The Child in Human Progress

This work surveys changing attitudes toward children from antiquity to its contemporary era, asserting maternal affection as a foundation for social altruism while documenting practices of infanticide, exposure, and neglect. It examines marriage, parental instincts, and economic, religious, and legal pressures that shaped family size and child treatment. Drawing on laws, myths, census evidence, and case studies from Mesopotamia, Egypt, East Asia, Japan, and Pacific societies, it traces reforms, legislative responses, and the rise of organized child protection. Chapters interweave anthropological detail, historical sources, and reform history to explain how institutions and public opinion altered childhood’s social status.