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The life of an ancient Egyptian was short and difficult. Newborn children were not likely to survive their first year. The infant mortality rate was extremely high, possibly around 60-70%, and the mortality rate for women in childbirth was also extremely high. Children then were seen as a special blessing from the gods if they survived their first year.
After about the age of 5, boys and girls were separated in their learning experiences. Boys from wealthy families went to school. Boys from poor families began helping with the men's jobs in the fields or whatever other occupation their father happened to hold. A boy's education lasted the child was between 12 and 16 at which time they were considered grown and could begin to work for themselves. This would be the earliest age for men to marry, but normally they were between 17-20 years of age when they took their first wife. Men could take more than one wife, but had to be able to support each of them and their children. As a result, this was usually done only by the very wealthy. Most men then continued to work until they died, the average life span was approximately 30 years of age for a poorer working man. Making it past the age of 40 was seen as a special blessing and those who did so were rewarded. Men were granted a stipend by the government consisting of grain and vegetables each year. This ration was smaller than what he would have earned had he continued to work but it was enough to keep him alive.
Girls lives were much different than boys. Their entire life was centered around the home and family. At age 4, girls would begin to learn from their mothers how to maintain the house . They would learn how to sew, make foods, and keep house. The hours spent doing domestic chores were much longer than the educational hours of boys. Cloth had to be made and sewed into pieces of clothing, the fields planted and tended, food prepared, and countless other household chores. Girls were expected to marry after they began menstruating around the age of 12 or 13, although there is evidence of girls marrying as young as 8 or 9 years of age. They were also excepted to have a child within the first year of marriage. Pregnancy was a revered condition in ancient Egypt and even if a girl wasn't married, her pregnancy was celebrated. Women's lives were also relatively short with an average of 30 years for poor women and slightly more for women from richer families. Female retirement was different from men's, however. Women were to be taken care of by their sons. If a women had no sons she was to be taken care of by her daughter and son-in-law, but this was rare and occurred only if the daughter was now part of a wealthier family. It was more likely that these old women would be forced to live as beggars.
References:
http://library.thinkquest.org/J0111229/team1/life.htm
http://www.touregypt.net/magazine/mag11012000/magf1.htm
http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/womneg.htm
Written by: Holly Laite, 2002
-Give a women milk from one who had already borne a male child mixed with melon puree. If it made the women sick she was pregnant.
Induce Delivery:
-Place on the woman's abdomen a plaster of sea salt, emmer wheat, and rushes from the Nile River.
Contracting the Uterus:
-Mix the kheper-wer plant, honey, water of carob, and milk. Strain and place in the vagina.
Spells to Assist the Birth Process:
“Come down, placenta, come down! I am Horus who conjures in order that she who is giving birth becomes better than she was, as if she was already delivered...Look, Hathor will lay her hand on her with an amulet of health! I am Horus who saves her!” Repeat four times over a Bes-amulet, placed on the brow of the woman in labor.
“Make the heart of the deliverer strong, and keep alive the one that is coming.”
References:
“Archaeologists uncover 3700-year-old `magical' birth brick in Egypt.” Eurekalert http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2002-07/uop-au3072502.php 30 Nov. 2002.
Parsons, Marie. “Childbirth and Children in Ancient Egypt.” Tour Egypt http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/mothers.htm 30 Nov. 2002.
“Ancient childbirth seat found in Egypt.” Blueyonder http://www.ancienthistory.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/enter/news/272.html 04 Nov. 2002.
“Women's Health and Obstetrics in Ancient Egypt.” Geocities http://www.geocities.com/honda841/Egypt.html 04 Nov. 2002.
“Health—Egyptian Approach to Illness, Pregnancy and Childbirth.” http://members.rogers.com/jasthompson/healthinegypt.htm 04 Nov. 2002.
“Ancient Egypt: Medicine-Pregnancy and childbirth.” http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad.egypt/timelines.topics/medicine.htm 04 Nov. 2002.
For an image of Cleopatra giving birth go to http://www.geocities.com/honda841/Egypt.html
Written by: Alison Thiele, 2002
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