BREFOTROFIO. – From βρέφος ‘newborn’ and τρέφω ‘I nourish’. An institution established to assist illegitimate children not recognized, that is, children who are registered at the civil registry as born of an unknown father and a mother who does not consent to be named.
Before the establishment of such institutions, these children were all too often abandoned at the doors of churches, in the gardens of convents, in those of hospices, and wherever there was hope that pious people, moved to compassion by the sight of the abandoned little being, would take it in.
It was the merit of the archpriest Dateo, moved by the fate of these children and driven by the spread of these crimes, to offer in 787 a house of his own in Milan, situated near the church of S. Salvatore, to serve as a refuge for the poor abandoned. In the act of foundation he thus expressed himself: “Volo atque statuo, ut cum tales feminae quae, istigante adversario, ex adultero conceperint et parturierint, si in Ecclesia provenerint, continuo per Praepositum colligantur et collocentur in predicto xenodochio, atque nutrices eis provideantur, mercede conductae, quae parvulos lacte nutriant” (L. Muratori, Antiquitates Italicae Medii Aevi, III, Milan 1740, col. 588).
Brema – Church dedicated to the Virgin (1400–1540), now Protestant.
A century later in Cremona, in 870, the archpriest Ansperto founded the first asylum “pro infantulis et parvulis peccato natis,” where natural and illegitimate children, lacking parental care, found shelter.
These two institutions, the first created in Italy by two ecclesiastics, represent the beginning of assistance for illegitimate children and thus the beginning of those institutions that came to be called b. and which would gradually spread throughout Italy and the world.
Among the oldest b. should be recalled that of Bergamo, founded in 1100 by the Crociferi Fathers; that of Naples around 1300 by a “Congrega” or “Frutria” on the occasion of the discovery on the threshold of the church of the Annunziata of an abandoned infant; that of Rome founded in the 13th century by Pope Innocent III; while abroad among the oldest should be recalled the shelters and asylums founded in Montpellier in the 10th century, those of Marseilles and Burgundy, and then in Spain by St. Thomas of Villanova.
An important historical detail is the establishment in b. of the so-called “ruota” (turnstile), which was first instituted in the asylum of Montpellier around 1480 and then, probably soon after, in Rome, at the hospital of S. Spirito, where it is still preserved today as a historical relic.
As is well known, the “ruota” served to admit a child into the hospice without the mother being able to be recognized. The “ruota” can be likened to a cylinder divided into two by a vertical partition leaving two compartments: one in front and one in the rear, all rotating on a pivot, so that a child deposited from the outside could be conveyed inside by turning the wheel itself.
At present in Italy almost all provinces have a b. Illegitimate children are legally admitted to them, and the natural mother is permitted to accompany the child in order to ensure maternal breastfeeding.
In addition to illegitimate children born of unknown parents, the law provides that children recognized by one parent and legitimate children who, due to special circumstances, can no longer be raised in the family environment (poverty of the parents, death of the mother, tuberculosis in the family, etc.) may also be admitted, by special ordinances issued by the federations of the Opera Nazionale Maternità e Infanzia and by provincial assistance offices.
This expanded function of assistance has meant that in recent years the most important b., such as those of Rome and Milan, have changed their name from b. to “Istituto provinciale per l’Assistenza all’Infanzia” (Provincial Institute for Child Assistance).
A whole body of legislation governs the legal and health functions of these institutions. They must be equipped to provide rooms for the admission of healthy and syphilitic children, isolation and quarantine wards, as well as clinical analysis laboratories specially equipped for the detection of congenital syphilis.
The law on assistance to the illegitimate child does not lose sight of its moralizing function and provides that the direction of the institution (Royal Decree-Law of 8 May 1927, no. 795), when public assistance is requested for an illegitimate child, must carry out, in the manner it deems most appropriate, confidential inquiries to ascertain the mother, with the aim of ascertaining, where possible, her health conditions, to secure maternal breastfeeding for the infant, and to induce the mother herself to recognize the child. The midwife and the physician who assisted during the birth of the infant’s mother are obliged to answer the questions of those conducting the inquiries. In case of refusal, Article 366 of the Penal Code is applied. It is strictly forbidden to disclose the outcome of the inquiries conducted to ascertain the maternity of illegitimate children, and where the circumstances warrant it, Articles 622 and 326 of the Penal Code are applied.
The law further provides that the mother or father may recognize the child at any age, while it gives the direction of the institution, if information received or the passage of time provides sufficient grounds for assuming that the abandonment was final, the power to entrust the child to a couple who, furnished with the necessary documents, request custody of a child.
The child may be entrusted either for mercantile custody, that is, by means of a monthly contribution that the direction gives to the custodian, whether a private individual or a collegial institution, or for affective reasons when childless couples request a child in order to adopt him.