We typically think of royalty as leading a life filled with the pleasures and privileges of divine power and influence. In the past, however, before the monarchy became mostly symbolic, the arrival of a new royal into the world had wide ranging political consequences. Royal births were steeped in endless tradition, ancient superstition, and more than a little fear.
And the privacy of a queen was always subordinate to the public interest. It's good to be the king. However, it wasn't always that great to be the queen.
Today, we're going to take a look at some eye opening details about what giving birth was like for royal mothers. But before we get started, be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel, and let us know in the comments below what other royal customs you would like to hear about. OK, let's take a deep breath.
I see the head. Congratulations. It's an explainer video.
[MUSIC PLAYING] A royal birth was more than just an exciting thing for the family. It was a political event that often had drastic implications for the future of a nation. The royal birth could itself signal the future success or failure of a monarchy.
So needless to say, everyone was interested in the outcome. This being the case, it wasn't exactly regarded as a private affair. In fact, the queen often gave birth in front of many spectators, all of whom watched every detail very carefully.
This was both to confirm the sex and health of the baby and to prevent foul play. For Marie Antoinette, the French princess, 200 people gathered in her bed chamber to witness the event. In fact, the exact moment of a royal birth was so important, the obstetrician would yell out, "The queen is going to give birth," at which point hundreds of courtesans would pour into the darkened room.
This rush was so extreme, it's said that Marie fainted from the heat, while onlookers scrambled up on furniture to get a better look at her, uh, child being born. Today, the birth of a child is seen as a celebratory time of family bliss, but this hasn't always been the case. Throughout history, Christians saw the pain of childbirth as unavoidable because the Bible states that God told women, in pain, you will give birth to children.
In some devout Christian cultures, the suffering of labor and delivery was seen as a natural part of a woman's experience. The agony was associated with the fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and symbolized the magnitude of original sin. It was for this religious reason that painkillers were frowned upon, even for royal women.
As a result, queens often clutched holy relics and amulets during labor, even sometimes tucking prayer rolls into the folds of their nightclothes. The church approved of these practices because they relied on God's protection. Apparently, it never occurred to them that God also created painkillers.
Royal women were accustomed to a pretty pain free existence, and the discomforts of childbirth weren't really a welcome change. While these pains were often thought to be unavoidable, some queens knew that if you wanted something done right, you had to do it yourself. Born in the early 1800s, Queen Victoria, who gave birth to nine children, began a campaign to make pain relief for royal mothers available and acceptable.
For the birth of her eighth son, Prince Leopold, she even found a doctor who would chloroform her to deaden the pain. She was so into it, she would later write, "Oh, that blessed chloroform, soothing and delightful beyond measure. " While asking for pain relief from childbirth still flew in the face of the belief that women deserved that pain, after Victoria, outlooks slowly began to change.
Royal women began politely requesting the anesthesia [INAUDIBLE] during labor, otherwise known as ether. This shift in thinking not only helped a lot of royal women avoid a lot of unnecessary pain, it also opened the floodgates to all sorts of new medical approaches. [MUSIC PLAYING] Until the middle of the 17th century, royal births were a ladies only affair.
They were typically overseen by various combinations of nurses, midwives, ladies in waiting, or whichever women of the court felt they could assist in some way. These women were known as God's siblings, and they were the protectors and handlers of anything and everything related to the royal birth. Men, on the other hand, were absolutely not allowed to be involved.
Because there were no heart monitors or medical equipment to evaluate the mother's health and progress, the only way to evaluate how things were going was via the experience of women who had previously given birth. Doctors were only called in if the situation became dire. And the midwives typically did all the heavy lifting.
As birthing experts, midwives had to be knowledgeable and have good character, the kind of women who could be trusted with the life of a future monarch. In fact, when attending a royal mother, the midwife was required to take an oath not to keep anything from the birth, such as the placenta or the umbilical cord. Not your typical souvenir, but the requirement existed to avoid these bits being used in witchcraft.
The matriarchal dominance of royal births continued until Prince Albert insisted on attending the labor of his wife, Victoria, in the mid 19th century. Victoria was grateful for the support and wrote that there could be no kinder, wiser, nor more judicious nurse. [MUSIC PLAYING] Medieval beliefs about the female reproductive system were nothing short of, well, medieval.
Many believed that a woman's genitalia were actually male organs turned inside out. The concept had been around since the second century, when Roman physician and philosopher Galen wrote, "Turn outward the woman's, turn inward, so to speak, in full double the man's, and you will find the same in every respect. The uterus and ovaries were considered inversions of the penis and testicles and allowed for the birth of a child.
Differences in the size and orientation of the female organs compared to the male led some to consider females, or the female organs, as lesser. Medieval beliefs about what created a baby in the first place were also a little shaky. At the time, they didn't know that the man's sperm determined the sex of the child.
And the praise or blame for the child's gender was placed on the mother. They also believed the gender of an unborn child could be influenced by diet or through the use of one of several potions. [MUSIC PLAYING] After a queen's procession, lying in, and birthing process, she lay low until it was fitting for her to re-enter society.
The mother remained in her bed chamber for about a month after birth until she could be churched. This meant she was purified and blessed by a priest before she could return to her royal duties. This cleansing was thought to be necessary after such a messy process.
While the mother was sequestered, the baby was celebrated and instantly received by the public with a christening, an event the mother could not attend. Because the pain of childbirth was so feared among royal women, a special girdle was created to offer them extra support. This elegant garment, often hemmed in silver thread, was designed to help a queen alleviate the pain of childbirth.
As a bonus, it could also be imbued with God's blessing. Sometimes known as a holy girdle or a virgin's girdle, it would be worn during the lying in period and sometimes contain bits of jaspar around the band, which was believed to promote a healthy baby. These girdles date back to the early 16th century and were mentioned in various historical texts.
We know from records that when Henry III's pregnant queen Eleanor was about to have her fourth child, she wore such a holy girdle as a way to help ensure her son would be born successfully. And in Da Milano's 1365 fresco, The Birth of the Virgin, a new mother is attended by her ladies, who are washing her new baby, while the special girdle is handed to another woman for cleaning. [MUSIC PLAYING] Even though royals often gave birth in front of an audience, the notion of pregnancy was still shrouded in considerable mystery and fear.
In modern times, the process of birth is well understood. But this was not the case through most of history. Giving birth in the Middle Ages was a risky endeavor.
And all mothers, rich or poor, faced the risk of complications or even death. Accurate medical records from the time don't exist, but a current popular belief is that one out of three births would result in the mother's death. That is a huge risk.
But while mortality was certainly high, a study published in 2020 of the medieval mortality in English noblewomen between 1,200 and 1,500 CE by Rachel Podd from Fordham University estimates that a medieval woman who had children faced a one in 20 chance of dying in birth over her lifetime. That's less huge than one in three, but still huge compared to today, where a woman from the European Union, with a comparable number of deliveries, has a lifetime risk of less than 1 in 4,000. In an era where ultrasounds can tell us the sex of a baby long before birth, it's strange to realize that in the past, many women wouldn't have even known they were pregnant until they felt the first flutters of movement at around five months.
Although this typically marks the halfway point of the pregnancy, the mother could still not be entirely sure of her condition or when the child would be born. Drgstores with home pregnancy tests were still a few centuries off. So to find out if they were pregnant, royal women would typically seek the advice of doctors, who would examine their urine to make the call.
If the urine was pale yellow to white with a cloudy surface, it was believed the woman was pregnant. And this result, combined with the absence of menstruation, would be enough to start planning for a royal birth. However, if the urine smelled like asparagus, that meant the woman probably had asparagus for lunch.
That is science. Some things never change. Alternative means of testing for pregnancy included examining a needle left in the woman's urine to see if it rusted.
[MUSIC PLAYING] The loss of the queen, or even worse, the baby, was absolutely the biggest fear associated with royal births. From Catherine of Aragon, who lost four pregnancies and one infant, to Anne Boleyn, who had two miscarriages, a queen faced many potential dangers during her quest for motherhood. Although necessary to the survival of the monarchy, giving birth was risky.
In 1533, when Queen Elizabeth I was born, all royal women were encouraged to write their wills before lying in. In fact, any pregnant royal would receive communion regularly and vigilantly ask God for help with her condition. Royal women of the Renaissance were typically given a special present known as a birth tray.
These decorative pieces were usually adorned with scenes of biblical births and were presented to women around the time of their lying in. They were then laden with jars filled with foods like chicken soup and sweetmeats. Once the food was eaten by the hungry mother to be, the tray would be hung on the wall as a decoration and become a keepsake for the royal family.
So what do you think? Would you like an audience while you give birth? Let us know in the comments below.
And while you're at it, check out some of these other videos from our Weird History.
