The Caesarean operation was thought to have originated in Roman times. It is known that Caesar (the ruler at the time), had made a decree under Roman law that all women who were dying in childbirth should have their baby delivered by cutting open their belly. This was meant as an attempt to save the child and increase the low population at the time. Hence the word 'Caesarean' was derived. In the 1500's a French midwifery text referred to the operation as a 'section', making common the term 'Caesarean section'.
Caesarean operations were performed infrequently in the following centuries and were regarded as a 'last resort' to save a child if the woman was dying (or had just died) in labour. In the early 1900's the rate of Caesarean operations was about 1%. It has only been since the 1960's that improvements in medical technology have made performing a Caesarean safer and therefore more popular. In 1970 the rate of Caesareans was about 5%, but this statistic has escalated sharply since then, to about 20 to 30% in the new millennium.