Childhood is not only a biological age, it is also a social construct. The essays in this collection range chronologically from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century, and geographically across England, France, Germany, Italy and Spain. They chart the depictions of children in various media including painting, sculpture and the graphic arts.

Chapter 1 Introduction: The Early Modern Child in Art and History, Matthew Knox Averett; Chapter 1a Cradle and Grave: Commemorating Individual Victims of Infant Mortality, Margaret Elizabeth Hadley; Chapter 2 'Little Idols': Royal Children and the Infant Jesus in the Devotional Practice of Sor Margarita de la Cruz (1567'"1633), Tanya J. Tiffany; Chapter 3 E Riluttante Ragazzotti: Youths as Hesitant Part Icipants in the Crucifixion, Margaret Flansburg; Chapter 4 'These Stories are Not for Children': Misbehaving Children in 'World Upside Down' Prints and the Origins of Folk Tales, Rachel L. Chantos; Chapter 5 Dynastic Identity in Renaissance Court Life: Dynastic Privilege in Portraits of Children, Jasmin W. Cyril; Chapter 6 'You Will Be a Man, My Son': Signs of Masculinity and Virility in Italian Renaissance Paintings of Boys, Fabien Lacouture; Chapter 7 Dressing the Part: Picturing and Promoting the Early Modern Child, Parme Giuntini; Chapter 8 Princely Portraits of Adolescence in the Habsburg Court of Philip II in the Mid-Sixteenth Century, Lisa Tom; Chapter 9 Titian's Clarissa Strozzi: The Infant as Ideal Bride, Brian D. Steele; Chapter 10 Uncle Urban Raises the Barberini Nephews: The Education and Expectations of Papal Nipote, Matthew Knox Averett;