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Psychologically, I don't think the value of children has changed. Mourning the death of children is as ancient a literary trope as any. But from a microeconomi

Psychologically, I don't think the value of children has changed. Mourning the death of children is as ancient a literary trope as any. But from a microeconomic point of view, children were more valuable in pre-industrial times. Most people worked in agriculture or the trades and lived in multi-generation households, and children were necessary to help with chores and eventually take over the main occupation and care for the elder parents. There was no retirement fund, just your children. Food and clothing were more expensive and childbirth was risky, so children represented a major investment. That they were sacrificed is a testament to how much value people placed on the ritual, not the lack of value of children. See also how valuable farm animals were sacrificed.

inglor_cz 3y ago
"Mourning the death of children is as ancient a literary trope as any." It might have been different between infants and slightly older children. The really young ones died all too often.
- TechnicalVault 3y ago
  That is definitely true, we have diaries from folks who lived in the 1600s in London where you have the different reactions to their children dying at different age. They loved and cared for them but with close to a quarter of kids dying in their first year, it was something most families came to expect and experience but that they never completely numb to. When an older child died, it was an even bigger deal because they'd got past that dangerous first few years and you weren't expecting it.
- EdwardDiego 3y ago
  What's interesting is that a "good" name would often be reused when a child died. So a former leader of my country had three daughters called "Catherine" (IIRC), but two are buried beside each other in a small gold mining town's cemetery, having died young, the last Catherine living to adulthood.

inglor_cz 3y ago

"Mourning the death of children is as ancient a literary trope as any." It might have been different between infants and slightly older children. The really young ones died all too often.

TechnicalVault 3y ago
That is definitely true, we have diaries from folks who lived in the 1600s in London where you have the different reactions to their children dying at different age. They loved and cared for them but with close to a quarter of kids dying in their first year, it was something most families came to expect and experience but that they never completely numb to. When an older child died, it was an even bigger deal because they'd got past that dangerous first few years and you weren't expecting it.
EdwardDiego 3y ago
What's interesting is that a "good" name would often be reused when a child died. So a former leader of my country had three daughters called "Catherine" (IIRC), but two are buried beside each other in a small gold mining town's cemetery, having died young, the last Catherine living to adulthood.