9 terrible things that awaited children in the Middle Ages

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

A collection of bad advice from the depths of time.

1. Extremely tight swaddling

It is impossible to say that in the Middle Ages parents did not love their children: they were sincerely cared for. Another thing is that the concept of care in those days was clearly different from the present.

For example, babies were swaddled extremely tightly - for their own good. It was believed that this would help their bodies to form. It was necessary to press the baby's hands at the seams, bring the legs together and wrap the body with long and narrow canvases, rolls, like a mummy. The ears were pressed tightly against the skull to make them more beautiful. At the same time, the comfort of the child did not bother anyone: he would say thank you later.

Dr. Aldobrandini from Siena in his treatise advised parents to overlay the baby with rose petals, rub with salt (sounds like a good recipe) and bandage with swaddling clothes, "for the child takes any shape, like wax." Three times a day - unwind and clean the contaminated parts with wine.

And also, in order to give a noble shape to the skull, special boards could be inserted into the cap.

Bartholomew English explains the need to swaddle children as tightly as possible by the fact that the child's organs have not yet been properly fixed and can mix inside the body, and the limbs can bend. The pediatrician is what you need.

2. Consumption of alcohol from an early age

There is a widespread myth that in the Middle Ages people hardly drank water due to the fact that it was dirty, and no one thought of boiling it. And they allegedly had to whip beer instead of her.

In fact, there was, of course, drinking water in medieval Europe - it was not for nothing that all settlements were founded near its sources. But alcohol was also consumed very often. Moreover, they even gave it to young children.

A drink called small ale, unfiltered and thick, up to 2.8% ABV, was drunk regardless of age.

Dr. Michele Savonarola in his book advised to drink wine diluted with water for children under seven years old. White was considered preferable to red.

In addition, wine had to be poured into the infant's mouth if it was too weak and quiet. For example, when the son of Louis XIII was born to King Henry IV of France and Navarre, he looked suspiciously unviable. He was drunk with wine, and the baby, suddenly feeling a taste for life, cried out loudly, as it should be for a future monarch.

Bartholomeus Mettlinger urged people not to go too far and give wine to boys from 14 years old, and girls from 12. He wisely noticed that this drink removes moisture from the body, and children need it to grow.

Nursing mothers were also advised to drink wine, preferably with a delicate bouquet. And, finally, it was believed that it is necessary for pregnant women who want to give birth to a boy. Those who preferred water could only count on a girl, and the latter were not particularly appreciated in the Middle Ages. A daughter was born - well, more wine was needed.

3. Image in ugly portraits

If you look at the painting of the Middle Ages, you will notice that it, frankly, lacked realism.

But if the extremely ugly lions, crocodiles and elephants can still be forgiven artists, since they have never seen them, then how to explain such frightening babies? In most of the paintings, they resemble forty-year-old balding men whose heads were sewn onto children's bodies.

You can, of course, say that people of that era simply did not know how to draw properly. Other works generally look like their author is your six-year-old niece.

However, in reality, the reason is less obvious, according to Matthew Everett, professor of art history at Creighton University. The fact is that most of the images of children of the Middle Ages are portraits of Jesus. According to the Catholic beliefs of those years, Christ was born physically and mentally perfect - he did not need to grow up. Son of God, after all.

The artists who painted similar paintings commissioned by the Church took it literally - that Jesus should be painted as an adult, only a little one. Moreover, with a facial expression containing all the world's sorrow.

And then they began to draw all babies in general. In general, this is not an inability, but the style. Homuncularity is called - from the Latin homunculus, "little man."

4. Harsh children's hygiene

A bathroom for babies was considered an optional procedure - it was enough to change the bridles. According to the leadership of Jacques Guillaume in 1612, it was done this way.

All doors and windows in the house must be tightly closed. Sit closer to the fireplace, put a pillow on your knees, and a child on it. In this case, you must hold his legs so that he does not kick. Then - cover the baby with a raincoat so as not to catch a cold (from this it was quite possible to die, medicine is so-so).

If the child needs cleaning, you can wipe it with a linen cloth dampened with water and wine. And then swaddle as tightly as possible.

The procedure is repeated three times a day - at seven in the morning, at noon and at seven in the evening.

Particularly clean parents, notes Dr. Guillaume, can also do this at midnight, but this practice is not very common.

However, the child can be bathed in water, says Dr. Francesco da Barberino in a manual for women of 1348. If the baby wants to kick you, you should let him get off his hands - this way he will get stronger faster. Just don't forget to rub his joints and nostrils with olive oil afterwards.

By the way, Senor da Barberino was not a doctor of medicine, but of jurisprudence, and worked as a notary. But this did not stop him from giving advice on caring for children.

5. Questionable help with teething

Dr. Michele Savonarola argued: if your child suffers from teething, it's okay. Massage his throat and gums, then make him chew on rabbit brain pate. It is an excellent pain reliever.

Don't believe me? Have you seen what teeth rabbits have? That's just it.

If the pate is not lying around in the house, give the baby dog milk. Puppies drink it, and their teeth erupt normally, which means that they will help the baby too. As a last resort, if there is no dog at hand, goose fat will do. Or olive oil.

By the way, if you do not trust the advice of any dubious people, and some of them are not doctors at all, but notaries, - here's a woman's view of the problem. Italian doctor Trota Salernska recommended lubricating the baby's palate with honey to relieve pain. And in general, she argued that this was the best way to make children stop crying - Trotha did not say anything about a possible allergy.

However, honey, of course, will be nicer than rabbit brains.

6. Using a meat teat

Trotha Salernskaya mentioned something else important - how to teach children from a young age to normal adult food. Indeed, in the harsh Middle Ages, infant formula was not yet delivered, and therefore, the sooner the baby begins to eat the same thing as the adults, the less problems with nutrition will be.

Therefore, from infancy, it is worth giving the child boiled pieces of poultry meat so that he sucks them. So, you look, and learn to chew. And if you are a simple peasant woman and you have meat on your table only on major holidays, give your baby a chewed bread crumb.

7. Feeding by professionals

The aforementioned Dr. Bartholomeus Mettlinger discouraged women from breastfeeding their newborns for the first 14 days, because the milk had not yet had time to infuse and acquire useful properties. It could even be poisonous to a child! Although, given the level of infant mortality in the Middle Ages, it is difficult to figure out whether the baby was poisoned by lactose or something else.

Therefore, it was better to give the children for feeding to specially trained professionals. Mettlinger has the following requirements for a wet nurse.

She should not be too young or too old - ladies aged 25 are best suited. A woman should feed her own baby for at least six weeks before she starts caring for yours. She should be healthy, not shy, with a tanned face, a large neck, with not too small, not too large or saggy breasts.

If you still decide to feed yourself right away, give the baby a drop of honey before bringing it to the breast. This will make your milk less “harmful,” writes Mettlinger.

Better yet, let the she-wolf suck your very first milk. If you get poisoned, then it's not a pity. How, there is no she-wolf on the farm? Well, why are you so.

At worst, you can give a puppy a normal dog's chest, but at the first opportunity, get a normal animal.

8. Elimination of twins

In general, attitudes towards twins in the Middle Ages varied greatly from case to case. Sometimes their birth was considered a blessing and a gift straight from the Lord. But sometimes the simultaneous appearance of two children caused uncomfortable questions from husbands.

How the human body works, then it was not entirely understood. See, for example, the illustration above from the treatise by Johannes de Quetham, which depicts the anatomy of a pregnant woman. Plausible, huh?

Therefore, some pundits believed that reproduction in humans always happens like this: one sexual intercourse - one child. And if two of them appeared in a single run, it means that your wife walked up the second one on the side.

Particularly suspicious husbands could suspect the wife of the fact that she had cheated not with a man, but with the devil himself. And then how do you know which of the babies is yours and which is the son of the incubus demon? In such cases, an extra baby could be killed.

However, there were also not so discrediting reasons for the parent. Twins could have appeared without adultery - just your wife heavily leaned on plums during pregnancy. Or a bird accidentally flew into the window to her, and birds, as you know, are restless souls. As a result, extra life was formed in the womb.

Albertus Magnus, a medieval theologian-philosopher, mentor of Thomas Aquinas, explained the birth of twins quite simply.

There are some women and animals who are too fond of intercourse. And with this delight, their uterus moves when sperm is spilled on her sensory nerves, and from this pleasure the sperm is separated.

Albertus Magnus Quote from De Animalibus

Albert also noticed that there are more twins and triplets in Egypt than in Europe, because the southern ladies are hotter.

In general, if you have two children and your husband pesters with explanations, tell them that he simply gives you double pleasure in bed. Or insist on the plum version.

9. Baking children in the oven

Finally, an interesting fact about caring for children in the Middle Ages, not in your Europe, but in Mother Russia. The ritual called "baking children" was preserved in some regions among the Slavic peoples until the 20th century. If a child was born prematurely, is weak, sick, or generally behaves somehow suspiciously, ordinary Russian peasants did this to him.

We cover the baby with dough. We put it on a shovel, on which bread is baked, and send it to a heated oven. Well, not on an open fire, of course.

It was believed that in the oven the child will “ripen”, as in the mother's womb. This action was accompanied by walking of midwives and healers clockwise and counterclockwise around the hut, the recitation of various spells and other rituals. The dough removed from the baby was then fed to the dog in order to pass on the diseases collected from the child.

So, perhaps, Baba Yaga in the original versions of Russian fairy tales, pushing the children who wandered into her in the oven, acted out of good intentions.