Alive Enough: Resuscitating Dead Infants for Baptism in Late Medieval Krakow

Starting in the 15th century, people in many parts of Europe began seeking the miraculous, temporary reanimation of deceased, unbaptized infants so that that they could properly baptize and then bury them. Although occasional resuscitation miracles had occurred over the course of the preceding centuries, it is at this time that they become a mass phenomenon. In some places, particular sites became associated with such powers and became the foci of emergency pilgrimages, which people often made with the infant’s corpse. This phenomenon has been mostly investigated in (modern-day) France and select sites in Switzerland, Germany and Austria, yet it appears that such miraculous reanimations were also taking place in Poland. Drawing on the miracle collections of several local saints, this paper will examine the degree to which late medieval Krakow can be viewed as a center for infant reanimation and emergency baptism. It will situate this phenomenon in the larger context of local miracles and contextualize it in the broader medical environment of the day. Above all, the paper examines not only why at this point large numbers of people felt a tremendous urgency to reanimate the dead children, but also why they believed it was even a possibility.