Toys

Most young mammals play, and will play with whatever they can find, turning such things as pinecones, rocks, and food into toys. It simply makes sense then that toys have a history as old as human civilization itself. Toys and games have been unearthed from the sites of ancient civilizations. They have been written about in some of our oldest literature. Toys excavated from the Indus valley civilization (3000-1500 BCE) include small carts, whistles shaped like birds, and toy monkeys which could slide down a string.

The earliest toys were made from materials found in nature, such as rocks, sticks, and clay. Thousands of years ago, Egyptian children played with dolls that had wigs and movable limbs which were made from stone, pottery, and wood. In Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome, children played with dolls made of wax or terra cotta, sticks, bows and arrows, and yo-yos. When Greek children, especially girls, came of age it was customary for them to sacrifice the toys of their childhood to the gods. On the eve of their wedding, young girls around fourteen would offer their dolls in a temple as a rite of passage into adulthood.

As technology changed and civilization progressed, toys also changed. Whereas ancient toys were made from materials found in nature like stone, wood, and grass modern toys are often made from plastic, cloth, and synthentic materials. Ancient toys were often made by the parents and family of the children who used them, or by the children themselves. Modern toys, in contrast, are often mass-produced and sold in stores.

This change in the nature of toys is exemplified by the changes that have taken place in one of the oldest and most universal of human toys; dolls. The earliest and most primitive dolls were simple wooden carvings and bundles of grass. Egyptian dolls were sometimes jointed so that their limbs could move realistically. By the early 1800s there were dolls that could say "mama". Today there are dolls that can recognize and identify objects, the voice of their owner, and choose among hundreds of pre-programed phrases with which to respond. The materials that toys are made from have changed, what toys can do has changed, but the fact that children play with toys has not changed.

The tags on Beanie Babies are considered a very important part of its value. It is widely believed that a Beanie without a tag loses half of its value. Every Beanie Baby has at least two tags: a swing tag (also known as a "hang tag", "ear tag" or "heart tag"), and a tush tag (usually attached to the Beanie's rear end). Each tag over time has gone through many changes, these changes have become known as "generations", there are currently 11 generations of swing tags, and 13 generations of tush tags. Additionally, there are also extra tags for certain regions that include things like safety information to comply with the Canadian Stuffed Articles Act or the CE Mark requirements in Europe. A few tag "generations" have become particularly noteworthy. Most Beanie Babies with first, second, or third generation hang tags have held their value (or in the case of some harder to find styles, increased in value), while fourth and fifth generation hang tags indicate Beanies that were available during the Beanie fad.