Many believe that in the Middle Ages children did not show love and compassion. So if this was really the case? How to care for babies and children under the Middle Ages?
How to educate children in the Middle Ages? / unsplash.com
Infancy
Babies lived a difficult life. Almost a third of them died at birth or in the first months of life. Therefore children baptized the day after birth. Childbirth were lotteries. Light by today's standards, they could have been killed or lying-in woman, or child, or both. Infections were complicated deliveries, which resulted in lack of knowledge of female physiology and inept midwives. Large families were the norm. You understand that none of the What contraception speech could not be. Woman in marriage the average pregnant once every 18 months. Constant pregnancy and childbirth affect its health, mothers were dying by 30-35 years, or even earlier.Infancy child depended on what family he was born. Notable mothers do not feed their children. They hired a nurse and could afford nannies. Church condemns it by appealing to the image of the Holy Mary and baby Jesus. Poor mom yourself breeding and fattening children. Over time, the baby was transferred to the general table. The food was meager, so often children suffer a deficit of vitamins and minerals, they have developed rickets and other diseases. Tight swaddling was the norm. It was believed that it aligns the legs of the child. It also prevented the loss of a baby cradle, he just could not move.
From one year to seven years
Once the child begins to walk, the risk increases for him. Therefore, mothers are often tied to her children that they have not gone away and is not crippled himself. Often children injured livestock, they burnt with fire, or can fall in the water unattended. During warmer months, the children of the poor were playing naked in the street. And no one did not care. Small and large need, they were celebrating in the streets, not bothering to hygiene. Children spend much time on the games: in their arsenal were wooden swords, horses on sticks, balls, wax figures, as well as the materials at hand.
How to educate children in the Middle Ages? / unsplash.com
Children until adolescence
With 7 years it was believed that childhood was over. From that moment the children were sent to school. The rich could afford to study science in schools. Children of the poor were an apprentice to master some profession. In the same period, children begin charging homework: girls gathered vegetables, fruits, berries, and helped with the younger children, as well as prepared food; boys look after the cattle. Children were allowed to beat. They are often punished by flogging. Even aristocratic status does not get rid of it. For example, in an eight-day coronation of Louis XIII carved it for a long time woke up in horror in the morning, waiting for corporal punishment.Teenage years
After puberty, children are considered as adults. The girls were ready for marriage is about 12-14 years old, boys 15-16. Girls are often married off for much older men. Often the gap in age is 20-30 years.
Despite the tough times of the Middle Ages, numerous diseases and short childhood - it was all the same. Children are considered to be "the gift of the Lord", so to say that it was very bad - it is impossible. There are indications that stood up for them, when they were punished. And they were not sent to work with the cradle, as it was in the Victorian era. Just in the Middle Ages, it was hard and everyone had to grow up fast.
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