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7000 BCE
CHILD SACRIFICE
It was practiced by the Irish Celts, the Gauls, the Scandinavians, the Egyptians, the Phoenicians, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and, in certain periods, the Israelites. Many archeologists have found child bones from these activities in Jericho. -
1230 BCE
BABIES WERE TIED UP
The belief that infants turned into evil beings is one of the reasons why they were tied up, or swaddled, so long and so tightly. -
50
CHILDREN DURING ORGIES
It was pretty common to see children waiting on adults during orgy. -
75
CHILD ABUSE
Sexual use of children was everywhere. Growing up in Greece and Rome often included being used sexually by older men. -
100
CIRCUMCISION
Jews, Egyptians, Arabs, and others circumcised the foreskin of boys. The reasons given for this is the excision of passions, which bind the mind. It was believed that circumcision would help. -
290
INFANTICIDE
The killing of legitimate children even by wealthy parents was so common that there was even a decrease of the population in several cities. Until the fourth century A.D., neither law nor public opinion found infanticide wrong in either Greece or Rome. -
400
CHILDHOOD AND HOMOSEXUALITY
Aristotle said homosexuality often becomes habitual in “those who are abused from childhood.” -
420
CASTRATION
Intercourse with castrated children was often spoken of as being especially arousing, castrated boys were the favorites. Surgeons said they were often called upon to perform the surgery. -
787
FIRST ASYLUM
Dateo of Milan founded the first asylum solely for abandoned infants. Other countries followed much the same pattern of evolution. -
900
CHILD AS MOTHER'S LOVER
In many pictures it was shown the wish of the child that they would be a lover who would passionately embrace the mother. -
1200
CHILD BEATING LAW
A child beating law was created in which was affirmed that parents should beat their children gently because they were also humans.
"Are they not human? Are they not flesh and blood like you?” -
1210
SWADDLED CHILDREN
It was common to se parents swaddling up their babies as swaddled infants are extremely passive, their hearts slow down, they cry less, they sleep far more -
1400
SCARY GHOST-LIKE FIGURES
Mormo, Canida, Poine, Sybaris, Acco, Empusa, Gorgon, and Ephialtes were invented for childs to feel scared about staying up at night. These ghosts "ate" and scared children. -
1400
CHILDREN GIVEN TO THE DEVIL
Bad parents use to give their children to the devil. This was common after some parents promised giving their children to him. -
1511
GRANDMOTHERS AND GRANDCHILDREN
Grandmothers were supposed to masturbate their grandsons according to Hans Baldung Grien’s picture
of Anna selbdritt shows -
1520
EXORCISMS FOR HYSTERICAL FITS
The frequent hysterical fits of children could often be cured by exorcising the Devil out of the children, as in this 1520 painting
by Grunewald. -
1558
CHILDREN AS SERVANTS
Children used to take care of adults in very concrete ways. Ever since Roman times, boys and girls waited on their parents at table, and in the Middle Ages all children except royalty acted as servants -
CHILDREN PLAY WITH MASKS
Children used to be frightened by masks, and not only from adults but from other kids who would play with the masks. -
BAPTISMS IN THE OLD ERA
Many people thought that "the new-born babe is full of the stains and pollution of sin, which it inherits from our first parents through our loins", as Richard Allestree said. Actually, the baptisms used to include exorcisms of the Devil. -
JOHN LOCKE TABULA RASA
In his brilliant 1689 work An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke argues that, at birth, the mind is a tabula rasa (a blank slate) that we fill with ‘ideas’ as we experience the world through the five senses. -
SINFUL ACTIVITIES
Masturbation in adults was a minor sin, even tho in children it wasn't. Adult homosexuality, not masturbation, was the main obsession of premodern sexual regulation, actually. -
CONTROL OF PISS
The struggle between parent and child for control in infancy of urine and feces is an eighteenth-century invention. Children were given suppositories, enemas, and oral purges in sickness and in health. -
INFANTICIDE WAS STILL COMMON
By the eighteenth century, there was high incidence of infanticide in every country in Europe. As more foundling homes were opened in each country, babies poured in from all over, and the homes quickly ran out of room. -
ABANDONED BABIES
There were lot of dying babies lying in the gutters and rotting on the dung-heaps of London -
SCARY NURSES
Nurses used to scare infants with stories of raw-head and bloody-bones monsters who would eat them. Not only that, but a person with a costume would terrify them. Some children died. -
SUBSTITUTES FOR BEATING
As beatings began to decrease children left in the dark became quite popular. Children were put in “dark closets, where they were sometimes forgotten for hours.” -
ABANDONING OF YOUNG CHILDREN
the informal abandoning of young children to other people by their parents occurred quite ofthen during this time. Children were given away for them to "learn to speak" or “to cure timidness”. -
CHILD'S SLEEPING BELT
This was used to assure body remains straight while sleeping, one of dozens of restraint devices invented. -
MIND CHANGE
It was really common to threaten children with ghosts and devils, but this practice stopped being acceptable and people stopped using it. Still, in many villages it was common to see those situations. -
ANTI MASTURBATION DEVICES
Anti masturbation devices were created for people not to be able to do this sinful activity. -
CHILDREN IN WALLS
Sealing children in walls, foundations of buildings, and bridges to strengthen the structure was also common and it was still common in the almost 20th century Germany -
PENIS RINGS
Penis-Rings were created to put on boys at night in bed to prevent erections while sleeping. -
Parent-child relation
Freud discovered that parent-child relation was important. St. Augustine’s also thought it was important, but since Freud childhood acquired a new dimension -
CHILD LABOR
In the early 1900s, children frequently worked in factories. Some children as young as 5 or 6 worked. Many children worked long shifts, sometimes up to 12 hours. -
UN ASSEMBLY ABOUT CHILDREN RIGHTS
In 1959, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which defines children's rights to protection, education, health care, shelter, and good nutrition. Check this video out: https://youtu.be/TFMqTDIYI2U -
Period: to
UNCRC
The UNCRC consists of 54 articles that set out children’s rights and how governments should work together to make them available to all children.
All countries that sign up to the UNCRC are bound by international law to ensure it is implemented. This is monitored by the Committee on the Rights of the Child -
CONTEMPORARY CHILDREN RIGHTS
As in 2022, the development of the rights of the child has been major, and there is a continuous implementation of new strategies to improve these rights.
