A Stacker Toy from Eretria (and a Collection of Little Cups). A New Look at Old Finds

The article concerns the Late Geometric child’s grave of the Heroon burial plot near the Western Gate ofEretria, with a series of fourteen discs cut from vases, and a collection of five small cups. The re-examination of the discs, regarded as pawns of a game, has made it possible to verify that their vertical assembly, according to the decreasing size of the discs themselves, makes what we now call a stacker toy. As for the cups, also characterised by the variety of sizes, they make up a set of five that includes a specimen corresponding to the Greek measure of the kyathos. Rather than playing at preparing dinner one can think of them as a game of dosing grains and other substances. The Platonic text of the Laws, dedicated to the education of children, evidences the custom of providing children with the skills necessary to perform various trades as adults, including that of the merchant. Through the educational use of simple everyday objects, Greek children were introduced to the knowledge of numbers and measurements.