Fetal Burials at San Giuliano

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Etruscan Centralization to Medieval Marginalization: Shifts in Settlement and Mortuary Traditions at San Giuliano, Italy" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The burial of unbaptized fetuses at San Giuliano exposes friction between the institutional church and medieval Italy's laity. The church's theology of Original Sin, baptism, and salvation left young children especially vulnerable to dying unbaptized and being denied a Christian burial in consecrated grounds. Texts reveal that in addition to utilizing the accepted, orthodox measures of appealing for divine help, Italian laypeople turned to folk religion and occasionally violated canon law when struggling or deceased fetuses and infants were in danger of being buried in unhallowed ground. Fetal and infant burials found at other medieval Italian sites confirms that parental concern often clashed with ecclesiastical burial regulations. The remains of unbaptized children have been discovered in consecrated ground in religiously symbolic placements. Ultimately, the textual and archaeological records of fetal and infant burial in medieval Italy serves as a material legacy for how laypeople interpreted and reacted to the church's theology and regulation of baptism and burial.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• Etruscan Centralization to Medieval Marginalization: Shifts in Settlement and Mortuary Traditions at San Giuliano, Italy

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 33029