My 17th-18th century great*6-grandfather lived to be over 100, and lots of my relatives lived to over 90 back then.
The Biblical line about “threescore years and ten, or if by reason of strength, fourscore” wasn’t mythology; most people could hope to live to 70-80 if they didn’t die in childhood, or get killed by wars, fights, accidents, childbirth, or random epidemics, and if they didn’t starve in a famine. Disease during early childhood was probably the biggest killer.
Penicillin did save me from disease when I was about 8, though; I’d probably have ended up dead or crippled without it. On the other hand, measles didn’t kill me, and neither did the 20th century’s biggest potential killer, nuclear war.
