Spinning Top Antique Toys Group *SOLD*

Spinning Top Toys

Our spinning top group will not be for many collectors, but it represents one of the earliest forms of toys.  Tops have been considered an acceptable toy for kids for hundreds, if not thousands of years.  They are humble and have been accepted in strict societies (versus most toys being a relatively new evolution).

We begin with the most expensive top, the steel fast spinning top with a gyroscopic look.  It comes with its original container egg and string.  Pull the cord and it operates very well with a sustained spin.

Next is the “Flicker Top”, a 1920’s novelty (patented 1920).  It isn’t quite a top, but has a spinning background and then two balls above it.  The balls spin in an almost “atomic orbit” and blur, creating a space age  and flickering pattern.

Then we have a boxed toy, circa 1915 with a box marked made in Germany.  It is a magnetic top that “picks” up simple tin objects.  Kids would spin the top with the parts strewn about.  At a seemingly random direction, the top would move and magnetically attract the parts.

Wikipedia well describes this category of ancient toy: ” Tops exist in many variations and materials, chiefly wood, metal, and plastic, often with a metal tip. They may be set in motion by twirling a handle with the fingers, by pulling a rope coiled around the body, or by means of a built-in auger (spiral plunger).

Such toys have been used since antiquity in solitary or competitive children games, where each player tries to keep one’s top spinning for as long as possible, or achieve some other goal. Some tops have faceted bodies with symbols or inscriptions, and are used like dice to inject randomness into games, or for divination and ritual purposes.

The ubiquity of spinning tops lends to the fact that the toy is used to name many living things such as Cyclosa turbinata, whose name comes from the Latin roots for spinning top.”