Editing Infanticide (section)

=====Pagan European tribes=====
In his book ''[[Germania (book)|Germania]]'', [[Tacitus]] wrote in {{CE|98}} that the ancient [[Germanic tribes]] enforced a similar prohibition. He found such mores remarkable and commented: "To restrain generation and the increase of children, is esteemed [by the Germans] an abominable sin, as also to kill infants newly born."<ref>Tacitus, ''[https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/tacitus-germanygord.asp Germania] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211106154709/https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/tacitus-germanygord.asp |date=6 November 2021 }}, translated by Thomas Gordon (1910)''</ref> It has become clear over the millennia, though, that Tacitus' description was inaccurate; the consensus of modern scholarship significantly differs. [[John Boswell]] believed that in ancient Germanic tribes unwanted children were exposed, usually in the forest.<ref name="KofS">{{Cite book| last = Boswell| first = John| author-link = John Boswell| title =The Kindness of Strangers| publisher = Vintage Books| year = 1988| location =New York}}</ref>{{rp|218}} "It was the custom of the [Teutonic] pagans, that if they wanted to kill a son or daughter, they would be killed before they had been given any food."<ref name="KofS"/>{{rp|211}} Usually children born out of wedlock were disposed of that way.

In his highly influential ''Pre-historic Times'', [[John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury|John Lubbock]] described burnt bones indicating the practice of child sacrifice in pagan Britain.<ref name="Pre-historic Times">{{Cite book| last = Lubbock| first = John| author-link = John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury| title =Pre-historic Times, as Illustrated by Ancient Remains, and the Manners and Customs of Modern Savages| publisher=Williams and Norgate | year =1865| location =London| page =176}}</ref>

The last canto, ''Marjatan poika'' (Son of Marjatta), of [[Finnish literature|Finnish]] national epic ''[[Kalevala]]'' describes assumed infanticide. [[Väinämöinen]] orders the infant [[Legitimacy (family law)|bastard]] son of Marjatta to be drowned in a [[marsh]].

The ''[[Íslendingabók]]'', the main source for the early history of [[Iceland]], recounts that on the [[Íslendingabók#7. Conversion of Iceland to Christianity|Conversion of Iceland to Christianity]] in 1000 it was provided – in order to make the transition more palatable to Pagans – that "the old laws allowing exposure of newborn children will remain in force".
However, this provision – among other concessions made at the time to the Pagans – was abolished some years later.