Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Dedication
- Acknowledgments
- Author’s notes
- 1 Losses, Lacunae and Liminality
- 2 European and Medieval Contexts of Infanticide
- 3 The Liminal child and mother
- 4 Love, Law and Liminality
- 5 Constructing Outsiders, Constructing Killers
- 6 Not the Usual Suspects: Communities and Accomplices
- 7 Not the Usual Suspects: Married Women
- 8 Not the Usual Suspects: Men
- 9 Interlude: Infanticide 1700–1950
- 10 Epilogue: Echoes of the Past
- Appendix 1 The 1624 Infanticide Act
- Appendix 2 Note on Sussex Coroners’ inquests
- Appendix 3 Sussex Cases of Violent, Unnatural, Unexplained Infant Death 1547–1686
- Appendix 4 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Water
- Appendix 5 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Throwing
- Appendix 6 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Bloodshed or Extreme Violence
- Appendix 7 Sussex Infant Deaths Showing Direct Involvement of Men
- Index
2 - European and Medieval Contexts of Infanticide
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Dedication
- Acknowledgments
- Author’s notes
- 1 Losses, Lacunae and Liminality
- 2 European and Medieval Contexts of Infanticide
- 3 The Liminal child and mother
- 4 Love, Law and Liminality
- 5 Constructing Outsiders, Constructing Killers
- 6 Not the Usual Suspects: Communities and Accomplices
- 7 Not the Usual Suspects: Married Women
- 8 Not the Usual Suspects: Men
- 9 Interlude: Infanticide 1700–1950
- 10 Epilogue: Echoes of the Past
- Appendix 1 The 1624 Infanticide Act
- Appendix 2 Note on Sussex Coroners’ inquests
- Appendix 3 Sussex Cases of Violent, Unnatural, Unexplained Infant Death 1547–1686
- Appendix 4 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Water
- Appendix 5 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Throwing
- Appendix 6 Sussex Infant Deaths Involving Bloodshed or Extreme Violence
- Appendix 7 Sussex Infant Deaths Showing Direct Involvement of Men
- Index
Summary
Abstract
Infanticide had been committed in diverse societies for centuries with attitudes toward it ranging from tolerance to condemnation and sensational punishments. An edict of 1532 made the crime a capital offence and prompted laws which led to some uniformity across European nations. This criminalisation of infanticide resulted in more reporting, giving the impression of increased frequency, though the hidden nature of the crime means its prevalence cannot be known. In the arts, infanticide was represented in oral traditions of storytelling, classical texts, and the biblical story of the massacre of the innocents, including its performance in churches. Increased awareness of domestic infanticide provided a riveting subject for popular literature and was described in German and English ballads, and occasionell in France.
Keywords: Frequency of infant murder; Overlaying and infant death; Laws regarding infanticide; Punishment; Literary representations
Hast thou also by hyre I-layn,
And so by-twene you the chylde I-slayn?
Infanticide in England did not take place in a temporal or geographical vacuum but was connected to laws and developments in other times and other countries. This chapter therefore looks back at other centuries, and beyond at other places, to put the crime in context. It sets out attitudes in continental Europe in both the Middle Ages and the early modern period and looks at the crime in medieval England. A chapter which touches on locations as northern as Iceland and as southern as Rome, and a 2000–year period of history, inevitably can only skim the surface. However, it does give an indication of the variations and commonalities in attitudes toward infanticide.
Infanticide in medieval Europe
In medieval Europe, the church and civil authorities avoided unwanted intrusion into family control, including the ways in which married couples sought to manage the size of their families. They felt able to accept the idea that some women avoided childbirth by abortion, a subject which is closely linked to infanticide, although the topic was debated. Arguments revolved around questions of when the unborn foetus became a person, its ability to survive outside the womb, the existence of the soul, when it first moved, and the number of days since conception – all questions which continued to be asked in the early modern period and are considered in more detail in Chapter 3.
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- Infanticide in Tudor and Stuart England , pp. 51 - 76Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2019