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In ancient times, exposition (from the Latin expositus, "exposed") was a method of infanticide or child abandonment in which infants were left in a wild place either to die due to hypothermia, hunger, animal attack^[1]^[2] or to be collected by slavers or by those unable to produce children.

Mythological

This form of child abandonment is a recurring theme in mythology, especially among hero births.

Some examples include:

Sargon, King of Akkad – exposed to the river.
Karna – exposed to the river.
Tang Sanzang – exposed to the river on a wooden plank. The historical person he is based on never suffered such a fate.
Oedipus – exposed in the mountains.
Paris – exposed at the top of Mount Ida.
Zāl – exposed in the Alborz mountains.
Telephus – exposed on Mount Parthenion.
Atalanta – exposed on Mount Parthenion.
Perseus – boxed and cast into the sea with his mother, Danaë.
Gilgamesh – thrown from the acropolis.
Romulus and Remus – exposed in a tub to the Tiber River.
Siegfried – exposed in a glass vessel to the river.
Ken Arok, Javanese king – exposed to the river.
Momotarō (桃太郎, "Peach Boy") – found inside of a giant peach, floating down a river.
Mess Búachalla - exposed to wild beasts.

Following exposure, the infants commonly died or were taken by slavers.^{[citation needed]}

Otto Rank explores this topic in his book, The Myth of the Birth of the Hero. The exposure, especially in water, "signifies no more and no less than the symbolic expression of birth. The children come out of the water. The basket, box, or receptacle simply means the container, the womb; so that the exposure directly signifies the process of birth". Further, according to Rank, these myths epitomize the natural psychological tension between parent and child. In all these stories there exists "a tendency to represent the parents as the first and most powerful opponents of the hero .... The vital peril, thus concealed in the representation of birth through exposure, actually exists in the process of birth itself. The overcoming of all these obstacles also expresses the idea that the future hero has actually overcome the greatest difficulties by virtue of his birth, for he has victoriously thwarted all attempts to prevent it."^[3]

Greece

Exposure was widely practiced in ancient Greece.^[4]^[5]^[6] It was advocated by Aristotle in the case of deformity: "As to the exposure of children, let there be a law that no deformed child shall live."^[7]^[8] Plato also defended infanticide as state policy.^[9]

In Sparta, according to Plutarch, in his The Life of Lycurgus:

Offspring was not reared at the will of the father, but was taken and carried by him to a place called Lesche, where the elders of the tribes officially examined the infant, and if it was well-built and sturdy, they ordered the father to rear it, and assigned it one of the nine thousand lots of land; but if it was ill-born and deformed, they sent it to the so‑called Apothetae, a chasm-like place at the foot of Mount Taÿgetus, in the conviction that the life of that which nature had not well equipped at the very beginning for health and strength, was of no advantage either to itself or the state.^[10]

However, this story has little other literary support. Modern excavations at the spot have found only adult human bones – it may have been used as a place for execution of criminals.^{[citation needed]}

Rome

Exposure was extremely widespread and deemed morally acceptable in ancient Rome, especially regarding female children, and according to Jack Lindsay, "more than one daughter was practically never reared" even in large families.^[11]^[12] The Twelve Tables allowed for the exposure of any female or any weak or deformed male infants.^[9] As Christianity gained a foothold in the Roman empire, Christians became known for rescuing exposed infants and raising them.^[13] Later, starting with Constantine the Great, Christian emperors began to implement reforms which eventually led to the end of the practice of infant exposure.^[14]

Early Middle Ages

During the Early Middle Ages in Europe, the History of European Morals (1869) by Irish historian William Lecky mentions that infant exposure was not punishable by law and was practiced on a large scale and was considered a pardonable offense. In the 8th century, foundling hospitals were opened in Milan, Florence and Rome, among others, to help reduce the deaths of newborns who were subjected to exposure. Church authorities were in charge of these hospitals until the 16th century.^[15]

References

^ Justin Martyr, First Apology.
^ Boswell, John Eastburn (1984). "Exposition and oblation: the abandonment of children and the ancient and medieval family". American Historical Review. 89 (1): 10–33. doi:10.2307/1855916. JSTOR 1855916. PMID 11611460.
^ Rank, Otto. The Myth of the Birth of the Hero. Vintage Books: New York, 1932.
^ Robert Garland, "Mother and child in the Greek world" History Today (March 1986), Vol. 36, pp 40-46
^ Sarah B. Pomeroy, "Infanticide in Hellenistic Greece" in Images of women in antiquity (Wayne State Univ Press, 1983), pp 207-222.
^ 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.
^ Dunn PM (2006). "Aristotle (384–322 BCE): philosopher and scientist of ancient Greece". Archives of Disease in Childhood: Fetal and Neonatal Edition. 91 (1): F75–77. doi:10.1136/adc.2005.074534. PMC 2672651. PMID 16371395.
^ (Alternate translation: "let there be a law that no deformed child shall be reared") Politics, Book VII, section 1335b Archived 13 May 2022 at the Wayback Machine
^ ^a ^b Stark 1996, p. 118.
^ Plutarch (1914). "The Life of Lycurgus". Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans. Vol. I. Translated by Perrin, Bernadotte. Loeb Classical Library. § 16. Archived from the original on 24 February 2024. Retrieved 19 February 2021.
^ Stark, Rodney (1996). The Rise of Christianity. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-02749-4. p. 97.
^ Lindsay, Jack (1968). The Ancient World: Manners and Morals. Putnam. p. 168.
^ Brierley, Justin (2023). The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God. Tyndale House Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4964-6679-2. ^{[page needed]}
^ Tate, Joshua C. (2008). "Christianity and the Legal Status of Abandoned Children in the Later Roman Empire". Journal of Law and Religion. 24 (1): 123–141. doi:10.1017/S0748081400001958. ISSN 0748-0814. JSTOR 27639134.
^ Golden, Richard M. (1996). Social History of Western Civilization. Vol. 2. New York: St. Martin's Press. p. 189. ISBN 978-0-312-09645-8.