Polish klezmer statuettes

[Paul M. Gifford <PGIFFORD...>]

Does anyone know how long they have been making those wooden 
statuettes of klezmorim in Poland? I saw a couple of guys in
the Old City in Warsaw selling wooden statuettes of various
subjects, usually caricatures of some sort. But they had sets
of klezmorim, playing violin, clarinet, flute, cymbaly, bass, drum, 
which seem realistic from an instrumentation point of view, and I
wonder how long they have been making them and selling them to 
tourists. One guy had a little sign over them saying something like 
"19th Century Warsaw Nostalgia." I understand that the carvers sell 
them to tourists in Cracow too. I just wonder what these guys have
used as models, or whether it is a convention of long standing.

Paul Gifford

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