"Highly original, learned, and skillfully written. . . . A mine of fascinating and surprising information about every aspect of the history of family limitation in ancient, medieval, and Renaissance Europe."--Bernard Knox, New York Review of Books

"A formidably learned, ingenious, at times eloquent investigation. Professor Boswell is a young historian of rare force and originality."--George Steiner, New Yorker

"Bold, original and, very likely, controversial. . . . This is a pioneering work of large importance, the first to map out and explore a tangled, mysterious region of human experience."--Mary Martin McLaughlin, New York Times Book Review

Kindness of Strangers: The Abandonment of Children in Western Europe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance

FROM OUR EDITORS

A pioneering inquiry into an unexplored corner of Western history: the widespread abandonment of children throughout classical antiquity and the Middle Ages. "A learned and lively book, which is...likely to prove controversial..."-- Boston Globe.

ANNOTATION

A pioneering inquiry into an unexplored corner of the Western past - the widespread abandonment of children throughout the Middle Ages.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Using a wide variety of sources, John Boswell examines the evidence that parents of all classes gave up unwanted children, "exposing" them in public places, donating them to the church, or delivering them in later centuries to foundling hospitals. He shows what happened to these children, and he illuminates the moral codes that condoned abandonment.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

The author of the widely acclaimed Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality (LJ 6/1/80) has now given us this original and fascinating work on abandoned children. It should be made available to every student of medieval and early modern Europe. And at a time when abortion, child abuse, and abandonment are much in the news, the book should have broad general interest. Abandonment of children--by leaving them, selling them, or consigning them to someone else--was practiced from Greek antiquity to early modern times by parents of all social classes, because of poverty, incest, shame, self-interest, inheritance, or to improve the child's future. Most children were rescued and survived due to ``the kindness of strangers.'' Based on a careful exploration of ancient and medieval sources, this book will deservedly win a wide audience.-- Bennett D. Hill, Georgetown Univ., Washington, D.C.

Mary McLoughlin - New York Times Book Review

This is a poineering work of large importance, the first to map out and explore a tangled, myterious region of human experience...Beswell sets a standard of excellence.