By Isla Quinn
Small. Wrinkled. Wearing a pointed hat. The prune man stands on a stall shelf at the Nuremberg Christmas market with a painted walnut face and a look of mild surprise, and a sign beside him says he is not for eating.
What he is
The market’s own site calls them Zwetschgenmännle, prune men, and gives the build in plain terms. Wire forms the skeleton, a “backbone”, held in a piece of birch wood. Dried prunes make the arms and legs, a fig makes the body, and a walnut makes the head, with smoother nuts preferred. The face is painted and a pointed hat goes on top.
A travel blog agrees on the fruit and adds raisins and nuts to its list, and says small sets of clothes are tailored from cloth snippets. Both pages say the figures are not edible. The market site says “Not fit for consumption” signs stand at every booth. The blog calls them “not really edible.”
How long one takes
According to the market’s site, a typical figure takes up to an hour, longer in special cases, and the work is done by hand and is time-intensive and difficult. It does not say how many people do it, and we have not found a source that does.
How many kinds
Here the sources part. The market site says more than 350 different figures exist, ranging from 9 to 22 centimetres tall. It names chimney sweeps, said to bring luck, kissing couples, guitar and piano players, cooks and waiters. The travel blog says one seller at the market, who has been there since 1994, offers more than 200 varieties and makes custom designs. We do not name him.
The two numbers describe different things. One is the market’s count of all figures that exist, and the other is one stall’s range. Our reading: they are not in conflict, but neither page says so.
Where the story starts
The market’s site gives a legend. A Nuremberg wire drawer in the eighteenth century wanted a gift to please his children, but had only his wire and a plum tree in front of the house. The children, it says, ate the prunes. That no longer happens, hence the signs.
The blog tells it another way. A poor man, struggling through a hard winter, made plum figures by a method his grandmother taught him and sold them at the market with great success. It also says the word Zwetschge is Slavic, not German, and suggests the figures came into Germany from the East. It also offers an older origin than the legend, which we have left out.
Two accounts, then, and no document. Both read as stories, and the sources do not say how to choose between them.
Looking after one
The market’s site is short on this. You dust it. If the body turns grey, that is sugar, not mould. It is a figure to look at, not to eat, and the page quotes a Nuremberg saying that a prune man in the house keeps money and happiness there too. The blog goes further and says the figures are placed in windows facing outward to protect the household. That is one blog’s account of a custom.
The market that sells them
The market’s site gives dates for this year: 27 November to 24 December 2026, with the opening on 27 November at 5.30 pm. It describes the Hauptmarkt, the main market square in the middle of Nuremberg, as the setting and calls the wooden booths a little city of wood and cloth. It calls the market one of the oldest and most famous Christmas markets in the world.
The blog says about two million people visit each year and that the prune men are sold at fourteen stalls. Those figures come from one blog, are undated, and may have changed. The market’s site gives neither.
The market also publishes themed walking tours for visitors. One of them is for handmade gifts and another for regional products, according to the market’s own site. A prune man appears on none of the tour descriptions we read, so we cannot say which stalls to look at, and we will not guess.
Side by side
- Number of kinds: more than 350 (market site) against more than 200 at one stall (blog).
- Origin: a wire drawer’s gift for his children (market site) against a poor man’s hard winter (blog).
- Eaten or not: not for eating in both; the legend says the children ate them once.
What kind of sources these are
The market’s own site, which promotes the market, and one travel blog. No museum or archive source was found. That is why we label every account and do not choose between them. We did not look for prices and have left them out.
Questions a buyer would ask
Can I eat it? No. Both sources say it is not edible, and the market site says signs say so at every booth.
Will it keep? The market’s site says it needs only dusting, and a grey bloom is sugar, not mould.
How big is it? The market’s site gives 9 to 22 centimetres across the whole range.
What we left out
Prices, the alcohol the market’s pages suggest for cleaning, characters with religious or devilish dress, the blog’s older origin story, and the name of the living seller.
Quick answers
What are Nuremberg prune men made of? According to the Christkindlesmarkt’s own site, wire, birch wood, dried prunes for arms and legs, a fig for the body and a walnut for the head, with a painted face and pointed hat.
Can you eat a Zwetschgenmännle? No. The market’s own site says they are not meant to be eaten, and “Not fit for consumption” signs stand at every booth. A travel blog also calls them not really edible.
How long does one take to make? The Christkindlesmarkt’s own site says a typical figure takes up to one hour, longer in special cases, and is made by hand.
Related on this site: goslar-old-town-rammelsberg-mine, melitta-bentz-coffee-filter-1908, playmobil-hans-beck-zirndorf-1974
Roam first. Shop later.