“What’s in your stocking?”

The ‘traditional’ Christmas Stocking is usually displayed as overflowing with small toys, gobs of sweets and at least one or two candy canes. Over the last few decades the sweets have begun to outnumber the small toys. Whether this is so because of the mass production of candy, because we love sweets more than toys, or because candy and cookies fit stockings easier than most current toys is hard to say. The one thing I can say for certain is that it wasn’t always this way.

There is much debate...