2016 Sheet of Japan Scott's 4064a-j, featuring the work of Mitsumasa Anno, including "Anno's Aesop." $6 from The Plastic Card Collector, Wakefield, MA, through Ebay, March, '23.
Now, this is fascinating! I would never have expected a stamp commemorating a fable book, and especially not from Japan. What a surprise! The book was, of course, published first in Japan in 1987 and then in the USA in English in 1989. This acquisition marks the 29th country to have contributed fable-themed stamps to our collection!
2023? Shapeshifter wooden and paper tiles of "Baby's Own Aesop." 12 pieces. About 1¾" square. $10.43 from ShapeShifterUK, London, through Etsy, April, '23.
Now here is something different. Paper facsimiles of Walter Crane's illustrations in "Baby's Own Aesop" are glued onto original wooden backings 45 mm square. Well done! We show them here in threes.
2008? Shadow Theater: Fables. For stories from Aesop, La Fontaine and other animal tales. Budapest, Hungary: Manufaktor Studio. $19 from the manufacturer through Etsy, June, '20.
This is a very creative and engaging set of materials. The materials, which take some shaping and assembling, include a stage with a translucent backdrop, for a shadow show, a number of characters, about a dozen stiff cardboard characters and props to cut out and attach to a set of thin straws. There are scripts in six different languages for GA; FC; "The Wolf and the Fox"; FS, FG, and UP. So clever and so well made!
1900? 2 cards from a larger French set depicting shadows created by hands in front of a screen or wall. The two images here are of "Tortue" and "Aigle."
The image beneath the shadow in each case is a fable image. In the former, we sit near the finish line and see the tortoise cross in front of the hare. In the latter, we see the eagle sustain the stolen lamb in mid air. No text and blank back.
1965? "Set of 56 Fables of Aesop on Individual Cards" A Superb Collection of Favorite Fables by Aesop, Magnificently Illustrated." Illustrations from Percy Billinghurst, not acknowledged. No. 1880S. Printed in Hong Kong. Shackman, NY 10001. Four sets in varying condition, one with a box without a label, another in a box missing one side. $25.07 from JoAnn Jeffreys, Overland, MO, through Ebay, July, '00. $15 from Frank Scott, Elizabeth City, NC, through Ebay, August, '00. $9.95 from Dorothy Buhrman, Cambria, CA, through Ebay, Feb., '01. $20 from Lee Shepherd, Lake Mary, FL, through Ebay, March, '01.
These sets all look much older than the 1960's, but there is a card with each deck providing Aesop's history and a sense of the fables. It includes at its bottom the ZIP code I have included above, and that gives us a terminus post quem. I almost believe that Shackman had someone "antique" the boxes by throwing them around and roughing them up! Some of the narrower Billinghurst designs have an added symbol or ornament outside the picture, like DS at the right. At first, I thought that these cards constituted a game to play, but I see no hint of that within the package. Now that I have at last had a chance to catalogue these cards and learned that the sets are all the same, I can stop buying them!
1960? Severin Original Wooden Box Purse Presenting TH. 6.5" x 3.75" x 3.75". Signed "Severin" on the inside cover. Unknown source.
Here is one of the more unusual objects in the collection. I learned what it is only by going online and seeing another instance for sale, with a price of $150 discounted to $75. I had wondered whether it might be a lunchbox. The four sides track the race from the starter's line to the finish, where the hare is sleeping five feet from the finish! The pictures seem to be carefully applied decals. The artist signs the last image "Carl." I wondered if the images themselves might be found on the web, but there I had no luck. I ask myself what the occasion might be for carrying a TH purse.
17 further pieces of earthenware from the same set for €129.90 from La Lanterne Rouge through Ebay, March, '25.
How nice to find more of the set 25 years later! And now, of course, I wonder how big the complete set might be. A quick Google search came up empty-handed.
1925? Seven Original Gouaches on La Fontaine's "Lion and Mouse" 12.5" x 9.75". Meant originally apparently for a book project. €250 from Sebastian Bailly, Paris, Jan., '25.
The "ci Bienfait" illustration is a second attempt pasted over the original. Might it be that #3 of 8 was planned but was either never done or became separated from these lovely depictions? Sebastian Bailly could give no further information on the source of these. His estimate was that they were created in the 1920's or 1930's.
1880? 7 cards depicting fables of Florian, including a text of very small print in two columns at the top of the back of the card and a simple colored picture on the front. 4 3/8" x 3 1/8".
The first six from Clignancourt are cropped. At present I have full versions of all seven cards except "Le Lion et le Léopard," for which my only examplar is cropped. How wonderful to have something from an institution like "Aux Deux Magots" right at St. Germain des Pres! The colors are strong and the animals well dressed. Most humans would need a magnifying glass to read these fable texts! They were kept deliberately small, one suspects, to make room for the advertiser's information. "La Guenon, le Singe et la Noix" may have the strongest illustration of the lot. The printer for both LP and ER is "Publicité Roussette, 65 Faub. St. Denis, Paris, while the printer for AQF and ADM is "Ass. d'Ouv. lith., Romanet et Cie, 27bis, r. Corbeau. While some cards have only the image on one side and the text of the fable with its title on the other, the other cards represent several advertisers.
