[heartwood]

The Kindness of Strangers: The abandonment of children in Western Europe, John Boswell

The Discovery of France: A Historical Geography, Graham Robb

[Verginius Rufus]

I haven't seen that book by Boswell. He was a gay activist who died of AIDS...I've been given to believe that he engages in special pleading for his cause, so don't accept his interpretations uncritically.

St. Augustine, before his conversion, lived with a mistress who bore him a son. In his Confessions he has a comment to the effect that children may be unwanted but when they arrive they force you to love them.