Death Control in the West 1500–1800

Were there missing girls in Biscay? Sex ratios in Northern Spain, 1550-1899

“…In the early years, and in the absence of conclusive data on female over mortality in the first years of life, it can be affirmed that the preference for boys in the rural world seems to be due to an under-recording of girls in sacramental registers. This would not exclude more extreme forms of discrimination such as infanticide and/or neglect of care in early life, as is the case in other European regions (Hanlon, 2022). Indeed, as noted above, documentary under-recording implicitly implies the legal invisibility of women and could be a sign that more extreme forms of gender discrimination were also practised.…”

“…3.1.3. Sex ratios at birth in rural and urban environment Given that different patterns of behaviour in the countryside and in the city have been found for other European regions (Hynes, 2011;Hanlon, 2022;Beltrán-Tapia and Gallego, 2020;Beltrán-Tapia and Marco Gracia, 2022), a differentiated analysis of Biscayan sex ratios in both environments has been conducted. The urban world is represented by Bilbao and its "an-teiglesias", while the rural sphere is made up of small towns, which exercised a strong regional centrality, and localities of less than 2,000 inhabitants.…”

“…Local studies of Protestant and Catholic communities in Italy, southwest France and England seem to confirm that neonatal abortion was a customary practice not only among the lower classes, but also among the elites as a way of safeguar-ding their social status (Hynes, 2011;Derosas, 2012;Hanlon, 2022). In Spain, there is evidence of infanticide and/or neglect in the care of new-borns, as evidenced by an abnormally high sex ratio at baptism, an unusual distance in the intergenerational intervals after the third or fourth child in vulnerable families, an increase in female mortality in the hours immediately after birth, and higher survival rates of males in infancy and early childhood, despite being biologically more vulnerable Beltrán Tapia, 2021, 2022;Beltrán-Tapia and Szoltysek, 2022;Beltrán-Tapia andGallego, 2017, 2020).…”

“…The asymmetry in the sex ratio is not easy to explain and historiography is torn between conscious carelessness resulting in death and under-reporting, which is nothing more than a form of legal discrimination. There is evidence of infanticidal practices through the sporadic cases that reached the courts, although all involved single, poor women or women in incestuous and illicit relationships, and almost never married or socially well-integrated women (Rodríguez, 2018;Hanlon, 2022). However, the lack of documentary evidence does not mean that these practices did not exist.…”

“…All this evidence supports the view that discriminatory practices during childhood were part of a cultural heritage that privileged -in terms of access to food and/or care -those offspring who were most likely to enter the labour market. In general, the preference for males was common in poorer agrarian regions, while in urban settings this preference was diluted by the presence of wage labour opportunities for women, even tipping the balance in their favour (Lynch, 2011;Hanlon, 2022;Hynes, 2011;Beltrán-Tapia and Gallego, 2020;Llopis et al, 2022b).…”