How to stop the child spending, how to install thrifty habits? The Money Box is the deal. Several of the above offer inducements, William Tell shooting coins with his cross bow, and the Great White Whale placated with money. Reach a certain target and you are rewarded by being granted access to your own money. I owned a Blackamoor Money Box and found it unsettling. Its example did induce me to suck sixpences to see what he was suffering. Not that he ever had much given to him.

Only the Uncle Sam figure offers a satirical aside, in likening the deposit of money to the Tax System when Sam drops the offering into his briefcase.

From the condition of the examples at Holkham it is clear the Money Boxes were regaulrly attacked out of frustration at the parent having wielded a knife's blade, or out of the need to get at your own resources.Not a lot has changed.