The book of the generation of the fetus, the treatment of pregnant women, and of newborns

by

‘Arîb ibn Sa‘id al-Kâtib al-Qûrtûbi

Chapter 9. On the secretion of milk and the nursing of the newborn; on the choice of a nurse, on her hygiene and on the regimen that is appropriate to her.

When the infant is born, the blood which nourished him (in the uterus) goes up to the breasts of the mother, becomes white and consistent, because the breast is an organ which is white on the inside and is created thus to receive and accumulate the humors that the heat of the nearby heart makes mature. This blood becomes milk by the power of God, and menstruation disappears as long as the mother nurses, unless she has a lot of humors to expel, in which case, a portion of them will not become milk. This category of women is menstruant during nursing.

When nursing stops, the humors return to the uterus and she has her periods as before, by the power of God, the High, Knowing, and Wise.

It is necessary that the nursing of the infant be sufficient, because it is the nourishment of his body, but one should not give him too much, because his stomach will dilate, he will vomit, languish, sleep too long, be agitated, and cry. If that happens, one should space the nursing sessions, thus his sleep will be longer and he will have time to digest; one should bathe him with warm water, and nurse him less frequently; not until later should one take up the usual nursing schedule; one should rock him gently in his cradle after nursing, and put strips of colorful cloth before his eyes.

Later bathe him in tepid water, to accustom his body to tolerate cold water. One should pick him up and put his head on the left arm and have him hanging toward the right. The nurse should wash him using her left hand, the stomach of the child resting on her arm. She should wash him in front, in back, wipe his neck and his whole body from his arms to his feet. She should plunge her index finger in good oil and pull out any stuff in the child’s mouth, she should wipe his tongue and teeth gently. She should gently touch his pubis to aide urination. She shouldn’t stop washing him until his body is red and full of warmth. She should take him out of the bath and lay him down his bottom covered with swaths of soft silk. She should wipe him and warm him up first and then lay him on his back and then on the stomach to rub him all over. She should wipe water from his eyes, his nostrils so as to prevent any problems. It is not appropriate to nurse him right after the bath, but let him rest; when she wants to put him to breast, she will squeeze out a bit of milk and put it in his mouth, so that only the milk flows and it will be easy to nurse him without tiredness.

Tears are advantageous for nursing; by them his pores enlarge, his limbs are exercised, they warm him up, and dissolve humors and take the place of physical exercise for men, if God wills.

Choice of nurse.

The nurse should be a young woman, of 20-30 years old, of clear complexion, white and rosy, not having given birth too recently, nor too long ago, nor pregnant because her milk disappears and becomes what nourishes the fetus in the uterus; in this case the milk will be late.

The ancient Arabs denigrated the one whom the mother nursed while pregnant. This nursing was called “ghayl”. The Prophet said: “I had intended to prohibit this kind of nursing, but I learned that the Persians and the Byzantines did it without prejudice against the nurse.” It is for this reason that the mother of Ta’abbat’a Sharr (a pre-Islamic poet) bragged: “By God, I did not conceive my son before finishing my period, he was not born feet first, I did not nurse him while pregnant, nor did I force him to sleep when he cried.”

If the nurse already has 2 or 3 children, her milk is better and preferred for nursing a newborn. If the nurse had a daughter this is advantageous for the boy she will nurse.

She should not have an irritable temperament nor an altered complexion, but be pretty to look at; her character should be happy; one shouldn’t irritate her because she could frighten the infant and provoke convulsions in him; her breasts should be well developed, her teats of medium size, because, if too big, they would be an obstacle to the child’s tongue as he nursed and swallowed the milk, as a smaller teat should allow. She should have a big stomach and be of middle weight, her milk should be white, of good color, an agreeable taste, neither too thin, nor too thick, nor too creamy; of the sort that its equilibrium and good consistency should be clear when you place it on a fingernail.

Hippocrates said: “In order to know if the milk is of good quality, one should put it in a vase of glazed clay or horn overnight, protected from dust, until the next morning; if it is too fluid, it is bad, if it has coagulated, it is also bad, but between these 2 states one can conclude that it is excellent.

The nurse should guard against food that is too salty, spicy, or acidic. She should not use strong spices that dry, nor acrid food, like peppers, onion, garlic, and above all, she should prohibit celery because it alters the brain and will give women who are nursing convulsions and malign eruptions; its characteristic is there; by its heat it provokes a concoction of humors in the mother that she passes on to the child through the milk; this is why she is prohibited these things, for a nurse should hold to wheat bread, rice, tender meat that has been well cooked with few condiments.

The nurse should guard against sexual relations and menstruation which weakens the milk. If it diminishes in quality without apparent cause, or after an illness, one should put her on an appropriate regimen, make her eat the breasts of sheep and goats, and she will have as much milk as she desires. One should give her wine mixed with water and pleasant spices, one should gently rub her breasts with washed oil containing fenegrek juice or water in which it is boiled. She should eat the flour of rice, or dry semolina, fresh fish, milk, sugar, all with grains of fennel. She should only take small quantities lest her milk thicken too much, for then the nursing child will have trouble swallowing it; one should constantly order for her lettuce both raw and cooked if her milk is very thick. One should hasten to make it more fluid so that the infant not be exposed to convulsions particular to his age and which are very dangerous. His nourishment will become less abundant; he should tire himself out a bit and walk. She should boil oxymel, fine wine mixed with water and honey, but not pure, strong wine, which is dangerous for the brain of the child; she should guard against food that is difficult to digest, because the body of the child will become like the milk drunk – healthy if the milk is good, sick if the milk is bad. This state of the milk has a strong influence on the health of the child, more than the food mother’s nourishment during her pregnancy, the same for a tree-shoot, as long as it is on the tree and protected from the violent winds that agitate it, whereas when separated and planted elsewhere, the least wind can blow it down directly, the same for the fetus.

If the nurse’s milk is very liquid, she should take the most nourishing food to fortify herself, such as rice, tender meat, the yellow of an egg, and should sleep longer; if her milk diminishes in quantity, one should give her water to drink in which one has put grain husks and fennel roots and boiled with sugar. She should eat the heads of salted fish that one has boiled with aneth sap; she should then drink wine mixed with water.

One should use termites (evidently a kind of bird, not the insect) and dried, plucked sparrow (or owl); the nurse will eat these with rye water 3 days in a row. This is greatly effective, if God wishes.

Description of food that one can have the nurse drink and will make her milk flow abundantly.

Take fennel grains, water cress, annis one measure of each, 3 parts hazelnuts, cook for a long time in drinkable water, filter it, and mix with sugar. One should take some in the morning and the evening, God willing.