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?

Basically loads of babies would have died. Those that survived were the strongest with the best parents who had the fiercest maternal/ paternal/ familial instinct. And a bunch of good luck.

They kept them warm likely in the same way that many indigenous communities still do today: by holding them, carrying them. Skin-to-skin..

Ditto! Every time I bake a cake (albeit, a very rare event!) I wonder who was the first person to put all those random ingredients together to make such a delicious (and edible!) product.

They would of carried them and probably have been moving around much of the day, when I had colicky babies I actually thought how much better they would of been suited to caveman days as taking them out for a walk in the carrier always settled them. Also my babies hardly cried when co slept. I just wasn’t inclined to walk round for 12 hours a day on my own and although did co sleep, it comes with a lot of anxiety these days with the safe sleeping advice (obviously crucial these days as we have cigarettes, sofas, duvets, formula feeding etc which are all major risk factors) Carrying baby & co sleeping would of kept baby warm

They wouldn’t have been dying from lack of car seats, baby nests etc however but most likely disease, undiagnosed congenital issues that babies are terminated or have surgery for these days/prematurity etc. However the survival rates being cared for by cavewomen mummy were probably much higher than for infants in early 20th century workhouses and orphanages where the mortality rates in some were absolutely shocking

Film writers OR authors.

Not heard of all of them but 'Clan of the Cave Bear' was definitely a book long before it became a film

Babies actually need very little.
Modern day consumerism tells us we need the crib, moses basket, multitude of toys, bottle maker machines, etc, etc, etc

So surprised nobody has mentioned the book ‘Hunt, Gather, Parent’ yet! It’s so fascinating and deals with all of this.

Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us about Raising Children https://amzn.eu/d/hZXkMEO

Also available as an audiobook on Spotify! https://spotify.link/oEI060nvrJb

Observation? Animals beasty bugs etc arent ALL discreet when banging /breeding/child rearing might =super defensive but..guess eventually some caveperson woulda saw cause effect.
thats funny cos.i am the least observant person on planet..id prob only have been in a cave-if followed gang. no way ever would be cosy firey cave cos zero change that "spark"flint stone thing woulda led my curiosity to "develop it"

I wonder about this stuff all the time too!! If I could go back in time, this is where I'd go, so that I could study it.

Another one... with all the babies they had, how on Earth did they ingest enough iron, without Pregnacare tablets??

Re having babies, spacing would have been through possible early contraception such all withdrawal method, but also breastfeeding would have delayed ovulation, and sadly not all pregnancies end in a baby, so this would have made spaces bigger too. Ovulation can also be delayed by things like starvation.

In many traditional tribes babies and toddlers are cared for by older children while mums work. Babies would be carried in slings with opening for poo. I saw in China a few babies in clothing open at the bum. Babies would be toilet trained very early. Evacuation method would be used first of all. If you are carrying a baby most of the time you soon know when they are going to poo and can hold them so it goes on the ground.
Apart from that babies do not really need anything else.

Interesting thread

I think the main thing was that there was a huge support network. It wasn't one woman/and also a man doing everything. It was a whole village

We don't know that.

Yes! Like, what did my mum dooooo when she was up in the night with me? Or on mat leave? With no podcasts, not much telly, no kindle... (hard to read a "real" book while rocking a fussy child to sleep).

In those days they barely got takeaways or drank wine at home, either.

(I do think about prehistoric and medieval women a fair bit, too. Imagine no calpol!)

That's so interesting! Thanks.

This.

Their diet would have been relatively high in iron ( red meat and berries). It is agriculture and then industrialization which gave us our carb heavy diet.

There weren’t ever really cave women and cave men. They went into caves for religious ceremonies, but lived above ground. The Stone Age is a misnomer. They were very good carpenters and craftsmen. It’s just wood doesn’t easily survive the passing millennia.

I’m also going to recommend Jean Auels Children of Humanity series (clan of the cave bear)

Beautifully written and very interesting. Along with all the practical day to day living details, it goes into one woman’s enlightenment to sex = babies.

The clan believe that women just become pregnant when they are the right age and the gods decide to bless them with child. They know a birth is coming when they stop their periods and they know how many moons of no bleeding will pass before birth. Sex is simply an act of pleasure or power.

She then realises that sometimes babies look like the male that a woman often has sex with and begins to wonder if there is a connection.

An excellent summer read for you!

Someone said about a lot of babies dying. Do we know this? Is the infant mortality rate in indigenous populations that haven't been exposed to things like measles very high?

Fascinating thread thank you!

Mine are much older now but oldest was always crying from between 6-8.30 pm every night and would need to be rocked, held or walked to be quiet. Often my mum would take her off my hands to give me a bit of respite.

I was wondering too. I thought it was more industrialisation, causing babies to be born too close together then fed inappropriate foods rather than their mother's milk that meant babies died in more recent times. Hunter gatherer populations tend to have good child spacing. Also today's figures would need to include babies aborted for conditions that would see them not likely to survive the first year, either at all or without medical intervention.

My little one was 6 weeks premature and I had to have an emergency section due to him being distressed, and I was told if I hadn't gone in for reduced movement he wouldn't be here now, thank god for modern day medicine

I remember when I had my first and found breast feeding so painful and unintuitive thinking about cave women and how stressful that newborn bit must have been.

@WatchOutMissMarpleIsAbout "Mine are much older now but oldest was always crying from between 6-8.30 pm every night and would need to be rocked, held or walked to be quiet."

It's possible, I suppose, that you might not even have been aware this was her pattern if she was just carried all the time as you went about your day?