The guillotine is a device used for beheading, with a heavy frame, angled blade, and movable collar for the prisoner’s neck. France refined the guillotine and used it almost exclusively for executions until 1977. It was proposed by Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin for humane and efficient executions. Antoine Louis designed the functional guillotine, first used in 1792. Many famous members of the French nobility were executed during the Reign of Terror. Public executions continued in France until 1939.
The guillotine is a bladed device designed to carry out executions by beheading. The design of the device involves a tall, heavy frame from which a traditionally angled blade is suspended, with a movable collar at the bottom for the prisoner’s neck. Also, most guillotines have a basket to receive the head so it doesn’t bounce or roll after being severed. In use, the convict’s neck is inserted into the collar, which is closed so that the convict is locked in place. The executioner releases a rope or lever that drops the blade, severing the condemned man’s head and causing near instantaneous death.
The guillotine is famous for its use in France, and more specifically for the heavy wear and tear it saw during the French Revolution and Reign of Terror. Various forms of the guillotine have been used since the 14th century, with Ireland and Scotland using a guillotine-like device called the Scottish Maiden, which used a straight rather than an angled blade, and Italy and Switzerland employing similar tools in the 15th century. However, it was France that refined the guillotine, introducing the classic angled blade and using the device almost exclusively for executions until 1977, when the guillotine claimed its last victim. Four years later, the death penalty was outlawed in France.
The guillotine was proposed by Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, a member of the National Revolutionary Assembly, in the early 1790s, because he believed that a mechanical device for execution would be more humane and efficient than previous methods. Before the introduction of the guillotine, members of the nobility were beheaded with swords or axes, which were sometimes blunt and required several blows to carry out the execution. Peasants, on the other hand, were burned at the stake, broken at the wheel, or executed in some other inefficient and painful way. The National Assembly also deemed the use of a uniform device for executions more egalitarian, and the guillotine was adopted on March 20, 1792, and used almost exclusively until 1977. The only exception to execution by guillotine was for certain crimes against state security, punished by firing squad.
Academy of Surgeons member Antoine Louis is the man who first designed a functional guillotine, which was initially called the louison or louisette before the press adopted the guillotine as its official moniker. Louis made several changes to a basic design that had been around for hundreds of years: he added the bezel, the two-part circular collar used to hold the condemned man’s head in place, and the angled blade. The device of him was first used on April 25, 1792 to execute Nicolas Pelletier, a notorious highwayman.
Many famous members of the French nobility were executed by guillotine during the Reign of Terror, which lasted from June 1793 to July 1794, notably Marie Antoinette, Louis XVI and Maximilien Robespierre. It’s unclear how many people were executed by guillotine during the Reign of Terror: estimates range widely from 15,000 to 40,000. Most of these executions were carried out in public, and public executions continued in France until 1939.
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