Gibbet

:See also Halifax gibbet, a kind of guillotine. style gibbet at Caxton Gibbet, in Cambridgeshire, England.]] A gibbet is a gallows-type structure from which the dead bodies of executed criminals were hung on public display to deter other existing or potential criminals. To gibbet a criminal is to display the criminal on a gibbet. This practice is also called "hanging in chains".

Display

hanging in chains]] inside]]

Gibbeting was common law punishment, which a judge could impose in addition to execution. This practice was regularised in England by the Murder Act 1752, which empowered judges to impose this for murder. It was most often used for traitors, murderers, highwaymen, pirates, and sheep-stealers, and was intended to discourage others from committing similar offences. The structures were therefore often placed next to public highways (frequently at crossroads) and waterways. There are many places named Gibbet Hill in England. One is between Coventry and Kenilworth in Warwickshire, and others are found at Frome, Somerset, near Haslemere in Surrey, and Mary Tavy in Devon.

Exhibiting a body could 'backfire' against a monarch, especially if he was unpopular. Henry of Montfort and Henry of Wylynton, enemies of Edward II and rebels, were drawn and hanged before being exhibited on a gibbet near Bristol. However, the people made relics of these bloody and mutilated remains and surrounded them with respect in violent protest. Even false miracles were organised at the spot where the bodies were hanging.

Although the intention was deterrence, the public response was complex. Samuel Pepys expressed disgust at the practice. There was Christian objection that persecution of criminals should end with their death. The sight and smell of decaying corpses were offensive, and regarded as "pestilential", so a threat to public health.

Pirates were sometimes executed by hanging on a gibbet erected close to the low-water mark by the sea or a tidal section of a river. Their bodies would be left dangling until they had been submerged by the tide three times. In London, 'Execution Dock' is located on the north bank of the River Thames in Wapping; after tidal immersion, particularly notorious criminals' bodies could be hung in cages a little further downstream at either Cuckold's Point or Blackwall Point, as a warning to other waterborne criminals of the possible consequences of their actions (such a fate befell Captain William Kidd in May 1701). There was objection that these displays offended foreign visitors and did not uphold the reputation of the law, though the scenes even became gruesome tourist attractions.

Variants

In some cases, the bodies would be left until their clothes rotted or even until the bodies were almost completely decomposed, after which the bones would be scattered.

In cases of drawing and quartering, the body of the criminal was cut into four or five portions, with each part often gibbeted in different places.

, Province of Perugia, Italy]] So that the public display might be prolonged, bodies were sometimes coated in tar and/or bound in chains. Sometimes, body-shaped iron cages were used to contain the decomposing corpses. For example, in March 1743 in the town of Rye, East Sussex, Allen Grebell was murdered by John Breads. Breads was imprisoned in the Ypres Tower and then hanged, after which his body was left to rot for more than 20 years in an iron cage on Gibbet Marsh. The cage and Breads' skull are still kept in the Town Hall.

Another example of the cage variation is the gibbet iron, on display at the Atwater Kent museum in Philadelphia, U.S. The cage, created in 1781, was intended to be used to display the body of convicted pirate Thomas Wilkinson so that sailors on passing ships might be warned of the consequences of piracy. As Wilkinson's planned execution never took place, the gibbet was never used.

An example of an iron cage used to string up bodies on a gibbet can still be seen in the Westgate Museum at Winchester.

Historical examples of gibbeting

Antiquity

Public crucifixion with prolonged display of the body after death can be seen as a form of gibbeting.

Old Testament (Torah) law forbids gibbeting beyond sundown of the day that the body is hung on the tree. (See Deuteronomy 21:22-23.)

United Kingdom

Oliver Cromwell was gibbeted after his death when monarchists disinterred his body during the restoration of the monarchy.

United States

Bird Island and Nix's Mate island in Boston Harbor were used for gibbeting pirates and sailors executed for crimes in Massachusetts during the Colonial era. Their bodies were left hanging as a warning to sailors coming into the harbor and approaching Boston.

Canada

Marie-Josephte Corriveau (1733-1763), better known as "la Corriveau", is one of the most popular figures in Québécois folklore. She lived in New France, and was sentenced to death by a British court martial for the murder of her second husband, was hanged for it and her body hanged in chains. Her story has become legendary in Quebec, and she is the subject of numerous books and plays.

Iran

In 838 Babak Khorramdin had his hands and feet cut off, and was then gibbeted alive whilst sewn into a cow's skin with the horns at ear level to gradually crush his head as it dried out.

Germany

Following his execution by hanging in 1738, the corpse of Jewish financier Joseph Süß Oppenheimer was gibbeted in a human-sized bird cage that hung outside of Stuttgart on the so-called Pragsattel (the public execution place at the time) for six years, until the inauguration of Karl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg, who permitted the hasty burial of his corpse at an unknown location.

Last recorded gibbetings

Afghanistan

The January 1921 issue of National Geographic Magazine contains a photograph of a gibbet cage in use in Afghanistan. Commentary included with the photograph indicates that the gibbet was a practice still in active use. Criminals sentenced to death were placed alive in the cage and remained there until some undefined time weeks or months after their death.

Australia

In 1837, five years after the practice had ceased in England, the body of John McKay was gibbeted on a tree near the spot where he had murdered Joseph Wilson near Perth, Tasmania. There was great outcry, but the body was not removed until an acquaintance of Wilson passed the spot, and, horrified by the spectacle of McKay's rotting corpse, pleaded with the authorities to remove it. The place where this occurred was just to the right (when traveling towards Launceston) of the Midlands Highway on the northern side of Perth, and is marked by a sign proclaiming 'Gibbet Hill'. Though the place is not visible from the present road, the tree upon which McKay was hanged still stands. It is the last case of gibbetting in a British colony.

United Kingdom

, a replica gibbet in Berkshire]] The Murder Act 1751 stipulated that "in no case whatsoever shall the body of any murderer be suffered to be buried"; the cadaver was either to be publicly dissected or left "hanging in chains". The body was soon removed by fellow miners and given a decent burial.

James Cook was a bookbinder convicted of the murder of his creditor Paas, a manufacturer of brass instruments, in Leicester. He was executed on Friday 10 August 1832 in front of Leicester prison. Afterwards: His body was to be displayed on a purpose-built gallows 33 ft high in Saffron Lane near the Aylestone Tollgate. According to The Newgate Calendar: In 1834, England outlawed gibbeting.

See also

Dule Tree

Pillory

References

pp. 266–9

Category:Execution methods Category:Death customs Category:Execution equipment Category:Capital punishment