1. Mothering - The Old-Fashioned Way
What Becomes a Legend Most?
Cavemother: Old Stone Age Mom
The Divine Womb: New Stone Age Mom

2. History Begins, Herstory Ends
The Decline and Fall of the Great Mother
The Cradle in the Cradle: Sumerian Mom
Honored Tombs, Honored Wombs: Ancient Egyptian Mom
The Abyss: Phoenician Mom
A Mother Love Story: Ancient Hebrew Mom

3. The Sublime and the Ridiculous: Classical Mom
The Secret History
Sexual Politics in Ancient Greece
Where's Momma? Maternal Images
She Loved Them, She Loved Them Not: Maternal Reality

4. Sacred and Profane Callings: Medieval Mom
Madonna Fever, the Original Version
Does She Love Me?
Medieval Mixed Messages
Devil or Angel: Images of the Child
Mother Superior, Mother Inferior: Maternal Images
Facts of Life: Maternal Reality

5. Father Knows Best: Early Modern Mom
The Obedient Mom: 1500-1700
Down and Out: Maternal Images
Sparing the Rod: Maternal Reality

6. The Exaltation of Mother: Eighteenth-and Nineteenth-Century Mom
From Devil's Consort to "Angel of the House"
The Romantic Tableau: Maternal Images in the Eighteenth Century
The Calm Before the Repressive Storm: Maternal Reality in the Eighteenth Century
Upstairs, Downstairs: Maternal Images in the Nineteenth Century
The Repressive Storm: Maternal Reality in the Nineteenth Century

7. Fall from Grace: Twentieth-Century Mom
Scientific Mom: 1900-1940
Empathic Mom: 1940-1980
Reinventing the Myth: 1980-1990s

Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index