Techniques for achieving conception by manipulating mammalian sperm, eggs and embryos have gained prominence especially over the last forty years, but experiments and debate go back to the late eighteenth century. This survey encompasses the fantasies and the firsts, including Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and Louise Brown’s birth, while recognizing the greater significance of everyday use and the associated institutions, professions, legal frameworks and ways of life. It explores how artificial fecondation or insemination became routine by the mid-twentieth century, in livestock and increasingly humans; charts the postwar rise of embryo transfer and in vitro fertilization (IVF), including the research programme of Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe; and reflects on the generalization of assisted reproduction since 1980, its reinforcement of the nuclear family and facilitation of new family forms and breaking down of the natural/artificial distinction. By grouping technologies and species, the chapter brings out general features, such as how taking fertilization apart has increased control and selection, with both artificial insemination and IVF serving as platforms for other techniques; explores exchange between infertility clinics and animal breeding, typically via research laboratories; and compares the manipulation of eggs and of sperm.