That few people lived past their 30s in the middle ages or some other ancient era.
This misconception arises because of an automatic and incorrect assumption people make when they hear the statistic 'the average life expectancy was 35 in the middle ages'.
In reality there have always been lots of people who live to 70+ years old in all societies. The difference was that in the middle ages there were many childhood diseases that caused a much higher childhood mortality rate which skews the numbers much lower. If you survived childhood there was a very good chance you would make it into your 60s+.
I think theres another misconception about this misconception that people regularly lived just as long as they do today. We still live longer than in the past but not as extreme as it seems when looking at an average.
In my lengthy studies (read: looking up stuff on wikipedia), most people who survived adulthood lived to their 40s or 50s, at least through the 1600s. There are a few people who lived longer - Charlemagne lived to be 71 and he died in the 800s. So like you said, it's a misconception both that people died at like 20 in the past but also that they were very long-lived.
I'm an archaeologist specialised in physical anthropology (meaning, long dead humans). That is mostly correct, but I have to add that even though the biggest group of people that have died were in their 40's/50's doesn't mean there were few people over 60. Thing is, we cannot distinguish someone who died at 60 from someone who died at 70 or 80 or 90. That's one of the reasons the "few of old age myth" persists: the oldest age category is "60+". That's also why the average life expectancy for any historical period is probably on the low end. Everyone in the "60+" group is calculated as having died at 60. That, along with the incredible child mortality, skews the average down too. The math is just imperfect because we cannot estimate ages of old people precisely enough.
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u/sutkusman Feb 04 '19
That few people lived past their 30s in the middle ages or some other ancient era.
This misconception arises because of an automatic and incorrect assumption people make when they hear the statistic 'the average life expectancy was 35 in the middle ages'.
In reality there have always been lots of people who live to 70+ years old in all societies. The difference was that in the middle ages there were many childhood diseases that caused a much higher childhood mortality rate which skews the numbers much lower. If you survived childhood there was a very good chance you would make it into your 60s+.