Infanticide

by

Elena Taddia

• LAST MODIFIED: 24 October 2024
• DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195399301-0538

Introduction

Infanticide, from the low Latin infanticidium, refers to the murder of a newborn, a crime found in all societies, in every historical period, and in most cases committed by its mother. The word infanticidium, first used by Tertullian in the Apologeticum (c. 197), denotes a ritual crime of a child in the context of early Christianity. The crime referred to the Holy Innocents—the children of Bethlehem massacred by Herod in the attempt to destroy the Infant Jesus (Matthew 2:16–18)—and/or was associated with the issue of baptism in newborn children. The word infanticide, however, was foreign to the Roman law; there is evidence of its employ in crescendo in Western sources (jurists’ treatises, criminal archives, forensic medicine, literature, encyclopedias, etc.) only since the late sixteenth century. In the early modern period, both Protestant and Catholic countries reinforced the control against child murders in all its aspects to prevent suffocation and pregnancy concealment; the Catholic Church was concerned about saving the souls of newborn children and desired for them to avoid the eternal conditions of Limbo. Infanticide is also perceived as an attempt at birth control and controlling the sex ratio, or as a failed abortion or abandonment. Infanticide was frequently affiliated or confused with abandonment, exposure, suffocation, accidental smothering, concealment, abortion, and homicide, as well as parricide, well into the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, while during the eighteenth century, infanticide appears more like a crime committed to save honor, and judges were generally indulgent with regard to criminal mothers. In the early twenty-first century, different disciplines that cross the histories of childhood, women, and gender studies—that is, anthropology, behavioral biology, criminology, law history, forensic medicine, demography, psychology, sociology, etc.—set out to give the reasons for this cruel act. Here we finally consider infanticide studies as an independent research subject within a historical perspective separated from the clinical and forensic literature, which developed from the middle of the nineteenth century. Historians dealing with infanticide were often discouraged by the “lack of sources” or by difficulty in identifying the cause of death because infanticide was easy to conceal. Forensic and juridical sources are more abundant starting in the eighteenth century, and from this century on, the crime is finally classified as infanticide. Infanticide in the field of historical sciences is a recent subject of study. There are still no exhaustive studies that bring together all-round works from a chronological and geographical point of view; nevertheless, in recent years these studies are increasing and very promising.

Historical Overviews

We propose to limit this section to those works that represent some fundamental tools for the understanding of infanticide in its various aspects. Pestalozzi 2003, originally published in German in 1793, can be considered the first modern study on infanticide using trial sources, an essential work in understanding the evolution of shifting the focus toward mothers who commit infanticide. The nineteenth century is characterized by several studies that are still considered fundamental today, based on the juridical and coroner aspects of infanticide from a historical perspective. Only since the 1970s has infanticide become a separate subject of historical investigation, thanks to the support of primary sources, in parallel with the development of childhood history as a subject of study in the historical field. Even if outside the framework, Noonan’s book remains a reference to understanding the ambiguity of infanticide, abortion, and parricide (Noonan 1970). Within the history of mentalities, Flandrin 1991 opens up new perspectives on the voluntary elimination of newborns. Trexler 1973 first uses a variety of secular and ecclesiastical sources; Hoffer and Hull 1981 provides the first study focusing on a chronological continuity between England and the American colonies (sixteenth through eighteenth centuries) using judicial sources, which opens the way to infanticide studies, as Wrightson 1982 detaches infanticide from psychopathology in its complexity within European history. A special issue of Annales de Démographie Historiques (Special Issue: Mères et nourrissons) is dedicated to mothers and infants with contributions by various specialists in areas of demography and the history of mentalities—it is still an important tool for work. These essays are still essential today for understanding the complexity of infanticide. English-language scholarship was, however, the most active, in particular Jackson 2002, which for the first time brings together some historiographical trends on infanticide in the early modern age.

• Flandrin, Jean-Louis. Sex in the Western World: The Development of Attitudes and Behaviours. Translated by Sue Collins. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic, 1991.

  A pioneer study focusing on the attitude toward the small child, demography, contraception, and sexual behavior in Western civilization as well as infanticide as a cultural practice. First published in French, “L’attitude à l’égard du petit enfant et les conduites sexuelles dans la civilisation occidentale: Structures anciennes et évolution,” in “Enfant et société,” special issue, Annales de démographie historique (1973): 142–201.

• Hoffer, Peter C., and Natalie E. H. Hull. Murdering mothers: Infanticide in England and New England, 1558–1803. New York: New York University Press, 1981.

  A relevant work based on a comparison of archival sources of prosecutions of women for infanticide, reviewing the legal history in England and the American colonies, which takes into account puritanism and the sociohistorical contexts of American society. Good basis for a methodological approach.

• Jackson, Mark, ed. Infanticide: Historical perspectives on child murder and concealment, 1550–2000. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2002.

  The first history of infanticide in a long-term perspective analyzing various aspects (concealment, birth at death, legal medicine) focusing mostly on Britain with a few cases in continental Europe (France, Germany).

• Noonan, John Thomas, Jr., ed. The Morality of Abortion: Legal and Historical Perspectives. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970.

  An important basis for understanding the concept of abortion in ancient sources and the practices of the destruction of the fetus that persists in Christian society, even in later times, linked to infanticide.

• Pestalozzi, Johann Heinrich. Sur la législation et l’infanticide: Vérités, recherches et visions; Suivi de quatre études. Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 2003.

  The first essay written in German in 1783 using archival sources from infanticide trials in the Swiss cantons alongside an analysis of society and psychological reasons of criminal mothers.

• Scrimshaw, Susan C. M. “Infanticide in Human Populations: Societal and Individual Concerns.” In Infanticide: Comparative and Evolutionary Perspectives. Edited by Glenn Hausfater and Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, 439–462. New York: Aldine, 1984.

  A concise and clear attempt to explain infanticide in an anthropological and civilizing perspective, considering a long-duration perspective within an interesting collective book, although missing the contribution of historians.

• Special Issue: Mères et nourrissons. Annales de Démographie Historique (1983).

  Even if infanticide is only marginally addressed, this special issue in French, dedicated to “Mothers and Infants,” remains an essential tool for understanding demography, social history, and childhood history with contributions by specialists in demographic history. Provides some contributions on themes like foundlings, wet nurses, and the long-term effects of abandonment.

• Trexler, Richard C. “Infanticide in Florence: New Sources and First Results.” History of Childhood Quarterly 1 (1973): 98–116.

  Infant mortality and suffocation and the ambiguous role of wet nurses in Renaissance Florence. A base for infanticide studies, analyzing for the first time, through ecclesiastical and secular justice, the repression and emergence of infanticide as a distinct judiciable crime. Reprinted in Volume 1 of the book series Power and Dependence in Renaissance Florence (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1993).

• Wrightson, Keith. “Infanticide in European History.” In Criminal Justice History. Vol. 3. Edited by Louis A. Knafla, 1–20. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982.

  Infanticide studied as a subject detached from psychopathology, reviewed in its societal complexity beyond legal and juridical issues and as a form of population control.