[Infant mortality in Great Britain: a review of historical knowledge]

This paper provides a concise review of what is known about long-term trends in infant mortality rates in Britain since the middle of the sixteenth century. It considers, first, various estimates of infant mortality based on E.A. Wrigley and R.S. Schofield's estimates of life expectancy at birth for England, 1541-1871, which it compares with equivalent series for groups of parishes and the families of the British peerage. Secondly, it explores the variations between infant mortality rates that were likely in different forms of environment, especially the urban and the rural. Thirdly, the paper suggests that the conditions affecting an individual's life chance in adulthood. It considers this possibility further using Thomas Hollingsworth's data for the British peerage. Fourthly, the paper attempts to provide some estimates of the social class variations in infant mortality in England and Wales in comparison with those in the USA at the end of the nineteenth and early years of the twentieth century. Lastly, some of these regularities are considered from an epidemiological perspective by examining cause of death patterns among children.