Abandoned Children Of The Italian Renaissance ─ Orphan Care In Florence And Bologna

Not everyone in the Renaissance was trotting about in silk painting frescoes and inventing the helicopter. Many were children under fifteen who had been abandoned or orphaned, the victims of unstable families and grinding poverty. Rather than allowing them to annoy the good citizens of Florence and Bologna, the city fathers organized private and public facilities to keep guttersnipes off the streets. However, even in that golden age, the results of institutionalization were mixed. Terpstra (history, U. of Toronto) works through primary resources to find out how boys and girls came to the institutions, what was done to prepare them for adult life, and how they fared when turned back out to the streets to become good citizens. It appears from his work that Florence's homes and shelters were punitive rather than preparatory, while Bologna's addressed the children's futures more consistently, with the corresponding results. Annotation c2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Nicholas Terpstra is an associate professor of history at the University of Toronto.