Beyond the Record: Babywearing, Women's Work, and the Silent Threads of History
Artwork by Luba Lukova, featured by the Museo de Ecología Humana. This striking image reimagines a prehistoric woman as both artist and mother — creating cave art while carrying her baby and supported by a child holding light. It reminds us that women’s creative and caregiving roles have always been deeply interwoven, shaping culture and knowledge in ways often overlooked by history.
When we walk through museums or turn the pages of history books, we encounter images of rulers, warriors, and towering monuments — but rarely do we see the quiet, tender work that sustained humanity: the work of caregiving. Among the most overlooked of these practices is babywearing, a tradition so ordinary and essential that it has often slipped through the cracks of recorded history.
Part of this invisibility lies in the nature of the materials. Carriers have always been crafted from organic, perishable resources — woven cloth, animal hides, plant fibers, leather — which rarely survive the centuries. And when history was written, it was often penned by men in patriarchal societies, who saw domestic and caregiving work as unworthy of record. Thus, the act of carrying babies close, so vital and universal, was left out of scrolls and stone.
Yet fragments of evidence whisper through time. In 2022, researchers studying the burial of an infant known as Neve in Liguria, Italy, dated to about 10,000 years ago, uncovered beads and pendants sewn onto what is believed to have been a baby carrier. These beads bore heavy signs of long-term use before being handed down to Neve — likely as protective heirlooms. When she was buried, these precious decorations were laid to rest with her, signaling the depth of care and community ties wrapped around this tiny life.
Beyond archaeological hints, babywearing traditions have persisted globally through oral histories and embodied knowledge passed from caregiver to caregiver — not in ink or marble, but in song, muscle memory, and quiet instruction. This is the way most women's work has been shared: through whispered advice beside the hearth, the gentle guidance of an elder’s hands showing how to knot a cloth, or the lullaby softly sung as a baby is tied close.
The historical art record tells another story of omission. In European and Western art, motherhood has largely been represented through the serene, static image of the Madonna and Child. These portrayals, while deeply revered, present a passive, ornamental ideal of motherhood: the mother sits, her child often perched or nursed, yet rarely ever carried in motion. The physical labor — the endless holding, balancing, and wrapping — is erased. Instead of a mother moving through her day with her child securely tied to her back, we see her as distant and still, framed for contemplation rather than living action.
This selective image has contributed to a long-standing undervaluing of care work. It created a cultural narrative where true mothering was imagined as quiet adoration, separate from sweat, effort, and the practical acts of daily life. Meanwhile, real mothers carried water, harvested fields, wove cloth, and kept their babies close — unseen and unrecorded by those who documented history.
Today, recognizing and reclaiming babywearing as an ancient, universal, and deeply valuable tradition is an act of both cultural and feminist restoration. It invites us to honor the countless women and caregivers who carried humanity forward, quite literally, on their backs and against their hearts.
To carry a baby is to embody a story older than words: a soft, steady promise that says, “You are safe. You belong. You are carried — and you are loved.”
The Museo de Ecología Humana offers a powerful reimagining of women's roles through art, including a striking painting that depicts a woman creating cave art while carrying her baby, supported by an older child holding light. This image challenges our assumptions about who shaped culture and knowledge in prehistory, showing that women’s creative and caregiving roles have always been interwoven. While history often records the achievements of men and overlooks the quiet genius of women's work, this artwork invites us to see the unseen threads — the mother’s warmth, the rhythm of a baby at the breast, the patient hands guiding paint across stone. It reminds us that carrying, feeding, and nurturing have always been part of our human story, even if they have too often gone unrecorded.
