The Child in Human Progress

by George Henry Payne

GROWTH OF THE HUMANITARIAN MOVEMENT THROUGHOUT EUROPE—IN THE DARK AGES—CHURCH TAKES UP THE HUMANITARIAN WORK IN THE SEVENTH CENTURY—SALE OF CHILDREN COMMON—STORY OF SAINT BATHILDE—CHILDREN SOLD FOR FATHER’S DEBTS—DATHEUS THE FIRST TO OFFER CHILDREN A HOME—APPEAL OF POPE INNOCENT III.

IN the Eastern Empire it was always a fight with the Church on the one hand and barbarian customs on the other for the humanization of the rapidly developing peoples. We may now look at the Dark Ages in a very different spirit from that which animated our fathers. We now know that whatever may have been the faults of the priests or the rulers, the world was making progress, and new and inherently strong peoples were developing as fast as they could assimilate a superior civilization.[404]

The Church, very early in the history of the Christian era, became the avowed protector of the parentless children and it soon became a custom to confide infants to the Church when mothers felt that they were unable to raise their offspring. The gain made by the Church by this step was immeasurable, for however much those opposed to Christianity might argue, the onward march was irresistible when religion rested itself on the mother instinct and, without accusation or attempted retribution, willingly assumed the ties that maternity was obliged to forego.

By the door of the churches it became the custom to have a marble receptacle in which mothers placed the children that they were forced to abandon. The newly born was received by the matricularii or by the priest, who, following the form prescribed, asked those who assisted at the adoption ceremonies if there was any known person who would consent to take charge of the infant. These formalities had to receive the sanction of the bishop. Not infrequently the priest succeeded in finding among the parishioners of his church someone who would adopt the infant, but if he did not, the church always assumed the responsibility and took care of the orphan. In some places the children that had been abandoned by their mothers were, by the order of the bishop, shown at the door of the church for ten days following their abandonment, and if any one recognized and was able to declare who the parents were, he made such a declaration to the ecclesiastical authorities—a dangerous custom as many unfortunate though innocent people discovered.

In the case where some person not officially connected with the church assumed the responsibility of bringing up the abandoned child, such a person (nutricarii) received with the charge, a document wherein the fact of adoption was set forth, the circumstances under which the child was found, and the right of the adoptive parent to hold the child henceforth as a slave. In this connection it must be remembered that the Code of Justinian, which had put an end to this custom in the East, had no force in the West. The result was that in the European States which succeeded to the Western Roman Empire it was an almost general custom that abandoned children grew up in slavery. Indeed, so general was this custom that even the Church placed the newly born as among its assets, the church of Seville in Spain enumerating the number of abandoned children taken in as among its revenues.

At the Council of Rouen, held in the seventh century, the priests of each diocese were enjoined to inform their congregations that women who were delivered in secret might leave their infants at the door of the church. The church thereby attended to the immediate care of the newly born, and while the fact that the children were brought up in slavery was bad, it was a great improvement over the conditions in Rome and Greece. At least, if brought up in slavery, they were brought up with no criminal purpose and as far as the ecclesiastical authorities were able to regulate their lives, they were not condemned to lives of immorality.

So bad, however, were the conditions in the seventh century, and so miserable and poor were the people, that despite the example and the preachings of the Church, thousands of children were thrown on the highways or left in deserted places to perish of starvation. Among the Gauls, before the domination of the Franks, the heads of families that lacked food, or the means to obtain it, took to the market their children and sold them as they would the veriest chattels.[405] This traffic was not only common but it took place publicly, and not only in ancient France but in Germany, in Flanders, in Italy, and in England. Northern Europe was colder, more swampy, and more desolate then than it is now and across the bleak and uncultivated country, country such as one finds nowhere in Europe today but on the professional and bleak battlefields of Bulgaria and Servia, the half-starved peasants tramped, each with his group of children to place on sale when the coasts of Italy or France were reached.

It was in this way that Saint Bathilde, afterward the wife of King Clovis II., became the slave of the mayor of the palace, Archambault. Bought by the latter, she was working as a slave in his household when the King saw her and fell in love with her.[406]

Moved by such great misery and such odious traffic, holy men went, purse in hand, to the places where these infants were being sold and purchased the unfortunates, giving them later their liberty. In this manner, Saint Eunice was purchased by an Abbé du Berry and Saint Thean by Saint Eloi.