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The Age Old Question of Old Age: Was it Really so Much Better Back When?

The belief that the elderly in pre-industrial societies fared considerably better than the elderly in modern mass societies has received nearly universal acceptance. Utilizing literary, historical and archaeological reports from early Greece to the present, the present paper offers data which challenges popular conceptions. Close examination of evidence dealing with societal evaluation, family and kin support reveals prejudicial stereotypes as pervasive as those associated with modern urban industrialized societies. While a gradual transition of the basis of authority and esteem is noted from nomadic and agrarian to industrial societies, there is substantial correspondence in the dominant cultural imagery of old age, life expectancy notwithstanding.