The Kozhlya toy is a folk toy craft of the Kursk region. The exhibition features more than 70 works by People's Craftsman of Russia — Maslova Natalia Alexandrovna, showcasing all the main motifs of the folk toy and the craft's distinctive features.\r\n\r\nAs is often the case, it is difficult to determine the exact time the craft originated; however, the Kozhlya toy is considered one of the oldest in our country. The pottery craft was known here 300 years ago, and the toy is thought to have appeared roughly 250 years ago. Over that time the toys underwent changes in appearance and subject matter. It is surprising that during the Soviet period a crocodile even appeared among the motifs and, in more than 50 years of its presence in the craft, became a traditional toy. The artisans work with several types of clay, so the toys may differ slightly in color, but their painting is easily recognizable: net patterns, sticks, diamonds and fir-tree motifs.\r\n\r\nThe exhibition at the Toy Museum runs in the winter months, until February 22, so a winter mood is guaranteed.
The Kozhlya traditional toy is a jewel of the Kursk region that, with its whistle, has for centuries celebrated the pottery traditions of the land of nightingales. Bright, cheerful, and distinctive fairs in Kozhlya were held annually, where one of the important goods was the toys. The craftswomen also took them to all the Kursk fairs and to neighboring provinces; everywhere the Kozhlya whistle was well received. One of the distinguishing features of the Kozhlya toy is its clear, ringing whistle, which, like a song, carries across the plains, and, as a medical instrument for exercising the lungs, was also always in demand.\r\n\r\nOur ancestors even held spring competitions and roll calls of whistlers on Yegory (Saint George the Victorious). The exact founding date of Kozhlya has not been established. In the general geometric plan of Lgovsky Uyezd of the Kursk Governorate from 1785 this village is marked with a four-pointed cross as the sloboda Nikolaevskaya and "Kozlya" as well. Over time the "z" in "Kozlya" changed to "zh," becoming "Kozhlya," and the village has existed under that name to this day.\r\n\r\nAccording to local residents, at the end of the 18th century the landowner Denisyev brought serfs to Kozhlya from the Poltava Governorate (now Ukraine), and some of them knew how to shape clay whistles. In the neighboring village of Dronyaevo, where the craft of making pottery has existed for several hundred years, the people of Kozhlya began taking bluish clay from the locality called Glinishche to make their whistles.
