How did cave women look after their babies?

[Lorddenning1]

Ok so I have a 6 week old baby and he has lots of stuff, a crib, Moses basket, cot and a a pod/nest, this is all for sleeping, don't get me started on a pram car seat, feeding stuff...
Back in the caveman times how did the ladies take care of the babies, like in winter how did they keep them warm, how did they keep the babies quiet so they didn't get eaten or killed by other tribes. What about nappies, was colic around then?

I often sit and wonder about these things, also how babies were made, did they just figure it out and then make the connection that everything they had sex, 9 months later a baby would appear,,,

Does anyone else think about these things or do I have cabin fever and need to get out more?

This is absolutely fascinating, although obviously tragic that infant mortality was still so high.

I suspect it’s more that he’d seen a bit of his mates/brothers/dad having a good fumble under the deer skins, made the connection with the bonking deer he’d seen during rutting season, and had a few pleasurable nights experimenting by himself, before giving it a go with his cave girlfriend.

Sex education is always the best bet.

Can I recomend a book that was very popular among "alternative" parents when mine were born? It's The Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff. It talks about the way babies were reared in an indigenous community in South America-and put forward a parenting style based on it. A fascinating read.

Well obviously they would know how women got pregnant and what the signs of pregnancy were as they would have learned this from elders. Just like in present-day hunter gatherer societies such as the Awa in the Amazon. “Cave men” (assuming you mean Palaeolithic people) were modern humans. They didn’t write, and hadn’t figured out agriculture yet, but they made tools, and even art objects, they traded with each other and they would have had an extensive oral history and culture. And the majority of them didn’t live in caves, at least not year round - they moved with the seasons and used tents, much as many hunter gatherers still do today.

Thanks OP for such an interesting thread.

I believe that sphagnum moss was used a lot as a sanitary product e.g. for menstruating women/girls. Also as an early form of wipe and toilet roll (among all manner of other uses) thanks to its super absorbent properties.
It's probably still used my some communities today (as well as by my DH when he does a solo camping trip :)

My sister says this too- she has travelled and worked extensively throughout west Africa and she swears blind she has never seen an African baby cry! As long as they are in physical contact with their mums, which they always are, they are happy.

Cavemen did not = stupid!!!!!! People knew a lot, discovered a lot and were as intelligent as we are - they just lived in small scale societies without access to as much tech as we have.

@Soigneur how did the elders know what to do, maybe my thread should of said the first person/persons ever

All or most other species sleep next to their young.

Only mammals- a lot of reptiles never even meet their mothers!

Re spaghum moss also meant to mention its antibacterial properties.

"Medicinal uses:It is bactericidal, resistant to decay in herbaria, and safe to use against skin. Sphagnum was used extensively for surgical dressings during the first World War, and by mothers in Lapland and North America for infants' "

Because they learned it from their elders and so on. Eventually you’ll go back to early (non-human) hominids who did not have language as we understand it and worked more on instinct and observation - just as chimpanzees do today.

Instincts. How do chimpanzees know? Or dogs? Or rabbits?

@ThreeEggOmlette I expect a lot of infanticide too. From mostly men, given babies would 'hold the tribe back', mean men got less sex and less productivity from the women and such other things.

I think about this all the time 😂

A midwife started me off when we were talking about the difficulty of getting babies to sleep on their own/in cots etc. she said something like "well no-one has told babies that we live in safe houses not caves and there aren't any sabre tooth tigers waiting to eat them."

I think babies would have learnt what was safe to eat by watching their mothers gather stuff. It's very notable that 2/3/4 year olds tend to stick to safe/known foods . Knowledge of what to eat would have been passed between generations and would have been pretty important. Don't eat that mushroom, that's what killed your uncle Keith etc 😂

I try not to think about the sex arrangements too much though. I imagine rape/violence was pretty common and women would have had to work together to protect each other and their offspring. Maybe I'm wrong and women could pick and choose from amongst the men - and what was attractive? most hairy? Best spear throwing technique? Gathered the most berries in one day?

And can you imagine how smelly they must have been 😂

I didn't have much baby stuff, and you don't have to go back that far to get to times when a baby born into a working family slept with their parents and possibly siblings too, or in a drawer or similar, and was carried in a shawl.

I had a sling, the equivalent could be tied from a length of woven cloth, or made from an animal skin. You only need a car seat if you use a car. Babies need very little.

Ah, from your comment it sounded like you were saying the Stone Age was "a bit before" the Victorian Era.

I think in lots of more primitive cultures sex didn't carry shame and people would have many partners,I think I read it was common in polynesian societies until Christian missionaries changed things. So maybe rape wasn't an issue if men and women were more likely to find someone as willing as they were.

I also read about a tribe in Papua New Guinea I think where they didn't believe sex had anything to do with pregnancy and this was proved as women would have babies when their husband's were away for extended periods (maybe it was just a female plot so men didn't realise they were having fun while the husband was off fighting wars or something.) I think ancient spirits made them pregnant so no issue with illegitimacy as all the women were made pregnant by the ancient spirits.

@Iwasafool is that the same as curry and sex bring on labour, I wonder who came up with that myth?

I think about this all the time! Especially when my baby was a newborn and there was so much chatter about schedules/tongue ties/room temperatures/sleep training/germs, as well as the algorithms constantly trying to sell me all sorts of products and gadgets for my baby.

Whenever I would start to feel overwhelmed I would just think “well how did a cavewoman do it” and it made me feel better! I felt like I was being told that raising babies is extremely complicated, and this thought helped me remember that it isn’t. Difficult yes! But complicated, no.

Truly excellent thread. I think about this stuff often. I posted a whole back wondering how anyone survived childbirth or illness - we’re only here because our ancestors did! I wouldn’t have survived my own delivery never mind got old enough to need complicated c sections with my own two.

I’ve got a one year old at the moment and have been wondering how any infant learns to crawl and walk safely when they’re carried most of the time. I use a carrier with mine constantly when we’re out, I can’t remember why we bothered getting a buggy, but he’s on the floor at a lot at home. I worry about him eating harmless house spiders never mind toxic plants or small rocks or falling off a cliff.

Someone on a baby sleep forum I’ve been on since I had DD used the phrase a cave age baby in a space age world to explain how normal infant sleep is inconvenienced by our modern ways and expectations rather than the other way round. I found it comforting and validating. Of me and baby DD tbh.

Enjoy your baby OP!

Just ordered it off eBay, thank you so much.

They build strength when being carried, more so that on their back in a pram. DS was held most of the time until he crawled at 5 months.

The Virgin Mary took note on this one!!!

@AnneLovesGilbert oh, I hope you come back when you've read it-I'd love to know what you think. It's not long.

Incidentally, I am listening to Anne as an audiobook as I type. They're just trying to replace Aunt Josephine's willow pattern platter....

Well, we apparently only have 7 "mother's", so lots of them were obviously not very good at it.