 the parents. As Hannah Wooley puts it when talking about marrying against parental wishes, "…Children are so much the goods and chattels of a parent that
they cannot without a kind of theft give themselves away...".
There was no cosy concept of childhood in the 17th century; that didn't arrive until the 19th. Children were small, undeveloped and unruly savages who, naturally wayward because of the Fall and Original Sin, had to be tamed and civilised
before they could be saved spiritually or admitted socially.
"Spare the rod and spoil the boy" was a belief commonly adhered to both for boys and girls, especially in the matter or learning which seems to have been literally beaten into some of them. Nor was it only men who did the beating: women
commonly beat girls for misdemeanours, both their own children and young maids.
In poor families where every mouth was an added burden, children were put to some sort of simple work as soon as possible; sometimes as young as three. Little fingers could tie threads and pick up fiddly pins and buttons.
There were many small jobs around house and fields to keep older children busy. Both sexes picked stones from the fields and scared rooks with wooden rattles and all members of the family helped with the harvest.
In large families the care of the smallest children was usually given to the oldest girl. A seven- or eight-year-old might be found shepherding her small siblings about, humping the baby on her hip. Such very young girls often bore the
responsibility for the survival of toddlers,keeping them out of millponds, lakes, cowbyres and fires and saving them from being eaten by pigs (true), occasionally, as in the case of Thomas Tomkins with tragic results.
Children still must have had plenty of time to play, as the smallness of the houses of the poor and the largeness of families made it necessary for them to be outside most of the time.
Boys, not having household duties like spinning, seemed to have an easier time of it altogether and "being boys" could go off playing one of the innumerable (and violent) games illustrated in Brueghel's "Childhood Games". Then, as until
recently, "being boys" involved getting hold of the most dangerous things available - knives, arrows, fire etc. and playing with them, but unlike today, this was seen as a natural way for them to develop into men. Fighting too was common
and not always discouraged even by the godly, for who wanted their son to grow up a milksop?
Nappies were not used once babies could toddle. They wore skirts split conveniently at the back and the resulting messes had to be cleaned up, like those of the dogs, by an unfortunate maid. Boys were dressed in aprons and skirts like
their sisters, (but can usually be identified in pictures by their shorter hair and play swords) until they were breeched, at about six or seven. This was a cause for family celebration as it symbolised their entry into the favoured
world of men. Henceforth they would be encouraged to spend more time in men's pursuits away from their mothers.
Once out of baby clothes children were dressed as small versions of adults not, as today, because they looked so cute, but because their parents wished them to identify with the adult world. (The care of these often expensive clothes
must have been a continual source of trouble for both boys and girls - remember Polly Flinders and her Nice New Clothes?) Mothers put quite young girls - four and five - into simple corsets "to set the waist" and as fashionable waists
grew longer over the century so these grew more restrictive. One of John Evelyn's little daughters died when her tight corset broke one of her soft ribs and drove it into a lung.
Children of poorer families, about whom we know very little, presumably wore cut down adult clothes and handed them on to younger children.
Respect for one's parents was reinforced by formal behaviour which could be found explained in the many books on manners available for the guidance of the young.
The old tradition of kneeling to greet one's parents in the morning was dying out by the mi