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Durham Research Online Deposited in DRO: 22 July 2016 Version of attached le: Accepted Version Peer-review status of attached le: Peer-reviewed Citation for published item: Penny-Mason, Bennjamin J. and Gowland, Rebecca L. (2014) 'The Children of the Reformation: childhood palaeoepidemiology in Britain, ad 10001700.', Medieval archaeology., 58 (1). pp. 162-194. Further information on publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/0076609714Z.00000000035 Publisher's copyright statement: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor Francis Group in Medieval archaeology on 20/10/2014 available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1179/0076609714Z.00000000035 Additional information: Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. Durham University Library, Stockton Road, Durham DH1 3LY, United Kingdom Tel : +44 (0)191 334 3042 | Fax : +44 (0)191 334 2971 https://dro.dur.ac.uk The Children of the Reformation: Childhood Palaeoepidemiology in Britain, AD 1000–1700 By BENNJAMIN J PENNY-MASON1 and REBECCA L GOWLAND2 CHILDHOOD IS A TIME of rapid biological growth and development and a stage of the life course during which bodies are particularly sensitive to social and environmental stressors. As a consequence, events which may impact upon a child’s care and treatment can become physically embodied within their bones and teeth. The skeletal remains of children have been neglected within archaeological discourse until recently, but they are, in fact, a particularly important demographic for understanding the impact of social processes on past population health. This research examines the prevalence of skeletal disease in children (≤16 years) in Britain (England, Wales and Scotland) between AD 1000–1700. Data for a total of 4626 children from 95 sites were collated from published and unpublished skeletal reports and analysed for evidence of skeletal changes reflecting disease. A biocultural approach was adopted in which the evidence was interpreted in relation to ecological, social, economic and environmental conditions. It was observed that childhood levels of skeletal stress did increase significantly after AD 1540. It was noted that during the Reformation sociocultural and economic factors added to stressors in the ecology of the medieval child. The effects of the Reformation were found to be the greatest aggravator in the rise of morbidity prevalence over seven centuries. Differences in morbidity patterns between non-adult age categories indicated that a state of ‘childhood’ existed until at least eleven years of age, after which there appears to have been a gradual transition into adolescence and adulthood. After the end of the Wars of the Roses in AD 1485, Henry VII’s focus on fiscal management of the country provided an economic stability that England had not experienced in over a century.3 The Valor Ecclesiasticus is evidence of how pre-Reformation hospitals were providing genuinely beneficial relief to the poor and sick.4 Children, particularly those in poverty or experiencing poor health, were often aided by monastic institutions; through alms, education and sanctuary.5 The religious reforms of AD 1535–50 saw the dissolution of not only the majority of religious houses in England, but also of the hospitals, alms houses and fraternities which they ran.6 The Reformation was not merely a religious phenomenon; it affected all aspects of life and had long-lasting sociocultural ramifications. The reforms had dramatic and rapid repercussions in relation to charitable care: alms giving and the majority of treatment of the sick disappeared in less than a decade, with nothing to substitute for this loss.7 Compounding this shift further, the post- Reformation economy became increasingly unstable and in conjunction with escalating population pressures caused widespread social stress and urban poverty.8 This study aims to examine the impact of this upheaval on the health of the population as evidenced through the analysis of the skeletal remains of children dating to both the pre- and post-Reformation periods. We hypothesize that skeletal indicators of poor health amongst children will be greater from those sites dating to the post-Reformation period. Children would have accounted for 40–65% of most ancient populations, yet non- adult (≤17 years old) palaeopathology remains a largely understudied topic in archaeology. The plasticity of the human body during the early years of development renders it far more likely to be shaped by its surrounding environment than in later life.9 Skeletal markers of non-adult stress can therefore be used as an indicator of a past population’s overall health, by measuring the wellbeing of its most fragile and sensitive members.10 Skeletal evidence provides the most direct evidence of the health status and disease burden of past populations, with skeletal material acting as a ‘site of articulation between biology and culture’.11 However, osteological material is only of value when it is placed within the correct cultural and environmental contexts, retrieved from historical and archaeological 1 perspectives. ‘It cannot be too strongly emphasized that the pathology of a group is never randomly produced. It is invariably an expression of the stresses and strains to which the people were subjected, a response to their total environment both external and internal. It reflects the climatic conditions under which they lived, their habits of diet, their daily occupations, their choice of clothing or weapons, their social customs and their genetic inheritance’.12 This analysis can therefore be used to measure the extent to which health was affected by ‘one of the most striking and important changes which occurred within English society and English economy’.13 THE MEDIEVAL CHILD Both historically and archaeologically ‘children’ are rarely considered as independent agents — neither socially active nor economically important.14 Traditionally they have been conceptualised as socially inconsequential, without their own material culture, social networks or social spaces.15 The first investigations into the medieval child left a legacy that children were unimportant and often neglected members of society, regarded with ambivalence by emotionally detached parents (Fig 1).16 However, more recent investigations have demonstrated that ‘childhood’ was considered to be a clearly definable, separate and special stage of medieval life.17 Appreciating that ‘age’ is a multidimensional construct is vital in understanding growth-related studies (Fig 2). Age categories can be divided into three types: biological age (physical growth); social age (culturally constructed); and chronological age (time elapsed since birth).18 When defining age categories, most archaeologists use these differing definitions interchangeably. The modern Western perception of ‘childhood’ is based on a chronological measurement which is both socially and lawfully measured, explicitly pertaining to our own culture and in stark contrast to medieval ideals. Osteologically, biological age is measured in order to gain a chronological age from skeletal remains, despite the fact that this may be inaccurate due to cultural and environmental factors. Chronological age is then often used to determine events within a social age group, despite the fact that the social age may have little bearing on the biological age. The lack of synchronicity between these categories means their definitions should not be assumed. Medieval terminology for describing social ageing was both incredibly specific and entirely flexible. Overlapping age categories and transient definitions make it hard to mark exact stages of maturation, but cultural ‘rites of passage’ can be used to estimate social growth. Technical terminology used to study non-adults is also conflicting and can lead to misunderstandings of what exactly biologically determine a ‘child’ and stages of ‘childhood’. Weaning, schooling, confirmation and apprenticeship all marked major transitions in a child’s life.19 Biological puberty was medievally understood, as well as being a socially important threshold. Around the time of puberty the Church and State began recognizing the maturation of the ‘child’ to adolescence with the introduction of work-related laws, taxation and religious confirmation.20 Medieval art and literature clearly depict several stages of childhood within the ages of life (Fig 3).21 Evidence for medieval maturation and periods of risk are plentiful from birth to adolescence. Child rearing and birth were incredibly hazardous throughout the medieval period.22 With limited medical understanding and intervention available, women were forced to be self-reliant.23 Exact proportions of birthing mortalities are difficult to access, but it is widely accepted that death was not a rare occurrence for the mother or the infant.24 2 Infant care practices such as swaddling are also likely to have been hazardous and counter- productive to the growth of straight limbs because this inhibits the skin being exposed