infanticide theme
A character murders a defenseless little baby, and it is featured as being a crime.
Examples
In "The Winter's Tale" (1611), King Leontes ordered the newborn child he thought was his wife's bastard to be slain. Although it appeared was legally in his right to do so, being the King and slighted husband, it was also featured as being morally reprehensible and therefore a crime against the customs of society. We also know that, in the historical context, Christianity proscribed infanticide.
6 total · 1 major · 5 minor
| Story | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| ahh3x16 | major | The story turned on the Dexters' nanny Freida being wanted by the police for having murdered a baby in cold blood by nursing it with arsenic-laced milk. The infanticidal nanny was not, in fact, the woman Joyce thought it was. |
| apuleius180tgab10inset2 | minor | A man commanded his pregnant daughter-in-law to kill the child should it turn out to be a girl. |
| ic1976e02 | minor | Livia opined that Claudius ought to have been exposed at birth. |
| ic1976e09 | minor | A baby was cruelly put to the sword in front of its mother. |
| play: The Self-Tormentor (163 BC) | minor | Chremes had years prior ordered a pregnant Sostrata not to rear the child, if it turned out to be a girl. |
| play: The Winter's Tale (1611) | minor | Leontes sought to kill the infant he thought belonged to Polixenes. |