I seek out different attributes in playthings, and a well-formed character is one of them. Without knowing anything about this fox (which I first came across while browsing the Nuremberg Toy Museum collection), he looked to me like he had stepped out of a storybook – but what was his story?

After searching for German references of Fuchs (fox) and Gans (goose), I was rewarded with a well-known old nursery rhyme: Fuchs, du hast die Gans gestohlen (Fox, you have stolen the goose).

It was written by Ernst Anschütz, who included it in his 1824 School Hymn Book, which also featured the more famous song O Tannenbaum (sometimes known in the English-speaking world as Oh Christmas Tree). Anschütz wrote the lyrics for Fuchs, du hast die Gans gestohlen, but used an old folk tune for the melody. It has remained a classic nursery rhyme in Germany and is still sung by young children today. Like many other nursery rhymes and songs of its time, the lyrics are on the bloodier side of things:

1. Fuchs, du hast die Gans gestohlen,
|:gib sie wieder her! :|
|: Sonst wird dich der Jäger holen,
mit dem Schießgewehr. :|

2. Seine große, lange Flinte
|: schießt auf dich den Schrot, :|
|: dass dich färbt die rote Tinte
und dann bist du tot. :|

3. Liebes Füchslein, lass dir raten,
|: sei doch nur kein Dieb; :|
|: nimm, du brauchst nicht Gänsebraten,
mit der Maus vorlieb. :|

Translated roughly, it goes:

1. Fox, you have stolen the goose
|: Give it back! :|
|: Or the hunter will get you
With his gun :|
2. His big, long gun,
|: Takes a little shot at you, :|
|: So, you're tinged with red
And then you're dead. :|
3. Dear little fox, let me advise you:
|: Don't be a thief, :|
|: Don't take the roast goose,
Be content with the mouse. :|

In 1888 a version of it appears in “The Counting Out Rhymes of Children. Their Antiquity, Origin and Wide Distribution. A Study in Folklore”, by Henry Carrington Bolton, apparently used by children at play in North Germany : “Fuchs du hast die Gans gestohlen/ Gieb sie wieder her / Sonst wird dich der Jager holen / Mit dem Schiessgewehr. / Eins, zwei, drei, / Du bist davon frei!” This features the addition of “One, two, three, you are free from this!” at the end.

There is a version of the song in Romanian (Vulpe tu mi-ai furat gâsca) and, interestingly, in Japanese (Kogitsune Konkon). The latter is also about a fox and has the exact same tune but in this case, the fox lives in the forest, brushes her tail, makes dresses and hasn’t a shred of menace. This version was written by the poet Yoshio Katsu in 1947, for a school textbook published by the Ministry of Culture. I find it intriguing that the poet kept the subject of the fox but gave it a completely new persona.

The wonderful Tomi Ungerer illustrated the book Das Große Liederbuch, a collection of more than 200 German folk songs and nursery rhymes, and portrayed our fox as a rather more evidently vicious creature (see here, scroll down for picture of fox and goose). In 1958 the Deustche Bundespost also issued a postage stamp in Germany, depicting a fox who looks a little more presentable than Ungerer’s, but still more villainous than ours.

Foxes are recurring characters in folk tales, fairy tales and fables in many countries – they are frequently shown to be wily, greedy tricksters who often get away with it (see The Gingerbread Man, p. 448, or Aesop’s fable The Fox and the Crow, for instance), or creatures of ambiguous morality (see the shape-shifting huli jing of China, and the related kitsune of Japan, for instance).

There is also a type of strategy board games in different countries that is referred to as ‘Fox games’, Fox and Geese, the English variant, was a favourite of Queen Victoria’s. This kind of board game probably originates from the Scandinavian game Halatafl, mentioned in Grettir’s Saga (14th C). One player is the fox (in some cases a wolf), and the other is the geese (or sheep, chickens, etc.) and they try to outwit each other.

One thing I like especially about our little fox is that he looks so very respectable, and I immediately found him endearing. The goose is not hanging limply in the fox’s mouth, nor has it been hurriedly stuffed in a sack, as we see depicted in other places – instead, it is in a smart carry case with its own little handle. The fox looks like he is going to a business meeting, not to a feral, bloody feast. He is a charming conman – handsome, well-dressed, polished black shoes. I will gladly buy whatever he is selling and be delightedly shocked when he shows his real intentions. And when the hunter chases him with a gun, who will I be cheering on?

Wind-up toys are always a delight. One might look at them and think they are limited in their scope – after all, they only seem to have one function: turn the key and watch them move until they wind down. But for a moment it is as though they have come alive; they do not need any hand to guide them and they appear to move of their own accord. They are a little like magic.

When children play with figures, they move for them and speak for them, they enact little exchanges and movements – the act of playing often consists in pretending that their toys are living creatures. And here is a toy that can move on its own for a little while, and provides a new dimension to our suspension of disbelief – why else do we keep on turning the key? Sometimes we might turn it and the fox runs away unsuccessfully, going round and round in circles (see here). And what if the key is lost? Does that mean he gets caught? Or does it mean that he becomes frozen in time, mid-escape?

Of course, there is wonder at the mechanism too, at what is making it move, and what we might find if we open it up and look inside. Schuco made a great many wind-up toys (see this collection, and see this video of three toys, where you can see this model). The company went bankrupt in the seventies, but was then bought up and revived, and now focuses on toy car manufacturing.

I fancy that our fox would not be so crass as to run away with the goose, but rather would opt for walking briskly and not looking back, pretending nothing had happened. He might even whistle casually while he was doing this. ‘Who me?’, he might ask if challenged. ‘How very dare you! Can you not see my smart yellow tie?’