[MR] What DID viking ladies really wear?

[McKenna]

> In a message dated 3/1/2008 7:01:28 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
> mckennawerks at earthlink.net writes:
>
> Also the  length of post-partum amenorrhea was (if memory serves) on 
> average
> greater  than 2 years, and that menopause occurred at a much earlier age 
> than
>
> today.
>
>
>
> Could I ask where you found this information on post-partum amenorrhea? 
> It
> is very interesting.

> Maire

Unfortunately, I can't site the source right now.  I almost didn't post 
because of that, but it's from an excellent book on life in the middle ages 
that I've packed away somewhere during renovations.  It is in English by an 
eastern European author whose name escapes me.   I bought it for the 
pictures, many from museums that were behind the 'iron curtain' and that I 
had not seen before, but found the text to draw some very interesting 
conclusions.

The information itself was derived from the author's research (primarily, 
though not exclusively) into some remarkably detailed eastern european (IIRC 
Hungarian and Czech) parish birth, marriage. death, inheritance, and legal 
records as primary source material, and reports by other authors doing 
similar data base studies.  Also cited were other author's examination of 
disinterred remains, and another author's study of medical writings from the 
period.

What the numbers show, based on extant records (again IIRC, I'll make 
another effort to find the book when I'm over this bronchitis) is marriage 
(wife) about age fourteen, (husband's age usually older, in many cases, much 
older) first child about age 18, second and subsequent children about 3 yrs 
apart with the time between children increasing with age and few births 
after age 30 and very few after age 35, leading him to conclude (among other 
things) menarche about age 18, and menopause in the mid to late 30s.

Yes, you can always cite examples of women wed at 12 and giving birth soon 
after, but this study was not based on a few examples of upper class births, 
but on a large statistical group across the population.

regards,

McKenna