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Friday, December 21, 2018

Q is for Question Time - Mary Mother of God!

This is the figure I mentioned the other day, and it's an odd one, not because I don't know what it is, not because I don't know where it came from, but because I'd like to know who handled it!

2/6; Christmas Decoration; Christmas Figure; Crèche; Creche; Italy; Krip; Krippen; Made In Italy; Mary Mother of God; Nativity; Noel; Precepi; PVC Figurine; PVC Toy; PVC Vinyl Rubber; Silicon Rubber; Sixpence; Small Scale World; smallscaleworld.blogspot.com; Two Shillings;
She's been smacked-to-life with an ugly-stick I'm afraid and in the hollow of her whole (an unfortunate phrase - I'll grant you!), she is clearly marked TALY (the 'I' miss-registered) and 2/6. She is a soft latex rubber, even a PVC or an early silicon-rubber, and is clearly a Precepi (Nativity) figure of Mary, mother of the Little Baby Jesus.

Now . . . here's the thing; the 2/6 can't be two-of-six, as she isn't holding the LBJ, so with a Joseph that's three? Which, if the count is six leaves room for either three wise men, or a shepherd and two something's? The minimum count of a nativity is seven - if Mary holds the LBJ or eight if the LBJ is in a manger, basket, beer-crate or shoe-box.

While as far as I can remember from my trips to Italy pre-Euro, they didn't have a sub-coinage, they only had Lira? Even if they had a sub-coin, two Lira and six-something's wouldn't buy you a sneeze at the time, while this figure would have cost you, what; 25 or 30p (?) in the UK in the seventies?

Go back to the sixties and the 2.06-something's (cents?) won't buy half a sneeze, but this figure might be two-shillings-and-sixpence in Britain, which - following decimalisation - would become 25-30p in 1970? The evidence would appear to suggest this figure, although clearly Italian was mould-marked - exclusively - for the UK market?

Anyone know who carried it? Have you got this set, are they all priced individually? Anyone recognise the Italian maker/sculpt? Did they go elsewhere with other mould-marks? Was there an unpriced version? The rubber seems too-soft for Landi or Chromoplasto types, so any info gratefully received.

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