Piggy bank

A money box or piggy bank ( rare: saving pot, special also: piggy bank ) is a container for saving coins by simply dumping from a designated drop slot. The removal of savings, however, is more difficult on a regular basis by a closure or requires even ( in many ceramic money boxes ) a battering of the object.

History

Money boxes have a close connection to the history of money and the history of private saving. They have a social and cultural significance, especially for the time when a savings accounts was not yet possible.

Greeks and Romans

One of the earliest savings container comes from the 2nd century BC and was found in Priene (mean Ionia in the modern-day Turkey ) during the excavation of a residential building. It is modeled on a Greek temple treasure and has an insertion slot for coins in the pediment of the temple. Such a treasure house was called " thesaurus ". This word was adopted into the Romance languages ​​, and later to refer to either the container or treasure of the treasure as such. It was also transmitted to money boxes and was in the German language, eventually the term " safe ".

The number of Spardosen finds from the Roman Empire is extremely large. The characteristic type was. Among the Romans made ​​of baked clay and pear-shaped as the simplest result of a potter's wheel work

Middle Ages and Early Modern Times

From the Middle Ages, especially iron, schlossbehangene money boxes have stood the test of time. In part it is also about collecting medieval guilds and brotherhoods for the purposes of poor relief and other charitable aspects. However, mostly clay and other ceramic types were still being used as common materials. One also finds increasingly animal forms as money boxes.

Particularly well-known and popular is still the piggy bank. The pig is considered early period as a good luck charm and symbol of fertility, utility and sufficiency. This had one hand its basis in the high number of piglets, on the other hand were fattened with the feeding of table scraps or excess or perishable crop residues summer pigs. They secured the synthesis of protein and fat supply in winter. Even in the English language one knows the piggy bank as a " piggy bank ". The oldest piggy found in Germany comes from Billeben in Thuringia and is dated to the 13th century. On the other hand, these pigs plastic remains in contrast to the piggy bank at Castle Schweinheim found guilty in Euskirchen the proof that it coins have been collected. The piggy bank from Euskirchen is assigned to the Knights of Spies Büllesheim, is said to have invented it around 1576, as the youngest coin found in the pig dates from this period.

Were used in different countries and cultures and the precautionary driving squirrels, the Gold-Ass, the luck -bringing ladybug, the wise elephant, sitting on the nest hen ( saving chicken ) and many other animal species. A common since ancient times Spardosen form is the beehive as a symbol of hard-working, tireless collecting the bees.

Baroque

In the Baroque period we find Spardosen first time as precious objects of great artistic value, such as from the finest Delftware. The sponsorship money boxes that were worshiped in the Rococo period, the Empire, and especially in the Biedermeier period, in historicism and in the era of Art Nouveau in the middle as christening gifts (often with an engraving of Taufdatums, initials, etc.) are often artful jeweler working in silver provided with ornamental decorations and a small padlock. Are outstanding works primarily Viennese silversmiths of the Biedermeier period here. One popular form was particularly the Sparhümpchen with handle, which is increasingly also in a simpler version ( usually silver plated, German silver ) over time from industrial small batch production could be purchased cheaper and so came into fashion in broader layers of the population.

Modern piggy banks

Especially in the U.S., but also in England and Germany, a large number of mechanical money boxes in the 19th and 20th centuries developed ( and partly also patented), which displaced by insertion of a coin or a button, a mechanism in motion been. The Anglo-American mechanical money boxes are mainly made ​​of cast iron ( cast iron ) made ​​while the German were made primarily of lithographed tin. The money box won by the toy character of the object for the toy industry of interest and has been since about 1890 as a by-product in the goods repertoire known toy manufacturers ( Rock & Graner, Gebrüder Bing, Marklin, Felix Lasse, Georg Kühn Rich, hall Heimer & Strauss, Michael Seidel, geobra, G. Zimmermann) was added. In particular, from Nuremberg and surroundings (eg Fuerth ), the world's leading production base for toys, also the export demand was covered. The industry made from about 1900 large numbers possible. Even among the " penny - articles", the Penny Toys, Money Boxes were represented. The sheet metal money boxes were produced predominantly printed tinplate and screen printing.

Around 1920, savings banks, and later banks systematically with the issue of home savings boxes (mostly home -saving cartridges in simple, elegant steel construction ), especially for savings education of children or for small savings. For this Spardosen a mortgage note was in the savings account usually registered as security against loss and damage, they were - at least initially - that is borrowed and to be members of the issuing credit institution, also retained the right key, usually a standard key to open. Since 1925, Home Savings doses were mainly on the occasion of the World Savings Day to potential customers in childhood and school age - often in conjunction with the school savings - distributed.

A larger variant of the money box is detectable since the 1920s, saving box, also referred to as saving box or savings box. The metal or wooden boxes with multiple throw slots serve the community or club Save and today depend preferred in restaurants. Have they been published earlier by banks for customer acquisition and retention for free, the operators usually have to take care of installation and maintenance of saving boxes even today.

Uses

The banks use the money box still for the purpose of advertising. Were advertising money boxes and be happy but also used by many other companies as intermediaries Spruchgut and mentality, to raise awareness for the purchase of a particular property, object to the idea of banking money. Children the money box is toy shapes still presented as a collection box. Today, these money boxes especially plastic, such keepsakes industry from ceramic and wood; they become more and more traded as souvenirs. The money box has become a collection object.

Similar to the money box, but with a different purpose, is a donation box.