Old Fashioned Toys -Summer Issue for the Canadian Icelandic Sheepdog Club 2007

Old Fashioned Toys
Reprinted with Permission from the Yeoman Farms and Icelandic Sheepdog Kennel

Every year, before Christmas the shelves in the local feed store fill with boxes of plastic animals for kids to Aplay farm@. I have bought a few of these as gifts for our grandchildren and other younger friends. Every time I do, I think of the times when I, myself, Aplayed farm@. My animals were not made in Taiwan, Hong Kong or China like the ones that now are used. Mine were the same as what my ancestors had played with for hundreds of years the same as all kids in Iceland in the past had played with. The bones of the sheep.

My Sheep
Certain bones had certain roles. Every Fall at slaughtering time the farmers brought home from the slaughterhouse boxfulls of horns, mostly ewe and weather horns. These were the children's treasured sheep. And it fitted beautifully that after being kept for a whole winter, the bone inside the horn came loose and the ewe was lambing. The occasional rams horn was brought home and these were naturally the rams. To put the sheep out to graze we stuck the harpe end of the horn into the ground and stood them up that way. There were two ways that I remember putting the sheep to graze, one was that the sheep were put into enclosed areas that represented the home fields. Then we always took the time to stick the Ahead@ into the ground. In the evening the sheep were herded home into either home corral, usually made from small stones, or into the sheep shed usually made from mud and stones with removable roof so we could put the sheep on the mangers to eat. The other way was when we Alet them go to the mountains@. Then we threw them as far as we could in every direction. Then we saddled up our horses and went out to round the sheep up. Then it was important to know exactly how many horns, oops! I mean sheep, one owned. Because if one was not found the farm dog was just as likely to find it and that usually was the end of that Asheep

My horses and dog

The horses we saddled up were the leg bone of the sheep. For some the front leg bones were mares and the hind leg bones were geldings. The knee end has a round bone that was the head. We tied a string around that end and were ready for our riding. If we were so lucky to ever get a leg bone from a horse or a cow we had a stallion!! But those bones were hard to come by so those were particularly well looked after. Most kids had a good stable of horses and these were usually kept at home. The horses were also used to go and visit our friends that had a farm on the other side of whatever (the house, barn or big rock etc.).

My Cows

The third of the most common animals was the cow. The lower jaw bone of the sheep was the cow. It was cut at the front teeth making two cows from each jawbone. When grazing the cows we stuck the front teeth into the ground as well as the other end. The molars were of course the teats and to milk we pulled on these. The cows were always kept on the home fields and the cow barn was the same as the sheep barn with a removable roof. The same applied here as with the horses, a bull was a jaw bone from either horse or a cow.

One more animal everybody had to have. That was the dog. There are two small bones in the pasterns and these were the dogs. Often we tied the dog to the horse so as to let the dog follow.

The Vala

When taking about the bones as playthings one must mention the AVala@. The meaning of the word AVala@ is Oracle, and that is just what the Vala is. The Vala bone is the knee bone (Tibial tarsal) and one can ask it a question and the answer depends on how the Vala drops. This bone has four possibilities as how it could land, it could give you Ayes@ A no@, Adon=t know@ and won=t tell@. The way I was taught to use it was to roll it on the top of my head and say this verse: @Vala, Vala, soothsayer; Answer my question; If you tell me the truth: I will gladden you with gold: I will feed you silver; But if you lie to me; I will burn you in the fire or throw you in the chamber pot.@ Then I asked my question and let the Vala drop on the floor. If the hollow side came up the answer was ANo@ but the other side meant AYes@ ( I might be wrong, I don=t think I was ever quite sure which side meant what). If it landed on its sides (which was not so often) then one side was Adon=t know@ and the other was Awon=t tell

I don't know if children in Iceland still play with these bones. I suspect that the Hong Kong made plastic animals have taken over. But I doubt that those new version of the farm animals give any more pleasure than the old version gave.

In my memory there is a certain warmth associated with the memories of playing with my Alegs and horns