Historical Deception
The Untold Story of Ancient Egypt - Second Edition
Book Excerpt - Health and Medicine
Page 307 - Berlin Papyrus
It has been dated between 1350 and 1200 B.C.
It deals with childbirth and infants.
It contains a test for pregnancy which recognized that urine carried the pregnancy factor. It calls for steeping some wheat and some barley in her urine. If the wheat sprouts, it will be a boy, if the barley sprouts, it will be a girl.
In 1963, Ghalioungui found that, whilst urine from non-pregnant women prevented the growth of (modern) barley and wheat, it proved impossible to detect the sex of an unborn child from the rate of growth of either grain, possibly because the grains and the soils were both different in ancient Egypt.
Nevertheless, the fact that the Egyptians recognized that urine carried the pregnancy factor was remarkable. The standardization of reliable urine tests for pregnancy did not occur until 1929.
It is astounding to know that this Egyptian recipe found its way to Europe, for in an ingenious book of the seventeenth century, Peter Boyer wrote, "Make two holes in the ground, throw barley into one and wheat into the other, then pour into both the water of the pregnant woman, and cover them up again with earth. If the wheat shoots up before the barley, it will be a boy, but if the barley comes up first, thou must expect a daughter."
There is also a little English book, called "The Experienced Midwife," in which this recipe appears, in a somewhat modified form.
