Terrible game, or Why in the old days, children played in the funeral
At all times children's games served as a preparation for adult life. Children are losing the familiar patterns of behaviour that are copied from the surrounding world. It is noteworthy that children from different countries enthusiastically played similar games. For example, worldwide, girls play with dolls, boys prefer fights and competitions.
Modern children, unlike their contemporaries in the nineteenth century, did not play in the death. So where there was a terrible game to the funeral?
As it was
It is no secret that the girls always loved dolls. Toy closet fashionista consisted of different outfits. Mourning dress was a mandatory attribute. It sounds shocking, but then children often saw death and themselves became its victims. In the nineteenth century, parents were legitimate concerns about children.
Very often babies do not live to their first birthday. Given the sad statistics parents tried to give birth to as many children as possible. If the child is fortunate enough to live the first year, his chances to enter in the adolescent age was still elusive. Older children would become witnesses of the death Jr. Because the funeral was frequently featured in children's games.
Adults were not trying to disguise the topic of death. While parents are often photographed with the dead children. Although in the nineteenth century photograph was expensive, the parents sought to preserve at least some memory of the deceased Chad. Usually this photo was a matter of pride and was on public display.
A little history
Sanitary norms of the nineteenth century was very far from our own. The level of medicine also left much to be desired. The deadly combination of the two factors had a direct relationship, as to the duration of death and mortality. Unfavorable environmental conditions was the third and decisive factor.
In human history, the nineteenth century is not only a pastoral shepherdess on a background of meadows, but also the victorious March of the industrial revolution. In the cities there were large factories, which caused an influx of labor. As a result, dramatically increased the population. But the conditions of life remain the same. The most depressing lack of sanitation, an incredible stench.A fast-growing industry in addition to new and cheap products gave the townspeople could. Air pollution was accompanied by the poisoning of water resources. Treatment facilities at the time simply did not exist. When building a new industrial object, they were not even designed. The factories had been dumping sewage into the rivers that fed the city.
Some statistics
Medicine of the XIX century not yet able to cope with many diseases. The doctors were powerless in the face of terrible epidemics of measles, tuberculosis, typhus, smallpox. Vaccination was under development and was the hot topic of scientific debate. Rural children, ill with chicken pox, influenza or measles, in 20% of cases are not recovered. In cities with high population density and a catastrophic environment the infant mortality rate was even higher.
Scary games in the literature
Many writers have preserved for posterity, traditions and habits of the people who lived in the XIX century. Thus, in the work of Charles Dickens "little Shop of jewels", which he wrote in 1840, there is a remarkable scene. In it the company of kids playing in the funeral of the present cemetery. They buried one of the kids, who by lot had to play the role of a dead man.
Charles Dickens literary talent thanks very accurately conveys the heavy, oppressive atmosphere of the XIX century in "the Adventures of Oliver Twist". Writer Mary carbery from the UK who was born in 1849, shared childhood memories in his memoirs. She described one of the normal games played with brother — the funeral of the doll.
We live in a different time. Due to the changes and progress children's game in the funeral gone. Modern children know about death a lot less than their peers from the XIX century. Psychologists and teachers are always ready to come to the aid of parents. The Internet is full of advice on how to delicately tell the child about death. But just over a hundred years ago, the death and life go hand in hand, and children played in the funeral.
Keywords: 19th century | Childhood games | Funerals