I saw this in an orphanage in Florence -- it looked like a cross between a mail dropbox, a medieval torture device, a wheel like conveyer belt ...

wow! this is amazing. good post!

What a pity the fathers of these babies abandoned them after impregnating their mothers with them. I suggest a matching guillotine drop-off window for the testicles of these irresponsible men so they cannot produce more "unwanted" babies.

Anne Russell PhD

Not only the men...how about the loose women who go around getting pregnant with no intentions of keeping the baby

yeah I hear those are both enormous problems in Italy especially with their declining population numbers

hey, architecture fans; Isn't this at the front of Brunelleschi's 'Ospedale degli innocenti' (circa 1420)? the one that's adorned with the Andrea Della Robbia Terra cotta figures in swaddling clothes (inspired by this little window, minus the blue vinyl) ....so this is kind of a persistent problem, I think. At least they've finally given the kid some kind of pillow, it used to be a slab of marble for the looongest time.
I also believe the orphanage has a bell that is tolled when they discover a baby.To be heard no doubt by the mother as she departs through the narrow streets, long after she can no longer hear the infants cries.... sorry to be so melodramatic.

Then again, it might not be....

lfons,

Yep, that's the one I was thinking of ... and inside, light streaming through the window into the library of orphan records in these massive beautiful volumes ... bound with ribbon, so theatrical in a way.