Georg Hieronimus Bestelmeier's Mail Catalog

Paper, cardboard. Learning by playing and watching was one of the cornerstones of educational theory during the Enlightenment in the second half of the 18th century. That encouraged the production and sale of toys and teaching resources. One gets a wonderful idea of what these were understood to mean in those days from the catalogs of Nuremberg merchant Georg Hieronimus Bestelmeier, with their engraved illustrations. From these catalogs, one could conveniently order anything one's heart desired, without leaving home. Products on offer included assembly toys that taught about the world in miniature, social games, magic tricks and resources for learning about technology and science through play. But the catalog served not just the young, but any "amateur of the arts and sciences" – because the boundaries between a child's game and scientific and technical playthings for adults were very fluid among educated, well-to-do people in the age of Goethe.