A Cause de son Infirmité: Disability at a Girl\u27s Orphanage in Early-Modern Dijon, France

Historians have traditionally studied the role of the orphanage within the economic and social framework of towns and cities. Scholars have shown the important role the orphanage played by caring for orphaned and abandoned children, but studies that look beyond the institutional history of the orphanage and examine the lives of the orphans themselves are a relatively new addition to scholarly work in the field. My research examined and compared the registry entries of the St. Anne\u27s orphanage in Dijon, France between 1770 and 1775. Examination of the registry entries gave an indication of the social function and contributions of the orphanage and provided information on patterns of social welfare and charity, the effects of death and illness on poor families, and the treatment of ill and disabled children. Along with supporting the work of historians studying the lives of orphans during this time, my research found a significant percentage of females admitted to the orphanage as a result of disability. Historians have largely neglected the history of disability, and my findings contribute to the emerging scholarly discussion of disability history while complicating the historical perspectives on the cultural and economic reasons for child abandonment in eighteenth-century Europe