Child saints have been venerated in Christianity since the early second century. The earliest example of child saints are the Holy Innocents, recorded in Matthew 2 in the New Testament; Bethlehemite children under the age of 2 who were killed by King Herod I in his attempt to kill Baby Jesus.
This list contains Christian children under the age of 18 who are venerated as saints in at least one Christian confession.
William of Norwich was a twelve year old English boy whose unsolved murder was, at the time, attributed to the Jewish community of Norwich. It is the first known medieval accusation against Jews of ritual murder. E. M. Rose points out that road robberies and kidnappings gone wrong were a frequent cause of death in the region during the period of the Anarchy when the Crown struggled to safeguard the roads. This was followed by a similar allegation regarding the unexplained death of Harold of Gloucester. An attempt to establish a cult of Harold seems to have been unsuccessful. It was never officially supported and died out long before the Reformation. However, it established a pattern. Any unexplained child death occurring near the Easter festival was arbitrarily linked to Jews in the vicinity. In some instances promotion of a cult may have been influenced by the interest of local clergy to enhance the prestige of their church with a shrine. Anthony Bale suggests this, and local politics, may have been contributing factors to the cult of Robert of Bury. Simon of Trent and Werner of Oberwesel are other examples of individuals who died under unknown circumstances, but whose deaths were nonetheless attributed to the Jews.
Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln was never actually canonised, making the moniker "Little Saint Hugh" a misnomer. He was for a short while acclaimed by local people as a saint but never officially recognised as one. Over time, the issue of the rush to sainthood was raised, and Hugh was never canonised, nor included in Catholic martyrology.
In the case of Dominguito del Val, and Andreas Oxner, and the Holy Child of La Guardia it is not clear that the alleged victim ever existed in the first place.