Playing is an essential component of life for all young children, whether royal or not. It teaches them about the world and their own place in it and allows them to develop skills such as problem solving while also promoting creativity and independence.

Royal children played with many of the same types of toys as other children- dolls, jigsaws and train sets as well as miniature versions of adult objects like prams and wheelbarrows.

As in many families, toys used by royal children were frequently passed on from one child to the next as they were outgrown and also reused by subsequent generations.