The living conditions of children at the end of the nineteenth century were the result both of the peculiar conditions of their environment and the wider socio-cultural context of the time. Medicine had not yet made great steps forward and special interest in childhood and young age was only just emerging and taking shape.

Child and infant mortality rates reached high levels, and there was an increase of child abandonment, as official statistics show.

Another 'invisible' aspect of Greek society, registered for the first time in the protectionist legislation of the period, was child labour. Children, boys and girls, were occupied in agricultural, building, manufacturing and occasional jobs, working as servants or in shipping.
A remarkable percentage besides (as can be seen from the census returns) was occupied in industry. In this field they began working from a very early age with low wages and exhausting timetables.

Concern for childhood and its special needs became more conspicuous amid the more prosperous strata of Greek society. Such attitudes were reflected in artistic creation that included children in its themes or that addressed them directly through children's literature.