LeBrok
Elite member
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- Calgary
- Ethnic group
- Citizen of the world
- Y-DNA haplogroup
- R1b Z2109
- mtDNA haplogroup
- H1c
Every so often I noticed that people love to exaggerate quality of life of our ancestors. Old times are romanticized and we only concentrate on glorious battles, and famous individuals. There is not much help from TV and books either, emphasizing only what people love to watch or read, and not necessarily portraying realistic view of life of our ancestors. In Hollywood movies people never works too hard, they have time to enjoy life, they are always dressed in clean clothes, hair is meticulous, makeup is done, and they do mostly heroic actions or romantic love.
So how comfortably ordinary folks had lived in the past?
Except for some elite, like kings and nobles, life was very harsh for 99 percent of ordinary people, from dawn of human kind till 19th century, when thanks to science and industrial revolution things started to improve slowly.
In the past, for this 99% of ancestors, life wasn’t peachy at all. For last 5,000 years of Europe agricultural and herding past, ordinary family lived in a small house mostly composed of two rooms. One room was design to keep animals like cows and pigs, the other room for people. Entire family averaging 5 people, often up to 10, had to share this one room. How they could fit in two or three beds was an art by itself. House was poorly insulated, freezing in winter, no running water, maybe lit by one candle if family could afford. Forget about daily showers, one was lucky to have a bath once a month in washtub, and most likely after father, mother and few siblings already bathed in same water. (And we are complaining about our privacy these days?)
Houses were infested with bugs, where cockroaches were the least nuisance. Blood sucking bedbugs lived in every mattress (made of straw). Clothing lice, head lice, or pubic lice (yes, there were specialized bugs like these, I’m not making it up) and fleas didn’t leave the poor soles even for a moment, very often transmitting many diseases hopping from people to people.
For people not familiar with these beasts, here is the link:
http://www.medicinenet.com/bad_bugs_pictures_slideshow/article.htm
To make lives even more miserable every living sole was a carrier of worms inside. The selection is not small either. Most common worms were pinworm, tapeworm, hookworm, roundworm, whipworm, and the list goes on.
Want to really get scared read some more here:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow.cfm?id=worms-human-parasites
No wonder the average life span was 35 years.
It brings another point. Almost every parent back then experienced death of a child, and some have seen all the kids’ death. Big majority of parents in today’s developed world will never know this biggest pain human can experience. From records we know that ancient populations’ growth was slow if any. It meant that most of kids from the past never lived till adulthood.
Other killers of kids were infectious diseases which now are eradicated or under control of immunization: Smallpox, Rinderpest, Polio, Measles, and Rubella.
Food was scarce, and we know this from archeology, measuring average height of our ancestors. They had signs of malnutrition and were 20 cm shorter than people today. Even till twentieth century there was a tradition in rural homes that father always eats first. It was important that father lives by all means. If father died it meant demise for the whole family. If kid died,…there were still others and father that feeds them. Sad but true.
(It was hard being an atheist in the past. Spirituality and religion gave you hope that your everyday suffering won’t go to waste. Life sucks big time but there will be only joy and pleasure in heaven, as a reward for all the misery.)
Despite being a kid, children had to work from the moment they could carry something. In old fashion agricultural way of life father and mother were not able to work hard enough to support big families. Kids had to work from necessity, they had to bring wood, carry water, herd cows and sheep, and most of all older siblings took care of younger ones. It gave mother more time to take care of domestic animals around the house and sometimes help husband in field work. Older girls helped with cooking, and older boys were working with father in fields. Before feudalism, boys also had to learn how to fight with weapons and be warriors.
Only thanks to our industrial societies nowadays parents can produce enough for whole family, so kids don’t need to work, can go to school and play all day.
In the past 8 hour days of work, free weekend, vacation and hobbies were unheard of.
Pay inequality was narrow, but everybody was poor and lacked free time. Imagine that.
Mothers had to cook from scratch, few meals for small “army” every day. Every piece of clothing was made by hand, and washed only few times a year just in water. People walked mostly barefoot, except in winter. If you had a rotten, painful tooth, you went to blacksmith to pull it off without anesthetic. Everybody stunk, hair was greasy, dirt behind fingernails, filthy cloths (by our standards). Everyday cloths were mostly gray in natural colour of linen and wool. Dyes were difficult to make and expensive to buy.
Freedom of religion? - Everybody in a village believed in same faith.
Freedom of expression? – Not many gays were brave enough to come out of closet. If they had, they didn’t live too long.
Romantic love? – Call the matchmaker, she knows the best. It’ll be arranged, plus two cows and a pig for a bride.
Village justice was swift and unforgiving. Everything that went against village tradition, custom and faith was eradicated rather quickly.
I don’t know about you, but I’ll take living in our current western world any time over lives of our ancestors, even if I was a Cesar.
If you think your life is miserable and cruel and falling apart, take a moment and think about the “joyful” life of our folks in the past.
So how comfortably ordinary folks had lived in the past?
Except for some elite, like kings and nobles, life was very harsh for 99 percent of ordinary people, from dawn of human kind till 19th century, when thanks to science and industrial revolution things started to improve slowly.
In the past, for this 99% of ancestors, life wasn’t peachy at all. For last 5,000 years of Europe agricultural and herding past, ordinary family lived in a small house mostly composed of two rooms. One room was design to keep animals like cows and pigs, the other room for people. Entire family averaging 5 people, often up to 10, had to share this one room. How they could fit in two or three beds was an art by itself. House was poorly insulated, freezing in winter, no running water, maybe lit by one candle if family could afford. Forget about daily showers, one was lucky to have a bath once a month in washtub, and most likely after father, mother and few siblings already bathed in same water. (And we are complaining about our privacy these days?)
Houses were infested with bugs, where cockroaches were the least nuisance. Blood sucking bedbugs lived in every mattress (made of straw). Clothing lice, head lice, or pubic lice (yes, there were specialized bugs like these, I’m not making it up) and fleas didn’t leave the poor soles even for a moment, very often transmitting many diseases hopping from people to people.
For people not familiar with these beasts, here is the link:
http://www.medicinenet.com/bad_bugs_pictures_slideshow/article.htm
To make lives even more miserable every living sole was a carrier of worms inside. The selection is not small either. Most common worms were pinworm, tapeworm, hookworm, roundworm, whipworm, and the list goes on.
Want to really get scared read some more here:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow.cfm?id=worms-human-parasites
No wonder the average life span was 35 years.
It brings another point. Almost every parent back then experienced death of a child, and some have seen all the kids’ death. Big majority of parents in today’s developed world will never know this biggest pain human can experience. From records we know that ancient populations’ growth was slow if any. It meant that most of kids from the past never lived till adulthood.
Other killers of kids were infectious diseases which now are eradicated or under control of immunization: Smallpox, Rinderpest, Polio, Measles, and Rubella.
Food was scarce, and we know this from archeology, measuring average height of our ancestors. They had signs of malnutrition and were 20 cm shorter than people today. Even till twentieth century there was a tradition in rural homes that father always eats first. It was important that father lives by all means. If father died it meant demise for the whole family. If kid died,…there were still others and father that feeds them. Sad but true.
(It was hard being an atheist in the past. Spirituality and religion gave you hope that your everyday suffering won’t go to waste. Life sucks big time but there will be only joy and pleasure in heaven, as a reward for all the misery.)
Despite being a kid, children had to work from the moment they could carry something. In old fashion agricultural way of life father and mother were not able to work hard enough to support big families. Kids had to work from necessity, they had to bring wood, carry water, herd cows and sheep, and most of all older siblings took care of younger ones. It gave mother more time to take care of domestic animals around the house and sometimes help husband in field work. Older girls helped with cooking, and older boys were working with father in fields. Before feudalism, boys also had to learn how to fight with weapons and be warriors.
Only thanks to our industrial societies nowadays parents can produce enough for whole family, so kids don’t need to work, can go to school and play all day.
In the past 8 hour days of work, free weekend, vacation and hobbies were unheard of.
Pay inequality was narrow, but everybody was poor and lacked free time. Imagine that.
Mothers had to cook from scratch, few meals for small “army” every day. Every piece of clothing was made by hand, and washed only few times a year just in water. People walked mostly barefoot, except in winter. If you had a rotten, painful tooth, you went to blacksmith to pull it off without anesthetic. Everybody stunk, hair was greasy, dirt behind fingernails, filthy cloths (by our standards). Everyday cloths were mostly gray in natural colour of linen and wool. Dyes were difficult to make and expensive to buy.
Freedom of religion? - Everybody in a village believed in same faith.
Freedom of expression? – Not many gays were brave enough to come out of closet. If they had, they didn’t live too long.
Romantic love? – Call the matchmaker, she knows the best. It’ll be arranged, plus two cows and a pig for a bride.
Village justice was swift and unforgiving. Everything that went against village tradition, custom and faith was eradicated rather quickly.
I don’t know about you, but I’ll take living in our current western world any time over lives of our ancestors, even if I was a Cesar.
If you think your life is miserable and cruel and falling apart, take a moment and think about the “joyful” life of our folks in the past.