When death comes he steals the infant from the arms of the mother just as he takes him who has reached old age.
New Kingdom scribal instruction
The high levels of infant mortality meant that childhood illnesses were always worrying times for the mother. Very few parents could afford to take their sick children to consult doctors, and anyway the lack of some of the most basic of medical skills meant that little effective treatment was available. If, for example, a child had teething trouble the standard cure was to offer the infant a fried mouse to eat; this must certainly have presented a challenge to a baby without molars. Illnesses such as measles which we today regard as trivial were, without proper treatment, fatal. Not surprisingly, mothers turned again to folk wisdom and magic to protect their darlings, placing their trust in a variety of charms, amulets and spells:
Perish, you who come in from the dark. You who creep in with your nose reversed and your face turned back, and who forgets what he came for. Did you come to kiss this child? I will not allow you to kiss him.
New Kingdom medical advice
The evil spirit described in this incantation cunningly wore his nose reversed so that he would not be recognized sneaking into the house. These spells were known to be so effective that they were frequently written on a small scrap of papyrus packed into a specially carved wooden or gold bead and carefully suspended around the neck of the beloved child to ensure maximum protection. Two thousand years later, little had changed in the Egyptian village and as Miss Blackman observed: ‘To prevent or cure disease in their children the women will go to one magician after another and purchase from them amulets and written charms, not grudging for a moment the expenditure of what may be to them considerable sums of money. Numbers of these prophylactics may be seen hanging from the necks of the hapless infants.’
There is no question that the care of babies and children, not only her own but also her younger brothers and sisters, her grandchildren and the children of friends and relations, would have played a major part in any Egyptian woman’s life. Royal children are occasionally depicted with male child-minders or tutors but, as a general rule, it was women who cared for children. Unfortunately, this type of work is not easily detected in the archaeological record, and in consequence we are left with very little knowledge of Egyptian child-care practices.11 The most important aspect of child-care, however, is clear; all surviving evidence indicates that most parents were loving and conscientious guardians who made every effort to ensure a happy and carefree childhood for their offspring.
Parents bought or made a wide range of toys for their darlings, and boys and girls were able to enjoy carved wooden animals, miniature boats, wooden balls and spinning tops which would still delight any modern child. For those who could not afford such luxuries there were the open fields to play in and the river and canals to swim in, while thick Nile mud was always in plentiful supply for use as modelling clay; several primitive clay dolls and animals, presumably made by children themselves, have been recovered from workmen’s villages. However, as might be expected in a hard-working society where teenage marriages were common and formal education a luxury, childhood was a relatively short-lived experience in ancient Egypt. As the children grew older they were gradually introduced to the work which they would be doing for the rest of their lives. Young children were expected to supervise their tiny brothers and sisters or to take care of the animals, girls helped their mothers around the house while older boys were sent to school, worked in the fields or started to learn their trade. ‘Teenagers’ as a distinct class of young adults simply did not exist. At the age of thirteen or fourteen a daughter would be eagerly anticipating her own marriage, while her mother, probably herself less than thirty years old, could look forward to the pleasant prospect of acquiring a new son-in-law and becoming a respected grandmother.
3
Mistress of the House
Do not control your wife in her house when you know she is efficient. Do not say to her ‘Where is it? Get it’ when she has put something in its correct place. Let your eye observe in silence; then you will recognize her skill, and it will be a joy when your hand is with her. There are many men who don’t realize this, but if a man desists from strife at home he will not find it starting. Every man who establishes a household should hold back his hasty heart.
New Kingdom scribal advice
In the ancient Egyptian mind housework was very firmly equated with women’s work. Domesticated house-husbands were quite simply unknown, and the married woman’s most coveted title of Mistress of the House was a constant reminder of her principal wifely duty: to ensure the smooth day-to-day running of her husband’s home. It seems very unlikely that either sex would ever have dreamed of questioning the inevitability of this division of labour. Males and females were understood by all to be different types of people destined to live very different lives, and any upsetting of this natural order would clearly have been wrong. In every household, therefore, the wife was nominally responsible for all domestic tasks. Naturally, the amount of housework which any individual was personally required to undertake was dependent upon her social status. A queen had no need to disrupt her social life to cook, clean or change nappies, while a wealthy society lady could rely upon the help of a large number of servants including maids, cooks, nurses and brewers, but was expected to supervise and order their activities. A poor woman would need to perform all the domestic tasks herself, helped only by her unmarried daughters and her other close female relations. Given the absence of modern luxuries such as running water, electricity, gas, supermarkets and motorized transport, the care of the home was a full-time occupation involving a great deal of hard physical work.