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3100 BCE
Ancient Egypt
Children in ancient Egypt were cherished. That does not mean they could misbehave and get away with it. Boys were considered to be troublemakers, and ancient Egyptian parents believed boys needed a firm hand to grow up strong and capable. Girls had an easier time of it, but they too had to behave and listen to their parents. All kids learned about the Egyptian gods and goddesses. Children were taught why it was important to keep their hearts light by doing good deeds. -
1300 BCE
Ancient Greece
Babies did not receive names until the seventh or tenth day of life. Children spent the majority of their time with their mother. Seven-year-old boys were taken to the barracks by the city and raised and were trained in the military. Girls reached puberty at ages twelve or thirteen, at which point they were considered adults and could marry and at age eighteen, boys in several ancient Greek cities were required to join the army for two years of service. -
600 BCE
Ancient Rome
Children were educated to the best of a family's ability to do so. They were allowed to play and visit friends. But they were also trained to obey elders. You never talked back to an elder Roman. You never talked back to your family. Doing those things could actually get you thrown out of the house, exiled by the paterfamilias (the male head of the family), and never allowed back. -
336 BCE
Aristoteles
According to his conception of childhood, a human child is an immature specimen of the organism type, human, which, by nature, has the potentiality to develop into a mature specimen with the structure, form, and function of a normal or standard adult. -
480
The Middle Ages
It is a popular notion that there was no recognition of childhood in medieval society and children were treated like miniature adults as soon as they could walk and talk. However, scholarship on the topic by medievalists provides a different account of children in the Middle Ages. It is not correct to assume that medieval attitudes were identical or even similar to modern ones. But, it can be argued that childhood was recognized as a phase of life, and one that had value, at that time. -
1250
Saint Thomas Aquinas
He said that children were a representation of sin and the only way of healing was growing up, turning into an adult. -
1300
Renaissance
Children went to bed early, often before sunset, after saying their prayers. In boarding school, they slept two in a bed until the age of fourteen when they were adults and slept alone. Children began work as soon as they were capable. At 14, girls reached the age of majority and were legally adults, considered old enough to inherit, marry, and bear children. Boys on the other hand didn't reach the full age of majority until 21 in England. -
Early 17th century
The boys were likely to spend much less time at home with his
mother, and more out with the men working. If a child did
not go to school, she or he usually entered the work force by ten
to twelve, although poor children might be placed in service
at a younger age.
A girl was legally at the age of discretion at the age of twelve,
and a boy at fourteen. They could wed at these ages, although
that was very rare. -
Jhon Locke
He said that children are like white paper void of all characters, without any ideas and they learn within the years, through education. The young child is at once the most vulnerable to bad health and moral influence but also the most open to understanding and experience. -
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
He believed that man is naturally good and that vice and error are alien to him -
Industrial Revolution
Child labour was the crucial ingredient which allowed Britain's Industrial Revolution to succeed. By the early 19th century, England had more than a million child workers, accounting for 15 per cent of the total labour force. -
Sigmund Freud
Freud thought that all babies are initially dominated by unconscious, instinctual and selfish urges for immediate gratification which he labeled the Id. As babies attempt and fail to get all their whims met, they develop a more realistic appreciation of what is realistic and possible, which Freud called the "Ego". Over time, babies also learn about and come to internalize and represent their parents' values and rules. -
The child as a social subject of law
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) of 1989 defines a child as any human person who has not reached the age of eighteen years. Children's rights includes their right to association with both parents, human identity as well as the basic needs for physical protection, food, universal state-paid education, health care, and criminal laws appropriate for the age and development of the child.
