Infanticide
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Infanticide. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the murder of an infant born alive; the killing of a young or newly-born child. The practice of destroying a portion of the offspring-in the majority of cases, the female children-among certain nations or tribes, appeared in the earliest times, and still lingers among some undeveloped races. infan- Lubbock thus accounts for female ticide: "Girls ate, and did not hunt. They weakened their mothers when young, and when grown up were a temptation to surrounding tribes"; but declines to accept the practice "as the true cause of exogamy." gamy." In Sparta it was used as one means of securing what Spencer calls the "survival of the fittest," and was defended by Plato and Aristotle. The murder by high caste Rajpoots in India of their female children, once most extensive, arose from pride of caste. father to Public opinion requiring the expend an extravagant sum on his laughter's marriage and dowry if she lived, he considered it more economic to have her put to death in infancy. To British remonstrance the answer was, "Pay our daughters' marriage portions, and they shall live." The government took a different method-it imposed on a father sanctioning the murder of his infant child an enormous fine, and the practice soon ceased. Till lately some of the aboriginal tribes, especially the Khoonds, sacrificed children as votive offerings to the Earthgoddess. The Anglo-Indian government was for a long time unable to put down the practice, but the persistent kidnapping of native children from British-Indian soil having furnished a casus belli, war was declared against the Khoonds, were required who by the treaty of peace to give up female infanticide. INFANTILE PARALYSIS. SEE POL- IOMYELITIS.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
in-fan'ti-sid, the killing of young babes. The life of a child was by no means sacred in the eyes of the ancients. Plato taught that a defective child should not be reared. In the various Greek republics it was considered an excusable act, if not a duty, to put an end to a maimed child. The Roman father decided whether the child should live or perish. The old Norse viking took the new born child on his arm, looked it over, and decided its fate. Until put a stop to by British occupancy, the women of India destroyed their infants, girls especially, with shocking freedom. Infanticide is still practised, it is said, in the South Sea Islands and among the natives of Australia. The Chinese are accused of the same crime. In civilized countries the killing of a young child is regarded as murder and is punished as such. In Paris and other cities foundling hospitals receive unwelcome children. That the temptation to infanticide may be lessened, babes may be secretly placed in a drawer in a hall to be taken out by an attendant on the other side of the partition.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Both accounts treat infanticide as something the ancients did and "undeveloped races" still do, and Collier's reports that a fine on Rajput fathers meant "the practice soon ceased" in India. It did not: the preference for sons resurfaced through prenatal sex selection, and in 1990 the economist Amartya Sen estimated that more than 100 million women were "missing" from Asian populations as a result. India banned prenatal sex determination for that purpose in 1994, and China's one-child policy (1979-2015) sharpened the same pressures. In the law, meanwhile, the flat rule Aiton's states -- that killing a young child "is regarded as murder and is punished as such" -- was softened in Britain by the Infanticide Act, which treats a mother who kills her infant while disturbed by birth or lactation as guilty of a lesser offence; and the foundling drawer Aiton's describes has a modern descendant in safe-haven laws and "baby hatches", from Texas in 1999 to Germany and Japan.
Written for this edition, 2026.