PART 8
EARLY AMERICA
SEX, MARRIAGE, CHILDREN, GAYS, LESBIANS, BOYS AS GIRLS,
ABORTION, BREECHING, FAMILY AND OTHER MYTHS



At about six years of age boys were BREECHED. This involved
removing them from their dresses and stays, shaving their
heads and fitting wigs, giving them clothing befitting an
adult male of their station and expecting them to act like
young adults. The social implications of breeching changed
with time. In the early years, boys were not yet men until
they passed through adolescence. In the middle and later
periods, breeching fully initiated them into the world of
men. SOURCE: The Writer's Guide, Everyday Life in Colonial
America From 1607 - 1783. Dale Taylor. Weiter's Digest
Books (1997) p. 131

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------ Breeching Boys
http://histclo.usanethosting.com/style/skirted/dress/breech.
html

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The status of boys in English society changed over the
period. Until they were breeched, boys were considered
women. After adolescence they were men. In the intervening
years they were neither during the early period. With time,
breeching came to signify acceptance as men. This change
occurred in England about 1680, but until then, boys were a
perfectly acceptable outlet for male sexuality. Since the
prevailing English view of sexuality was based in power and
the submission to power, no man would willingly submit to
another man. A boy, however, who was less than a man and
may have been considered a woman, was under no stigma at
all in providing sex, and no male lost any standing by
taking it. This places special relevance on the boys sent
to Virginia in 1607 and other early settlements, but would
surely have run afoul of the New England strictures against
nonprocreative sex, although the aristocratic nature of
Chesapeake society almost assuredly meant English
aristocratic practices were continued without comment.
Needless to say, the records contain little about
pederasty. SOURCE: The Writer's Guide, Everyday Life in
Colonial America From 1607 - 1783. Dale Taylor. Weiter's
Digest Books (1997) pp. 127-28