What is the old stepchild?
"To treat someone as a stepchild" is often used to indicate ostroocize or unfair abuse of man. The origin of the phrase seems to be lost in history, but can have something to do with long -term cultural prejudices towards both red people and step or illegitimate children. "The granting of a stepchild" is often used to describe a person who is considered to be an embarrassment or responsibility, or to describe a person or thing that is cruelly treated for reasons beyond his control.
Red hair has long been associated with a fire layout, but this is not the only negative quality of historically attributed redheads. Some early cultures, including ancient Greece, related red hair with vampirism. No wonder red hair is often associated with blood; The medieval Europeans believed that birth with red hair was the result of being conceived, while a menstrual woman, which was considered sinful and unclean.
Association of illegal sex that has for usLED red hair can be responsible for the literary concept of a red -haired child. In modern use, a "stepchild" usually refers to the relationship between the new husband and the children of his partner from the previous connection. However, it is possible that this term may once include a wider definition of offspring, such as children born from marriage or children conceived through matters. Thus, the idea of a stepchild can be associated with the illegal consequences of red hair, perhaps to create an impulse for ostracization and abuse associated with the term "red -haired child".
Over the possibility of sinful conception, the motif of a red -haired child can also draw their history from a long literary and historical tradition connecting stepchildren or illegitimate children with a threat to inheritance lines. Especially in the Noble Circles, the presence of a stepchild or an illegitimate child represented a serious threat to those who inherited property, money or even thrones. William Shakespeare used in several of his gamesEnough image of a duplicate illegitimate child, including the character of Edmund The Bastard in King Lear , and John Bastard in anything about anything. Fairy tales representing characters such as Snow White and Cinderella also emphasize the potential conflict among stepchildren and use the fear that children from the previous Union will prevent the heirs from the second connection.
Probably the most famous red -haired stepch in history is England of Queen Elizabeth I of England. Anne Boleyn, who was created shortly before the marriage of King Henry VII and his lover, suffered the future queen Elizabeth of the distrust of her people as a child, many of whom despised her mother. After Anna Boleyn King Henry Went, when it comes to the statement of Elizabeth, illegitimate and removes it from a series of sequences for many years. Elizabeth spent a large part of her youth completely excluded by the English court, even plunging her in prison by her half -sister Queen Mary, who feared that Elizabeth would try to hideStrůn. It is a degree of pride in many modern redheads that Elizabeth has survived many courts to become one of the greatest English monarchs.