The Invention of Childhood - A Brief History

Phillipe Aries, a French historian, was the first person to argue that'childhood' did not exist throughout history as it does today. He claimed that in the Middle Ages, there was no concept of the child. The child was invisible, not distinguished from adults in terms of age or physical maturity. Children went to work as soon as they could walk and socialised with adults, even in public houses and brothels.

He came to this conclusion by studying the representation of children in art from the 13th to the 18th Century. In the paintings of the Middle Ages, children did not exist. Aries' suggested that they were of such little importance as a distinct category that they did not warrant any form of unique representation. When they did appear through necessity, as in the representation of the Madonna and the child, Jesus, they were portrayed as 'miniature' adults, without any of the physical characteristics of the child or the chubby, rounded, vulnerable appearance familiar to us today.

During this period children suffered great amounts of cruelty. Often children who born deformed or with other disabilities discarded, often left to die of exposure. Parents didn't form strong, emotional attachments to their children during the Middle Ages, though this may have been due to the high mortality rates among children during this time in history.

Children suffered awful atrocities during the Middle Ages. Unwanted babies were often 'exposed', left naked on large open wastedlands to die of exposure.

During the late 16th and early 17th century, a gradual awareness of the child as 'different' began to develop. This was the beginning of the perception of childhood as the 'age of innocence'. Initially, children began to be seen as play-things, sources of amusement and delight. But this wasn't a universal perception. It was particular to the middle classes who could afford to 'pamper' or 'coddle' their children. So while the child was developing an emotional value among the the middle classes, their economic value remained central to the working classes of the time.

Only the wealthy could afford the luxury of pampering their children. Even then, it was for their own amusement only

During the 18th Century children came to be seen as in need of education and discipline. It was at this time that the first writings on morals and education began to appear, developing from books on manners and etiquette that were used in schools of the time.

So by the this the modern conception of the child was emerging in the recognition of the process of growing and the need to control this process. This period was prompted by the Enlightenment, a period of where reason and rational thinking. The proper education of the child was considered to be in the interest of progress.

It was Rousseau, writing at this time, who is responsible for the emergence of 'the child' as a very distinct category, as he wrote "Emile", the guide to creating the perfect child through education.

With the emphasis on the child's eduction, came the institutionalised child - the child whose physical and moral well-being were ensured via corrective training.

So the modern conception of of childhood came be seen to have emerged from a moral sensibility that societies began to acquire during the C18th.

Only when society developed a 'moral sensibility' did we recognise that children needed care, protection and education. Unforunately, providing this is still a challenge for many societies

Phillipe Aries discovered that the 'childhood' did not exist in the Middle Ages as they were either completely absent from the art of the day or represented as 'miniature' adults. But others have suggested that this could have been due to changes in artistic style rather than changes in understandings of childhood as a separate category.

He also claims that the educational system emerged as a response to society developing morally and understanding the need to train and educate children, but it was the books used in the schools at the time, particularly on morals and etiquette, that influenced how children were percieved at this time by society.