A.A. Milne's Winnie the Pooh may be a "bear of little brain" but, boy oh boy, what a pocketbook. Forbes has compiled a list of the 10 largest revenue producers last year, and Winnie's $5.9 billion tops the list.

Licensed by Disney (NYSE:DIS), despite recent legal assaults against those rights, Pooh and the rest of the hand-drawn 100 Acre Wood gang have been brisk sellers on a wide range of marketable products.

Disney also has the second spot locked up with its ambassador Mickey Mouse. Harry Potter, Marvel's (NYSE:MVL) Spider-Man (David Gardner was all over this one -- recommending Marvel twice in Motley Fool Stock Advisor), and Frodo Baggins round out the top five on the list, but it bears noting that these three clearly benefited from movie releases last year.

Unheralded licensing specialist 4Kids (NYSE:KDE) actually has two franchises that it manages stateside for their Japanese creators in the top 10. Those would be Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh. Viacom's (NYSE:VIA) SpongeBob SquarePants also made the cut along with Darth Vader and Pixar's (NASDAQ:PIXR) Sully from Monsters Inc. fame.

While Forbes' methodology may be contested -- Snoopy was denied his MetLife (NYSE:MET) ad money and Mattel's (NYSE:MAT) Barbie was disqualified for being a toy before she became a character starlet -- it's still a great indicator of the amazing earnings power these entertainment purveyors are packing.

Sure, fact may be stranger than fiction, but, when you get down to it, it's not really as profitable.

What do you think of the Forbes list? With Disney playing an active role in promoting three of the stars on the top 10 list, when will the company's other characters come out to play in the lucrative licensing field? All this and more -- in the Disney discussion board . Only on Fool.com.