What was invented first? Baby Diaper or Sanitary Napkin?

Many societies have women go to a women's tent or area during menses.

In other societies, women used old rags and had to wash them.

This became quite bothersome when women nurses went to war. It was then that the tampon was invented.

Babies have needed diapers for as many years as women needed sanitary protection.

Many societies allow children to go pant-less. and infants they were swaddled. The swaddling needed to be washed. Paper diapers and those with added absorbents came into wider use in the 1960's

The Napkin was of course first, they were still common when i was a child, every home that had kids had a boiler as well, to boil them clean in.

Diapers are an American 1940s idea,( the late sixties are when they were first imported to my homeland of Ireland.) And a very good American idea too as it goes!

Until then parents, used Terry toweling napkins on their babies. They usually were held together with a huge locking safety pin! ( A very dangerous item in the hands of a small baby they were too) Velcro was not yet invented, neither was the tiny self adhesive bits of sticky tape of todays diapers. Though the first diaper i used i remember had soft Velcro fastenings.

Velcro was an Irish invention that was used adapted and further developed during the Apollo part of the space programme, it was developed to hold a toolset to the outside of the modules in open space. During space walks. But sorry im drifting away from your question...

The pin had to be so large because it had to be long and strong enough to pierce and hold together all of the nappies folds, put on over the nappy were rubber panties of course elasticated at the waist and leg holes, and in the cot where baby slept the matrass was rubberised in case of leaks or accidents in the night.

Im old enough to remember them being used on my siblings i could even now still fold one the correct way should the occasion ever arise. :-D

I was the oldest child of a huge Irish family, mom needed all the help she could get.

Therefore the changing of the baby, i often did as a youngster,

Hope i answered your question to your satisfaction.

That first long answer is so wrong (or local) it is hard to believe.

Undoing a bit of it - cloth diapers that had to be washed are centuries old and have been held by safety pins for over a century http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safety_pin

and by other pins, knots, and ties before that. In more primitive societies, babies simply went naked. Disposable diapers are modern paper products.

The Sanitary Napkin as a product came out about a century ago http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanitary_napkin but before then women used anything that was absorbent that could be held in position.

The baby diaper goes into antiquity (cloth)...

Women were required to go to a separate location during menstruation...