Home Pregnancy Tests In ancient Egyptian times, women who wanted
to know if they were expecting a baby had their own version of
an at-home pregnancy test. Think you might be pregnant? Learn
more about how to take a pregnancy test. According to a scroll
dated 1350 B.C.E., a woman would urinate on wheat and barley
seeds for several days in a row. If the wheat began to grow, it
meant she was carrying a girl. If barley grew, it meant a boy
was on the way. And if nothing sprouted, it meant there was no
pregnancy. The Egyptians may have been on to something.
According to an article about the history of pregnancy tests
posted on the National Institutes of Health’s website (A Thin
Blue Line), “Scientists tested this theory in 1963 and found
that 70 percent of the time the urine of a pregnant woman did
promote growth, while the urine of non-pregnant women and men
did not.” We don’t have to urinate in a field any more to find
out if we’re pregnant, but many of us will urinate into a cup or
onto a stick for the same inf