Die Zinnlaube - German toy soldier magazine

The last month has seen quite a flurry of activity in the world of toy soldier magazines, it kicked off with Plastic Warrior, which came through at the start of December, see the blog links bar to the right for details.  Followed on Christmas eve by Die Zinnlaube, this German magazine is only issued roughly once a year and isn't widely known so I like to give it a bit of a plug.  The toys covered tend to be early, predominantly German made, flats, solid lead and composition figures, so it aims very much at the top end (read expensive) of the collectors market.  Still it's nice to see lots of unusual toy soldiers that rarely get an airing elsewhere.

The front and back covers (above and below) show carved wooden figures by the French firm Giroux, I do like the "rocking horse" pose of the mounted Cossack.  

Articles include: Editorial, Obituary - Roland Umhey, Italian Composition Figures, Giroux Soldiers, Advertising figures from the George Spenkuch foundry, Diorama with Heyde figures celebrating the 250th anniversary of the explorer Alexander von Humboldt, the "Saxon artillery kettledrum carriage" made by Heyde, the French conquest of Algeria made by J E du Bois of Hanover, Paris World Exhibition set by Krause, figures from the collection of Peter Hofmann, interview with Danish collector Mogens Hvid, Austrian General Staff of 1859 in flats, homecasting moulds made made in France by Scad, figure identification page and Heyde 75mm personality figures, 

The text is now just in German and English (French has been dropped) which covers 90% of the readership, and anyway it's worth getting just for the pictures.  Cost is 20 Euro (including post to UK) by Paypal and as it only comes out once a year I feel it is worth giving yourself a treat at Christmas.  It's a high quality publication, runs to 96 pages in full colour and it's available from Freunde alter Spielfiguren

Hark the herald.................

This trumpeter comes from a set of Winged Hussars, not surprisingly made in Poland, and invariably attributed to the manufacturer PZG.  The figure has been gilded and was originally mounted on a plinth to be sold as an ornament or tourist item.  It's part of a range that I assume was inspired by the Siege of Vienna as it includes a personality figure of King Jan Sobieski, Winged Hussar, Dragoon, Standard Bearer, Kettle Drummer and Trumpeter.

PZG is the Polski Zwiazek Gluchych (Polish Associaton of the Deaf) which ran workshops producing all manner of goods to provide employment for people with hearing disability.  Founded in 1946, the Association is still going strong today and during the Communist era produced various ranges of toy soldiers.  These days collectors tend to label all Polish made plastic figures as PZG, even though very few are actually marked as such, due to the dearth of information on who manufactured them.
                                                                                                      

The elegantly sculpted horse has damage to a couple of his legs from where he was prised off the original plinth, another project in the queue is to repair, rebase and repaint him, perhaps I'll actually get around to doing it next year.  To get an idea of what he should look like when painted up take a look at Eric's Blog here.