#children in history

[artifacts-and-arthropods]

Doodles Made by a 6-year-old Boy Named Onfim, from Russia, c. 1240-1260 CE: created nearly 800 years ago, these drawings were scrawled onto the homework/spelling exercises of a little boy in Novgorod

Over the last 75 years, excavations in and around Novgorod, in Russia, have led to the discovery of hundreds of documents dating back to the Middle Ages. These documents were made using pieces of bark from the local birch trees; they include letters, notes, spelling exercises, shopping lists, receipts, and legal documents, among other things.

The most famous examples are the panels that contain the writing exercises of a 6-7 year-old boy named Onfim, whose work was often accompanied by drawings of knights, fantastical beasts, battle scenes, and depictions of himself in various forms.

These are just a few examples:

Birch-Bark Document no.199: on the back of a panel that had been used for his spelling exercises, Onfim drew this picture of himself as a wild beast, writing "I am a wild beast" in the center of the drawing; the beast is also shown holding a sign that says "Greetings from Onfim to Danilo," likely referring to a friend or classmate.

Birch-Bark Document no.200: Onfim began writing the Cyrillic alphabet at the top of this panel, but he then stopped to draw a picture of himself as a warrior on horseback, labeling the figure with his name; the drawing shows him wielding a sword while he impales his enemy with a spear.

Birch-Bark Document no.202: the boy's mother and father are depicted in this drawing, which accompanies another writing exercise.

Birch-Bark Document no.206: Onfim began to copy a liturgical prayer (the Troparion of the Sixth Hour) onto this strip of bark, but he apparently got distracted after writing just the first few words, and started drawing a row of people along the bottom of the panel instead.

The examples above are just a few of the many documents that have been unearthed in Novgorod (now known as Veliky Novgorod) and its surrounding areas. More than a thousand birch-bark manuscripts and styli have been found throughout the region, suggesting that there was a high rate of literacy among the local inhabitants. Most of these documents were created during the 11th-15th centuries, when Novgorod served as the capital city of the Novgorod Republic; they had been buried in the thick, wet clay that permeates the local soil, in conditions that allowed them to remain almost perfectly preserved for hundreds of years.

I know that Onfim's drawings are pretty well-known already, but my most recent post involved a very similar writing exercise/doodle from a child in Medieval Egypt, so I just thought I'd post some of Onfim's work, as well.

Sources & More Info:

Institute of Slavic Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences: Birch-Bark no.200, no.199, no.202, no.203, no.206, & no.210 (the site is in Russian, but can be translated)

Institute of Slavic Studies: Full Database of Birch-Bark Documents

The New York Times: Where Mud is Archaeological Gold, Russian History Grew on Trees

Russian Linguistics: Old East Slavic Birch-Bark Literacy - a history of linguistic emancipation?

[good-old-gossip]

Important Update!!!

Source -

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"The Soviet trade school student smiles happily after winning the school skiing championship. Sports are an important part of the youth training program and skiing has played a vital part in helping Soviet troops frustrate the Germans in winter fighting on the long front." - from the Toronto Star. September 24, 1943.

Toronto Star Photograph Archive, Toronto Public Library, TSPA_0118473F.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

The dog days are over.

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[cavalierzee]

Baby and Children's Zip Ties

Inside the mass Graves that were uncovered at Nasser Hospital, Khan Younis, Gaza, they found children and babies who had their hands bound with zip ties.

[paintingispoetry]

Joshua Reynolds, "The Age of Innocence", ca. 1785-88

[tagasaing]

falin and thistle are like this to me

[peasant-player]

Everyone in the Tolkien fandom who spent hours to makes ellaborated charts, name descriptions, little drawings and every other thing to help get to know the characters better.

And get like 3 views

Know that I love you and hope your life is filled with kindness.

[reality-detective]

Old photos never lie 🤔

[addicttionsstuff]

All time I spent with her in this game — isn't complete without a photo shoot. //. 🤍🖖

[artifacts-and-arthropods]

Child's Writing Exercises and Doodles, from Egypt, c. 1000-1200 CE: this was made by a child who was practicing Hebrew, creating doodles and scribbles on the page as they worked

This writing fragment is nearly 1,000 years old, and it was made by a child who lived in Egypt during the Middle Ages. Several letters of the Hebrew alphabet are written on the page, probably as part of a writing exercise, but the child apparently got a little bored/distracted, as they also left a drawing of a camel (or possibly a person), a doodle that resembles a menorah, and an assortment of other scribbles on the page.

This is the work of a Jewish child from Fustat (Old Cairo), and it was preserved in the collection known as the Cairo Genizah Manuscripts. As the University of Cambridge Library explains:

For a thousand years, the Jewish community of Fustat placed their worn-out books and other writings in a storeroom (genizah) of the Ben Ezra Synagogue ... According to rabbinic law, once a holy book can no longer be used (because it is too old, or because its text is no longer relevant) it cannot be destroyed or casually discarded: texts containing the name of God should be buried or, if burial is not possible, placed in a genizah.

At least from the early 11th century, the Jews of Fustat ... reverently placed their old texts in the Genizah. Remarkably, however, they placed not only the expected religious works, such as Bibles, prayer books and compendia of Jewish law, but also what we would regard as secular works and everyday documents: shopping lists, marriage contracts, divorce deeds, pages from Arabic fables, works of Sufi and Shi'ite philosophy, medical books, magical amulets, business letters and accounts, and hundreds of letters: examples of practically every kind of written text produced by the Jewish communities of the Near East can now be found in the Genizah Collection, and it presents an unparalleled insight into the medieval Jewish world.

Sources & More Info:

Cambridge Digital Library: Writing Exercises with Child's Drawings

Cambridge Digital Library: More About the Cairo Genizah Manuscripts

[swan2swan]

Yasammy: Reunited

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

""ON YOUR MARK" AT R. H. McGREGOR SCHOOL FIELD DAY," Toronto Star. June 23, 1942. Page 8. ---- Tensely awaiting the starting gun for a field day race at R. H. McGregor school. East York, are LEFT to RIGHT: Beverley Barkey, Marilyn Cosby, Joan Hughes, Dawn Willard and Isabel Webster. One the sidelines with a ball almost as big as herself is little Jacqueline Hammond RIGHT. She put all she had into the ball-tossing contest when her turn came. The field day, complete with refreshments and entertainment, wound up a successful term of activities at the school.

[illadvisedart]

phone background from my latest illustration :> anyone feel free to use (and maybe tell me if u do i think that’d be really cool)!!

[cavalierzee]

Stand For What's Right

Stand for what's right,

Even if it means standing alone!

History Is Always Watching!

History Is Always Judging!

Be Like Those 2 Heroes!

[originalhaffigaza]