schools as existed were characterized by a “lack of gradation in the curricula according to the difficulty of the subject matter, the simultaneity with which subjects were taught, the mixing of the ages, and the liberty of the pupils.” If a medieval child got to school, he would have begun as late as age ten, probably later. He would have lived on his own in lodgings in the town, far from his family. It would have been common for him to find in his class adults of all ages, and he would not have perceived himself as different from them. He certainly would not have found any correspondence between the ages of students and what they studied.[43]

The Islamic tradition is known for its attention to detail in oralthe response of the Prophet ﷺ was identical for both, even though Khawla clearly differentiated the age to the Prophet. That is because society saw them no different, and that is why the Classical Medieval Islamic scholars made no mention of the age of ʿĀʾisha in marriage. It was only after the development of childhood did we attempt to impose that social structure onto a society that did not recognize it.

In addition, if a claim is made that the Middle Ages were a time of moral corruption and their distorted perception is what led them to child marriages then we need look no further than the past century in the United States of America. In 1930, thousands of boys and girls married before the age of fourteen. It