The ceramic figurine of an infant in a cradle (also called a cradleboard) was created by the Nahua, or Aztec people of Mexico, between 1350 and 1521 CE. It shows how infants were kept bound in a cradle or carried on a cradleboard, a practice that was common among the indigenous peoples of the Americas. The figurine also shows how the baby would have been bound or swaddled in the cradle. The drawing further illuminates the way in which the cradle was used, and may illustrate a ceremony of placing the child in the cradle that took place some days after the birth of the child. The illustration is from the work collected in the Nahua language by Bernardino de Sahagún (1500-1590 CE), a Church official sent by the Spanish to Mexico in 1529. Sahagún collected information about Aztec language, rituals, values, and childrearing from a select group of native informants. It is the only source of its kind of Aztec customs and modes of thought. Also compiled by Sahagún was a narrative and representations of the Spanish conquest. The work was sent to Spain where it was not published until 1829 or translated until 1831. It was called The Florentine Codex because the manuscript was found in that city; it had been suppressed in Spain after the death of Sahagún.

The fish mobile above is a type traditionally hung over the cradle in Thailand. It is made from the folded, woven leaves of the palm, especially in Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya province. The fish depicted is the Thai barb, or carp, which is a symbol of prosperity. The smaller fish, the offspring of the larger one, are thought to symbolize fertility. The custom of making the woven mobiles is indigenous to Thai Muslims, particularly the spice traders who sailed in houseboats along the Chao Phraya River. Fish mobiles are also placed in the entry of homes and shops as a harbinger of good fortune. The text describing the custom is from the 1948 book by Phya Anuman Rajadhon (1888-1969) Customs Connected with Birth and the Rearing of Children. The author is a prolific and well regarded literary figure and university professor. Although he did not receive formal academic training in anthropology, his writings have constituted a major source for anthropologists and others on customs from Siam, the traditional name for Thailand.

The text and photographs above describe a traditional Thai birth ritual that celebrates the child's reaching the milestone of one month old, at which time its survival seems more assured than at birth, and it becomes a full-fledged member of the family. Before the infant is one month old, according to tradition, it may have belonged merely to spirits. At this time, a Buddhist monk cuts the infant's hair. "Fire hair" refers to the hair with which the child was born and that grows until the end of its mother's postpartum period of lying in, or lying near the fire as Phya Anuman described the custom. The photograph shows the monk cutting or shaving the hair. The hair is placed on a small raft made of banana leaf and set afloat. The second part of the ceremony involves tying unspun cotton threads around the child's wrists and ankles.

This ceremony of the "khwan," the soul or life spirit, is a prominent object of ritual, and the text describing the custom is from Phya Anuman Rajadhon's (1888-1969) Customs Connected with Birth and the Rearing of Children (1948). The author is a prolific and well regarded literary figure and university professor. Although he did not receive formal academic training in anthropology, his writings have constituted a major source for anthropologists and others on customs from Siam, the traditional name for Thailand. The photographs are from the baby photo album on a website by Thailand's most prominent teenage blogger, Panrit "Gor" Daoruang, who began an online diary at the age of twelve, and chronicled his own life and aspects of Thai culture and contemporary life, and teaching both English and Thai language through stories, quizzes and audio files. The site attracted the attention of the Office of the National Culture Commission for its value in promoting Thailand's image to a worldwide audience.

This postcard, from the early 20th century, shows a group of women and children, most likely belonging to the Mapuche people. The Mapuche occupied a large area in the cone of South America, the territory of the current nations of Chile and Argentina. Indigenous American tribes were popular subjects for postcards around the turn of the 20th century, and a large subgroup of postcards portrayed babies in cradleboards—called "papooses."

One of the women is holding a cradleboard upright in front of her, and another is holding a young girl by the hand. The use of cradleboards was widespread among indigenous American ethnic and tribal groups. With variations in the shape of the board, the use of fabrics and lacings to bind the child onto the board, and the arrangement of the protective hoods, cradleboards display remarkable uniformity across North and South America. One postcard legend described this variation on the worldwide practice of swaddling infants: "the Cradle of the Indian children consists of a board made of slats, with hood of same material or wicker. the youngster being bound with bands there to uncomfortable in appearance yet the children seem fat and happy. they are usually carried on their mothers back wrapped in a bright shawl.[sic]"

The postcards—some with black-and-white or color-retouched photographs, and others as color lithographs—often featured captions intended to be humorous, such as "An Embryonic Warrior" or "Snug as a Bug in a Rug." One postcard of a Navaho papoose from the popular publisher Fred Harvey contained a printed legend commenting on indigenous American childrearing practices: "The Navaho child is seldom punished for the simple reason that he seldom requires it. There appears to be a bond of sympathy and love between parent and child which is very strong during the minority of the child, but strange to say the children do not always love and protect their parents when the latter become old and infirm."