMuseum Collection Search 2.53”. 1

February 2013. < http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=37763>

White, Gwen. Antique Toys and their Background.Arco Publishing Company, Inc. New York,

1971.

“History of Rocking Horses” Stevenson Brothers.2 February 2013.

<http://www.rockinghorses.uk.net/history-of-rocking-horses>

“King’s Rocking Horse Goes on Show” BBC News.  9 December 2006. 2 February 2012.

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/6165167.stm>

“Rocking Horse” V&A Collections.9 January2013. 2 February 2013.

<http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O138880/rocking-horse-unknown/>

“Rickets” Dictionary.com. 2 February 2013.

<http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/rickets?s=t>

ImageCredit

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O138880/rocking-horse-unknown/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Charles_lavallen_jessop_(boy_on_a_rocking_horse)_sarah_miriam_peale.jpg