On Oct 18, 7:35*pm, "Don Phillipson" wrote:
"GordonD" wrote in message

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"Don Phillipson" wrote in message
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"David Hill" wrote in message
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A cousin of mine lost her daughter to cancer a short while ago.
She raised the following question.
A man who loses his wife is a widower, a woman who loses her husband is
a widow, a child who loses a parent is an orphan. *Why is there no word
in the English language for a parent who loses a child?

Perhaps because before 1900 this was so common: *most
parents lost at least one child to illness, i.e. bereavement was
normal and required no special word.

I'd also suggest that there's no easy way to tell if a family is missing a
child as there is no set number of children they should have. In the other
situations, there is: one spouse or two parents; any fewer and it's clear
something has happened, either a death or a family break-up.

Family trees of the 18th and 19th centuries seem to confirm the
normality of death before maturity.

Especially infant deaths. That's why children born in January were not
registered until April, to make sure they made it through the winter.
Or children born during any other time of the year were not registered
for at least one month because the paper of the birth certificate was
quite expensive and parents saw no point to spend the money for only a
few months.

For this reason I suspect that most birthdays of famous people are
inaccurate. Also those of the ancestors recorded in our family trees.
According to some witnesses, one of my grandfathers was born in
"spring time" (in the northern hemisphere) but his birth certificate
indicates "Fifteen of October"