What exactly did an Ayah do

[youngtug]

From Kiplings  autobiography,,"Something of Myself"


  http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks04/0400691.txt

[brigidmac]

Thanks so much young tug
And for the link to indian research you posted in chatterbox

I will take a look in the morning and see if theres anything about Sarah ARETRION & her family tho im.not convincinced thats the spelling it looks more like ARETRIOUS on 1911 census

Shes not on freebmd in uk deaths in UK.under that spelling but other members of PACKE family travelled abroard so she could easily have gone with them or back.to india when her charges were sent to school and no longer needed her

[youngtug]

https://www.bl.uk/subjects/south-asia

[brigidmac]

What were childminders called in other countries
In.France some are referred to as NouNou whivh always makes me think of the hoover in teletubbies

Nounou is short for Nourrice ....which I.believe is because the original wet nurses were employed to breast feed or nousish the children of Ladies .

What are the words in other countries

[brigidmac]

Looking for Ayah Sarah.s family

I couldnt find any other ARETION names in UK in 1911

The indian ladies in.my.coffee morning zoom group all thought she.d have left her children behind while she worked

The link provided by Tug wouldnt allow me to do a search withuit subscribing  .

[youngtug]

 India office collection on FindMyPast

[brigidmac]

Thanks Tug I.ll try that ....can you remind me of the name of the town please

[youngtug]

Maybe the National Archives of India would be useful

[Kiltpin]

Hopefully  a_i & kiltpin will tell us how they said it and if they know which language it was from

   

I learned the word from my mother and she would pronounce it - Eye yah. I believe that it comes from Hindi, which is an oral language only. Because of the lack of being pegged to the written word, it tends to evolve in any direction that it is needed. It is the Pigeon English of the Indian sub-continent. 

For example - Go You Shops. Depending on the inflection of the speaker this could either mean "Are you going to the shops?", or "I want you to go to the shops!", or even "Please do me a favour and go to the shops."

Regards 

Chas