Eighteenth-century European writers showed a heightened awareness of childhood and children, expressed frequently in sentimental or romantic terms. Historian Hugh Cunningham lists key aspects of this sensitivity to children, which had its roots in the Renaissance and Reformation and emerged in the mid-nineteenth century's "ideology of childhood." He includes: "a belief in the importance of early education;... a concern for the salvation of the child's soul;... a growing interest in the way children learn; and ... a sense that children were messengers of God, and that child hood was therefore the best time of life." An exemplar of this type of think ing was Nikolaus Ludwig, Count von Zinzendorf, the leader of the Moravian church in the eighteenth century. Emphasizing the child's connection to the divine and portraying childhood as a special stage of life, he wrote in 1739: "Children are little royal majesties. Baptism is their anointing, and from then on they should be treated as none other than a king by birth." Zinzendorf wrote numerous religious works for children and about childrearing, demonstrating a deep concern for early education. 1 For Zinzendorf and the Moravians in general, the child offered every one a model of what the good Christian should be. Thus, not only did Zinzendorf focus on early childhood education, but he also asked adults to look to children for their own religious education. In this sense, the child became both the teacher and the student. The child offered an example of simplicity (Einfali) and through humility and meekness verified Jesus' injunc
This article explores the wide-ranging and complex relationships in the lives of children based on Moravian records of the 1740s and 1750s. Childrearing in Moravian settings involved integrating children into a web of connections with people both nearby and far away. Long-distance communication and mobility shaped the world of eighteenth-century Moravians and contributed to the complexity in children's relationships. These relationships are studied within three settings—boarding institutions where European American, Native American, and African American children were educated; rural, predominantly European American communities in Pennsylvania where Moravians operated day schools; and Native American mission communities, which also included day schools. This essay examines family relationships between children and adults, noting variations in parental influences and highlighting the role of the Delaware Indians' matrilineal social structure; however, it also devotes significant attention to the topic of child-to-child relationships, which represented both local and distant connections.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.