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Medieval Children, Part I
By Madeline | March 5, 2008
My toddler has been especially tantrumish (is that a Bushism?) lately, so I was doing some research to see how best to deal with it. As with everything, I immediately thought to myself, what would they have done during the medieval times with a screaming toddler? I did a little research and found that surprisingly there really is very little information out there. Additionally, the information found really put parents in a negative light and almost made the children seem unwanted.
I find it strange that in a time where children were so important as far their marriages (for wealthier kids) and additional incomes (for poorer children) the parents would treat them so poorly. Essentially, almost all of the research I saw indicated that children were put to hard labor as soon as they could walk, treated them like drill instructors and gave them little, if any, love and affection. These articles stated there was no physical proof of much of what they were writing about and I say good for that!
In a world where fertile women were of the utmost importance, how could children be seen as such a burden? In fact, from what I have found, children were most helpful. As stated previously, children of the rich were betrothed, sometimes as early as at birth, to form strong allegiances to other families making both families more powerful by these ties. Of course, the children wouldn’t marry until they were old enough - usually when the girl started menstruating (there’s that fertility thing again!), although in some cases this wasn’t always so. It was not unheard of for children to wed even if the act of consummation could not be acted on until they were mature enough. In poorer households, children were certainly another mouth to feed, but a necessary one. Young children were often tasked with easy chores like carrying baskets for their mothers as they worked in herb gardens. As they grew older, their work shifted to harder labor, but nothing they could not handle. Children were certainly not given mens work until said children were men and could handle it. Not all poor children were sold into servitude as is often assumed, in fact, many stayed on with their parents in order to help maintain the lands and assist in keeping food on the table until they married their own spouses and had their own children thus starting the cycle again.
While I’m sure some parents sold their children as servants, many children were hired servants who could eventually return home if they so desired. Once a child was hired as a servant, they would reside in the manor of the master they served, this not only generated more household income as the offspring usually sent funds home to assist the family, but it also created one less mouth to feed. Additionally, young children were not sought as servants, usually children were around the age of twelve when they were hired. Children younger than twelve could sometimes be ungainly and awkward where twelve year olds were typically more mature not just in physical maturity, but mentally as well. Often times, several children of the same family would work in the same house.
One of the main reasons it is assumed that children were not shown affection was due to the high death rate among children under one year of age. I think this is ridiculous. First off, the chance of death was most likely only around 30% meaning that most children had a 70% chance of survival. Those are still pretty good odds, all things considered. Additionally, just because it was the medieval times doesn’t mean everyone was a pessimist! Being a mother myself, I could never hold my daughter and think, “Well, I shouldn’t get attached because three out of every ten kids die.” That’s BS! In fact, it is literally going against every innately maternal instinct in a woman’s body to keep from loving her child - except those few rare ones, of course (there are always those few rare ones, aren’t there?). As if the maternal bond weren’t enough, many women who had children nursed them, even some of the wealthy, despite popular belief. In fact, nursing was strongly encouraged by the Catholic church. Having nursed my daughter, I know that this only deepens the bond that the mother has with the child. There’s no way you can give so much of yourself to one small tiny baby and not fall absolutely 100% head over heels in love with it.
Speaking of nursing and going back to that initial 30% chance of mortality, you have to consider that included in that 30% are the children whose mother’s either became too ill during their birth to establish a good milk supply or died and were unable to supply milk. In both cases, if a wet nurse could not be found, the child was usually fed animal milk trickled into it’s mouth through linens or soaked bread. This usually left them with an incredibly lowered immune system. Why, you may ask? Isn’t all milk the same? The answer to that is a resounding no. I’ll try to be brief since I know most of you could care less (and some might be creeped out) about breastfeeding. The most critical milk is called collostrum and is only produced the first few days of an infants life. This is not really milk at all so much it it’s highly fatty liquid that contains all kinds of wonderful things to jump start a child’s immune system - children who have wet nurses at birth lack the good start this wonderful, natural concoction gives them as well rendering them more susceptible to illness. Once the milk does come in, the breast milk contains two part - the initial milk that acts as a thirst quencher and the hind milk that contains the fat - kind of like the food for the baby. The most important thing that breast milk contains that animal milk lacks are antibodies - this was obviously of great importance in a time where germs were unheard of and yet ran rampant - additionally, children who are fed animal milk as babies typically become lactose intolerant later. Milk in a mother has to be established as well. If she fails to produce milk, the child fails to nurse correctly or she is too ill to nurse, her supply will dry up and her child’s chances to live drop drastically. When you consider the amount of women who die in childbirth, this had to have had a large impact on the infant mortality rate. If mother and baby were both healthy after the birth and the child was nursing well, it would still have a great chance of survival. Sorry, probably more than some people ever wanted to know about breast milk… LOL
Alright, this is getting far too long and I’m getting really busy, so I will continue this tomorrow or whenever I get a chance to post again - so stay tuned for part 2, just don’t hold your breath - I don’t want to be responsible for anyone passing out for lack of sufficient oxygen! ;)
Topics: Medieval Era |
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