From Divine Milk to Human Wet Nurses: The Origins of Infant Feeding

For most of human history, mothers had no alternative but to breastfeed their infants. As medical historian Valerie Fildes observed, before the advent of agriculture and settled civilizations, newborns either nursed from their biological mothers or perished. This biological imperative found expression in ancient myths like Romulus and Remus being suckled by a she-wolf – a rare happy ending in the often brutal reality of infant survival.

Ancient Egyptians recognized breastmilk’s sacred importance early on. Artistic depictions show goddess Isis nursing her son Horus, who symbolized the pharaohs. Egyptians believed milk spiritually nourished pharaohs during critical life moments – birth, coronation, and death. This “sacred milk” concept spread through Greek and Roman cultures, appearing in tomb art showing goddesses like Demeter, Gaia, and Hera nursing. Even early Christian catacombs contain the oldest known image of Virgin Mary breastfeeding infant Jesus.

As civilizations developed, wet nursing emerged as what Fildes calls “the second oldest female profession.” Powerful families employed wet nurses, with pharaohs’ wet nurses occupying privileged positions – their own children became “milk siblings” to future rulers. The earliest legal code regulating wet nurses appears in Mesopotamia’s Code of Hammurabi (circa 1750 BCE), the world’s oldest preserved legal document.

The Wet Nurse Controversy in Classical Civilizations

Greek society assigned wet nursing to slaves or indentured servants. Wealthy Greeks even hired wet nurses for their slaves’ children to increase the slave population. Plato’s Republic proposed state-run nurseries with wet nurses to foster absolute loyalty to the state. Roman aristocrats similarly used slave wet nurses, prompting early Christian writer Tertullian to note that Roman kings “suckled at Christian breasts.” Romans particularly prized Greek wet nurses, believing they provided both physical and cultural nourishment.

This growing practice among elites sparked backlash from intellectuals like Aristotle, Pliny, Cicero, Tacitus, and Plutarch. They argued breastfeeding was women’s natural duty, with early familial love inspiring future civic virtue. Mothers neglecting this duty allegedly threatened social stability. Yet upper-class women resisted – employing wet nurses had become a status symbol.

Medical authorities like Avicenna and Maimonides advocated two-year breastfeeding periods. Their views spread through medieval European universities, especially Montpellier’s medical school.

The Nursing Madonna and Medieval Feeding Practices

Post-1000 CE, Virgin Mary veneration surged across southern Europe. Gothic cathedrals like Notre-Dame and Chartres honored her, while art historian Kenneth Clark noted how “Madonna statues reached exquisite refinement.” The 13th century saw rising popularity of “Maria Lactans” images showing Mary with exposed breasts nursing Jesus, exemplified by Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s Madonna del Latte.

Theological interpretations of Mary’s milk coexisted with practical concerns during plague-ridden times. As theology professor Margaret Miles explains, these images reflected 14th-century Tuscany’s anxieties about food insecurity amid war and Black Death.

Despite religious symbolism, European nobility clung to wet nurses. Post-11th century, most noblewomen handed newborns to wet nurses to resume fertility quickly. From the 12th century, French royal children never tasted their mothers’ milk – ensuring more potential heirs and allowing marital relations (believed impossible during lactation).

Renaissance Shifts and Dutch Domesticity

Renaissance humanists like Francesco Barbaro and Erasmus encouraged maternal breastfeeding, while artists like Tintoretto and Rubens celebrated nursing in paintings. As printing spread and female literacy rose, women joined the debate. In early 17th-century England, the Countess of Lincoln defied aristocratic norms by advocating universal maternal nursing. In 1658, the Countess of Manchester’s tomb proudly proclaimed she nursed all seven children.

Yet historian Janet Golden notes breastmilk remained “the most ordinary commodity” in the 18th century. Without royal courts and with strong middle-class values, 17th-century Holland developed a new domestic ideal. Painters like Pieter de Hooch depicted spotless homes where mothers nursed while maids tended older children – reflecting what Stanford historian Marilyn Yalom calls a new “civic responsibility,” where breastfeeding contributed to household and societal wellbeing.

Enlightenment Ideals and Revolutionary Feeding

A century later, Enlightenment thinkers attacked non-nursing mothers. Benjamin Franklin declared “no nurse can love a baby like its mother,” while Carl Linnaeus insisted humans shouldn’t “dishonor the mammalian name.” Linnaeus’ 1761 work featured Artemis with four breasts, while English doctor William Cadogan promoted year-long breastfeeding.

In France, Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s writings made nursing fashionable among elite women, despite his own hypocrisy – he abandoned five children to orphanages. His natural parenting philosophy influenced Queen Marie Antoinette to break Habsburg tradition by nursing her children, as did her friend the Duchess of Devonshire in England.

Yet urban poor had no choice but to use often-negligent rural wet nurses, resulting in horrifying infant mortality rates that Simon Schama called “the rural death trade.” Playwright Beaumarchais used profits from The Marriage of Figaro to establish maternal welfare societies.

Breastfeeding as Political Act

The French Revolution transformed infant feeding into political symbolism. Revolutionaries considered wet nursing morally corrupt and incompatible with equality. A 1790 sculpture showed “Nature as Mother” nursing both a white and black child, while revolutionary medals depicted Robespierre collecting milk from Liberty’s breast for patriots. Nursing became political – symbolizing patriotism and freedom.

In 1792, feminist Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman supported maternal nursing but rejected Rousseau’s condescension. She argued women should nurse not from biological duty or civic virtue, but as a right – liberating themselves from being “pretty dolls.”

19th-century radicals maintained this passion. Romantic poet Percy Shelley unsuccessfully opposed wet nurses before abandoning his children to marry Wollstonecraft’s daughter Mary (future author of Frankenstein). Honoré Daumier’s 1848 painting La République showed a robust Republic nursing two toddlers while a third read – symbolizing France as nurturing, educating mother.

The Bottle Wins the Battle

The millennia-old wet nurse debate ended dramatically in the late 19th century with technological innovation. For the first time in human history, lactating breasts faced competition – the baby bottle launched the infant formula era, closing this extraordinary chapter in the cultural history of childrearing while opening new controversies about infant nutrition that continue today.