Would you still be alive if you lived in the 16th century?

[LittleMosIron]

I would have died aged 7 from appendicitis. If not then childbirth or an infected tooth would have finished me off in my early 20's.

Go on then - why couldn't your parents marry? Are they related?

Some dog breeds have it worse, due to human intervention! However, their young are a lot smaller and less well developed.

I do know a lot of mares and foals unfortunately die every year, even with modern veterinary medicine and intervention.

That said, I think a lot of nasty births may be just about survivable- especially if you started having children younger- but the impact on your life afterwards may have been very unpleasant.

I was born by emergency C-section, but that was partly due to me being a large baby and my mother very petite. With less good maternal nutrition, I may not have been as large, and so it might have been an easier birth for her?

If they were related, it'd be more acceptable in the c16 than today! 😂

Just different religions/ethnicities.

No, there were pretty strict rules about consanguinity (being related).

Different ethnicities wouldn't necessarily be a problem; different religions, usually, yes.

Slave trade? Pretty confident my parents wouldn't have been allowed to marry.

Probably. No health problems and easy labours.

What was it you were thinking about, when you said 'slave trade'?

If you are thinking about black people and white people in sixteenth century England/Wales/Scotland, there wasn't a prohibition against marriage. We know people married outside their ethnicity with some regularity. Marrying enslaved people is a more complicated question, and it's more complicated in places like the US. Though, of course, that wouldn't preclude your existence.

Probably would have died from an allergic reaction in my 20s, if not any number of infections for which I would have had antibiotics. I have measles and german measles at the same time as a child, so that may have done for me.
Im incredibly shortsighted, so probably would have been employed as a miniature painter for illuminated manuscripts, or a seamstress, Id likely have been knocked down by a cart if let loose in the street.
My daughter, who has cystic fibrosis, would have been identified as one of the 'fairy children' identified in medieval rhymes, that tasted of salt and would be stolen away in the night. Likely within about 6 months or so. My son would have died from appendicitis at 11.

More recently, in the 1910-20s, my grandfather lost 4 of his siblings in one swoop from scarlet fever. Lives were short and lost easily at that time if you were too poor for a doctor. There are several things that took public health forwards in great leaps - sanitation, antibiotics, vaccines and the NHS spring to mind

My daughter, who has cystic fibrosis, would have been identified as one of the 'fairy children' identified in medieval rhymes, that tasted of salt and would be stolen away in the night.

Which medieval rhymes?

I'm really not thinking that deeply about it at quarter past midnight on a Monday evening.

But fine. It might not preclude my existence, just make it vanishingly unlikely.

I would have died from an ectopic pregnancy. It's amazing how many women would have died due to childbirth or pregnancy complications.

Would have died from pneumonia at 3 weeks old

Fair enough. I was just interested (and can't sleep!).

Actually - sorry, it's horrible as a bit of history - but the slave trade itself resulted in a huge increase in children born to parents who were of different races. Obviously, not consensually. It's grim.

But prior to the bit of the slave trade we generally think about when we say 'the slave trade,' people did marry across ethnicities - not super often, necessarily, but it wasn't seen as a reason to ban marriages.

Excellent work. Keep it up 😂

No I'd have died of sepsis in my 30s.

I dunno about childbirth as I was induced both times at 42 weeks so maybe that would've got me first

I'd have died of MS.

I probably would have died quite young as I had tonsils too big for my body at the age of 3. Luckily I never had tonsillitis but I lived on scrambled eggs as nothing else could get down so failure to thrive
if I had survived that I would have been a goner with DD3. She was in severe distress and I failed to progress so emcs where she very barely survived.
also must mention the anti D injection that was needed the first 2 times

Both I and dd1 would have died during her birth, the doctors told me exactly that at the time. Interesting thread!

I had pneumonia at about a year old so reckon that would have killed me off. If I’d survived that I think the pre- eclampsia would have done it.

I think I'm quite hardy and might have made it, now in my 50's <touches wood>. Hardly ever taken medication like antibiotics. 3 very large babies and 2 further miscarriages were all very straightforward.

I did break my arm skiing and had to have surgery to put it back together, but I have disregarded that as don't think I would have been skiing in the 16th century...

If chest infections as a kid didn't finish me off, pregnancy would have done. Placental abruption.

Everyone is so very certain they would DEFINITELY have been killed by things that only MIGHT have killed them. It was far more of a lottery than that.
I have spent some time researching a woman in the mid 16th century who fell into a coma in the last stages of pregnancy and was thought to be dead and was buried in the family vault, but woke up again and was found and went on to give birth to her son and live another 40 odd years.
The reason for her coma is not known but most likely eclampsia.

Gall stones would have got me , aged 35 but I've slso had a few UTIs that I may have succumbed to without ABs. Oh and I had pre-cancerous cells zapped from my cervix.

That's really interesting, imagine waking up in your own grave 😱

Oh they would. I used to read death records at Uni ( for my course, not for fun)
From ourworldindata.com
Sweden is a country with particularly good historical demographic data. It was the first country to establish an office for population statistics: the Tabellverket, founded in 1749. Going back to their records, we can look at the child mortality rate at the time. During the first three decades of the existence of the statistical office — the period from 1750 to 1780 — their data tells us that 40% of children died before the age of 15.1
During the same period, the mortality rate was about 45% in France, and in Bavaria, about half of all children died. At that time, fertility rates were high, with the average couple having more than 5, 6, or even 7 children, which meant that most parents saw several of their children die.2