Editing Infanticide

{{Short description|Intentional killing of human offspring}}
{{About|infanticide in humans|infanticide among animals|Infanticide (zoology)|practices of killing newborns within 24 hours of a child's birth|Neonaticide|the killing of older children by a parent|Filicide}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2024}}
{{Homicide}}
'''Infanticide''' (or '''infant homicide''') is the intentional killing of [[infant]]s or offspring. Infanticide was a widespread practice throughout [[human history]] that was mainly used to dispose of unwanted children,<ref name="InfAnAn">{{Cite book | last = Williamson| first = Laila| contribution = Infanticide: an anthropological analysis| editor-last = Kohl| editor-first = Marvin| title = Infanticide and the Value of Life| pages = 61–75| publisher = [[Prometheus Books]]| place = New York| year = 1978 | quote="Infanticide has been practiced on every continent and by people on every level of cultural complexity, from hunter gatherers to high civilizations. Rather than being an exception, then, it has been the rule."}}</ref>{{rp|61}} its main purpose being the prevention of resources being spent on weak or disabled offspring. Unwanted infants were usually abandoned to die of exposure, but in some societies they were deliberately killed. Infanticide is generally illegal, but in some places the practice is tolerated, or the prohibition is not strictly enforced.

Most [[Stone Age]] human societies routinely practiced infanticide, and estimates of children killed by infanticide in the [[Mesolithic]] and [[Neolithic]] eras vary from 15 to 50 percent. Infanticide continued to be common in most societies after the historical era began, including [[ancient Greece]], [[Roman Empire|ancient Rome]], the [[Phoenicians]], ancient [[China]], ancient [[Japan]], [[Pre-Islamic Arabia]], [[early modern Europe]],<ref>{{Cite web |title=New book suggests historical infanticide in Europe was likely more widespread than estimated |url=https://phys.org/news/2023-07-historical-infanticide-europe-widespread.amp |access-date=2025-04-07 |website=phys.org |language=en}}</ref> [[Aboriginal Australians|Aboriginal Australia]], [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native Americans]], and [[Native Alaskan]]s.

Infanticide became forbidden in the [[Near East]] during the 1st millennium. [[Christianity]] forbade infanticide from its earliest times, which led [[Constantine the Great]] and [[Valentinian I]] to ban infanticide across the Roman Empire in the 4th century.
The practice ceased in [[Arabia]] in the 7th century after the founding of [[Islam]], since the [[Quran]] prohibits infanticide.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Surah At-Takwir - 8-9 |url=https://quran.com/en/at-takwir/8-9 |access-date=2025-04-10 |website=Quran.com |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Surah An-Nahl - 58-59 |url=https://quran.com/en/an-nahl/58-59 |access-date=2025-04-10 |website=Quran.com |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Surah Al-An'am - 151 |url=https://quran.com/en/al-anam/151 |access-date=2025-04-10 |website=Quran.com |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=iqna.ir |date=8 March 2006 |title=Killing of Baby Girls is Condemned by Holy Quran |url=https://iqna.ir/en/news/1481889/killing-of-baby-girls-is-condemned-by-holy-quran |access-date=2025-04-10 |website=International Quran News Agency |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Tasgheer |first1=Aqsa |last2=Ishfaq |first2=Muhammad |date=2021 |title=Female Infanticide in Pre-Islamic Arab Society: A Quranic and Historical Perspective |url=https://journal.al-qawarir.com/index.php/alqawarir/article/view/128 |journal=Al-Qawārīr |language=en |volume=3 |issue=1 |pages=1–12 |issn=2709-457X}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Lindstedt |first=Ilkka |date=2023-08-01 |title=The Qurʾān and the Putative pre-Islamic Practice of Female Infanticide |url=https://www.degruyterbrill.com:443/document/doi/10.1515/jiqsa-2023-0005/html |journal=Journal of the International Qur'anic Studies Association |language=en |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=5–29 |doi=10.1515/jiqsa-2023-0005 |issn=2474-8420|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Aksoy |first=Soner |date=2024-08-21 |title=The Impact of Religious Practices on Shaping Cultural Habits: The Case of Child Sacrifice among the Pre-Islāmic Arabs from the Qur'ānic Perspective |journal=Religions |language=en |volume=15 |issue=8 |pages=1019 |doi=10.3390/rel15081019 |doi-access=free |issn=2077-1444}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=BBC - Ethics - Abortion: Female infanticide |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/abortion/medical/infanticide_1.shtml |access-date=2025-04-11 |website=www.bbc.co.uk |language=en-GB}}</ref> Infanticide of male babies had become uncommon in China by the [[Ming dynasty]] (1368–1644), whereas infanticide of female babies became more common during the [[One-Child Policy]] era (1979–2015). During the period of [[Company rule in India]], the [[East India Company]] attempted to eliminate infanticide but were only partially successful, and female infanticide in some parts of India still continues. Infanticide is very rare in industrialised countries but may persist elsewhere.

Parental infanticide researchers have found that mothers are more likely to commit infanticide.<ref>MARLENE L. DALLEY, Ph.D. The Killing of Canadian Children by Parent(s) or Guardian(s): Characteristics and Trends 1990–1993, January 1997 & 2000</ref> In the special case of [[neonaticide]] (murder in the first 24 hours of life), mothers account for almost all the perpetrators. Fatherly cases of neonaticide are so rare that they are individually recorded.<ref>Neil S. Kaye M.D – Families, Murder, and Insanity: A Psychiatric Review of Paternal Neonaticide</ref>

{{TOC limit|3}}

==History==
[[File:InfanticidioGarciaVega.jpg|thumb|''Infanticidio'' by Mexican artist [[Antonio García Vega]]]]
The practice of infanticide has taken many forms over time. [[Child sacrifice]] to supernatural figures or forces, such as that believed to have been practiced in ancient [[Carthage]], may be only the most notorious example in the [[ancient world]].

A frequent method of infanticide in ancient [[Europe]] and [[Asia]] was simply to [[child abandonment|abandon the infant]], leaving it to die by exposure (i.e., [[hypothermia]], hunger, thirst, or animal attack).<ref name = "Justin Martyr">[[Justin Martyr]], ''[[First Apology]].''</ref><ref name="Ex&Ob">{{cite journal | last = Boswell| first = John Eastburn| author-link = John Boswell| title =Exposition and oblation: the abandonment of children and the ancient and medieval family| jstor = 1855916| journal= [[American Historical Review]]| volume = 89| pages = 10–33| year = 1984| doi =10.2307/1855916| issue = 1 | pmid = 11611460}}</ref>

On at least one island in [[Oceania]], infanticide was carried out until the 20th century by suffocating the infant,<ref name="Collapse">[[Jared Diamond|Diamond, Jared]] (2005). ''[[Collapse (book)|Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed]]''. {{ISBN|0-14-303655-6}}.</ref> while in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica and in the [[Inca Empire]] it was carried out by sacrifice (see below).

A minority of academics subscribe to an alternate school of thought, considering the practice as "[[early infanticidal childrearing]]".<ref name="EMOL">{{Cite book| last = deMause| first = Lloyd| author-link = Lloyd deMause | title = The Emotional Life of Nations| publisher = Karnak| year = 2002| location = New York, London| pages = 258–62}}</ref>{{rp|246–47}} They attribute parental infanticidal wishes to massive [[projection (psychology)|projection]] or [[Displacement (psychology)|displacement]] of the parents' [[Unconscious mind|unconscious]] onto the child, because of intergenerational, ancestral abuse by their own parents.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Godwin| first = Robert W.| title = One cosmos under God| publisher = Paragon House| year = 2004| location = Minnesota| pages = 124–76}}</ref> Clearly, an infanticidal parent may have multiple motivations, conflicts, emotions, and thoughts about their baby and their relationship with their baby, which are often colored both by their individual psychology, current relational context and attachment history, and, perhaps most saliently, their psychopathology<ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Almeida A, Merminod G, Schechter DS | year = 2009 | title = Mothers with severe psychiatric illness and their newborns: a hospital-based model of perinatal consultation | journal = Journal of ZERO-TO-THREE: National Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families | volume = 29 | issue = 5| pages = 40–46 }}</ref> Almeida, Merminod, and Schechter suggest that parents with fantasies, projections, and delusions involving infanticide need to be taken seriously and assessed carefully, whenever possible, by an interdisciplinary team that includes infant mental health specialists or mental health practitioners who have experience in working with parents, children, and families.

===Paleolithic and Neolithic===
Many Neolithic groups routinely resorted to infanticide in order to control their numbers so that their lands could support them. [[Joseph Birdsell]] believed that infanticide rates in [[prehistory|prehistoric times]] were between 15% and 50% of the total number of births,<ref>{{Cite book | last1= Birdsell| first1=Joseph B.| chapter=Some predictions for the Pleistocene based on equilibrium systems among recent hunter gatherers| editor-last1= Lee| editor-first1 = Richard |editor-first2=Irven|editor-last2=DeVore| title = Man the Hunter| page = 239| publisher =Aldine Publishing Co.|location=New York| year = 1986}}</ref> while Laila Williamson estimated a lower rate ranging from 15% to 20%.<ref name="InfAnAn"/>{{rp|66}} Both [[anthropologist]]s believed that these high rates of infanticide persisted until the development of agriculture during the [[Neolithic Revolution]].<ref name="Hardness" />{{rp|19}} A book published in 1981 stated that comparative anthropologists estimated that 50% of female newborn babies may have been killed by their parents during the [[Paleolithic]] era.<ref>{{Cite book| last1= Hoffer|first1 = Peter|last2=Hull|first2=N.E.H.|title=Murdering Mothers: Infanticide in England and America, 1558–1803| publisher = New York University Press|year = 1981|location = New York|page = 3}}</ref> The anthropologist [[Raymond Dart]] has interpreted fractures on the skulls of [[hominid]] infants (e.g. the [[Taung Child]]) as due to deliberate killing followed by [[human cannibalism|cannibalism]], but such explanations are by now considered uncertain and possibly wrong.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Simons| first = Elwyn L.| title = Human origins| journal = [[Science (journal)|Science]] | volume = 245| issue = 4924| page = 1344 | year = 1989| doi = 10.1126/science.2506640| pmid = 2506640 | bibcode = 1989Sci...245.1343S| s2cid = 38430465}}</ref> Children were not necessarily actively killed, but neglect and intentional malnourishment may also have occurred, as proposed by Vicente Lull as an explanation for an apparent surplus of men and the below average height of women in prehistoric [[Menorca]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lull |first1=Vicente |last2=Mico |first2=R. |last3=Rihuete |first3=C. |last4=Risch |first4=R. |title=Peinando la Muerte: Rituales de vida y muerte en la prehistoria de menorca |location=Barcelona |publisher=Museo Arqueológico de Alicante |year=2006 |url=https://www.marqalicante.com/Publicaciones/es/PEINANDO-LA-MUERTE-RITUALES-DE-VIDA-Y-MUERTE-EN-LA-PREHISTORIA-DE-MENORCA-P21.html |access-date=24 October 2023 |archive-date=11 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231111073025/https://www.marqalicante.com/Publicaciones/es/PEINANDO-LA-MUERTE-RITUALES-DE-VIDA-Y-MUERTE-EN-LA-PREHISTORIA-DE-MENORCA-P21.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

===In ancient history===
====In the New World====
{{Main|Child sacrifice in pre-Columbian cultures}}

[[Archaeologist]]s have uncovered physical evidence of [[child sacrifice]] at several locations.<ref name="Hardness"/>{{rp|16–22}} Some of the best attested examples are the diverse rites which were part of the religious practices in [[Mesoamerica]] and the [[Inca Empire]].<ref>{{cite journal | last = Reinhard| first = Johan| author-link =Johan Reinhard|author2=Maria Stenzel| title = A 6,700 metros niños incas sacrificados quedaron congelados en el tiempo| journal=[[National Geographic (magazine)|National Geographic]]| pages = 36–55|date=November 1999}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.exn.ca/mummies/story.asp?id=1999041452 |title=Discovery Channel: The mystery of Inca child sacrifice |publisher=Exn.ca |access-date=2013-07-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080506113520/http://www.exn.ca/mummies/story.asp?id=1999041452 |archive-date=2008-05-06  }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book | last = de Sahagún| first = Bernardino | author-link = Bernardino de Sahagún| title = Florentine Codex: History of the Things of New Spain| publisher = University of Utah Press| date = 1950–1982| location = Utah| title-link = Florentine Codex }}</ref>

====In the Old World====
Three thousand bones of young children, with evidence of sacrificial rituals, have been found in [[Sardinia]]. [[Pelasgians]] offered a sacrifice of every tenth child during difficult times. Many remains of children have been found in [[Gezer]] excavations with signs of sacrifice. Child skeletons with the marks of sacrifice have been found also in Egypt dating 950–720 BCE.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Tort |first=César |title=Day of Wrath |publisher=Daybreak |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-291-88444-9 |location=Minneapolis |page=165 |language=English}}</ref> In [[Carthage]] "[child] sacrifice in the ancient world reached its infamous zenith".{{attribution needed|date=December 2017}}<ref name="Hardness" />{{rp|324}} Besides the Carthaginians, other [[Phoenicians]], and the [[Canaanites]], [[Moabites]] and [[Sepharvite]]s offered their first-born as a sacrifice to their gods.

=====Ancient Egypt=====
In Egyptian households, at all social levels, children of both sexes were valued and there is no evidence of infanticide.<ref>''Egypt and the Egyptians'', Emily Teeter, p. 97, Cambridge University Press, 1999, {{ISBN|0521449847}}</ref> The [[Ancient Egyptian religion|religion of the ancient Egyptians]] forbade infanticide and during the [[Greco-Roman]] period they rescued abandoned babies from manure heaps, a common method of infanticide by Greeks or Romans, and were allowed to either adopt them as foundling or raise them as slaves, often giving them names such as "copro -" to memorialize their rescue.<ref>"''Eroticism and Infanticide at Ashkelon"'', Lawrence E. Stager, Biblical Archaeology Review, July/August 1991</ref> [[Strabo]] considered it a peculiarity of the Egyptians that every child must be reared.<ref>''Folkways: A Study of Mores, Manners, Customs and Morals'', [[William Graham Sumner]], p. 318, org pub 1906, Cosmo 2007, {{ISBN|978-1602067585}}</ref> [[Diodorus]] indicates infanticide was a punishable offence.<ref>''Life in Ancient Egypt'', [[Adolf Erman]], Translated by H. M. Tirard, p. 141, org pub 1894, republished Kessinger 2003, {{ISBN|0-7661-7660-6}}</ref> Egypt was heavily dependent on the annual flooding of the Nile to irrigate the land and in years of low inundation, severe famine could occur with breakdowns in social order resulting, notably between {{CE|930–1070}} and {{CE|1180–1350}}. Instances of cannibalism are recorded during these periods, but it is unknown if this happened during the pharaonic era of ancient Egypt.<ref>''Ancient Egypt'', David P. Silverman, p. 13, Oxford University Press US, 2003, {{ISBN|0-19-521952-X}}</ref> Beatrix Midant-Reynes describes human sacrifice as having occurred at Abydos in the early dynastic period ({{circa}} {{BCE|3150–2850}}),<ref>''The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt'', Ian Shaw, p. 54, Oxford University Press, 2002, {{ISBN|0-19-280293-3}}</ref> while [[Jan Assmann]] asserts there is no clear evidence of human sacrifice ever happening in ancient Egypt.<ref>''Of God and Gods'', Jan Assmann, p. 32, University of Wisconsin Press, 2008, {{ISBN|0-299-22554-2}}</ref>

=====Carthage=====
<!--

Before making any edits regarding the alleged practice of child sacrifice, please read the archived discussion at [[Talk:Carthage/Human Sacrifice]]. We have been around this block several times before.

Please refrain from entering text that comes down conclusively on the question of whether or not child sacrifice was, in fact, practiced in Carthage. This question has been the subject of long and heated debate among editors of this article and has occasioned edit warring, semi-protection, etc.

The current consensus is that nobody knows for sure and that we should simply report both sides of the question without asserting which one is right. Any departure from this stance is likely to get edited out fairly quickly.

Parts of this section may be canted towards the assertion that child sacrifice ''was'' practiced in Carthage. It is reasonable to put in qualifying text that asserts that the details of the child sacrifice are based on accounts that may not be altogether reliable.

We are in the process of looking for sources for these details so that the descriptions can be based on [[WP:RS|reliable sources]].

See [[Talk:Carthage/Human Sacrifice]] for details of past debate on this topic.

-->

{{Main|Punic religion#Tophets and child sacrifice|l1=Carthaginian religion – child sacrifice question}}

According to Shelby Brown, [[Ancient Carthage|Carthaginian]]s, descendants of the [[Phoenicia]]ns, sacrificed infants to their gods.<ref name="Brown 1991">{{Cite book| last = Brown | first = Shelby | title = Late Carthaginian Child Sacrifice and Sacrificial Monuments in their Mediterranean Context| publisher = Sheffield Academic Press| year = 1991| location = Sheffield }}</ref> Charred bones of hundreds of infants have been found in Carthaginian archaeological sites. One such area harbored as many as 20,000 burial [[urn]]s.<ref name="Brown 1991"/> Skeptics suggest that the bodies of children found in Carthaginian and Phoenician cemeteries were merely the cremated remains of children who died naturally.<ref>Sergio Ribichini, "Beliefs and Religious Life" in Moscati, Sabatino (ed), ''The Phoenicians'', 1988, p.141</ref>

[[Plutarch]] ({{circa}} {{CE|46–120}}) mentions the practice, as do [[Tertullian]], [[Paulus Orosius|Orosius]], Diodorus Siculus and [[Philo]]. The [[Hebrew Bible]] also mentions what appears to be child sacrifice practiced at a place called the [[Tophet]] (from the Hebrew ''taph'' or ''toph'', to burn) by the [[Canaan]]ites. Writing in the {{BCE|3rd century}}, [[Kleitarchos]], one of the historians of [[Alexander the Great]], described that the infants rolled into the flaming pit. [[Diodorus Siculus]] wrote that babies were roasted to death inside the burning pit of the god [[Baal#Ba'al|Baal Hamon]], a bronze statue.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Brown| first = Shelby| title = Late Carthaginian Child Sacrifice and Sacrificial Monuments in their Mediterranean Context| publisher = Sheffield Academic Press| year = 1991| location = Sheffield | pages = 22–23}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last = Stager| first = Lawrence| author-link = Lawrence Stager|author2=Samuel R. Wolff| title = Child sacrifice at Carthage – religious rite or population control?| journal = [[Biblical Archaeology Review]]| volume = 10| issue = Jan/Feb| pages = 31–51| year = 1984}}</ref>

=====Greece and Rome=====
[[File:Eugène Ferdinand Victor Delacroix 031.jpg|thumb|[[Medea]] killing her sons, by [[Eugène Ferdinand Victor Delacroix]] (1862)]]

The historical Greeks considered the practice of adult and child sacrifice [[Barbarian|barbarous]],<ref>{{Cite book| last= Hughes|first = Dennis D.|title = Human Sacrifice in Ancient Greece | publisher = Routledge|year = 1991|page = [https://archive.org/details/humansacrificean00hugh/page/n201 187]|url =https://archive.org/details/humansacrificean00hugh| url-access= limited| isbn=978-0-415-03483-8 }}</ref> however, [[infant exposure]] was widely practiced in [[ancient Greece]].<ref>Robert Garland, "Mother and child in the Greek world" ''History Today'' (March 1986), Vol. 36, pp 40-46</ref><ref>[[Sarah B. Pomeroy]], "Infanticide in Hellenistic Greece" in ''Images of women in antiquity'' (Wayne State Univ Press, 1983), pp 207-222.</ref><ref>Richard Harrow Feen, "The historical dimensions of infanticide and abortion: the experience of classical Greece" ''The Linacre Quarterly,'' vol 51 Aug 1984, pp 248-254.</ref> It was advocated by Aristotle in the case of congenital deformity: "As to the exposure of children, let there be a law that no deformed child shall live."<ref>{{cite journal|title=Aristotle (384–322 BCE): philosopher and scientist of ancient Greece| pmc=2672651 | pmid=16371395|doi=10.1136/adc.2005.074534|volume=91| issue=1 |year=2006|pages=F75–77 | author = Dunn PM| journal=Archives of Disease in Childhood: Fetal and Neonatal Edition}}</ref><ref>(Alternate translation: "let there be a law that no deformed child shall be reared") [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:abo:tlg,0086,035:7:1335b Politics, Book VII, section 1335b] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220513082601/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:abo:tlg,0086,035:7:1335b |date=13 May 2022 }}</ref>

In Greece, the decision to expose a child was typically the father's, although in Sparta the decision was made by a group of elders.<ref>See Plutarch's ''Life of Lycurgus''.</ref> Exposure was the preferred method of disposal, as that act in itself was not considered to be murder; moreover, the exposed child technically had a chance of being rescued by the gods or any passersby.<ref>See (e.g.) Budin 2004, 122–23.</ref> This very situation was a recurring motif in [[Greek mythology]].

To notify the neighbors of a birth of a child, a woolen strip was hung over the front door to indicate a female baby and an olive branch to indicate a boy had been born. Families did not always keep their new child. After a woman had a baby, she would show it to her husband. If the husband accepted it, it would live, but if he refused it, it would die. Babies would often be rejected if they were illegitimate, unhealthy or deformed, the wrong sex, or too great a burden on the family. These babies would not be directly killed, but put in a clay pot or jar and deserted outside the front door or on the roadway. In ancient Greek religion, this practice took the responsibility away from the parents because the child would die of natural causes, for example, hunger, asphyxiation or exposure to the elements.{{citation needed|date=October 2023}}

The practice was prevalent in [[ancient Rome]], as well. [[Philo]] was the first known philosopher to speak out against it.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Philo| author-link = Philo| title =The Special Laws| publisher =[[Harvard University Press]]| year =1950| location =Cambridge| pages =III, XX.117, Volume VII, pp. 118, 551, 549| no-pp = true}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Infanticide {{!}} Encyclopedia.com |url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/anthropology-and-archaeology/customs-and-artifacts/infanticide |access-date=2022-03-23 |website=www.encyclopedia.com |archive-date=23 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220323013809/https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/anthropology-and-archaeology/customs-and-artifacts/infanticide |url-status=live }}</ref> A letter from a Roman citizen to his sister, or a pregnant wife from her husband,<ref name="Woolf2007">{{cite book|author=Greg Woolf|title=Ancient civilizations: the illustrated guide to belief, mythology, and art |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=94NuSg3tlsgC&q=letter+pregnant|year=2007 |publisher=Barnes & Noble |isbn=978-1-4351-0121-0|page=386}}</ref> dating from {{BCE|1}}, demonstrates the casual nature with which infanticide was often viewed:

{{blockquote|I am still in Alexandria{{nbsp}}... I beg and plead with you to take care of our little child, and as soon as we receive wages, I will send them to you. In the meantime, if (good fortune to you!) you give birth, if it is a boy, let it live; if it is a girl, expose it.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Lefkowitz |first1=Mary |author-link=Mary Lefkowitz |last2=Maureen |first2=Fant |title=249. Exposure of a female child |url=https://diotima-doctafemina.org/translations/anthologies/womens-life-in-greece-and-rome-selections/vii-private-life/249-exposure-of-a-female-child/ |website=[[Diotíma (website)|Diotíma]]: Women's Life in Greece and Rome (selections) |date=1992 |access-date=28 December 2022 |archive-date=28 December 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221228211344/https://diotima-doctafemina.org/translations/anthologies/womens-life-in-greece-and-rome-selections/vii-private-life/249-exposure-of-a-female-child/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book | contribution = Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 744| editor-first = Naphtali| editor-last = Lewis| editor-link = Naphtali Lewis | title = Life in Egypt Under Roman Rule| page = 54| publisher = [[Oxford University Press]]| place = Oxford| year = 1985}}</ref><ref name="Woolf2007 1">{{cite book|author=Greg Woolf|title=Ancient civilizations: the illustrated guide to belief, mythology, and art|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=94NuSg3tlsgC&q=expose+money|year=2007 |publisher=Barnes & Noble |isbn=978-1-4351-0121-0|page=388}}</ref>}}

[[File:Schnorr von Carolsfeld Bibel in Bildern 1860 172.png|thumbnail|[[Massacre of the Innocents]] by [[Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld]], 1860]]

In some periods of [[Roman history]] it was traditional for a newborn to be brought to the ''[[pater familias]]'', the family [[Patriarchy|patriarch]], who would then decide whether the child was to be kept and raised, or left to die by exposure.<ref name=Crossan>John Crossan, ''The Essential Jesus: Original Sayings and Earliest Images'', p. 151 (Castle, 1994, 1998) {{ISBN|978-1-55635-833-3}}</ref> The [[Twelve Tables]] of [[Roman law]] obliged him to put to death a child that was visibly deformed. The concurrent practices of [[Slavery in ancient Rome|slavery]] and infanticide contributed to the "background noise" of the [[Crisis of the Roman Republic#Institution of Slavery|crises during the Republic]].<ref name=Crossan />

Infanticide became a [[capital offense]] in Roman law in 374, but offenders were rarely if ever prosecuted.<ref name="SXR">{{Cite book| last=Radbill| first=Samuel X.| contribution=A history of child abuse and infanticide| editor-last=Steinmetz| editor-first=Suzanne K. |editor-last2=Straus |editor-first2=Murray A. |editor-link2=Murray A. Straus| title=Violence in the Family| pages=173–79| publisher=Dodd, Mead & Co.| place=New York| year=1974}}</ref>

According to mythology, [[Romulus and Remus]], twin infant sons of the war god [[Mars (mythology)|Mars]], survived near-infanticide after being tossed into the Tiber River. According to the myth, they were raised by wolves, and later founded the city of Rome.

=====Middle Ages=====
Whereas theologians and clerics preached sparing their lives, newborn abandonment continued as registered in both the literature record and in legal documents.<ref name="Ex&Ob"/>{{rp|16}} According to [[William Edward Hartpole Lecky|William Lecky]], exposure in the [[early Middle Ages]], as distinct from other forms of infanticide, "was practiced on a gigantic scale with absolute impunity, noticed by writers with most frigid indifference and, at least in the case of destitute parents, considered a very venial offence".<ref name="InfHisSu">{{cite journal | last = Langer| first = William L.| author-link = William L. Langer|title = Infanticide: a historical survey| journal = History of Childhood Quarterly| volume = 1| pages = 353–66| year = 1974| pmid = 11614564| issue = 3}}</ref>{{rp|355–56}} However the first foundling house in Europe was established in [[Milan]] in 787 on account of the high number of infanticides and out-of-wedlock births. The [[Ospedale di Santo Spirito in Sassia|Hospital of the Holy Spirit]] in Rome was founded by [[Pope Innocent III]] because women were throwing their infants into the [[Tiber river]].<ref>{{cite journal | last = Trexler| first = Richard| author-link = Richard Trexler|title = Infanticide in Florence: new sources and first results| journal = History of Childhood Quarterly| volume = 1| page = 99| year = 1973| issue = 1| pmid = 11614568}}</ref>

Unlike other European regions, in the Middle Ages the German mother had the right to expose the newborn.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Westrup| first = C.W.| title =Introduction to Roman Law| publisher = [[Oxford University Press]]| year = 1944| location =London| page = 249}}</ref>

In the High Middle Ages, abandoning unwanted children finally eclipsed infanticide.{{Citation needed|date=August 2013}} Unwanted children were left at the door of church or abbey, and the clergy was assumed to take care of their upbringing. This practice also gave rise to the first [[orphanage]]s.

However, very high sex ratios were common in even late medieval Europe, which may indicate sex-selective infanticide.<ref>Josiah Cox Russell, 1958, ''Late Ancient and Medieval Population,'' pp. 13–17.</ref> The [[Waldensians]], a pre-Reformation medieval Christian sect deemed heretical by the [[Catholic Church]], were accused of participating in infanticide.<ref name="Griesse Barget de Boer 2021 p. 97">{{cite book | last1=Griesse | first1=M. | last2=Barget | first2=M. | last3=de Boer | first3=D. | title=Revolts and Political Violence in Early Modern Imagery | publisher=Brill | series=Brill's Studies on Art, Art History, and Intellectual History | year=2021 | isbn=978-90-04-46194-9 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vIRSEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA97 | access-date=2023-02-27 | page=97 | archive-date=27 February 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230227230232/https://books.google.com/books?id=vIRSEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA97 | url-status=live }}</ref>

=====Judaism=====
[[File:Schnorr von Carolsfeld Bibel in Bildern 1860 028.png|thumbnail|In this depiction of the [[Binding of Isaac]] by [[Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld]], 1860, Abraham is shown not sacrificing Isaac.]]
Judaism prohibits infanticide, and has for some time, dating back to at least the early [[Common Era]]. Roman historians wrote about the ideas and customs of other peoples, which often diverged from their own. [[Tacitus]] recorded that the Jews "take thought to increase their numbers, for they regard it as a crime to kill any late-born children".<ref name="Histories">{{Cite book| last = Tacitus| author-link = Tacitus| title =The Histories| publisher =William Heinemann| year =1931| location =London|page=Volume V, 183| no-pp = true| title-link = The Histories (Tacitus)}}</ref> [[Josephus]], whose works give an important insight into 1st-century Judaism, wrote that God "forbids women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to destroy it afterward".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Josephus| author-link = Josephus| title =The Works of Flavius Josephus, "Against Apion"| publisher = [[Harvard University Press]]| year =1976| location =Cambridge| page =II.25, 597}}</ref>

=====Pagan European tribes=====
In his book ''[[Germania (book)|Germania]]'', [[Tacitus]] wrote in {{CE|98}} that the ancient [[Germanic tribes]] enforced a similar prohibition. He found such mores remarkable and commented: "To restrain generation and the increase of children, is esteemed [by the Germans] an abominable sin, as also to kill infants newly born."<ref>Tacitus, ''[https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/tacitus-germanygord.asp Germania] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211106154709/https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/tacitus-germanygord.asp |date=6 November 2021 }}, translated by Thomas Gordon (1910)''</ref> It has become clear over the millennia, though, that Tacitus' description was inaccurate; the consensus of modern scholarship significantly differs. [[John Boswell]] believed that in ancient Germanic tribes unwanted children were exposed, usually in the forest.<ref name="KofS">{{Cite book| last = Boswell| first = John| author-link = John Boswell| title =The Kindness of Strangers| publisher = Vintage Books| year = 1988| location =New York}}</ref>{{rp|218}} "It was the custom of the [Teutonic] pagans, that if they wanted to kill a son or daughter, they would be killed before they had been given any food."<ref name="KofS"/>{{rp|211}} Usually children born out of wedlock were disposed of that way.

In his highly influential ''Pre-historic Times'', [[John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury|John Lubbock]] described burnt bones indicating the practice of child sacrifice in pagan Britain.<ref name="Pre-historic Times">{{Cite book| last = Lubbock| first = John| author-link = John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury| title =Pre-historic Times, as Illustrated by Ancient Remains, and the Manners and Customs of Modern Savages| publisher=Williams and Norgate | year =1865| location =London| page =176}}</ref>

The last canto, ''Marjatan poika'' (Son of Marjatta), of [[Finnish literature|Finnish]] national epic ''[[Kalevala]]'' describes assumed infanticide. [[Väinämöinen]] orders the infant [[Legitimacy (family law)|bastard]] son of Marjatta to be drowned in a [[marsh]].

The ''[[Íslendingabók]]'', the main source for the early history of [[Iceland]], recounts that on the [[Íslendingabók#7. Conversion of Iceland to Christianity|Conversion of Iceland to Christianity]] in 1000 it was provided – in order to make the transition more palatable to Pagans – that "the old laws allowing exposure of newborn children will remain in force".
However, this provision – among other concessions made at the time to the Pagans – was abolished some years later.

===Christianity===
Christianity explicitly rejects infanticide. The ''Teachings of the [[Apostles in the New Testament|Apostles]]'' or ''[[Didache]]'' states "thou shalt not kill a child by [[abortion]], neither shalt thou slay it when born".<ref>{{Cite book | translator =Robinson, Charles| title =The Didache| page =76| publisher =David Nutt| place =Oxford | year =1894 }}</ref> The ''[[Epistle of Barnabas]]'' makes a similar statement.<ref>''[[Epistle of Barnabas]]'', xix.5d.</ref> Early Christian writers such as [[Tertullian]], [[Athenagoras of Athens|Athenagoras]], [[Minucius Felix]], [[Justin Martyr]] and [[Lactantius]] also maintained that exposing a baby to death was a wicked act.<ref name="Justin Martyr"/> In 318, [[Constantine I]] considered infanticide a crime, and in 374, [[Valentinian I]] mandated the rearing of all children (exposing babies, especially girls, was still common). The [[Council of Constantinople (1094)|Council of Constantinople]] declared that infanticide was homicide, and in 589, the [[Third Council of Toledo]] took measures against the custom of killing their own children.<ref name="SXR"/> Christianity thus played a leading role in the abolition of infanticide in the Roman Empire.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Gosbell |first1=Louise |title=What we can learn from Christianity's resistance to infanticide and exposure in antiquity |url=https://www.abc.net.au/religion/early-christianitys-resistance-to-infanticide-and-exposure/10898016 |website=ABC Religion & Ethics |access-date=13 December 2024 |language=en-AU |date=13 March 2019}}</ref>

===Arabia===
Some Muslim sources allege that [[pre-Islamic Arabia]]n society practiced infanticide as a form of "post-partum birth control".<ref name="Children">[[Encyclopedia of the Qur'an]], ''Children''</ref> The word ''waʾd'' was used to describe the practice.<ref name="EoQ-Infanticide">Donna Lee Bowen, Encyclopedia of the Qur'an, Infanticide</ref> These sources state that infanticide was practiced either out of destitution (thus practiced on males and females alike), or as "disappointment and fear of social disgrace felt by a father upon the birth of a daughter".<ref name="Children"/>

Some authors believe that there is little evidence that infanticide was prevalent in pre-Islamic [[Arabian Peninsula|Arabia]] or early [[Muslim history]], except for the case of the [[Banu Tamim|Tamim tribe]], who practiced it during severe famine according to Islamic sources.<ref>{{Cite book| last= Lammens|first = Henri| title = Islam. Belief and Institutions| publisher = Methuen & Co. Ltd.|orig-date = 1929|year = 1987| location = London|page = 21}}</ref><ref name=":0" /> Others state that "female infanticide was common all over Arabia during this period of time" (pre-Islamic Arabia), especially by burying alive a female newborn.<ref name="Hardness" />{{rp|59}}<ref>{{Cite book| last = Smith| first = William Robertson| author-link = Robertson Smith| title =Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia| publisher =Adam & Charles Block| year =1903| location =London| page =293}}</ref> A tablet discovered in [[Yemen]], forbidding the people of a certain town from engaging in the practice, is the only written reference to infanticide within the peninsula in pre-Islamic times.<ref>{{cite journal|title= Free and bound prepositions: a new look at the inscription Mafray/Qutra 1|volume=28| date=17–19 July 1997 | pages=169–74| journal=Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies |author=Manfred Kropp|jstor= 41223623}}</ref>

===Islam===
Infanticide is explicitly [[Islam and children#Against infanticide|prohibited by the Qur'an]].<ref name="Oxford">{{Cite book| editor-last= Esposito|editor-first = John L. |title = The Oxford Dictionary of Islam| publisher = [[Oxford University Press]]|year = 2004|location =New York |page = 138|url =https://books.google.com/books?id=6VeCWQfVNjkC&pg=PA138| isbn= 978-0-19-512559-7}}</ref> "And do not kill your children for fear of poverty; We give them sustenance and yourselves too; surely to kill them is a great wrong."<ref>[[Qur'an]], XVII:31. Other passages condemning infanticide in the Qur'an appear in LXXXI:8–9, XVI:60–62, XVII:42 and XLII:48.</ref>
Together with [[polytheism]] and [[homicide]], infanticide is regarded as a grave sin (see {{qref|6|151}} and {{qref|60|12}}).<ref name="Children"/> Infanticide is also implicitly denounced in the story of Pharaoh's slaughter of the male children of Israelites (see {{qref|2|49}}; {{qref|7|127}}; {{qref|7|141}}; {{qref|14|6}}; {{qref|28|4}}; {{qref|40|25}}).<ref name="Children"/>

===Ukraine and Russia===
[[File:Russian woman throwing her baby to wolves (Geoffroy, 1845).JPG|thumb|''Femme Russe [[Child abandonment|abandonnant]] ses enfants à des loups'' ("Russian Woman Abandoning Her Children to the Wolves"). {{ill|Charles-Michel Geoffroy|fr}}, 1845]]

Infanticide may have been practiced as human sacrifice, as part of the [[pagan]] cult of [[Perun]]. [[Ibn Fadlan]] describes sacrificial practices at the time of his trip to Kiev Rus (present-day Ukraine) in 921–922, and describes an incident of a woman voluntarily sacrificing her life as part of a [[funeral rite]] for a prominent leader, but makes no mention of infanticide. The [[Primary Chronicle]], one of the most important literary sources before the 12th&nbsp;century, indicates that human sacrifice to idols may have been introduced by [[Vladimir the Great]] in 980. The same Vladimir the Great formally converted Kiev Rus into [[Christianity]] just 8&nbsp;years later, but pagan cults continued to be practiced clandestinely in remote areas as late as the 13th&nbsp;century.

American explorer [[George Kennan (explorer)|George Kennan]] noted that among the [[Koryaks]], a people of north-eastern [[Siberia]], infanticide was still common in the nineteenth century. One of a pair of twins was always sacrificed.<ref>{{cite book |author-last=Kennan |author-first=George |author-link=George Kennan (explorer) |year=1871 |title=Tent Life in Siberia |publisher=Gibbs Smith |location=New York<!-- |orig-date=1871 -->}}</ref>

=== Great Britain ===
Infanticide (as a crime) gained both popular and bureaucratic significance in [[Victorian era|Victorian]] Britain. By the mid-19th century, in the context of criminal lunacy and the [[Insanity defense|insanity defence]], killing one's own child(ren) attracted ferocious debate, as the role of women in society was defined by motherhood, and it was thought that any woman who murdered her own child was by definition insane and could not be held responsible for her actions. Several cases were subsequently highlighted during the [[Royal Commission on Capital Punishment 1864–66]], as a particular felony where an effective avoidance of the [[Death penalty in the UK|death penalty]] had informally begun.

[[File:Amelia dyer1893.jpg|thumb|upright|Baby killer [[Amelia Dyer]] (pictured upon entry to [[Mendip Hospital|Wells Asylum]] in 1893). Her trial led to stricter laws for adoption and raised the profile of the fledgling [[National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children]] (NSPCC) which formed in 1884.<ref name="monster">{{cite news |title=Amelia Dyer: the woman who murdered 300 babies |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/amelia-dyer-the-woman-who-murdered-300-babies-8507570.html |access-date=29 August 2020 |agency=The Independent}}</ref>]]

The [[Poor Law Amendment Act 1834]] ended [[English Poor Laws|parish relief]] for unmarried mothers and allowed fathers of illegitimate children to avoid paying for "child support".<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://people.loyno.edu/~history/journal/1989-0/haller.htm|title=Bastardy and Baby Farming in Victorian England|last=Haller|first=Dorothy L.|website=Loyola University New Orleans|access-date=2018-08-31|archive-date=2019-05-23|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190523012357/http://people.loyno.edu/~history/journal/1989-0/haller.htm}}</ref> Unmarried mothers then received little assistance, and the poor were left with the option of either entering the [[workhouse]], turning to prostitution, resorting to infanticide, or choosing abortion. By the middle of the century infanticide was common for social reasons, such as illegitimacy, and the introduction of [[child life insurance]] additionally encouraged some women to kill their children for gain. Examples include [[Mary Ann Cotton]], who murdered many of her 15 children as well as three husbands; [[Margaret Waters]], the 'Brixton Baby Farmer', a professional [[Baby farming|baby-farmer]] who was found guilty of infanticide in 1870; Jessie King, who was hanged in 1889; [[Amelia Dyer]], the 'Angel Maker', who murdered over 400 babies in her care; and [[Ada Williams (baby farmer)|Ada Chard-Williams]], a baby farmer who was later hanged at Newgate prison.

''The Times'' reported that 67 infants were murdered in London in 1861 and 150 more recorded as "found dead", many of which were found on the streets. Another 250 were suffocated, half of them not recorded as accidental deaths. The report noted that "infancy in London has to creep into life in the midst of foes."<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://find.galegroup.com/ttda/infomark.do?&source=gale&prodId=TTDA&userGroupName=rtl_ttda&tabID=T003&docPage=article&searchType=&docId=CS135043741&type=multipage&contentSet=LTO&version=1.0 |title=Infanticide in London |date=29 April 1862 |work=The Times [London, England] |page=8 |via=The Times Digital Archive |access-date=31 August 2018 |archive-date=5 June 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190605020856/http://find.galegroup.com/ttda/infomark.do |url-status=live }}</ref>

Recording a birth as a [[Stillbirth|still-birth]] was also another way of concealing infanticide because still-births did not need to be registered until 1926 and they did not need to be buried in public cemeteries.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0002148/18950201/084/0006|title=Trafficking in Babies. An Interview with Coroner Braxton Hicks|date=1 February 1895|work=Leicester Daily Post|page=6 |via=British Newspaper Archive}}</ref> In 1895 ''The Sun'' (London) published the article, "Massacre of the Innocents", highlighting the dangers of baby-farming, the recording of stillbirths, and quoting [[Athelstan Braxton Hicks]], the London coroner, on lying-in houses: {{blockquote|I have not the slightest doubt that a large amount of crime is covered by the expression 'still-birth'. There are a large number of cases of what are called newly-born children, which are found all over England, more especially in London and large towns, abandoned in streets, rivers, on commons, and so on... [A] great deal of that crime is due to what are called lying-in houses, which are not registered, or under the supervision of that sort, where the people who act as midwives constantly, as soon as the child is born, either drop it into a pail of water or smother it with a damp cloth. It is a very common thing, also, to find that they bash their heads on the floor and break their skulls.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Secret Commissions: An Anthology of Victorian Investigative Journalism|last1=Donovan |first1=Stephen |last2=Rubery|first2=Matthew |publisher=Broadview Press|year=2012|isbn=978-1-55111-330-2|location=Peterborough, Ontario |pages=232–69 |chapter=Herbert Cadett. Massacre of the Innocents}}</ref>}}

The last British woman to be executed for infanticide of her own child was [[Rebecca Smith (infanticide)|Rebecca Smith]], who was hanged in Wiltshire in 1849.

The [[Infant Life Protection Act 1897]] required local authorities to be notified within 48 hours of changes in custody or the death of children under seven years. Under the [[Children Act 1908]] "no infant could be kept in a home that was so unfit and so overcrowded as to endanger its health, and no infant could be kept by an unfit nurse who threatened, by neglect or abuse, its proper care, and maintenance."

Instances of infanticide in Britain in the 18th and 19th&nbsp;centuries are often attributed to the economic position of the women, with juries committing [[Jury nullification|"pious perjury"]] in many subsequent murder cases. The knowledge of the difficulties faced in the 18th&nbsp;century by those women who attempted to keep their children can be seen as a reason for juries to show compassion. If the woman chose to keep the child, society was not set up to ease the pressure placed upon the woman, legally, socially or economically.<ref>{{cite book |last=McLynn |first=Frank |title=Crime and Punishment in 18th&nbsp;Century England |publisher=Routledge |location=London, UK |year=1989 |page=102}}</ref> 
In mid-18th century Britain there was assistance available for women who were not able to raise their children. The [[Foundling Hospital]] opened in 1756 and was able to take in some of the illegitimate children. However, the conditions within the hospital caused [[Parliament of Great Britain|Parliament]] to withdraw funding and the governors to live off of their own incomes.<ref name="unknown 1878">{{cite journal |title=The Foundling Hospital and Neighbourhood |journal=Old and New London Journal |volume=5 |year=1878 |url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/ |access-date=12 July 2010 |archive-date=23 February 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110223025617/http://british-history.ac.uk/ |url-status=live }}</ref> This resulted in a stringent entrance policy, with the committee requiring that the hospital:

:Will not receive a child that is more than a year old, nor the child of a domestic servant, nor any child whose father can be compelled to maintain it.<ref name="unknown 1878"/>

Once a mother had admitted her child to the hospital, the hospital did all it could to ensure that the parent and child were not re-united.<ref name="unknown 1878"/> MacFarlane argues in ''Illegitimacy and Illegitimates in Britain'' (1980) that English society greatly concerned itself with the burden that a bastard child places upon its communities and had gone to some lengths to ensure that the father of the child is identified in order to maintain its well-being.<ref>{{cite book |last=MacFarlane |first=Alan |chapter=Illegitimacy and Illegitimates in English History |chapter-url=https://www.alanmacfarlane.com/TEXTS/bastardy.pdf |page=75 |publisher=Arnold |year=1980 |title=Bastardy and its Comparative History |access-date=2023-08-22 |archive-date=2023-06-25 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230625204553/https://www.alanmacfarlane.com/TEXTS/bastardy.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> Assistance could be gained through maintenance payments from the father, however, this was capped "at a miserable 2&nbsp;[[shilling|s]] and 6&nbsp;[[pence|d]] a week".<ref name="Rose 1986 28">{{cite book |last=Rose|first=Lionel |title=Massacre of the Innocents: Infanticide in Great Britain 1800–1939 |page=28 |publisher=Routledge and Kegan |location=London, UK |year=1986}}</ref> If the father fell behind with the payments he could only be asked "to pay a maximum of 13&nbsp;weeks arrears".<ref name="Rose 1986 28"/>

Despite the accusations of some that women were getting a free hand-out, there is evidence that many women were far from receiving adequate assistance from their parish. "Within Leeds in 1822 ... relief was limited to 1&nbsp;[[shilling|s]] per week".<ref>{{cite book |last=Rose |first=Lionel |title=Massacre of the Innocents: Infanticide in Great Britain 1800–1939 |page=25 |publisher=Routledge and Kegan |location=London, UK |year=1986}}</ref> Sheffield required women to enter the [[workhouse]], whereas Halifax gave no relief to the women who required it. The prospect of entering the workhouse was certainly something to be avoided. Lionel Rose quotes Dr&nbsp;[[Joseph Rogers (physician)|Joseph Rogers]] in ''Massacre of the Innocents ...'' (1986). Rogers, who was employed by a London workhouse in 1856 stated that conditions in the nursery were 'wretchedly damp and miserable ... [and] ... overcrowded with young mothers and their infants'.<ref>{{cite book |last=Rose |first=Lionel |title=Massacre of the Innocents: Infanticide in Great Britain 1800–1939 |pages=31–33 |publisher=Routledge and Kegan |location=London, UK |year=1986}}</ref>

The loss of social standing for a servant girl was a particular problem in respect of producing a bastard child as they relied upon a good character reference in order to maintain their job and more importantly, to get a new or better job. In a large number of trials for the crime of infanticide, it is the servant girl that stood accused.<ref>{{cite book |last=McLynn |first=Frank|title=Crime and Punishment in 18th Century England |publisher=Routledge |location=London, UK |year=1989 |page=111}}</ref> The disadvantage of being a servant girl is that they had to live to the social standards of their superiors or risk dismissal and no references. Whereas within other professions, such as in the factory, the relationship between employer and employee was much more anonymous and the mother would be better able to make other provisions, such as employing a minder.<ref>{{cite book |last=Rose |first=Lionel |title=Massacre of the Innocents: Infanticide in Great Britain 1800–1939 |page=19 |publisher=Routledge and Kegan |location=London, UK |year=1986}}</ref> The result of the lack of basic social care in Britain in the 18th and 19th&nbsp;century is the numerous accounts in court records of women, particularly servant girls, standing trial for the murder of their child.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hitchcock |first1=Tim |last2=Shoemaker |first2=Robert |url=http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/ |title=The Proceedings of the Old Bailey |publisher=University of Sheffield and University of Hertfordshire |year=2006 |access-date=12 July 2010 |archive-date=15 May 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120515160959/http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

There may have been no specific offense of infanticide in England before about 1623 because infanticide was a matter for the by [[ecclesiastical court]]s, possibly because [[infant mortality]] from natural causes was high (about 15% or one in six).<ref>{{cite book |title=Urban disease and mortality in nineteenth-century England |author1=Woods, R. |author2=Woodward, J. |publisher=Batsford |location=London |year=1984 |isbn=978-0-7134-3707-2}}</ref> Thereafter the accusation of the suppression of bastard children by lewd mothers was a crime incurring the presumption of guilt.<ref>{{cite web |title=The history of infanticide in England |first=Alan |last=MacFarlane |year=2002 |access-date=2012-11-07 |url=http://www.alanmacfarlane.com/savage/A-INFANT.PDF |archive-date=1 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180701030740/http://www.alanmacfarlane.com/savage/A-INFANT.PDF |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Asia===
====China====
[[File:Burying Babies in China (p.40, March 1865, XXII).jpg|thumb|Burying Babies in China (p. 40, March 1865, XXII)<ref name=Offering1865>{{cite journal|title=Burying Babies in China |journal=Wesleyan Juvenile Offering|date=March 1865|volume=XXII|page=40 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1VwEAAAAQAAJ|access-date=1 December 2015}}</ref>]]

As of the [[3rd century BC]], short of execution, the harshest penalties were imposed on practitioners of infanticide by the legal codes of the [[Qin dynasty]] and [[Han dynasty]] of ancient China.<ref name="Makeham2008">{{cite book|author=John Makeham|title=China: The World's Oldest Living Civilization Revealed |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TQ4NAQAAMAAJ&q=child|year=2008|publisher=Thames & Hudson|isbn=978-0-500-25142-3|pages=134–35}}</ref>

China's society practiced sex selective infanticide. Philosopher [[Han Fei Tzu]], a member of the ruling aristocracy of the {{BCE|3rd century}}, who developed a school of law, wrote: "As to children, a father and mother when they produce a boy congratulate one another, but when they produce a girl they put it to death."<ref>{{Cite book| last=Yu-Lan| first=Fung| title=A History of Chinese Philosophy| publisher=[[Princeton University Press]]| year=1952| location=Princeton| page=327}}</ref> Among the [[Hakka people]], and in [[Yunnan]], [[Anhui]], [[Sichuan]], [[Jiangxi]] and [[Fujian Province, Republic of China|Fujian]] a method of killing the baby was to put her into a bucket of cold water, which was called "baby water".<ref>{{Cite book| last=Yao |first=Esther S. Lee| title=Chinese Women: Past and Present| publisher=Ide House| year=1983| location=Mesquite| page=75}}</ref>

Infanticide was reported as early as the {{BCE|3rd century}}, and, by the [[Song dynasty]] ({{CE|960–1279}}), it was widespread in some provinces. Belief in [[reincarnation]] allowed poor residents of the country to kill their newborn children if they felt unable to care for them, hoping that they would be reborn in better circumstances. Furthermore, 18th and 19th century Qing reports of villagers in Liaoning show that they did not consider newborn children fully human, instead regarding life as beginning at some point after the sixth month after birth.<ref>{{cite book|title=Fate and fortune in rural China: social organization and population behavior in Liaoning, 1774–1873|author=James Z. Lee |author2=Cameron D. Campbell |page=70}}</ref>

The Venetian explorer [[Marco Polo]] claimed to have seen newborns exposed in [[Manzi (geography)|Manzi]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Polo |first=Marco |title=The Travels |publisher=[[Penguin Books]] |year=1965 |location=Middlesex |page=174 |author-link=Marco Polo}}</ref> Contemporary writers from the Song dynasty note that, in [[Hubei]] and [[Fujian]] provinces, residents would only keep three sons and two daughters (among poor farmers, two sons, and one daughter), and kill all babies beyond that number at birth.<ref>{{cite book |title=Drowning girls in China: female infanticide since 1650|author=David E. Mungello|pages=5–8}}</ref> Initially the sex of the child was only one factor to consider. By the time of the Ming dynasty, however (1368–1644), male infanticide was becoming increasingly uncommon. The prevalence of female infanticide remained high much longer. The magnitude of this practice is subject to some dispute; however, one commonly quoted estimate is that, by late [[Qing dynasty|Qing]], between one fifth and one-quarter of all newborn girls, across the entire social spectrum, were victims of infanticide. If one includes excess mortality among female children under 10 (ascribed to gender-differential neglect), the share of victims rises to one third.<ref>{{cite book |author=King |first=Michelle Tien |author-link=Michelle T. King |title=Drowning daughters: A cultural history of female infanticide in late nineteenth-century China}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Fate and fortune in rural China: social organization and population behavior in Liaoning, 1774–1873|author=James Z. Lee |author2=Cameron D. Campbell |pages=58–82}}</ref><ref>Bernice J. Lee, "Female Infanticide in China." ''Historical Reflections / Réflexions Historiques'' 8#3 (1981), pp. 163–77 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/41298766 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201121005656/https://www.jstor.org/stable/41298766 |date=21 November 2020 }}</ref>

Scottish physician [[John Dudgeon]], who worked in [[Beijing|Peking]], China, during the early 20th century said that, "Infanticide does not prevail to the extent so generally believed among us, and in the north, it does not exist at all."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/diseaseschinain00maxwgoog|title=The Diseases of China, including Formosa and Korea|year=1910|author=William Hamilton Jefferys|publisher=P. Blakiston's son & Co.|location=Philadelphia|page=[https://archive.org/details/diseaseschinain00maxwgoog/page/n290 258] |access-date=Dec 20, 2011|quote=Chinese children make delightful patients. They respond readily to kindness and are in every way satisfactory from a professional point of view. Not infrequently simply good feeding and plenty of oxygen will work the most marvelous cures. Permission is almost invariably asked to remain with the child in the hospital, and it is far better to grant the request, since, after a few days when all is well and the child is happy, the adult will gladly enough withdraw. Meanwhile, much has been gained. Whereas the effort to argue parents into leaving a child at once and the difficulty of winning the frightened child are enormous. The Chinese infant usually has a pretty good start in life. "Infanticide does not prevail to the extent so generally believed among us, and in the north, it does not exist at all."—Dudgeon, Peking.}}</ref>

[[File:Sex ratio at birth in mainland China.png|thumb|upright=1.35|Sex ratio at birth in mainland China, males per 100 females, 1980–2010]]
Gender-selected abortion or sex identification (without medical uses<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nhfpc.gov.cn/fzs/s3576/201808/45d292b302b4422ab9b0ffc8723924d6.shtml |title=《禁止非医学需要的胎儿性别鉴定和选择性别人工终止妊娠的规定》 |website=National Health and Family Planning Commission of China |language=zh}}{{dead link|date=July 2020|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}} [http://cache.baiducontent.com/c?m=9d78d513d9d431d94f99e4697b12c016124381132ba7d5020ed18449e3732d41501695ac51210777d6d27d1716d94b4b9dfa2104371453c48cc9f85dadbc8559299c60742e13dc0754910eaeb85b388465d54de9d845bdeeb26384aea586821044ca2454269da4c31b1d55cb68f5102ce3a49a4217550dbcea6665f45927289d2310b041f9e0613e0cd1f489081dc92fd0601a97a963b42912c252fe59447a&p=81759a4ed08318b30be296351154&newp=8b2a971c899e11a053eb8c3e525e92695d0fc20e3dd1c44324b9d71fd325001c1b69e7bf2d221606d9c47e6406af4f58e0f23370301766dada9fca458ae7c47170d5&user=baidu&fm=sc&query=%BD%FB%D6%B9%B7%C7%D2%BD%D1%A7%D0%E8%D2%AA%B5%C4&qid=b4525e840005e09d&p1=2 Alt URL]{{Dead link|date=July 2020 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>Diseases or abnormal will be affected by gender. Such as [[Duchenne muscular dystrophy]] will effect boy if his mother carry the gene.</ref>), abandonment, and infanticide are illegal in present-day mainland China. Nevertheless, the [[US State Department]],<ref>See Associated Press article [http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/27-12142004-416868.html US State Department position] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070226032823/http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/27-12142004-416868.html |date=February 26, 2007 }}.</ref> and the [[human rights]] organization [[Amnesty International]]<ref>See Amnesty International's report on [http://www.amnesty.ie/content/view/full/1683/ violence against women in China] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061009055656/http://www.amnesty.ie/content/view/full/1683/ |date=2006-10-09 }}.</ref> have all declared that mainland China's family planning programs, called the [[one child policy]] (which has since changed to a [[two-child policy]]<ref>{{cite web |title=中共全会公报允许普遍二孩政策 |url=http://news.163.com/15/1029/18/B746VT6C0001124J.html |website=Wangyi News |access-date=3 May 2019 |language=zh |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20190503122241/http://news.163.com/15/1029/18/B746VT6C0001124J.html |archive-date=3 May 2019}}</ref>), contribute to infanticide.<ref>[http://www.theinterim.com/issues/abortion/steve-mosher%E2%80%99s-china-report/ "Steve Mosher's China report"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190828224837/http://www.theinterim.com/issues/abortion/steve-mosher%E2%80%99s-china-report/ |date=28 August 2019 }} ''The Interim'', 1986</ref><ref>[http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html "Case Study: Female Infanticide"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080421141103/http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html |date=2008-04-21 }} ''Gendercide Watch'', 2000</ref><ref>[http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/infanticide-china-statistics "Infanticide Statistics: Infanticide in China"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121101014043/http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/infanticide-china-statistics |date=2012-11-01 }} ''AllGirlsAllowed.org'', 2010</ref> The sex gap between males and females aged 0–19 years old was estimated to be 25&nbsp;million in 2010 by the [[United Nations Population Fund]].<ref name=czg>Christophe Z Guilmoto, [https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20120604063319/https://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/Guilmoto_Revised_presentation_Hanoi_Oct2011.pdf Sex imbalances at birth Trends, consequences and policy implications] United Nations Population Fund, Hanoi (October 2011)</ref> But in some cases, in order to avoid mainland China's family planning programs, parents will not report to government when a child is born (in most cases a girl), so she or he will not have an identity in the government and they can keep on giving birth until they are satisfied, without fines or punishment. In 2017, the government announced that all children without an identity can now have an identity legally, known as [[family register]].<ref>{{cite web |title=2017重磅!超生、非婚生子女也能上户口了, 这7类人可合法落户! |url=https://news.china.com/news100/11038989/20170619/30772432.html |access-date=3 May 2019 |language=zh |archive-date=3 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190503122243/https://news.china.com/news100/11038989/20170619/30772432.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

====Japan====
Since feudal Edo era [[Japan]] the common slang for infanticide was ''mabiki'' (間引き), which means to pull plants from an overcrowded garden. A typical method in Japan was smothering the baby's mouth and nose with wet paper.<ref>{{cite journal | doi = 10.1097/00000433-198607020-00004 | last = Shiono| first = Hiroshi|author2=Atoyo Maya |author3=Noriko Tabata |author4=Masataka Fujiwara |author5=Jun-ich Azumi |author6=Mashahiko Morita| title =Medicolegal aspects of infanticide in Hokkaido District, Japan| journal =American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology| volume = 7| issue = 2| pages = 104–06| year = 1986| pmid = 3740005 | s2cid = 483615}}</ref> It became common as a method of population control. Farmers would often kill their second or third sons. Daughters were usually spared, as they could be married off, sold off as servants or prostitutes, or sent off to become [[geisha]]s.<ref>{{Cite news|url = https://www.nytimes.com/1973/12/08/archives/infanticide-in-japan-sign-of-the-times-daughters-spared.html|title = Infanticide in Japan: Sign of the Times?|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 1973-12-08|access-date = 1 September 2017|archive-date = 3 March 2018|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180303230043/https://www.nytimes.com/1973/12/08/archives/infanticide-in-japan-sign-of-the-times-daughters-spared.html|url-status = live}}</ref> ''Mabiki'' persisted in the 19th century and early 20th century.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Vaux| first = Kenneth| title = Birth Ethics | publisher = Crossroad | year = 1989 | location = New York | page = 12}}</ref> According to one estimate, at least 97% of homicide victims in Japan in 1900 were newborns.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Drixler |first1=Fabian |last2=Matsuzaki |first2=Reo |date=2024 |title=Façade Fictions: False Statistics and Spheres of Autonomy in Meiji Japan |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00323292241253135 |journal=Politics & Society |volume=53 |pages=57–97 |language=en |doi=10.1177/00323292241253135 |issn=0032-3292|url-access=subscription }}</ref> To bear twins was perceived as barbarous and unlucky and efforts were made to hide or kill one or both twins.<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Science: Japanese Twins |magazine=Time |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,770452,00.html |access-date=2015-03-19 |date=1936-11-09 |archive-date=6 June 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190606223356/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,770452,00.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

====South Asia====
{{main|Infanticide in India}}
[[File:Hindoo Woman and Child (March 1852, p.24, IX) - Copy.jpg|thumb|Hindu Woman carrying her child to be drowned in the River [[Ganges]] at Bengal (1852)<ref name="Juvenile1852">{{cite journal|title=Hindoo Woman and Child|journal=The Wesleyan Juvenile Offering: A Miscellany of Missionary Information for Young Persons |date=March 1852|volume=IX|page=24 |url=https://archive.org/download/wesleyanjuvenil08socigoog/wesleyanjuvenil08socigoog.pdf|access-date=24 February 2016}}</ref>]]
[[File:Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant (November 1853, X, p.120).jpg|thumb|Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant (November 1853, X, p. 120)<ref name="Juvenile1853">{{cite journal|title=Hindoo Mother Sacrificing her infant|journal=The Wesleyan Juvenile Offering: A Miscellany of Missionary Information for Young Persons|date=November 1853|volume=X|page=120 |url=https://archive.org/details/wesleyanjuvenil19socigoog|access-date=29 February 2016}}</ref>]]

[[Female infanticide]] of newborn girls was systematic in feudatory [[Rajput]]s in [[South Asia]] for [[illegitimate]] female children during the Middle Ages. According to [[Firishta]], as soon as the illegitimate female child was born she was held "in one hand, and a knife in the other, that any person who wanted a wife might take her now, otherwise she was immediately put to death".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Westermarck| first = Edward| author-link = Edward Westermarck| title =A Short History of Marriage| publisher =Humanities Press| year =1968| location =New York| page =Vol. III, 162}}</ref> The practice of female infanticide was also common among the Kutch, Kehtri, Nagar, Bengal, Miazed, Kalowries and [[Sindh]] communities.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Panigrahi| first = Lalita |title =British Social Policy and Female Infanticidein India| publisher =Munshiram Manoharlal| year =1972| location = New Delhi| page = 18}}</ref>

It was not uncommon that parents threw a child to the [[Ganges shark|sharks]] in the [[Ganges River]] as a sacrificial offering. The [[Company rule in India|East India Company administration]] were unable to outlaw the custom until the beginning of the 19th century.<ref name="HumSac">{{Cite book| last=Davies|first = Nigel| title =Human Sacrifice |publisher= William Morrow & Co|year = 1981| location= New York|isbn=978-0-333-22384-0}}</ref>{{rp|78}}

According to social activists, female infanticide has remained a problem in India into the 21st century, with both [[NGO]]s and the government conducting awareness campaigns to combat it.<ref>{{Cite news|author=Staff reporter|date=11 July 2011|title=2011 census: average literacy rate improves in Krishnagiri district |newspaper=The Hindu|url=http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-tamilnadu/2011-census-average-literacy-rate-improves-in-krishnagiri-district/article2217649.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130427195220/http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-tamilnadu/2011-census-average-literacy-rate-improves-in-krishnagiri-district/article2217649.ece |archive-date=27 April 2013|url-status=live|location=Chennai, India}}</ref>

===Africa===
In some [[Africa]]n societies some neonates were killed because of beliefs in evil omens or because they were considered unlucky. Twins were usually put to death in Arebo; as well as by the [[Nama people]] of [[South West Africa]]; in the [[Lake Victoria|Lake Victoria Nyanza]] region; by the [[Tswana people|Tswana]] in [[Portuguese East Africa]]; in some parts of [[Igboland]], [[Nigeria]] twins were sometimes abandoned in a forest at birth (as depicted in ''[[Things Fall Apart]]''), oftentimes one twin was killed or hidden by midwives of wealthier mothers; and by the [[ǃKung people]] of the [[Kalahari Desert]].<ref name="Hardness"/>{{rp|160–61}}

The [[Kikuyu people|Kikuyu]], [[Kenya]]'s most populous ethnic group, practiced ritual killing of twins.<ref>{{Cite book | last = LeVine| first = Sarah and Robert LeVine| contribution = Child abuse and neglect in Sub-Saharan Africa| editor-last = Korbin| editor-first = Jill| title = Child Abuse and Neglect| page = 39| publisher = [[University of California Press]]| place = Berkeley| year = 1981}}</ref> Infanticide is rooted in the old traditions and beliefs prevailing all over Kenya. A survey conducted by [[Disability Rights International]] found that 45% of women interviewed by them in Kenya were pressured to kill their children born with disabilities. The pressure is much higher in the rural areas, with every two mothers out of three being forced to kill their disabled child.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-45670750|title=Infanticide in Kenya: 'I was told to kill my disabled baby'|work=BBC News|access-date=27 September 2018|date=2018-09-27|last1=Soy|first1=Anne|archive-date=10 June 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190610225502/https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-45670750|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Australia===
Estimations of the prevalence of infanticide among [[Aboriginal Australians]] vary widely.<ref name=Berndt-Berndt-p470>{{cite book |last1=Berndt |first1=Ronald M. |last2=Berndt |first2=Catherine H. |author-link1=Ronald Berndt |author-link2=Catherine Berndt |title=The World of the First Australians |date=1977 |publisher=Ure Smith |location=Sydney |page=470 |isbn=978-0-7254-0272-3 |edition=2 |url=https://archive.org/details/worldoffirstaust00bern}}</ref>
Many early European settlers considered it to be extremely common.
For example, an 1866 issue of ''The Australian News for Home Readers'' informed readers that "the crime of infanticide is so prevalent amongst the natives that it is rare to see an infant".<ref>{{cite news|title=My First Born|newspaper=Australian News for Home Readers|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article63170296|access-date=13 April 2013|location=Victoria, Australia|date=20 January 1866|page=5|via=National Library of Australia|archive-date=26 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200526151041/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/63170296/|url-status=live}}</ref>
In later times, attitudes shifted and the issue became contested.
Author [[Susanna de Vries]] said in 2007 that her accounts of Aboriginal violence, including infanticide, were censored by publishers in the 1980s and 1990s. She told reporters that the censorship "stemmed from guilt over the [[Stolen Generations|stolen children]] question". [[Keith Windschuttle]] weighed in on the conversation, saying this type of censorship started in the 1970s. In the same article [[Louis Nowra]] suggested that infanticide in customary Aboriginal law may have been because it was difficult to keep an abundant number of Aboriginal children alive; there were life-and-death decisions modern-day Australians no longer have to face.<ref name="Aboriginalviolence'Sanitised'2007">{{cite news|title=Aboriginal violence was 'sanitised '|url=http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/aboriginal-violence-was-sanitised/story-e6frg6nf-1111113906387|newspaper=[[The Australian]]|access-date=13 April 2013|author=Justine Ferrari|date=7 July 2007|archive-date=26 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200526151048/https://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/aboriginal-violence-was-sanitised/story-e6frg6nf-1111113906387?nk=aee3ce3213cb87117e716c2f6edf4505-1590505847%2F|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Image:Daisy may bates.jpg|thumb|upright=1.15|[[Daisy Bates (author)|Daisy Bates]] with a group of Aboriginal women, circa 1911]]
Liz Conor's 2016 work, ''Skin Deep: Settler Impressions of Aboriginal Women'', a culmination of 10 years of research, found that stories about Aboriginal women were told through a colonial lens of racism and misogyny. Vague stories of infanticide and cannibalism were repeated as reliable facts, and sometimes originated in accounts told by members of rival tribes about the other. She also refers to [[Daisy Bates (author)|Daisy Bates]]' now contested accounts of such practices, reproaching some historians for accepting them too uncritically.<ref>{{cite web | title="A Book of Lies": Settler impressions of Aboriginal women | website=Australian Women's History Network | date=7 May 2017 | url=https://www.auswhn.org.au/blog/a-book-of-lies/ | access-date=26 October 2023 | archive-date=26 October 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231026114551/https://www.auswhn.org.au/blog/a-book-of-lies/ | url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=Healy on Conor, 'Skin Deep: Settler Impressions of Aboriginal Women' | website=H-Net | url=https://networks.h-net.org/node/19399/reviews/168406/healy-conor-skin-deep-settler-impressions-aboriginal-women | access-date=26 October 2023 | archive-date=26 October 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231026114551/https://networks.h-net.org/node/19399/reviews/168406/healy-conor-skin-deep-settler-impressions-aboriginal-women | url-status=live }}</ref>

The anthropologists [[Ronald Berndt]] and [[Catherine Berndt]] note that "infanticide does seem to have been practised occasionally almost all over Aboriginal Australia, but it cannot have been so frequent as [[George Taplin|Taplin]]&nbsp;... and Bates&nbsp;... suggest", while also cautioning that others "underestimated" its prevalence. The flesh of killed infants was sometimes [[child cannibalism|eaten]], but this was not always the case. Usually only parts of the body were eaten, in "the hope that the child will be born again, or that strength will accrue to another child".<ref name=Berndt-Berndt-p470/>

====South Australia and Victoria====
According to [[William D. Rubinstein]], "Nineteenth-century European observers of [[Aboriginal Australians|Aboriginal]] life in South Australia and [[Victoria (Australia)|Victoria]] reported that about 30% of Aboriginal infants were killed at birth."<ref>{{Cite book | last = Rubinstein | first = W. D.| title = Genocide: a history| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=nMMAk4VwLLwC&pg=PA16| publisher = Pearson Education| year = 2004| page = 16| isbn = 978-0-582-50601-5 }}</ref>

In 1881 [[James Dawson (activist)|James Dawson]] wrote a passage about infanticide among Indigenous people in the western district of Victoria, which stated that "Twins are as common among them as among Europeans; but as food is occasionally very scarce, and a large family troublesome to move about, it is lawful and customary to destroy the weakest twin child, irrespective of sex.
It is usual also to destroy those which are malformed."<ref name=VictorianAboriginalInfanticide>{{cite journal |title=Australian Aborigines: The Languages and Customs of Several Tribes of Aborigines in the Western District of Victoria, Australia |journal=Nature |volume=24 |issue=623 |pages=529–30 |author=James Dawson |year=1881 |bibcode=1881Natur..24..529T |doi=10.1038/024529a0 |s2cid=4118217 |url=https://zenodo.org/record/1948095 |access-date=2 July 2019 |archive-date=2 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191202202336/https://zenodo.org/record/1948095 |url-status=live }}<br />Reprinted in {{cite book |last=Dawson |first=James |year=2009|title=Australian Aborigines: the Languages and Customs of Several Tribes of Aborigines in the Western District of Victoria, Australia |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-108-00655-2}}</ref>

He also wrote "When a woman has children too rapidly for the convenience and necessities of the parents, she makes up her mind to let one be killed, and consults with her husband which it is to be. As the strength of a tribe depends more on males than females, the girls are generally sacrificed.
The child is put to death and buried, or burned without ceremony; not, however, by its father or mother, but by relatives. No one wears mourning for it.
Sickly children are never killed on account of their bad health, and are allowed to die naturally."<ref name=VictorianAboriginalInfanticide />

====Western Australia====
In 1937, a Christian reverend in the [[Kimberley (Western Australia)|Kimberley]] offered a "baby bonus" to Aboriginal families as a deterrent against infanticide and to increase the birthrate of the local Indigenous population.<ref name=RevLoveBabyBonus>{{cite news|title=Iron-Roofed Cottage as Baby Bonus|page=2|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85590904|newspaper=The Daily News|access-date=13 April 2013|location=Perth, Western Australia|date=11 March 1937|via=National Library of Australia|archive-date=14 March 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200314132645/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/85590904|url-status=live}}</ref>

====Australian Capital Territory====
A [[Canberra]]n journalist in 1927 wrote of the "cheapness of life" to the Aboriginal people local to the Canberra area 100&nbsp;years before. "If drought or bush fires had devastated the country and curtailed food supplies, babies got a short shift. Ailing babies, too would not be kept", he wrote.<ref name=CanberraBlacks1927>{{cite news|title=Canberra Blacks. In early settlement days|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16374628|newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald|access-date=11 April 2013|author=W. P. Bluett|date=21 May 1927|page=11|via=National Library of Australia|archive-date=26 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200526151045/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/16374628/|url-status=live}}</ref>

====New South Wales====
A bishop wrote in 1928 that it was common for Aboriginal Australians to restrict the size of their tribal groups, including by infanticide, so that the food resources of the tribal area may be sufficient for them.<ref name=AustraliaSMH1928>{{cite news|title=The Aboriginal. Our great waste product|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16513617|newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald|access-date=13 April 2013|author=Stephen Davies|date=1 December 1928|page=11|via=National Library of Australia|archive-date=26 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200526151053/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/16513617/|url-status=live}}</ref>

====Northern Territory====
Annette Hamilton, a professor of anthropology at [[Macquarie University]], who carried out research in the Aboriginal community of [[Maningrida]] in [[Arnhem Land]] during the 1960s, wrote that prior to that time part-European babies born to Aboriginal mothers had not been allowed to live, and that "mixed-unions are frowned on by men and women alike as a matter of principle".<ref name=Australia1999Brunton>{{cite web|title=Moral Dilemma Not Merely A Question of Black and White |url=http://www.ipa.org.au/news/682/moral-dilemma-not-merely-a-question-of-black-and-white/pg/8|publisher=Courier Mail|access-date=13 April 2013|author=Ron Brunton|date=13 March 1999 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130522000520/http://www.ipa.org.au/news/682/moral-dilemma-not-merely-a-question-of-black-and-white/pg/8|archive-date=22 May 2013|df=dmy-all}}</ref>

===Oceania===
====New Zealand====
{{main|Infanticide in 19th-century New Zealand}}

====Marshall Islands====
When Russian explorer [[Otto von Kotzebue]] visited the [[Marshall Islands]] in Micronesia in 1817, he noted that Marshallese families practiced infanticide after the birth of a third child as a form of [[Human population planning|population planning]] due to frequent [[famine]]s.<ref>{{cite book |last=Hezel |first=Francis X. |date=1983 |title=The First Taint of Civilization: A History of the Caroline and Marshall Islands in Pre-colonial Days, 1521–1885 |series=Pacific Islands Monograph Series |location=Honolulu |publisher=University of Hawaii Press |pages=92–94 |isbn=9780824816438}}</ref>

===North America===

====Inuit====
There is no agreement about the actual estimates of the frequency of newborn female infanticide in the [[Inuit]] population. [[Carmel Schrire]] mentions diverse studies ranging from 15% to 80%.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Schrire| first = Carmel| author-link = Carmel Schrire|author2=William Lee Steiger| title = A matter of life and death: an investigation into the practice of female infanticide in the Arctic| journal = Man| volume = 9| issue = 2| pages = 161–84| year = 1974| doi=10.2307/2800072| jstor = 2800072}}</ref>

Polar Inuit ([[Inughuit]]) killed the child by throwing him or her into the sea.<ref>{{Cite book| last=Fridtjof| first=Nansen| title=Eskimo Life| publisher=Longmans, Green & Co.| year=1894| location=London| page=152}}</ref> There is even a legend in [[Inuit mythology]], "The Unwanted Child", where a mother throws her child into the [[fjord]].

The [[Yukon]] and the Mahlemuit tribes of [[Alaska]] exposed the female newborns by first stuffing their mouths with grass before leaving them to die.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Garber| first = Clark| title =Eskimo Infanticide| journal = [[Scientific Monthly]]| volume = 64| issue = 2| year = 1947| pages = 98–102| pmid = 20285669| bibcode = 1947SciMo..64...98G}}</ref> In [[Arctic]] Canada the Inuit exposed their babies on the ice and left them to die.<ref name="InfHisSu"/>{{rp|354}}

Female Inuit infanticide disappeared in the 1930s and 1940s after contact with the Western cultures from the South.<ref>{{Cite book | last = Balikci| first = Asen| contribution = Netslik| editor-last = Damas| editor-first = David| title = Handbook of North American Indians (Arctic)| page = 427| publisher = [[Smithsonian Institution]]| place = Washington DC| year = 1984| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref>

However, it must be acknowledged these infanticide claims came from non-Inuit observers, whose writings were later used to justify the forced westernization of indigenous peoples. In 2009, Travis Hedwig argued that infanticide runs counter to cultural norms at the time and that researchers were misinterpreting the actions of an unfamiliar culture and people.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hedwig |first=Travis |date=2009 |title=The Boundaries of Inclusion for Iñupiat Experiencing Disability in Alaska |url=https://www.alaskaanthropology.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/AJA-v71-optimized.pdf |journal=Alaska Journal of Anthropology |volume=7 |issue=1 |pages=126–134 |access-date=28 June 2023 |archive-date=28 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230628024441/https://www.alaskaanthropology.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/AJA-v71-optimized.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>

====Canada====
The ''[[Handbook of North American Indians]]'' reports infanticide among the [[Dene]] Natives and those of the [[Mackenzie Mountains]].<ref>{{Cite book | last1 = Savishinsky| first1 = Joel |first2=Hiroko Sue |last2=Hara| contribution = Hare| editor-last = Helm| editor-first = June| title = Handbook of North American Indians (Subarctic)| page = 322| publisher = Smithsonian Institution| place = Washington DC| year = 1981| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book | last = Gillespie| first = Beryl| contribution = Mountain Indians| editor-last = Helm| editor-first = June| title = Handbook of North American Indians (Subarctic)| page = 331| publisher = [[Smithsonian Institution]]| place = Washington DC| year = 1981| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref>

====Native Americans====
In the Eastern [[Shoshone]] there was a scarcity of Native American women as a result of female infanticide.<ref>{{Cite book | last = Shimkin| first = Demitri B.| contribution = Eastern Shoshone| editor-last = D'Azevedo| editor-first = Warren L.| title = Handbook of North American Indians (Great Basin)| page = 330| publisher = [[Smithsonian Institution]]| place = Washington DC| year = 1986| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref> For the [[Maidu]] [[Native Americans in the United States|Native Americans]] twins were so dangerous that they not only killed them, but the mother as well.<ref>{{Cite book | last = Riddell| first = Francis| contribution = Maidu and Konkow| editor-last = Heizer | editor-first = Robert F.| title = Handbook of North American Indians (California)| page = 381| publisher=[[Smithsonian Institution]]| place = Washington DC| year = 1978| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref> In the region known today as southern [[Texas]], the Mariame Native Americans practiced infanticide of females on a large scale. Wives had to be obtained from neighboring groups.<ref>{{Cite book | last = Campbell| first = T.N.| contribution = Coahuitlecans and their neighbours| editor-last = Ortiz| editor-first = Alonso| title = Handbook of North American Indians (Southwest)| page = 352| publisher = [[Smithsonian Institution]]| place = Washington DC| year = 1983| title-link = Handbook of North American Indians}}</ref>

====Mexico====
[[Bernal Díaz]] recounted that, after landing on the [[Veracruz]] coast, they came across a temple dedicated to [[Tezcatlipoca]]. "That day they had sacrificed two boys, cutting open their chests and offering their blood and hearts to that accursed idol".<ref>{{Cite book | last = Díaz| first = Bernal| author-link = Bernal Díaz| title = Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva España (published posthumously in 1632) | publisher = Editorial Porrúa| year=2005|location= Mexico City | page = 25}}</ref> In ''[[The Conquest of New Spain]]'' Díaz describes more child sacrifices in the towns before the Spaniards reached the large [[Aztec]] city [[Tenochtitlan]].

===South America===
Although academic data of infanticides among the indigenous people in [[South America]] is not as abundant as that of North America, the estimates seem to be similar.

====Brazil====
The [[Tapirapé people|Tapirapé]] indigenous people of [[Brazil]] allowed no more than three children per woman, and no more than two of the same sex. If the rule was broken infanticide was practiced.<ref>{{Cite book | last =Johnson| first = Orna| contribution =The socioeconomic context of child abuse and neglect in native South America| editor-last = Korbin| editor-first = Jill| title = Child Abuse and Neglect| page = 63| publisher = [[University of California Press]]| place = Berkeley| year = 1981}}</ref> The [[Bororo]] killed all the newborns that did not appear healthy enough. Infanticide is also documented in the case of the [[Korubo people]] in the [[Amazon Basin|Amazon]].<ref>{{Cite book| last=Cotlow|first =Lewis |title =The Twilight of the Primitive |publisher=Macmillan|year = 1971|location= New York|page =65}}</ref>

The [[Yanomami]] men killed children while raiding enemy villages.<ref name="valero"/> [[Yanoama|Helena Valero]], a Brazilian woman kidnapped by Yanomami warriors in the 1930s, witnessed a Karawetari raid on her tribe:

{{blockquote|They killed so many. I was weeping for fear and for pity but there was nothing I could do. They snatched the children from their mothers to kill them, while the others held the mothers tightly by the arms and wrists as they stood up in a line. All the women wept. ... The men began to kill the children; little ones, bigger ones, they killed many of them.<ref name="valero">Christine Fielder, Chris King (2006). "''[https://books.google.com/books?id=9YInrVSoa9cC Sexual Paradox: Complementarity, Reproductive Conflict and Human Emergence] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230421200918/https://books.google.com/books?id=9YInrVSoa9cC |date=21 April 2023 }}''". Lulu PR. p. 156. {{ISBN|1-4116-5532-X}}</ref>}}

====Peru, Paraguay and Bolivia====
While ''[[qhapaq hucha]]'' was practiced in the [[Peru]]vian large cities, child sacrifice in the pre-Columbian tribes of the region is less documented. However, even today studies on the [[Aymara people|Aymara]] Indians reveal high incidences of mortality among the newborn, especially female deaths, suggesting infanticide.<ref>{{cite journal | last = de Meer| first = Kees|author2=Roland Bergman |author3=John S. Kushner| title = Socio-cultural determinations of child mortality in Southern Peru: including some methodological considerations | journal = Social Science and Medicine | volume = 36| issue = 3| pages = 317–318|year = 1993| doi=10.1016/0277-9536(93)90016-w| pmid = 8426976}}</ref> The [[Abipones]], a small tribe of [[Guaycuru peoples|Guaycuruan]] stock, of about 5,000 by the end of the 18th century in [[Paraguay]], practiced systematic infanticide; with never more than two children being reared in one family. The Machigenga killed their disabled children. Infanticide among the [[Chaco (tribe)|Chaco]] in Paraguay was estimated as high as 50% of all newborns in that tribe, who were usually buried.<ref>{{Cite book| last=Hastings |first=James| author-link=James Hastings| title=Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics |publisher=Scribner's Sons|year=1955| location=New York| volume=I| page=6 |title-link=Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics}}</ref> The infanticidal custom had such roots among the [[Ayoreo]] in [[Bolivia]] and Paraguay that it persisted until the late 20th century.<ref>{{Cite book| last1=Bugos| first1=Paul E.| first2=Lorraine M.| last2=McCarthy| contribution=Ayoreo infanticide: a case study| editor-last=Hausfater| editor-first=Glenn| editor-last2=Hrdy| editor-first2=Sarah Blaffer| editor-link2=Sarah Blaffer Hrdy| title=Infanticide, Comparative and Evolutionary Perspectives| page=510| publisher=Aldine| place=New York| year=1984}}</ref>

==Modern times==
{{See also|Missing women}}

Infanticide has become less common in the [[Western world]]. The frequency has been estimated to be 1 in approximately 3000 to 5000 children of all ages<ref>{{cite journal |author1=Putkonen Amon |author2=Almiron Cederwall |author3=Eronen Klier |author4=Kjelsberg Weizmann-Henelius |year=2009 |title=Filicide in Austria and Finland – A register-based study on all filicide cases in Austria and Finland 1995-2005 |journal=BMC Psychiatry |volume=9 |page=74 |doi=10.1186/1471-244x-9-74| pmid=19930581 |pmc=2784763 |doi-access=free }}</ref> and 2.1 per 100,000 newborns per year.<ref>{{cite journal| doi=10.1001/jama.289.11.1425 |last=Herman-Giddens |first=Marcia E. |author2=Jamie B. Smith |author3=Manjoo Mittal |author4=Mandie Carlson |author5=John D. Butts |date=19 Mar 2003 |title=Newborns Killed or Left to Die by a Parent A Population-Based Study |journal=JAMA |volume=289 |issue=11 |pages=1425–29 |issn=0098-7484 |pmid=12636466 |quote=Context: Interest in the discarding or killing of newborns by parents has increased due to wide news coverage and efforts by states to provide Safe Haven legislation to combat the problem. |doi-access=free }}</ref> It is thought that infanticide today continues at a much higher rate in areas of extremely high [[poverty]] and [[Human overpopulation|overpopulation]], such as parts of [[India]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Female Infanticide |website=Gendercide Watch |url=http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html |access-date=2013-07-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080421141103/http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html |archive-date=2008-04-21}}</ref> Female infants, then and even now, are particularly vulnerable, a factor in sex-selective infanticide. Recent estimates suggest that over 100&nbsp;million girls and women are 'missing' in Asia.<ref>"[http://www.economist.com/node/15606229 The war on baby girls: Gendercide] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180614064837/https://www.economist.com/node/15606229 |date=14 June 2018 }}". The Economist. March 4, 2010.</ref>

===Benin===
In spite of the fact that it is illegal, in [[Benin]], [[West Africa]], parents secretly continue with infanticidal customs.<ref>{{cite journal| last =Sargent| first =Carolyn|title =Born to die: witchcraft and infanticide in Bariba culture| jstor =3773562| journal =[[Ethnology (journal)|Ethnology]]|volume = 27|year =1988| doi =10.2307/3773562| issue =1| pages =79–95}}</ref>

===Mainland China===
{{See also|Sex-ratio imbalance in China}}

There have been some accusations that infanticide occurs in [[mainland China]] due to the [[one-child policy]].<ref>[https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna5953508 NBC: China begins to face sex-ratio imbalance], NBC News, September 14, 2004</ref> In the 1990s, a certain stretch of the [[Yangtze River]] was known to be a common site of infanticide by drowning, until government projects made access to it more difficult. A study from 2012 suggests that over 40&nbsp;million girls and women are missing in mainland China (Klasen and Wink 2002).<ref>{{cite web |url=http://iussp2005.princeton.edu/download.aspx?submissionId=51345 |title=Estimation of the Number of Missing Females in China: 1900–2000 |access-date=2013-07-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120420051451/http://iussp2005.princeton.edu/download.aspx?submissionId=51345 |archive-date=2012-04-20  }}</ref>

===India===
The practice has continued in some [[rural area]]s of India.<ref>{{Cite news | last = Murphy| first = Paul| title = Killing baby girls routine in India| newspaper = [[San Francisco Examiner]]| page = C12| date = May 21, 1995}}</ref><ref>[http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/south/07/07/india.infanticide.pt1/index.html Grim motives behind infant killings] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304081133/http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/south/07/07/india.infanticide.pt1/index.html |date=4 March 2016 }}, CNN.com, July 7, 2003</ref> India has the highest infanticide rate in the world, despite infanticide being illegal.<ref>[http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0209/p11s01-wosc.html For India's daughters, a dark birth day] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190827184513/https://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0209/p11s01-wosc.html |date=27 August 2019 }}, csmonitor.com, February 9, 2005</ref>

According to a 2005 report by the [[United Nations Children's Fund]] ([[UNICEF]]) up to 50&nbsp;million girls and [[Missing women of Asia|women are missing]] in [[India]]'s population as a result of systematic sex [[discrimination]] and sex selective abortions.<ref>"[https://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/24/opinion/24iht-edswami.html Missing: 50 million Indian girls] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150509104405/http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/24/opinion/24iht-edswami.html |date=9 May 2015 }}". The New York Times. November 25, 2005</ref>

===Pakistan===
Killings of newborn babies have been on the rise in [[Pakistan]], corresponding to an increase in poverty across the country.<ref name =tribune/> More than 1,000 infants, mostly girls, were killed or abandoned to die in Pakistan in 2009 according to a Pakistani charity organization.<ref>Daughter neglect, women's work, and marriage: Pakistan and Bangladesh compared BD Miller – Medical anthropology, 1984 – Routledge</ref>

The [[Edhi Foundation]] found 1,210 dead babies in 2010. Many more are abandoned and left at the doorsteps of [[mosque]]s. As a result, Edhi centers feature signs "Do not murder, lay them here." Though female infanticide is punishable by life in prison, such crimes are rarely prosecuted.<ref name =tribune>[http://tribune.com.pk/story/105019/infanticide-on-the-rise-in-pakistan-statistics/ Infanticide on the rise: 1,210 babies found dead in 2010, says Edhi] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190418065733/https://tribune.com.pk/story/105019/infanticide-on-the-rise-in-pakistan-statistics/ |date=18 April 2019 }}, ''The Tribune'', January 18, 2011.</ref>

===Oceania===
On November 28, 2008, ''The National'', one of Papua New Guinea's two largest newspapers at the time, ran a story entitled "Male Babies Killed To Stop Fights"<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.thenational.com.pg/281108/nation5.php |title=Nation &#124; the National Newspaper |website=www.thenational.com.pg |access-date=11 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081201083337/http://www.thenational.com.pg/281108/nation5.php |archive-date=1 December 2008 }}</ref> which claimed that in Agibu and Amosa villages of Gimi region of [[Eastern Highlands (Papua New Guinea)|Eastern Highlands]] province of [[Papua New Guinea]] where tribal fighting in the region of Gimi has been going on since 1986 (many of the clashes arising over claims of [[Witchcraft|sorcery]]) women had agreed that if they stopped producing males, allowing only female babies to survive, their tribe's stock of boys would go down and there would be no men in the future to fight. They had supposedly agreed to have all newborn male babies killed. It is not known how many male babies were supposedly killed by being smothered, but it had reportedly happened to all males over a 10-year period.

However, this claim about male infanticide in Papua New Guinea was probably just the result of inaccurate and sensationalistic news reporting, because [[Salvation Army]] workers in the region of Gimi denied that the supposed male infanticide actually happened, and said that the tribal women were merely speaking hypothetically and hyperbolically about male infanticide at a peace and reconciliation workshop in order to make a point. The tribal women had never planned to actually kill their own sons.<ref>{{Cite news|url = https://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-12-01/salvos-deny-png-baby-killing-reports/225248|title = Salvos deny PNG 'baby killing' reports|newspaper = ABC News|date = December 2008|access-date = 17 September 2021|archive-date = 17 September 2021|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210917230341/https://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-12-01/salvos-deny-png-baby-killing-reports/225248|url-status = live}}</ref>

===England and Wales===
In England and Wales there were typically 30 to 50 homicides per million children less than 1 year old between 1982 and 1996.<ref name=Marks2009>{{cite journal | journal = Psychiatry | doi = 10.1016/j.mppsy.2008.10.017 | title = Infanticide | volume = 8 | issue = 1 | pages = 10–12 | author = Maureen Marks | url = http://www.psychiatryjournal.co.uk/article/S1476-1793(08)00217-6/abstract | year = 2009 | access-date = 8 September 2011 | archive-date = 4 December 2019 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20191204175114/http://www.psychiatryjournal.co.uk/article/S1476-1793(08)00217-6/abstract | url-status = live | url-access = subscription }}</ref> The younger the infant, the higher the risk.<ref name=Marks2009 /> The rate for children 1 to 5 years was around 10 per million children.<ref name=Marks2009 /> The homicide rate of infants less than 1 year is significantly higher than for the general population.<ref name=Marks2009 />

In [[English law]] infanticide is established as a distinct offence by the [[Infanticide Act]]s. Defined as the killing of a child under 12 months of age by their mother, the effect of the Acts are to establish a [[partial defence]] to charges of murder.<ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Craig M |title=Perinatal risk factors for neonaticide and infant homicide: can we identify those at risk? |pmc=1079289 |pmid=14749398 |volume=97 |issue=2 |date=Feb 2004 |pages=57–61 |journal=J R Soc Med |doi=10.1177/014107680409700203}}</ref>

===United States===
In the United States, the infanticide rate during the first hour of life outside the womb dropped from 1.41 per 100,000 between the years 1963 and 1972, to 0.44 per 100,000 between 1974 and 1983.  The rates during the first month after birth also declined, whereas those for older infants rose during this time.<ref name=Paul>{{cite book| title = Management of unintended and abnormal pregnancy: comprehensive abortion care | url = https://archive.org/details/managementuninte00paul | url-access = limited | author = Maureen Paul | pages = [https://archive.org/details/managementuninte00paul/page/n52 33]–34 | publisher = Wiley-Blackwell | isbn = 978-1-4051-7696-5 | date = 2009-05-11 }}</ref> [[Roe v. Wade|The legalization of abortion, which was completed in 1973]], was the most important factor in the decline in neonatal mortality during the period from 1964 to 1977, according to a study by economists associated with the National Bureau of Economic Research.<ref name=Paul /><ref name=BestIntent >{{cite book |author1=Eisenberg, Leon |author2=Brown, Sarah Hart |title=The best intentions: unintended pregnancy and the well-being of children and families |publisher=National Academy Press |location=Washington, D.C. |year=1995 |page=[https://archive.org/details/bestintentionsun0000unse/page/72 72] |isbn=978-0-309-05230-6 |url=https://archive.org/details/bestintentionsun0000unse/page/72 }}</ref>

===Canada===
In Canada, 114 cases of infanticide by a parent were reported during 1964–1968.<ref name="Rodenburg 1971 43">{{cite journal | last = Rodenburg| first = Martin| title = Child murder by depressed parents| journal =[[Canadian Psychiatric Association Journal]]| volume = 16| page = 43| year = 1971| issue = 1| doi = 10.1177/070674377101600107| pmid = 5547202| s2cid = 36859937| doi-access = }}</ref>

===Spain===
In Spain, far-right political party Vox has claimed that female perpetrators of infanticide outnumber male perpetrators of femicide.<ref name="Alfageme">{{cite news |url=https://elpais.com/sociedad/2019/09/06/actualidad/1567772407_243899.html |title=Las cuentas y cuentos de Vox sobre las 'mujeres asesinas' de niños |first=Ana |last=Alfageme |date=6 September 2019 |access-date=8 March 2021 |newspaper=[[El País (Spain)|El País]] |language=es |publisher=[[Grupo Prisa]] |archive-date=26 January 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126065500/https://elpais.com/sociedad/2019/09/06/actualidad/1567772407_243899.html |url-status=live }}</ref> However, neither the Spanish National Statistics Institute nor the Ministry of the Interior keep data on the gender of perpetrators, but victims of femicide consistently number higher than victims of infanticide.<ref name="Alfageme"/> From 2013 to March 2018, 28 infanticide cases perpetrated by 22 mothers and three stepmothers were reported in Spain.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.elmundo.es/cronica/2018/03/18/5aad7a67e2704e7f7d8b45b7.html |title=Las 22 madres y tres madrastras que asesinaron a sus hijos en España |first=Leyre |last=Iglesias |date=18 March 2018 |access-date=27 September 2018 |newspaper=[[El Mundo (Spain)|El Mundo]] |language=es |publisher=[[Unidad Editorial]] |archive-date=3 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191203231514/https://www.elmundo.es/cronica/2018/03/18/5aad7a67e2704e7f7d8b45b7.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

==Explanations for the practice==
There are various reasons for infanticide. Neonaticide typically has different patterns and causes than for the killing of older infants. Traditional neonaticide is often related to economic necessity – the inability to provide for the infant. In the United Kingdom and the United States, older infants are typically killed for reasons related to [[child abuse]], [[domestic violence]] or [[mental illness]].<ref name=Marks2009/> For infants older than one day, younger infants are more at risk, and boys are more at risk than girls.<ref name=Marks2009/> Risk factors for the parent include: Family history of violence, violence in a current relationship, history of abuse or neglect of children, and personality disorder and/or depression.<ref name=Marks2009/>

===Economic===
Many historians believe the reason to be primarily economic, with more children born than the family is prepared to support. [[Marvin Harris]] estimated that among [[Paleolithic]] hunters 23–50% of newborn children were killed. He argued that the goal was to preserve the 0.001% population growth of that time.<ref name="Cannibals&Kings"/>{{RP|15}} He also wrote that female infanticide may be a form of population control.<ref name="Cannibals&Kings">{{Cite book| last = Harris| first = Marvin| author-link = Marvin Harris| title = Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures| publisher = Random House| year = 1977| location = New York}}</ref>{{Rp|5}} Population control is achieved not only by limiting the number of potential mothers; increased fighting among men for access to relatively scarce wives would also lead to a decline in population. For example, on the [[Melanesia]]n island of [[Tikopia]] infanticide was used to keep a stable population in line with its [[carrying capacity|resource base]].<ref name="Collapse" /><!--He devotes a chapter to this aspect of Tikopia--> In 1888, Lieut. F. Elton reported that [[Ugi Island|Ugi]] beach people in the [[Solomon Islands]] killed their infants at birth by burying them, and women were also said to practice abortion. They reported that it was too much trouble to raise a child, and instead preferred to buy one from the bush people.<ref>{{cite journal| last = Elton| first = Lieut. F.| title = Notes on Natives of the Solomon Islands| journal = The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland| volume = 17| pages = 90–99| year = 1888| jstor = 2841588| doi = 10.2307/2841588| url = https://zenodo.org/record/1449550| access-date = 2 July 2019| archive-date = 26 November 2021| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20211126232521/https://zenodo.org/record/1449550| url-status = live}}</ref> Research by Marvin Harris and [[William Divale]] supports this argument, it has been cited as an example of [[environmental determinism]].<ref>{{Cite book| last = Hallpike | first = C.R.| title = The Principles of Social Evolution| publisher = Clarendon Press| year = 1988| location = Oxford| pages = 237–38}}</ref> However, it is argued that it has also occurred equally among rich and poor and during decadent periods of the [[Roman Empire]] as during earlier, less affluent, periods.<ref name="Hardness"/>{{rp|28–34, 187–92}}

In societies that are [[patrilineal]] and [[patrilocal]], the family may choose to allow more sons to live and practice [[female infanticide]], as sons will support their birth family until they die, whereas daughters will leave economically and geographically to join their husband's family, possibly only after the payment of a burdensome [[dowry]] price.<ref name="Hardness">{{Cite book| last = Milner| first = Larry S.| title = Hardness of Heart / Hardness of Life: The Stain of Human Infanticide| publisher = University Press of America| location =Lanham/New York/Oxford| year = 2000|isbn=978-0-7618-1578-5}}</ref>{{rp|362–68}} Under natural conditions, mortality rates for girls under five are slightly lower than boys for biological reasons. However, after birth, neglect and diverting resources to male children, such as biased feeding
practices, inadequate clothing during winter
and lower-quality health care,<ref name=WHO/> can lead to some countries having a skewed ratio with more boys than girls, with such practices killing an approximate 230,000 girls under five in India each year.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/may/15/discrimination-deaths-girls-under-five-india-lancet-study|title=Discrimination kills 230,000 girls under five in India each year, study shows |date=15 May 2018|access-date=20 August 2018|work=The Guardian}}</ref> While sex-selective abortion is more common among the higher income population, who can access medical technology, abuse after birth, such as infanticide and abandonment, is more common among the lower income population.<ref>{{cite web|author=Mariya Karimjee |url=http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/1/14/infanticides-on-theriseinpakistan.html |title=Infanticide is on the rise in Pakistan &#124; Al Jazeera America |publisher=America.aljazeera.com |date=14 January 2014 |access-date=18 February 2014}}</ref> Before the appearance of effective [[contraception]], infanticide was a common occurrence in ancient brothels and prostitutes in certain areas preferred to kill their male offspring.<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14401305 ''Roman dead baby 'brothel' mystery deepens''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180824155154/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14401305 |date=24 August 2018 }}, BBC</ref>

Cross-cultural research has found that infanticide is more likely to occur when the child has deformities or illnesses<ref name=Liddle/> and anthropologists have argued that they are often viewed as bad omens as raising such a child in poverty stricken communities are an insurmountable hurdle.<ref name=fp>{{cite news|url=https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/04/09/the-right-to-kill-brazil-infanticide/|title=The Right to Kill|date=9 April 2018|access-date=9 June 2018|work=Foreign Policy}}</ref> For example, in southern Ethiopia, children with physical abnormalities are considered to be ritually impure or [[mingi]], with the ability to exert an evil influence upon others, so disabled infants have traditionally been disposed of.<ref>{{cite book|last=Petros|first=Gezahegn|title=The Karo of the lower Omo Valley: subsistence, social organisation and relations with neighbouring groups|year=2000|publisher=Dept. of Sociology, Anthropology and Social Administration, Addis Ababa University|page=57|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bE0wAQAAIAAJ|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151017033609/https://books.google.com/books?id=bE0wAQAAIAAJ|archive-date=17 October 2015}}</ref>

===Social stigma===
Infants have be killed for superstitious accusations, such as being witches, often by being buried alive or left to starve.<ref name=fp/> Those at higher risk of being accused and killed include the disabled, [[albino]]s, those born prematurely, twins,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.irinnews.org/report/89858/rights-child-witchcraft-allegations-on-the-rise |title=Child witchcraft allegations on the rise – Angola – Benin – DRC – Central African Republic – Cameroon – Gabon – Nigeria – Chad – Children – Education – Gender Issues – Human Rights – Urban Risk |agency=IRINnews |access-date=5 March 2015 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205090303/http://www.irinnews.org/report/89858/rights-child-witchcraft-allegations-on-the-rise |archive-date=5 February 2015  |date=15 July 2010 }}</ref> children of single mothers and [[intersex]] infants. Intersex infants commonly suffer from infanticide particularly in [[developing countries]], largely caused by stigma surrounding intersex conditions. Often intersex infants are [[Child abandonment|abandoned]], while others are actively killed.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.ohchr.org/en/sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity/intersex-people|title=Intersex people|website=OHCHR|access-date=21 August 2023|archive-date=8 July 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230708011645/https://www.ohchr.org/en/sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity/intersex-people|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="OHCR1">{{Cite web|url=https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/BackgroundNoteHumanRightsViolationsagainstIntersexPeople.pdf|title=Background Notes on Human Rights Violations against Intersex People|website=OHCHR|access-date=21 August 2023|archive-date=21 August 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230821201746/https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/BackgroundNoteHumanRightsViolationsagainstIntersexPeople.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-39780214|title=The midwife who saved intersex babies|work=BBC News|date=May 3, 2017|access-date=21 August 2023|archive-date=15 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170515044758/http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-39780214|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Legitimacy (family law)|Illegitimacy]] and its shame has led mothers or their families to kill infants.<ref>{{cite web |last1=PHULL |first1=IMRAN |title=Curse of Infanticide |url=https://nation.com.pk/25-Jun-2018/curse-of-infanticide |website=The Nation |access-date=9 July 2020 |date=25 June 2018 |archive-date=2 February 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190202074949/https://nation.com.pk/25-Jun-2018/curse-of-infanticide |url-status=dead }}</ref> This was also the impetus for a mother's decision to give her child to a [[baby farmer]]. Baby farming is the practice of accepting custody of a child in return for payment. This was most common in Victorian Britain. Baby farmers sometimes neglected or murdered the babies to keep costs down.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Mosalski |first=Ruth |date=2017-11-16 |title=The horrible story of the last woman to be hanged in Wales |url=https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/horrible-story-last-woman-hanged-13906837 |access-date=2025-02-08 |website=Wales Online |language=en}}</ref>

===Psychiatric===
{{See also|Psychiatric disorders of childbirth}}
[[Postpartum psychosis]] is also a causative factor of infanticide. Stuart S. Asch, MD, a professor of psychiatry at [[Weill Cornell Medicine|Cornell University Medical School]] established the connections between some cases of infanticide and [[postpartum depression]].<ref>{{cite journal|title= Crib deaths: their possible relationship to post-partum depression and infanticide|date=2013-03-25 |pmid=5239550 | volume=35 |issue=3 |journal=J Mt Sinai Hosp New York |pages=214–20 | author = Asch SS}}</ref><sup>,</sup><ref>{{cite journal|title= Postpartum reactions: some unrecognized variations|date=2013-03-25 |pmid=4857893 | doi=10.1176/ajp.131.8.870 |volume=131 |issue=8 |journal=Am J Psychiatry |pages=870–74 |vauthors=Asch SS, Rubin LJ }}</ref><sup>,</sup><ref>{{cite journal|journal = Perspect Public Health| year = 2009 | volume = 129 | number = 5 | pages = 221–27 | title = Postnatal depression: a global public health perspective | vauthors = Almond P | doi=10.1177/1757913909343882| pmid = 19788165 | s2cid = 37712302 }}</ref> The books, ''From Cradle to Grave'',<ref>Egginton, Joyce. From Cradle to Grave. The Short Lives and Strange Deaths of Marybeth Tinning's Nine Children. 1989. William Morrow, New York</ref> and ''The Death of Innocents'',<ref>Richard Firstman and Jamie Talan. The Death of Innocents. Bantam, New York. 1997</ref> describe selected cases of maternal infanticide and the investigative research of Professor Asch working in concert with the New York City Medical Examiner's Office.
Stanley Hopwood wrote that childbirth and lactation entail severe stress on women, and that under certain circumstances attempts at infanticide and suicide are common.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Hopwood| first = Stanley J.| title = Child murder and insanity| journal = Journal of Clinical and Experimental Psychopathology| volume = 73| page = 96| year = 1927}}</ref> The [[Infanticide Act]]s are several now repealed [[English Law|laws]] that, in 1922, made the killing of an infant child by its mother during the early months of life a lesser crime than murder, introducing the idea that [[postpartum depression]] was legally to be regarded as a form of [[diminished responsibility]]. A study published in the ''[[American Journal of Psychiatry]]'' revealed that 44% of filicidal [[father]]s had a diagnosis of [[psychosis]].<ref>{{cite journal | last = Campion| first = John|author2=James M. Cravens |author3=Fred Covan| title =A study of filicidal men| journal = [[American Journal of Psychiatry]] | volume = 145| issue = 9| year = 1988| pages = 1141–44| doi = 10.1176/ajp.145.9.1141| pmid = 3414858}}</ref> In addition to postpartum psychosis, dissociative psychopathology, and sociopathy have also been found to be associated with neonaticide in some cases.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Spinelli MG | year = 2001 | title = A systematic investigation of 16 cases of neonaticide | journal = American Journal of Psychiatry | volume = 158 | issue = 5| pages = 811–13 | doi=10.1176/appi.ajp.158.5.811 | pmid=11329409}}</ref>

In the late 17th and early 18th centuries, "loopholes" were invented by some suicidal members of [[Lutheran]] churches<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://sciencenordic.com/christianity-crime-death/danes-killed-to-get-killed/1462820|title = Danes killed to get killed|date = 14 March 2012|access-date = 18 September 2021|archive-date = 18 September 2021|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210918010141/https://sciencenordic.com/christianity-crime-death/danes-killed-to-get-killed/1462820|url-status = live}}</ref> who wanted to avoid the damnation that was promised by most Christian doctrine as a penalty of suicide. One famous example of someone who wished to end their life but avoid the eternity in hell was [[Christina Johansdotter]] (died 1740). She was a Swedish murderer who killed a child in Stockholm with the sole purpose of being executed. She is an example of those who seek suicide through execution by committing a murder. It was a common act, frequently targeting young children or infants as they were believed to be free from sin, meaning they would go "straight to heaven".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Watt |first1=Jeffrey Rodgers |year=2004 |title=From Sin to Insanity: Suicide in Early Modern Europe |publisher=Cornell University Press}}</ref> Although mainstream Christian denominations, including Lutherans, view the murder of an innocent as being condemned in the Fifth Commandment, the suicidal members of Lutheran churches who deliberately killed children with the intent of getting executed were usually well aware of Christian doctrine against murder, and planned to repent and seek forgiveness of their sins afterwards. For example, in 18th century [[Denmark]] up until the year 1767, murderers were given the opportunity to repent of their sins before they were executed either way. In 1767, religiously motivated suicidal murders ceased in Denmark with the abolishment of the [[Capital punishment in Denmark|death penalty]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://sciencenordic.com/christianity-crime-death/danes-killed-to-get-killed/1462820|title=Danes killed to get killed|date=14 March 2012|access-date=18 September 2021|archive-date=18 September 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210918010141/https://sciencenordic.com/christianity-crime-death/danes-killed-to-get-killed/1462820|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Evolutionary psychology]] has proposed several theories for different forms of infanticide. Infanticide by stepfathers, as well as child abuse in general by stepfathers, has been explained by spending resources on not genetically related children reducing [[reproductive success]] (See the [[Cinderella effect]] and [[Infanticide (zoology)]]). Infanticide is one of the few forms of violence more often done by women than men and this has been explained as since women generally have a greater [[parental investment]] than men, spending resources on an unfit child would decrease the mother's [[inclusive fitness]].<ref name=Liddle>{{Cite journal | last1 = Liddle | first1 = J. R. | last2 = Shackelford | first2 = T. K. | last3 = Weekes–Shackelford | first3 = V. A. | title = Why can't we all just get along? Evolutionary perspectives on violence, homicide, and war | doi = 10.1037/a0026610 | journal = Review of General Psychology | volume = 16 | pages = 24–36 | year = 2012 | s2cid = 142984456 }}</ref>

==Ethics==
Philosopher [[Peter Singer]], known for a philosophy called [[personism]], argues that newborns lack the essential characteristics of personhood—"rationality, autonomy, and self-consciousness"<ref>[http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1993----.htm Taking Life: Humans] {{Webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170205000916/http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1993----.htm |date=5 February 2017}}, Excerpted from Practical Ethics, 2nd edition, 1993</ref>—and therefore "killing a newborn baby is never equivalent to killing a person, that is, a being who wants to go on living".<ref>{{cite web |last=Singer |first=Peter |url=https://petersinger.info/faq/ |title=Peter Singer FAQ |access-date=28 October 2018 |archive-date=22 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230622185445/https://petersinger.info/faq/ |url-status=dead}}</ref> Some medical ethicists have argued for parents to be allowed to kill their newborn babies because they are not "actual persons"; they have proposed to call this [[after-birth abortion]].<ref>{{cite journal|title=Infanticide: a reply to Giubilini and Minerva|journal=Journal of Medical Ethics|pmid=23637448 | doi=10.1136/medethics-2012-100664|pmc=3632995|volume=39|issue=5|pages=336–40 | last1 = Laing | first1 = JA|year=2013 }}</ref>

==Current law==

===Australia===
In [[New South Wales (Australia)|New South Wales]], infanticide is defined in Section 22A(1) of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) as follows:<ref>{{cite Legislation AU|NSW|act|ca190082|Crimes Act 1900|22A}} Infanticide; see also {{cite AustLII|NSWSC|1755|2014|litigants=R v MB (No. 2) |courtname=auto}}.</ref>

{{blockquote|Where a woman by any willful act or omission causes the death of her child, being a child under the age of twelve months, but at the time of the act or omission the balance of her mind was disturbed by reason of her not having fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to the child or by reason of the effect of lactation consequent upon the birth of the child, then, notwithstanding that the circumstances were such that but for this section the offense would have amounted to murder, she shall be guilty of infanticide, and may for such offense be dealt with and punished as if she had been guilty of the offense of manslaughter of such child.}}

Because Infanticide is punishable as manslaughter, as per s24,<ref>{{cite Legislation AU|NSW|act|ca190082|Crimes Act 1900|24}} Manslaughter – punishment.</ref> the maximum penalty for this offence is therefore 25 years imprisonment.

In [[Victoria (Australia)|Victoria]], infanticide is defined by Section 6 of the Crimes Act of 1958 with a maximum penalty of five years.<ref>{{Cite web|title=CRIMES ACT 1958 - SECT 6 Infanticide|url=http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/ca195882/s6.html|access-date=2021-03-11|website=classic.austlii.edu.au|archive-date=5 June 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200605095534/http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/ca195882/s6.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== New Zealand ===
In New Zealand, infanticide is provided for by Section 178 of the Crimes Act 1961 which states:
{{blockquote|Where a woman causes the death of any child of hers under the age of 10 years in a manner that amounts to culpable homicide, and where at the time of the offence the balance of her mind was disturbed, by reason of her not having fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to that or any other child, or by reason of the effect of lactation, or by reason of any disorder consequent upon childbirth or lactation, to such an extent that she should not be held fully responsible, she is guilty of infanticide, and not of murder or manslaughter, and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 years.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The legal context - Homicide law |url=https://www.lawcom.govt.nz/sites/html-pubs/r139/Chapter+3+-+The+legal+context/Homicide+law.html#:~:text=187Infanticide%20is%20provided%20for,reason%20of%20her%20not%20having |access-date=26 July 2023 |website=Law Commission |archive-date=27 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230727012352/https://www.lawcom.govt.nz/sites/html-pubs/r139/Chapter+3+-+The+legal+context/Homicide+law.html#:~:text=187Infanticide%20is%20provided%20for,reason%20of%20her%20not%20having |url-status=live }}</ref>}}

===Canada===
In Canada, infanticide is a specific offence under section 237 of the ''[[Criminal Code (Canada)|Criminal Code]]''. It is defined as a form of culpable homicide which is neither murder nor manslaughter, and occurs when "a female person... by a wilful act or omission... causes the death of her newly-born child [defined as a child under one year of age], if at the time of the act or omission she is not fully recovered from the effects of giving birth to the child and by reason thereof or of the effect of lactation consequent on the birth of the child her mind is then disturbed."<ref name="CanCrC">{{cite web |title=Criminal Code |url=https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-46/page-52.html |website=Consolidated federal laws of Canada |publisher=Justice Canada |access-date=22 August 2021 |date=29 June 2021 |archive-date=29 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210929034927/https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/page-52.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Infanticide is also a defence to murder, in that a person accused of murder who successfully presents the defence is entitled to be convicted of infanticide rather than murder.<ref name="RvLB">{{cite web |author1=D. H. Doherty, J. |author1-link=David H. Doherty |author2= Court of Appeal of Ontario | author2-link = Court of Appeal for Ontario | title=''R. v. L.B.'', 2011 ONCA 153 |url=https://www.canlii.org/en/on/onca/doc/2011/2011onca153/2011onca153.html |website=CanLII |publisher=Canadian Legal Information Institute |access-date=22 August 2021 |date=2 March 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |author1=T. Cromwell, J. |author1-link=Thomas Cromwell (jurist) |author2= Supreme Court of Canada | author2-link = Supreme Court of Canada | title=''R. v. Borowiec'', 2016 SCC 11 (CanLII), [2016] 1 SCR 80 |url=https://canlii.ca/t/gnzm7 |website=CanLII |publisher=Canadian Legal Information Institute |access-date=22 August 2021 |date=24 March 2016}}</ref> The maximum sentence for infanticide is five years' imprisonment; by contrast, the maximum sentence for manslaughter is life, and the mandatory sentence for murder is life.<ref name="CanCrC" />

The offence derives from an offence created in English law in 1922, which aimed to address the issue of judges and juries who were reluctant to return verdicts of murder against women and girls who killed their newborns out of poverty, depression, the shame of illegitimacy, or otherwise desperate circumstances, since the mandatory sentence was death (even though in those circumstances the death penalty was likely not to be carried out). With infanticide as a separate offence with a lesser penalty, convictions were more likely. The offence of infanticide was created in Canada in 1948.<ref name="RvLB" />

There is ongoing debate in the Canadian legal and political fields about whether section 237 of the ''Criminal Code'' should be amended or abolished altogether.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Vallillee|first=Eric|title=Deconstructing Infanticide|journal=University of Western Ontario Journal of Legal Studies|year=2015|volume=5|issue=4|pages=9–10|url=http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=uwojls|access-date=11 April 2015|archive-date=9 January 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200109232601/http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=uwojls|url-status=live}}</ref>

===England and Wales===
In [[England and Wales]], the [[Infanticide Act 1938]] describes the offence of infanticide as one which would otherwise amount to murder (by their mother) if the victim was older than 12 months and the mother did not have an "imbalance of mind" due to the effects of childbirth or lactation. Where a mother who has killed such an infant has been charged with murder rather than infanticide s.1(3) of the Act confirms that a jury has the power to find alternative verdicts of [[manslaughter|Manslaughter in English law]] or guilty but insane.

===The Netherlands===
{{Main|Groningen Protocol}}
Infanticide is illegal in the Netherlands, although the maximum sentence is lower than for homicide. The Groningen Protocol regulates [[Child euthanasia|euthanasia for infants]] who are believed to "suffer hopelessly and unbearably" under strict conditions.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sheldon |first=Tony |date=2005-07-16 |title=Dutch doctors adopt guidelines on mercy killing of newborns |journal=BMJ: British Medical Journal |volume=331 |issue=7509 |page=126 |doi=10.1136/bmj.331.7509.126-a |issn=0959-8138 |pmid=16020836|pmc=558719 }}</ref>

===Poland===
Article 149 of the [[Polish Penal Code#The Penal Code of 1997|Penal Code of Poland]] stipulates that a mother who kills her child in labour, while under the influence of the course of the delivery, is liable to imprisonment for between three months and five years.<ref>{{Cite Polish law|title=Ustawa z dnia 6 czerwca 1997 r. - Kodeks karny|year=1997|volume=88|number=553|date=1997-06-06}}</ref>

===Romania===
Article 200 of the [[Penal Code of Romania#The Penal Code of 2014|Penal Code of Romania]] stipulates that the killing of a newborn during the first 24 hours, by the mother who is in a state of mental distress, shall be punished with imprisonment of one to five years.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.avocatura.com/ll491-noul-cod-penal.html|title=Noul Cod Penal (2014)|website=avocatura.com|access-date=2015-08-13|archive-date=2015-05-17|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150517054948/http://www.avocatura.com/ll491-noul-cod-penal.html}}</ref> The previous Romanian Penal Code also defined infanticide (''pruncucidere'') as a distinct criminal offense, providing for punishment of two to seven years imprisonment,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://legeaz.net/cod-penal-actualizat-2011/art-177-cpen|title=Art. 177 Cod penal Pruncuciderea Omuciderea INFRACŢIUNI CONTRA VIEŢII, INTEGRITĂŢII CORPORALE ŞI SĂNĂTĂŢII|website=legeaz.net|access-date=13 August 2015|archive-date=30 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150930160740/http://legeaz.net/cod-penal-actualizat-2011/art-177-cpen|url-status=live}}</ref> recognizing the fact that a mother's judgment may be impaired immediately after birth.

===United States===
{{Further|Born-Alive Infants Protection Act|Born alive laws in the United States}}

While legislation regarding infanticide in some countries focuses on rehabilitation, believing that treatment and education will prevent repetitive action, the United States remains focused on delivering punishment. One justification for punishment is the difficulty of implementing rehabilitation services. With an overcrowded prison system, the United States can not provide the necessary treatment and services.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Spinelli|first=Margaret G.|date=September 2004|title=Maternal Infanticide Associated With Mental Illness: Prevention and the Promise of Saved Lives|journal=American Journal of Psychiatry|volume=161|issue=9|pages=1548–57|doi=10.1176/appi.ajp.161.9.1548|pmid=15337641|issn=0002-953X}}</ref>

==== State legislation ====

In 2009, [[Texas]] state representative [[Jessica Farrar]] proposed legislation that would define infanticide as a distinct and lesser crime than [[homicide]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/032209dnmetinfanticide.3030173.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100417132305/http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/032209dnmetinfanticide.3030173.html|title=Proposed Texas House bill would recognize postpartum psychosis as a defense for moms who kill infants|archive-date=April 17, 2010}}</ref> Under the terms of the proposed legislation, if jurors concluded that a mother's "judgment was impaired as a result of the effects of giving birth or the effects of lactation following the birth," they would be allowed to convict her of the crime of infanticide, rather than murder.<ref name="When Infanticide Isn't Murder">{{cite news |url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jacob-m-appel/when-infanticide-isnt-mur_b_279703.html |title=When Infanticide Isn't Murder |publisher=Huffingtonpost.com |access-date=2013-07-18 |date=8 September 2009 |archive-date=12 March 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170312074814/http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jacob-m-appel/when-infanticide-isnt-mur_b_279703.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The maximum penalty for infanticide would be two years in prison.<ref name="When Infanticide Isn't Murder"/> Farrar's introduction of this bill prompted liberal bioethics scholar [[Jacob M. Appel]] to call her "the bravest politician in America".<ref name="When Infanticide Isn't Murder"/>

==== Federal legislation ====

The ''MOTHERS Act'' ('''M'''oms '''O'''pportunity '''T'''o access '''H'''ealth, '''E'''ducation, '''R'''esearch and '''S'''upport), precipitated by the death of a Chicago woman with postpartum psychosis was introduced in 2009. The act was ultimately incorporated into the ''[[Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act]]'' which passed in 2010. The act requires screening for postpartum mood disorders at any time of the adult lifespan as well as expands research on postpartum depression. Provisions of the act also authorize grants to support clinical services for women who have, or are at risk for, postpartum psychosis.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Rhodes|first1=Ann M.|last2=Segre|first2=Lisa S.|date=August 2013|title=Perinatal depression: a review of US legislation and law|journal=Archives of Women's Mental Health|volume=16|issue=4|pages=259–70|doi=10.1007/s00737-013-0359-6|issn=1434-1816|pmc=3725295|pmid=23740222}}</ref>

==Wider effects==
===Surviving children===
In addition to debates over the morality of infanticide itself, there is some debate over the effects of infanticide on surviving children, and the effects of childrearing in societies that also sanction infanticide. Some argue that the practice of infanticide in any widespread form causes enormous psychological damage in children.<ref name="EMOL"/>{{rp|261–62}} Conversely, studying societies that practice infanticide [[Géza Róheim]] reported that even infanticidal mothers in [[New Guinea]], who ate a child, did not affect the personality development of the surviving children; that "these are good mothers who eat their own children".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Róheim| first = Géza| author-link = Géza Róheim| title =Psychoanalysis and Anthropology| publisher = International Universities Press | year = 1950 | location = New York | pages =60–62}}</ref> Harris and Divale's work on the relationship between female infanticide and warfare suggests that there are, however, extensive negative effects.

===Societal===
For female infanticide, mothers who keep giving birth to daughters could face divorce or violence. Skewed sex ratio with lack of available women to marry leads to violence such as [[bride kidnapping]].<ref name=WHO>{{cite web |url=https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Issues/Women/GenderAndEquality/PreventingGenderBiasedSexSelection.pdf|title=Preventing Gender Biased Sex Selection|publisher=World Health Organization |access-date=2025-04-02 }}</ref>

==Prevention==

=== Sex education and birth control ===
Since infanticide, especially neonaticide, is often a response to an unwanted birth,<ref name=Marks2009/> preventing [[unwanted pregnancies]] through improved [[sex education]] and increased [[birth control|contraceptive]] access are advocated as ways of preventing infanticide.<ref name=Friedman2009>{{cite journal |vauthors=Friedman SH, Resnick PJ |title=Neonaticide: Phenomenology and considerations for prevention |journal=Int J Law Psychiatry |volume=32 |issue=1 |pages=43–47 |year=2009 |pmid=19064290 |doi=10.1016/j.ijlp.2008.11.006 }}</ref> Increased use of contraceptives and access to safe legal [[abortion]]s<ref name="Hardness" /><ref name=Paul/>{{rp|122–23}} have greatly reduced neonaticide in many developed nations. In Pakistan, advocates of legalizing abortion say it would reduce infanticide and save mothers from potentially fatal back-street terminations.<ref name =tribune />

=== Psychiatric intervention ===
Cases of infanticide have also garnered increasing attention and interest from advocates for the mentally ill as well as organizations dedicated to postpartum disorders. Following the trial of [[Andrea Yates]], a mother from the United States who garnered national attention for drowning her 5 children, representatives from organizations such as the Postpartum Support International and the Marcé Society for Treatment and Prevention of Postpartum Disorders began requesting clarification of diagnostic criteria for postpartum disorders and improved guidelines for treatments. While accounts of postpartum psychosis have dated back over 2,000 years ago, perinatal mental illness is still largely under-diagnosed despite postpartum psychosis affecting 1 to 2 per 1000 women.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Sharma|first1=Indira|last2=Rai|first2=Shashi|last3=Pathak|first3=Abhishek|date=2015|title=Postpartum psychiatric disorders: Early diagnosis and management|journal=Indian Journal of Psychiatry|volume=57|issue=6|pages=S216–21|doi=10.4103/0019-5545.161481|issn=0019-5545|pmc=4539865|pmid=26330638 |doi-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Osborne|first=Lauren M.|date=September 2018|title=Recognizing and Managing Postpartum Psychosis|journal=Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinics of North America|volume=45|issue=3|pages=455–68|doi=10.1016/j.ogc.2018.04.005|pmc=6174883|pmid=30092921}}</ref> However, with clinical research continuing to demonstrate the large role of rapid neurochemical fluctuation in postpartum psychosis, prevention of infanticide points ever strongly towards psychiatric intervention.{{Citation needed|date=August 2019}}

Screening for psychiatric disorders or risk factors, and providing treatment or assistance to those at risk may help prevent infanticide.<ref name="FriedmanDepress">{{cite journal |vauthors=Friedman SH, Resnick PJ |title=Postpartum depression: an update |journal=Women's Health |volume=5 |issue=3 |pages=287–95 |date=May 2009 |pmid=19392614 |doi=10.2217/whe.09.3 |doi-access=free }}</ref> Current diagnostic considerations include symptoms, psychological history, thoughts of self-harm or harming one's children, physical and neurological examination, laboratory testing, substance abuse, and brain imaging. As psychotic symptoms may fluctuate, it is important that diagnostic assessments cover a wide range of factors.{{Citation needed|date=August 2019}}

While studies on the treatment of postpartum psychosis are scarce, a number of case and cohort studies have found evidence describing the effectiveness of [[lithium (medication)|lithium]] monotherapy for both acute and maintenance treatment of postpartum psychosis, with the majority of patients achieving complete remission. Adjunctive treatments include [[electroconvulsive therapy]], antipsychotic medication, or [[benzodiazepine]]s. Electroconvulsive therapy, in particular, is the primary treatment for patients with [[catatonia]], severe agitation, and difficulties eating or drinking. Antidepressants should be avoided throughout the acute treatment of postpartum psychosis due to risk of worsening mood instability.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Bergink|first1=Veerle|last2=Rasgon|first2=Natalie|last3=Wisner|first3=Katherine L.|date=2016-09-09|title=Postpartum Psychosis: Madness, Mania, and Melancholia in Motherhood|journal=American Journal of Psychiatry|volume=173|issue=12|pages=1179–88|doi=10.1176/appi.ajp.2016.16040454|pmid=27609245|issn=0002-953X|doi-access=free}}</ref>

Though screening and treatment may help prevent infanticide, in the developed world, significant proportions of neonaticides that are detected occur in young women who deny their pregnancy and avoid outside contacts, many of whom may have limited contact with these health care services.<ref name="Marks2009" />

=== Safe surrender ===
In some areas [[baby hatch]]es or ''safe surrender sites'', safe places for a mother to anonymously leave an infant, are offered, in part to reduce the rate of infanticide. In other places, like the United States, [[safe-haven law]]s allow mothers to anonymously give infants to designated officials; they are frequently located at hospitals and police and fire stations. Additionally, some countries in Europe have the laws of [[anonymous birth]] and [[confidential birth]] that allow mothers to give up an infant after birth. In anonymous birth, the mother does not attach her name to the birth certificate. In confidential birth, the mother registers her name and information, but the document containing her name is sealed until the child comes to age. Typically such babies are put up for adoption, or cared for in orphanages.<ref>최예니 . "Study on Confidential Birth and Safety Measures of Infants from Unmarried Mothers." SNU Open Repository and Archive: Study on Confidential Birth and Safety Measures of Infants from Unmarried Mothers, 서울대학교 대학원, August 2018, s-space.snu.ac.kr/handle/10371/137993#export_btn</ref>

=== Employment ===
Granting women employment raises their status and autonomy. Having a [[gainful employment]] can raise the perceived worth of women. This can lead to an increase in the number of women getting an education and a decrease in the number of female infanticide. As a result, the [[infant mortality]] rate will decrease and economic development will increase.<ref name="Fuse">{{cite journal|last=Fuse|first=K|author2=Crenshaw, E.M|title=Gender imbalance in infant mortality: A cross-national study of social structure and female infanticide|journal=Social Science & Medicine|year=2006|volume=62|issue=2|pages=360–74|doi=10.1016/j.socscimed.2005.06.006|pmid=16046041}}</ref>

==In animals==
{{main|Infanticide (zoology)}}
[[File:Mones.jpg|thumb|The [[Hanuman langur]]s are among the species where infanticide occurs.<ref name=Sugiyama-langurs/>]]

The practice has been observed in many other species of the [[animal]] kingdom since it was first seriously studied by [[:jp:杉山幸丸|Yukimaru Sugiyama]].<ref name=Sugiyama-langurs>{{cite journal | author = Sugiyama Y | year = 1965 | title = On the social change of Hanuman langurs (''Presbytis entellus'') in their natural conditions | journal = Primates | volume = 6 | issue = 3–4| pages = 381–417 | doi=10.1007/bf01730356| s2cid = 26758190 }}</ref> These include from microscopic [[rotifer]]s and [[insect]]s, to [[fish]], [[amphibian]]s, [[bird]]s and [[mammal]]s, including primates such as [[chacma baboon]]s.<ref name="Hoogland">{{cite journal | author = Hoogland J. L. | year = 1985 | title = Infanticide in Prairie Dogs: Lactating Females Kill Offspring of Close Kin | journal = Science | volume = 230 | issue = 4729| pages = 1037–40 | doi=10.1126/science.230.4729.1037 | pmid=17814930| bibcode = 1985Sci...230.1037H | s2cid = 23653101 }}</ref>

According to studies carried out by [[Kyoto University]] in primates, including certain types of gorillas and chimpanzees, several conditions favor the tendency to kill their offspring in some species (to be performed only by males), among them are: Nocturnal life, the absence of nest construction, the marked sexual dimorphism in which the male is much larger than the female, the mating in a specific season and the high period of lactation without resumption of the estrus state in the female.

== In art and literature ==

An instance in which a child born on an inauspicious day is to live or die according to the chance of being trampled by cattle (death being likely) is provided by {{ws|[[s:Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838/Infanticide in Madagascar|Infanticide in Madagascar]]|ps=no}}, painted by Henry Melville and engraved by J Redaway for Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838 with a poetical illustration and notes by [[Letitia Elizabeth Landon]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Landon|first=Letitia Elizabeth|title=Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838|url=https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=49BbAAAAQAAJ&pg=GBS.PA134|section=poetical illustration|year=1837|publisher=Fisher, Son & Co.|access-date=9 March 2023|archive-date=9 March 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230309103017/https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=49BbAAAAQAAJ&pg=GBS.PA134|url-status=live}}{{cite book|last=Landon|first=Letitia Elizabeth|title=Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838|url=https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=49BbAAAAQAAJ&pg=GBS.PA136|section=picture|year=1837|publisher=Fisher, Son & Co.|access-date=9 March 2023|archive-date=9 March 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230309103021/https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=49BbAAAAQAAJ&pg=GBS.PA136|url-status=live}}</ref>

==See also==
{{div col|colwidth=30em}}
* {{Annotated link|Child cannibalism}}
* {{Annotated link|Child euthanasia}}
* {{Annotated link |The Cruel Mother}}
* [[Female perversion#Violence against children|Female perversion]] – Violence against children by women
* {{Annotated link |Filicide}}
* {{Annotated link |Margaret Garner}}
* ''[[Jenůfa]]'' (opera by [[Leoš Janáček]])
* {{Annotated link |List of countries by infant mortality rate}}
* ''[[La Llorona]]'' (Mexican legend)
* ''[[Medea (play)|Medea]]'' ([[Euripides]]' play)
* {{Annotated link |Miyuki Ishikawa}}
* ''[[A Modest Proposal]]'', by [[Jonathan Swift]]
* [[Overlaying]] – child-smothering during carer's sleep
* {{Annotated link |Sudden infant death syndrome}}
{{div col end}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Backhouse, Constance B. "Desperate women and compassionate courts: infanticide in nineteenth-century Canada." ''University of Toronto Law Journal'' 34.4 (1984): 447–78 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/825592 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230409084901/https://www.jstor.org/stable/825592 |date=9 April 2023 }}.
* Bechtold, Brigitte H., and Donna Cooper Graves. "The ties that bind: Infanticide, gender, and society." ''History Compass'' 8.7 (2010): 704–17.
* Donovan, James M. "Infanticide and the Juries in France, 1825–1913." ''Journal of family history'' 16.2 (1991): 157–76.
* Feng, Wang; Campbell, Cameron; Lee, James. "Infant and Child Mortality among the Qing Nobility." ''Population Studies'' (Nov 1994) 48#3 pp.&nbsp;395–411; many upper-class Chinese couples regularly used infanticide to control the number and sex of their infants.
* Giladi, Avner. "Some observations on infanticide in medieval Muslim society." ''International Journal of Middle East Studies'' 22.2 (1990): 185–200 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/163739 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230409082850/https://www.jstor.org/stable/163739 |date=9 April 2023 }}.
* Hoffer, Peter, and N.E.H. Hull. ''Murdering Mothers: Infanticide in England and America, 1558–1803'' (1981).
* Kilday, A. ''A History of Infanticide in Britain, c. 1600 to the Present'' (Springer, 2013).
* Langer, William L. "Infanticide: A historical survey." ''History of Childhood Quarterly: the Journal of Psychohistory'' 1.3 (1974): 353–65.
* Leboutte, René. "Offense against family order: infanticide in Belgium from the fifteenth through the early twentieth centuries." ''Journal of the History of Sexuality'' 2.2 (1991): 159–85.
* Lee, Bernice J. "Female infanticide in China." ''Historical Reflections/Réflexions Historiques'' (1981): 163–77 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/41298766 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201121005656/https://www.jstor.org/stable/41298766 |date=21 November 2020 }}.
* Lewis, Margaret Brannan. ''Infanticide and abortion in early modern Germany'' (Routledge, 2016).
* Mays, Simon. "Infanticide in Roman Britain." ''Antiquity'' 67.257 (1993): 883–88.
* Mungello, David Emil. ''Drowning girls in China: Female infanticide since 1650'' (Rowman & Littlefield, 2008).
* Oberman, Michelle. "Mothers who kill: coming to terms with modern American infanticide." ''American Criminal Law Review'' 34 (1996) pp: 1–110 [https://digitalcommons.law.scu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1515&context=facpubs online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210116044629/https://digitalcommons.law.scu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1515&context=facpubs |date=16 January 2021 }}.
* Pomeroy, Sarah B. "Infanticide in Hellenistic Greece" in A. Cameron and A. Kuhrt, eds., ''Images of women in antiquity'' (Wayne State Univ Press, 1983), pp 207–222.
* Rose, Lionel. ''Massacre of the Innocents: Infanticide in Great Britain 1800–1939'' (1986).
* Wheeler, Kenneth H. "Infanticide in nineteenth-century Ohio." ''Journal of Social History'' (1997): 407–18 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3789945 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230409084858/https://www.jstor.org/stable/3789945 |date=9 April 2023 }}.

==External links==
{{Commons category}}
{{Wikiquote}}
{{Wiktionary|infanticide}}
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20060815193200/http://infanticide.org/history.htm A Brief History of Infanticide]}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Killings by type]]
[[Category:Infanticide| ]]
[[Category:Homicide]]
[[Category:Population]]
[[Category:Cultural aspects of death]]