Jump to content

Decapitation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Head on a pole)
For the military strategy, see Decapitation strike. For decapitation in the context of voting, see decapitation strategy.
"Decapitated" redirects here. For the band, see Decapitated (band).

Decapitation
The Beheading of Saint Paul. Painting by Enrique Simonet in 1887, Málaga Cathedral
CausesDeliberate (executions, murder or homicide, suicide); unintended (accidents)
PrognosisInvariably fatal
Beheadings in an illumination from Froissart's Chronicles from the beginning of the 15th century – the execution of Guillaume Sans and his secretary in Bordeaux on the orders of Thomas Felton
Perseus using the severed head of Medusa to turn King Polydectes to stone
Depiction of an Ethiopian emperor executing people, 18th century

Decapitation is the total separation of the head from the body. Such an injury is invariably fatal to humans and most other animals, since it deprives the brain of oxygenated blood by way of severing through the jugular vein and common carotid artery, while all other organs are deprived of the involuntary functions that are needed for the body to function. The term beheading refers to the act of deliberately decapitating a person, either as a means of murder or as an execution; it may be performed with an axe, sword, or knife, or by mechanical means such as a guillotine. An executioner who carries out executions by beheading is sometimes called a headsman.[1] Accidental decapitation can be the result of an explosion,[2] a car or industrial accident, improperly administered execution by hanging or other violent injury. The national laws of Saudi Arabia and Yemen[3] permit beheading. Under Sharia, which exclusively applies to Muslims, beheading is also a legal punishment in Zamfara State, Nigeria.[4] In practice, Saudi Arabia is the only country that continues to behead its offenders regularly as a punishment for capital crimes. Cases of decapitation by suicidal hanging,[5] suicide by train decapitation[6][7] and by guillotine[8] are known.

Less commonly, decapitation can also refer to the removal of the head from a body that is already dead. This might be done to take the head as a trophy, as a secondary stage of an execution by hanging, for public display, to make the deceased more difficult to identify, for cryonics, or for other, more esoteric reasons.[9][10]

Etymology

[edit]

The word decapitation has its roots in the Late Latin word decapitare. The meaning of the word decapitare can be discerned from its morphemes de- (down, from) + capit- (head).[11] The past participle of decapitare is decapitatus[12] which was used to create decapitatio, the noun form of decapitatus, in Medieval Latin, whence the French word décapitation was produced.[12]

History

[edit]
Odin finding Mímir's beheaded body – an episode of Norse mythology
Beheading – facsimile of a miniature on wood in the Cosmographia of Sebastian Münster (1488–1552), Basel, Switzerland, 1552
"The beheading of St. Barbara" by Giulio Quaglio the Younger (1721–1723)
Depiction of a public execution in Brueghel's The Triumph of Death, 1562–1563
Depiction of the public execution of pirates (namely Klein Henszlein and his crew) in Hamburg, Germany, 10 September 1573

Humans have practiced capital punishment by beheading for millennia. The Narmer Palette (c. 3000 BCE) shows the first known depiction of decapitated corpses. The terms "capital offence", "capital crime", "capital punishment", derive from the Latin caput, "head", referring to the punishment for serious offences involving the forfeiture of the head; i.e. death by beheading.[13]

Some cultures, such as ancient Rome and Greece, regarded decapitation as the most honorable form of death.[14] In the Middle Ages, many European nations continued to reserve the method only for nobles and royalty.[15] In France, the French Revolution made it the only legal method of execution for all criminals regardless of class, one of the period's many symbolic changes.[14]

Others have regarded beheading as dishonorable and contemptuous, such as the Japanese troops who beheaded prisoners during World War II.[14] In recent times, it has become associated with terrorism.[14]

If a headsman's axe or sword is sharp and his aim is precise, decapitation is quick and thought to be a relatively painless form of death. If the instrument is blunt or the executioner is clumsy, repeated strokes might be required to sever the head, resulting in a prolonged and more painful death. Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex,[16] and Mary, Queen of Scots[17] required three strikes at their respective executions. The same could be said for the execution of Johann Friedrich Struensee, favorite of the Danish queen Caroline Matilda of Great Britain. Margaret Pole, 8th Countess of Salisbury, is said to have required up to 10 strokes before decapitation was achieved.[18] This particular story may, however, be apocryphal, as highly divergent accounts exist. Historian and philosopher David Hume, for example, relates the following about her death:[19]

She refused to lay her head on the block, or submit to a sentence where she had received no trial. She told the executioner, that if he would have her head, he must win it the best way he could: and thus, shaking her venerable grey locks, she ran about the scaffold; and the executioner followed her with his axe, aiming many fruitless blows at her neck before he was able to give the fatal stroke.

The Beheading of Cosmas and Damian, by Fra Angelico

To ensure that the blow would be fatal, executioners' swords usually were blade-heavy two-handed swords. Likewise, if an axe was used, it almost invariably was wielded with both hands.

Physiological aspects

[edit]

Physiology of death by decapitation

[edit]

Decapitation is quickly fatal to humans and most animals. Unconsciousness occurs within seconds without circulating oxygenated blood (brain ischemia).[20] Cell death and irreversible brain damage occurs after 3–6 minutes with no oxygen, due to excitotoxicity. Some anecdotes suggest more extended persistence of human consciousness after decapitation,[21] but most doctors consider this unlikely and consider such accounts to be misapprehensions of reflexive twitching rather than deliberate movement, since deprivation of oxygen must cause nearly immediate coma and death ("[Consciousness is] probably lost within 2–3 seconds, due to a rapid fall of intracranial perfusion of blood").[22]

A laboratory study testing for humane methods of euthanasia in awake animals used EEG monitoring to measure the time duration following decapitation for rats to become fully unconscious, unable to perceive distress and pain. It was estimated that this point was reached within 3–4 seconds, correlating closely with results found in other studies on rodents (2.7 seconds, and 3–6 seconds).[23][24][25] The same study also suggested that the massive wave which can be recorded by EEG monitoring approximately one minute after decapitation ultimately reflects brain death. Other studies indicate that electrical activity in the brain has been demonstrated to persist for 13 to 14 seconds following decapitation (although it is disputed as to whether such activity implies that pain is perceived),[26] and a 2010 study reported that decapitation of rats generated responses in EEG indices over a period of 10 seconds that have been linked to nociception across a number of different species of animals, including rats.[27]

Some animals (such as cockroaches) can survive decapitation and die not because of the loss of the head directly, but rather because of starvation.[28] A number of other animals, including snakes, and turtles, have also been known to survive for some time after being decapitated, as they have slower metabolisms and their nervous systems can continue to function at some capacity for a limited time even after connection to the brain is lost, responding to any nearby stimulus.[29][30] In addition, the bodies of chickens and turtles may continue to move temporarily after decapitation.[31]

Although head transplantation by the reattachment of blood vessels has seen some very limited success in animals,[32] a fully functional reattachment of a severed human head (including repair of the spinal cord, muscles, and other critically important tissues) is not likely.

Technology

[edit]

Guillotine

[edit]
Aristocratic heads on pikes – a cartoon from the French Revolution

Early versions of the guillotine included the Halifax Gibbet, which was used in Halifax, England, from 1286 until the 17th century, and the "Maiden", employed in Edinburgh from the 16th through the 18th centuries.

The modern form of the guillotine was invented shortly before the French Revolution with the aim of creating a quick and painless method of execution requiring little skill on the part of the operator. Decapitation by guillotine became a common mechanically assisted form of execution.

The French observed a strict code of etiquette surrounding such executions. For example, a man named Legros, one of the assistants at the execution of Charlotte Corday, was imprisoned for three months and dismissed for slapping the face of the victim after the blade had fallen in order to see whether any flicker of life remained.[33] The guillotine was used in France during the French Revolution and remained the normal judicial method in both peacetime and wartime into the 1970s, although the firing squad was used in certain cases. France abolished the death penalty in 1981.

The guillotine was also used in Algeria before the French relinquished control of it, as shown in Gillo Pontecorvo's film The Battle of Algiers.

Fallbeil

[edit]
French anarchist Auguste Vaillant just before being guillotined in 1894

Many German states had used a guillotine-like device known as a Fallbeil ("falling axe") since the 17th and 18th centuries, and decapitation by guillotine was the usual means of execution in Germany until the abolition of the death penalty in West Germany in 1949. It was last used in communist East Germany in 1966.

In Nazi Germany, the Fallbeil was reserved for common criminals and people convicted of political crimes, including treason. Members of the White Rose resistance movement, a group of students in Munich that included siblings Sophie and Hans Scholl, were executed by decapitation.

Contrary to popular myth, executions were generally not conducted face-up, and chief executioner Johann Reichhart was insistent on maintaining "professional" protocol throughout the era, having administered the death penalty during the earlier Weimar Republic. Nonetheless, it is estimated that some 16,500 persons were guillotined in Germany and Austria between 1933 and 1945, a number that includes resistance fighters both within Germany itself and in countries occupied by Nazi forces. As these resistance fighters were not part of any regular army, they were considered common criminals and were in many cases transported to Germany for execution. Decapitation was considered a "dishonorable" death, in contrast to execution by firing squad.[citation needed]

A fresco by Ambrogio Lorenzetti

Historical practices by nation

[edit]

Africa

[edit]

Congo

[edit]

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the conflict and ethnic massacre between local army and Kamuina Nsapu rebels has caused several deaths and atrocities such as rape and mutilation. One of them is decapitation, both a fearsome way to intimidate victims as well as an act that may include ritualistic elements. According to a UN report from Congolese refugees, they believed the Bana Mura and Kamuina Nsapu militias have "magical powers" as a result of drinking the blood of decapitated victims, making them invincible.[34]

Besides the massive decapitations (like the beheading of 40 members of the State Police), a globally notorious case happened in March 2017 to Swedish politician Zaida Catalán and American UN expert Michael Sharp, who were kidnapped and executed during a mission near the village of Ngombe in Kasaï Province. The UN was reportedly horrified when video footage of the executions surfaced in April that same year, where some grisly details led to assume ritual components of the beheading: the perpetrators first cut the hair of both victims, and then one of them beheaded Catalán only, because it would "increase his power",[35] which may be linked to the fact that Congolese militias are particularly brutal in their acts of violence toward women and children.[36]

In the trial that followed investigations after the bodies were discovered, and according to a testimony of a primary school teacher from Bunkonde, near the village of Moyo Musuila where the executions took place, he witnessed a teenage militant carrying the young woman's head,[37] but despite the efforts of the investigation, the head was never found. According to a report published on 29 May 2019, the Monusco peacekeeping military mission led by Colonel Luis Mangini, in the search for the missing remains, arrived to a ritual place in Moyo Musila where "parts of bodies, hands and heads" were cut and used for rituals,[38] where they lost track of the victim's head.

Asia

[edit]

Azerbaijan

[edit]

During the 2016 Armenian–Azerbaijani clashes, Yazidi-Armenian serviceman Kyaram Sloyan was decapitated by Azerbaijani servicemen.[39][40][41]

Several reports of decapitation, along with other types of mutilation of Armenian POWs by Azerbaijani soldiers, emerged in 2020 during the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War.[42]

China

[edit]
Ranked beheaded bodies on the ground, in Caishikou, Beijing, China, 1905

In traditional China, decapitation was considered a more severe form of punishment than strangulation, although strangulation caused more prolonged suffering. This was because in Confucian tradition, a person's body was a gift from their parents, and so it was therefore disrespectful to their ancestors to return their bodies to the grave dismembered. The Chinese, however, had other punishments, such as dismembering the body into multiple pieces (similar to the English quartering). In addition, there was also a practice of cutting the body at the waist, which was a common method of execution before being abolished in the early Qing dynasty due to the lingering death it caused. In some tales, people did not die immediately after decapitation.[43][44][45][46]

India

[edit]

The British officer John Masters recorded in his autobiography that Pathans in British India during the Anglo-Afghan Wars would behead enemy soldiers who were captured, such as British and Sikh soldiers.[47][48][49][50]

Japan

[edit]
Japanese illustration depicting the beheading of Chinese captives. First Sino-Japanese War
Sgt. Leonard Siffleet, an Australian POW captured in New Guinea, about to be beheaded by a Japanese soldier with a shin guntō sword, 1943

In Japan, decapitation was a common punishment, sometimes for minor offences. Samurai were often allowed to decapitate soldiers who had fled from battle, as it was considered cowardly. Decapitation was historically performed as the second step in seppuku (ritual suicide by disembowelment). After the victim had sliced his own abdomen open, another warrior would strike his head off from behind with a katana to hasten death and to reduce the suffering. The blow was expected to be precise enough to leave intact a small strip of skin at the front of the neck—to spare invited and honored guests the indelicacy of witnessing a severed head rolling about, or towards them; such an occurrence would have been considered inelegant and in bad taste. The sword was expected to be used upon the slightest sign that the practitioner might yield to pain and cry out—avoiding dishonor to him and to all partaking in the privilege of observing an honorable demise. As skill was involved, only the most trusted warrior was honored by taking part. In the late Sengoku period, decapitation was performed as soon as the person chosen to carry out seppuku had made the slightest wound to his abdomen.

Decapitation (without seppuku) was also considered a very severe and degrading form of punishment. One of the most brutal decapitations was that of Sugitani Zenjubō [ja] (杉谷善住坊), who attempted to assassinate Oda Nobunaga, a prominent daimyō, in 1570.[disputed – discuss] After being caught, Zenjubō was buried alive in the ground with only his head out, and the head was slowly sawn off with a bamboo saw by passers-by for several days (punishment by sawing; [[[nokogiribiki]] [ja]] Error: {{Lang}}: Non-latn text/Latn script subtag mismatch (help) (鋸挽き).[51] These unusual punishments were abolished in the early Meiji era. A similar scene is described in the last page of James Clavell's book Shōgun[dubious – discuss].

Korea

[edit]

Historically, decapitation had been the most common method of execution in Korea, until it was replaced by hanging in 1896. Professional executioners were called mangnani (망나니) and they were volunteered from death rows.[citation needed]

Thailand

[edit]

Historically, decapitation had been the main method of execution in Thailand, until it was replaced by shooting in 1934.

Vietnam

[edit]
Illustration of the beheading of a prisoner of the Nguyễn dynasty in the book Mechanics and Crafts of the People of Annam
Guillotine under Ngô Đình Diệm, South Vietnam

Execution by beheading was one of the most common forms of execution in Vietnam under the feudal system. This form of execution still existed in the South Vietnam regime until 1962.

Europe

[edit]

Bosnia and Herzegovina

[edit]

During the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992–1995) there were a number of ritual beheadings of Serbs and Croats who were taken as prisoners of war by mujahideen members of the Bosnian Army. At least one case is documented and proven in court by the ICTY where mujahedin, members of 3rd Corps of Army BiH, beheaded Bosnian Serb Dragan Popović.[52][53]

Britain

[edit]
A contemporary German print depicting the beheading of King Charles I[54]

In British history, beheading was typically used for noblemen, while commoners would be hanged; eventually, hanging was adopted as the standard means of non-military executions. The last actual execution by beheading was of Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat on 9 April 1747, while a number of convicts were beheaded posthumously up to the early 19th century.[55] (Typically traitors were sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered, a method which had already been discontinued.) Beheading was degraded to a secondary means of execution, including for treason, with the abolition of drawing and quartering in 1870 and finally abolished by the Statute Law (Repeals) Act 1973.[56][57] One of the most notable executions by decapitation in Britain was that of King Charles I of England, who was beheaded outside the Banqueting House in Whitehall in 1649, after being captured by parliamentarians during the English Civil War and tried for treason.[58][59]

In England, a bearded axe was used for beheading, with the blade's edge extending downwards from the tip of the shaft.[citation needed]

Celts

[edit]
See also: Celtic headhunting

The Celts of western Europe long pursued a "cult of the severed head", as evidenced by both Classical literary descriptions and archaeological contexts.[60] This cult played a central role in their temples and religious practices and earned them a reputation as head hunters among the Mediterranean peoples. Diodorus Siculus, in his 1st-century Historical Library (5.29.4) wrote the following about Celtic head-hunting:

They cut off the heads of enemies slain in battle and attach them to the necks of their horses. The blood-stained spoils they hand over to their attendants and striking up a paean and singing a song of victory; and they nail up these first fruits upon their houses, just as do those who lay low wild animals in certain kinds of hunting. They embalm in cedar oil the heads of the most distinguished enemies, and preserve them carefully in a chest, and display them with pride to strangers, saying that for this head one of their ancestors, or his father, or the man himself, refused the offer of a large sum of money. They say that some of them boast that they refused the weight of the head in gold.

Both the Greeks and Romans found the Celtic decapitation practices shocking and the latter put an end to them when Celtic regions came under their control.

The Corleck Head, Irish, 1st or 2nd century AD

According to Paul Jacobsthal, "Amongst the Celts the human head was venerated above all else, since the head was to the Celt the soul, centre of the emotions as well as of life itself, a symbol of divinity and of the powers of the other-world."[61] Arguments for a Celtic cult of the severed head include the many sculptured representations of severed heads in La Tène carvings, and the surviving Celtic mythology, which is full of stories of the severed heads of heroes and the saints who carry their own severed heads, right down to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, where the Green Knight picks up his own severed head after Gawain has struck it off in a beheading game, just as Saint Denis carried his head to the top of Montmartre.[62][63]

A further example of this regeneration after beheading lies in the tales of Connemara's Saint Féchín, who after being beheaded by Vikings carried his head to the Holy Well on Omey Island and on dipping it into the well placed it back upon his neck and was restored to full health.[64]

Classical antiquity

[edit]
Beheading of John the Baptist by Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld, 1860

Pothinus matched Mark Antony in crime:
They slew the noblest Romans of their time.
The helpless victims they decapitated,
An act of infamy with shame related.
One head was Pompey's, who brought triumphs home,
The other Cicero's, the voice of Rome.

— Martial, Epigram I:60 (Trans. by Garry Wills)

The ancient Greeks and Romans regarded decapitation as a comparatively honorable form of execution for criminals. The traditional procedure, however, included first being tied to a stake and whipped with rods. Axes were used by the Romans, and later swords, which were considered a more honorable instrument of death. Those who could verify that they were Roman citizens were to be beheaded, rather than undergoing crucifixion. In the Roman Republic of the early 1st century BC, it became the tradition for the severed heads of public enemies—such as the political opponents of Marius and Sulla—to be publicly displayed on the Rostra in the Forum Romanum after execution. Perhaps the most famous beheading was that of Cicero who, on instructions from Mark Antony, had his hands (which had penned the Philippicae against Antony) and his head cut off and nailed up for display in this manner.

France

[edit]

In France, until the abolition of capital punishment in 1981, the main method of execution had been by beheading by means of the guillotine. Other than a small number of military cases in which a firing squad was used (including that of Jean Bastien-Thiry), the guillotine was the only legal method of execution from 1791, when it was introduced by the Legislative Assembly during the last days of the kingdom French Revolution, until 1981. Before the revolution, beheading had typically been reserved for noblemen and carried out manually. In 1981, President François Mitterrand abolished capital punishment and issued commutations for those whose sentences had not been carried out.

The first person executed by the guillotine in France was highwayman Nicolas Jacques Pelletier in April 1792. The last execution was of murderer Hamida Djandoubi, in Marseille, in 1977.[65] Throughout its extensive overseas colonies and dependencies, the device was also used, including on St Pierre in 1889 and on Martinique as late as 1965.[66]

Germany

[edit]
  • Fritz Haarmann, a serial killer from Hannover who was sentenced to death for killing 27 young men, was decapitated in April 1925. He was nicknamed "The Butcher from Hannover" and was rumored to have sold his victims' flesh to his neighbor's restaurant.
  • In July 1931, notorious serial killer Peter Kürten, known as "The Vampire of Düsseldorf", was executed on the guillotine in Cologne.
  • On 1 August 1933, in Altona, Bruno Tesch and three others were beheaded. These were the first executions in Nazi Germany. The executions concerned the Altona Bloody Sunday (Altonaer Blutsonntag) riot, an SA march on 17 July 1932 that turned violent and led to 18 people being shot dead.[67][68]
  • Marinus van der Lubbe by guillotine in 1934 after a show trial in which he was found guilty of starting the Reichstag fire.
  • In February 1935 Benita von Falkenhayn and Renate von Natzmer were beheaded with the axe and block in Berlin for espionage for Poland. Axe beheading was the only method of execution in Berlin until 1938, when it was decreed that all civil executions would henceforth be carried out by guillotine. However, the practice was continued in rare cases such as that of Olga Bancic and Werner Seelenbinder in 1944. Beheading by guillotine survived in West Germany until 1949 and in East Germany until 1966.
  • A group of three Catholic clergymen, Johannes Prassek, Eduard Müller and Hermann Lange, and an Evangelical Lutheran pastor, Karl Friedrich Stellbrink, were arrested following the bombing of Lübeck, tried by the People's Court in 1943 and sentenced to death by decapitation; all were beheaded on 10 November 1943, in the Hamburg prison at Holstenglacis. Stellbrink had explained the raid next morning in his Palm Sunday sermon as a "trial by ordeal", which the Nazi authorities interpreted to be an attack on their system of government and as such undermined morale and aided the enemy.
  • In October 1944, Werner Seelenbinder was executed by manual beheading, the last legal use of the method (other than by guillotine) in both Europe and the rest of the Western world. Earlier the same year, Olga Bancic had been executed by the same means.
  • In February 1943, American academic Mildred Harnack and the university students Hans Scholl, Sophie Scholl, and Christoph Probst of the White Rose protest movement, were all beheaded by the Nazi State. Four other members of the White Rose, an anti-Nazi group, were also executed by the People's Court later that same year. The anti-Nazi Helmuth Hübener was also decapitated by People's Court order.[69]
  • In 1966, former Auschwitz doctor Horst Fischer was executed by the German Democratic Republic by guillotine, the last executed by this method outside France. Beheading was subsequently replaced by shooting in the neck.[70]

Nordic countries

[edit]

In Nordic countries, decapitation was the usual means of carrying out capital punishment. Noblemen were beheaded with a sword, and commoners with an axe. The last executions by decapitation in Finland in 1825, Norway in 1876, Faroe Islands in 1609, and in Iceland in 1830 were carried out with axes. The same was the case in Denmark in 1892. Sweden continued the practice for a few decades, executing its second to last criminal—mass murderer Johan Filip Nordlund—by axe in 1900. It was replaced by the guillotine, which was used for the first and only time on Johan Alfred Ander in 1910.

Finland's official beheading axe resides today at the Museum of Crime in Vantaa. It is a broad-bladed two-handed axe. It was last used when murderer Tahvo Putkonen was executed in 1825, the last execution in peacetime in Finland.[71]

Spain

[edit]
The beheading of the 15th Century Castilian Royal favorite, Don Álvaro de Luna. Painting by José María Rodríguez de Losada (1826–1896).

In Spain executions were carried out by various methods including strangulation by the garrotte. In the 16th and 17th centuries, noblemen were sometimes executed by means of beheading. Examples include Anthony van Stralen, Lord of Merksem, Lamoral, Count of Egmont and Philip de Montmorency, Count of Horn. They were tied to a chair on a scaffold. The executioner used a knife to cut the head from the body. It was considered to be a more honourable death if the executioner started with cutting the throat.[72]

Middle East

[edit]

Iran

[edit]

Iran, since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, has alleged it uses beheading as one of the methods of punishment.[73][74]

Iraq

[edit]
Assyrian military campaign in southern Mesopotamia, beheaded enemies, 7th century BC, from Nineveh, Iraq. The British Museum.

Though not officially sanctioned, legal beheadings were carried out against at least 50 prostitutes and pimps under Saddam Hussein as late as 2000.[75]

Beheadings have emerged as another terror tactic especially in Iraq since 2003.[76] Civilians have borne the brunt of the beheadings, although U.S. and Iraqi military personnel have also been targeted. After kidnapping the victim, the kidnappers typically make some sort of demand of the government of the hostage's nation and give a time limit for the demand to be carried out, often 72 hours. Beheading is often threatened if the government fails to heed the wishes of the hostage takers. Sometimes, the beheadings are videotaped and made available on the Internet. One of the most publicized of such executions was that of Nick Berg.[77]

Judicial execution is practiced in Iraq, but is generally carried out by hanging.

Saudi Arabia

[edit]
See also: Capital punishment in Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia has a criminal justice system based on Shari'ah law reflecting a particular state-sanctioned interpretation of Islam. Crimes such as rape, murder, apostasy, and sorcery[78] are punishable by beheading.[79] It is usually carried out publicly by beheading with a sword.

A public beheading will typically take place around 9am. The convicted person is walked into the square and kneels in front of the executioner. The executioner uses a sword to remove the condemned person's head from his or her body at the neck with a single strike.[80] After the convicted person is pronounced dead, a police official announces the crimes committed by the beheaded alleged criminal and the process is complete. The official might announce the same before the actual execution. This is the most common method of execution in Saudi Arabia.[81]

According to Amnesty International, at least 79 people were executed in Saudi Arabia in 2013.[82] Foreigners are not exempt, accounting for "almost half" of executions in 2013.[82]

In 2015 Ashraf Fayadh (born 1980), a Saudi Arabian poet, was sentenced to be beheaded, but his sentence was later reduced to eight years in prison and 800 lashes, for apostasy.

Syria

[edit]

The Syrian government employs hanging as its method of capital punishment. However, the terrorist organisation known as the Islamic State, which controlled territory in much of eastern Syria, had regularly carried out beheadings of people.[83] Syrian rebels attempting to overthrow the Syrian government have been implicated in beheadings too.[84][85][86]

North America

[edit]

Mexico

[edit]
Panel showing ballplayer being beheaded, Classic Veracruz culture, Mexico

Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, Ignacio Allende, José Mariano Jiménez and Juan Aldama were tried for treason, executed by firing squad and beheaded during the Mexican independence in 1811. Their heads were on display on the four corners of the Alhóndiga de Granaditas, in Guanajuato.

During the Mexican Drug War, some Mexican drug cartels turned to decapitation and beheading of rival cartel members as a method of intimidation.[87] This trend of beheading and publicly displaying the decapitated bodies was started by the Los Zetas, a criminal group composed by former Mexican special forces operators, trained in the infamous US Army School of the Americas, in torture techniques and psychological warfare.[88][89][90][91][92][93]

United States

[edit]

The United States government has never employed beheading as a legal method of execution. However, beheading has sometimes been used in mutilations of the dead, particularly of black people like Nat Turner, who led a rebellion against slavery. When caught, he was publicly hanged, flayed, and beheaded. This was a technique used by many enslavers to discourage the "frequent bloody uprisings" that were carried out by "kidnapped Africans". While bodily dismemberment of various kinds was employed to instill terror, Dr. Erasmus D. Fenner noted postmortem decapitation was particularly effective.[94]

During the Vietnam War, as a terror tactic, "some American troops hacked the heads off... dead [Vietnamese] and mounted them on pikes or poles".[95] Correspondent Michael Herr noted "thousands" of photo-albums made by US soldiers "all seemed to contain the same pictures": "the severed head shot, the head often resting on the chest of the dead man or being held up by a smiling Marine, or a lot of the heads, arranged in a row, with a burning cigarette in each of the mouths, the eyes open". Some of the victims were "very young".[96]

General George Patton IV, son of the famous WWII general George S. Patton, was known for keeping "macabre souvenirs", such as "a Vietnamese skull that sat on his desk." Other Americans "hacked the heads off Vietnamese to keep, trade, or exchange for prizes offered by commanders."[97]

Although the Utah Territory permitted a person sentenced to death to choose beheading as a means of execution, no person chose that option, and it was dropped when Utah became a state.[98]

Notable people who have been beheaded

[edit]
Main article: List of people who were beheaded

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Definition of HEADSMAN". Archived from the original on 29 July 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  2. ^ "Blows Head Off with Dynamite?". The Rhinelander Daily News. 2 April 1937. p. 7. Archived from the original on 8 October 2014. Retrieved 29 September 2014 – via Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  3. ^ "Republican Decree – By Law No. [13] For 1994 Concerning the Criminal Procedures" (PDF). 12 October 1994. Archived (PDF) from the original on 21 May 2024. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
  4. ^ "Sharia Criminal Procedure Code Law 2005, No. 6 of 2005" (PDF). 23 November 2005. Archived (PDF) from the original on 13 October 2023. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
  5. ^ Tracqui, A.; Fonmartin, K.; Géraut, A.; Pennera, D.; Doray, S.; Ludes, B. (1 December 1998). "Suicidal hanging resulting in complete decapitation: a case report". International Journal of Legal Medicine. 112 (1): 55–57. doi:10.1007/s004140050199. ISSN 1437-1596. PMID 9932744. S2CID 7854416. Archived from the original on 20 August 2023. Retrieved 20 August 2023.
  6. ^ Dinkel, Andreas; Baumert, Jens; Erazo, Natalia; Ladwig, Karl-Heinz (January 2011). "Jumping, lying, wandering: Analysis of suicidal behaviour patterns in 1,004 suicidal acts on the German railway net". Journal of Psychiatric Research. 45 (1): 121–125. doi:10.1016/j.jpsychires.2010.05.005. PMID 20541771.
  7. ^ De Giorgio, Fabio; Polacco, Matteo; Pascali, Vincenzo L.; Oliva, Antonio (October 2006). "Death Due to Railway-Related Suicidal Decapitation". Medicine, Science and the Law. 46 (4): 347–348. doi:10.1258/rsmmsl.46.4.347. ISSN 0025-8024. PMID 17191639. S2CID 41916384. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 20 August 2023.
  8. ^ "Guillotine death was suicide". BBC News. 24 April 2003. Archived from the original on 27 September 2008. Retrieved 26 September 2008.
  9. ^ Francis Larson. Severed: a history of heads lost and heads found Liveright, 2014.
  10. ^ Fabian, Ann (1 December 2014). "Losing our Heads (review of Larson's "Severed" Chronicle of Higher Education". Archived from the original on 28 July 2017. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  11. ^ Dunmore, Charles; Fleischer, Rita (2008). Studies in Etymology (Second ed.). Focus. ISBN 9781585100125.
  12. ^ a b "Decapitation". Online Etymology Dictionary. Archived from the original on 28 July 2017. Retrieved 19 July 2017.
  13. ^ Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, edited by Noah Porter, published by G & C. Merriam Co., 1913
  14. ^ a b c d Roberson, Cliff; Das, Dilip K. (2008). An Introduction to Comparative Legal Models of Criminal Justice. CRC Press. p. 172. ISBN 9781420065930. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  15. ^ Giovénal, Carine; Corbellari, Alain (2020). "42 | 2020 Le chief tranché". Babel (in French) (42). doi:10.4000/babel.11036. Archived from the original on 26 May 2021. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
  16. ^ Smollett, T. (1758). A Complete History of England, from the Descent of Julius Caesar. Vol. 4. London. p. 488. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 16 October 2020.
  17. ^ Cheetham, J.K. (2000). On the Trail of Mary Queen of Scots. Glasgow. p. 161. ISBN 9780946487509. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 23 March 2016.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  18. ^ The Complete Peerage. Vol. XII part II. p. 393.
  19. ^ Hume, David (1792). The history of the reign of Henry the eighth. London. p. 151. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 16 October 2020.
  20. ^ Turner, Matthew D. (2023). "The Most Gentle of Lethal Methods: The Question of Retained Consciousness Following Decapitation". Cureus. 15 (1): e33830. doi:10.7759/cureus.33830. PMC 9930870. PMID 36819446.
  21. ^ Gabriel Beaurieux, writing in 1905, quoted in Kershaw, Alister (1958). A History of the Guillotine. John Calder. ISBN 9781566191531., cited by "Losing One's Head: A Frustrating Search for the 'Truth' about Decapitation". The Chirurgeon's Apprentice. Archived from the original on 9 April 2014. Retrieved 8 April 2014.
  22. ^ Hillman, Harold (27 October 1983). "An Unnatural Way to Die". New Scientist: 276–278. Cited in Shanna Freeman (17 September 2008). "Top 10 Myths About the Brain". How Stuff Works. p. 5: Your Brain Stays Active After You Get Decapitated. Archived from the original on 6 April 2014. Retrieved 8 April 2014.
  23. ^ van Rijn, Clementina M. (27 January 2011). "Decapitation in Rats: Latency to Unconsciousness and the 'Wave of Death'". PLOS ONE. 6 (1): e16514. Bibcode:2011PLoSO...616514R. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0016514. PMC 3029360. PMID 21304584.
  24. ^ Derr, Robert F. (29 August 1991). "Pain perception in decapitated rat brain". Life Sciences. 49 (19): 1399–1402. doi:10.1016/0024-3205(91)90391-n. PMID 1943446.
  25. ^ Holson, R. Robert (6 January 1992). "Euthanasia by decapitation: Evidence that this technique produces prompt, painless unconsciousness in laboratory rodents". Neurotoxicology and Teratology. 14 (4): 253–257. Bibcode:1992NTxT...14..253H. doi:10.1016/0892-0362(92)90004-t. PMID 1522830.
  26. ^ Hawkins, Penny (23 August 2016). "A Good Death? Report of the Second Newcastle Meeting on Laboratory Animal Euthanasia". Animals. 6 (50): 50. doi:10.3390/ani6090050. PMC 5035945. PMID 27563926.
  27. ^ Kongara, Kavitha (January 2014). "Electroencephalographic evaluation of decapitation of the anesthetized rat". Laboratory Animals. 48 (1): 15–19. doi:10.1177/0023677213502016. PMID 24367032. S2CID 24006386. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2019.
  28. ^ Choi, Charles. "Fact or Fiction?: A Cockroach Can Live without Its Head". Scientific American. Archived from the original on 27 December 2013. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  29. ^ Leahy, Stephen (7 June 2018). "Decapitated Snake Head Nearly Kills Man – Here's How". National Geographic. Archived from the original on 7 June 2018. Retrieved 7 August 2018.
  30. ^ "AL man battles headless rattlesnake". WSFA 12 News. 7 June 2018. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 7 August 2018.
  31. ^ Sjøgren, Kristian (13 February 2014). "Why do headless chickens run?". ScienceNordic. Archived from the original on 7 August 2018. Retrieved 7 August 2018.
  32. ^ Roach, Mary (2004). Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. W. W. Norton & Company. p. 208. ISBN 978-0-393-32482-2.
  33. ^ Mignet, François, History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, (1824).
  34. ^ Our Foreign Staff (4 August 2017). "Army of 'bewitched' children involved in Congo massacres as UN reports hundreds of deaths". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 11 January 2022.
  35. ^ "Meurtre de deux experts de l'ONU: la RDC présente une vidéo" [Murder of two UN experts: the DRC presents a video]. Lalibre.be (in French). Archived from the original on 6 August 2017. Retrieved 5 August 2017.
  36. ^ "UN Experts conclude crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in Kasai, warn against risk of new wave of ethnic violence". Ohchr.org. Archived from the original on 13 July 2018. Retrieved 13 July 2018.
  37. ^ "In English Aftonbladet reveals new information about the murders of Zaida Catalán and Michael Sharp". Aftonbladet. 7 October 2017. Archived from the original on 28 September 2020. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  38. ^ "How Uruguayan Peacekeepers Found the Two Dead UN Experts in Congo in 2017". 29 May 2019. Archived from the original on 11 October 2023. Retrieved 30 August 2019.
  39. ^ "Armenian Soldier Reburied". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Armenian Service. 11 April 2016. Archived from the original on 14 April 2016. Retrieved 6 July 2022.
  40. ^ Beliakov, Dmitry; Franchetti, Mark (10 April 2016). "Former Russian states on brink of renewing war". The Sunday Times. Archived from the original on 19 April 2016.
  41. ^ Kerkonian, Karnig (19 May 2016). "Illinois voters support Senator Kirk's call for pro-peace measures in Nagorno-Karabakh". The Hill. Archived from the original on 6 July 2022. Retrieved 6 July 2022.
  42. ^ "Azerbaijan: Armenian Prisoners of War Badly Mistreated". Human Rights Watch. 2 December 2020. Archived from the original on 23 February 2023. Retrieved 9 December 2020.
  43. ^ "原來斬頭係唔會即刻死既(仲識講野)中國有好多斬頭案例!!". Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  44. ^ ""无头人"挑战传统医学 人类还有个"腹脑"?". Archived from the original on 3 August 2012. Retrieved 21 July 2019.
  45. ^ "福州晚報". Archived from the original on 19 October 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  46. ^ "换人头". Archived from the original on 20 June 2009. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  47. ^ Masters, John (1956). Bugles and a tiger: a volume of autobiography. Viking Press. p. 190. ISBN 9780670194506. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  48. ^ Barthorp, Michael; Anderson, Douglas N. (1996). The Frontier Ablaze: The North-west Frontier Rising, 1897–98. Windrow & Greene. p. 12. ISBN 978-1-85915-023-8. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 23 March 2016.
  49. ^ Clay, John (1992). John Masters: a regimented life. University of Michigan: Michael Joseph. p. 62. ISBN 978-0-7181-2945-3. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  50. ^ Masters, John (2002). Bugles and a Tiger. Cassell Military. p. 190. ISBN 978-0-304-36156-4.
  51. ^ "善住坊とは". Kotobank.jp. Archived from the original on 21 February 2022. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
  52. ^ "UN – TRIBUNAL CONVICTS ENVER HADZIHASANOVIC AND AMIR KUBURA Press Release, March 2006". UN.org. United Nations. Archived from the original on 8 May 2009. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
  53. ^ "Third Amended Indictment". Archived from the original on 5 August 2009. Retrieved 13 October 2006.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  54. ^ "The Execution of King Charles I". National Portrait Gallery. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 2 March 2019.
  55. ^ Fraser, Sarah (2012). The Last Highlander. p. 9.
  56. ^ Kenny, C. (1936). Outlines of Criminal Law (15th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 323.
  57. ^ The Chronological Table of the Statutes, 1235–2010. The Stationery Office. 2011. ISBN 978-0-11-840509-6. Part II. p. 1243, read with pages viii and x of Part I.
  58. ^ Gheeraert-Graffeuille, Claire (2011), "The Tragedy of Regicide in Interregnum and Restoration Histories of the English Civil Wars", Études Épistémè, 20 (20), doi:10.4000/episteme.430
  59. ^ Holmes, Clive (2010), "The Trial and Execution of Charles I", The Historical Journal, 53 (2): 289–316, doi:10.1017/S0018246X10000026, S2CID 159524099
  60. ^ Cunliffe, Barry (2010). Druids: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. pp. 71–72.
  61. ^ Paul Jacobsthal Early Celtic Art
  62. ^ Wilhelm, James J. "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight." The Romance of Arthur. Ed. Wilhelm, James J. New York: Garland Publishing, 1994. 399–465.
  63. ^ Pirlo, Paolo O. (1997). "St. Denis". My First Book of Saints. Sons of Holy Mary Immaculate – Quality Catholic Publications. pp. 238–239. ISBN 971-91595-4-5.
  64. ^ Charles-Edwards, Early Christian Ireland, p. 467 n. 82.
  65. ^ "Il y a 30 ans, avait lieu la dernière exécution" [Thirty years ago, the last execution took place], Le Nouvel Observateur (in French), 10 September 2007, archived from the original on 27 February 2008, retrieved 28 March 2014 (Google translation)
  66. ^ "Photographic image of newspaper article" (JPG). Grandcolombier.com. Archived from the original on 1 December 2017. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
  67. ^ "asfpg ~ Altonaer Stiftung für philosophische Grundlagenforschung". Archived from the original on 31 May 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  68. ^ Mannikka, Eleanor (2008). "Movies: About Das Beil von Wandsbek". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. Archived from the original on 7 December 2008.
  69. ^ "East Germany Reports Execution of Auschwitz 'selection' Physician". Jta.org. 11 July 1966. Archived from the original on 21 February 2022. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
  70. ^ Halter, Hans (25 August 1991). ""Nahschuß in den Hinterkopf"" ["Close Shot In The Back Of The Head"]. Der Spiegel (in German). Archived from the original on 18 January 2022. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
  71. ^ Otonkoski, Pirkko-Leena. "Henkirikoksista kuolemaan tuomittujen kohtaloita vuosina 1824–1825 Suomessa" [The fates of those sentenced to death for homicides in 1824–1825 in Finland]. Genos (in Finnish). 68: 55–69, 94–95. Archived from the original on 27 December 2010. Retrieved 14 December 2010.
  72. ^ Execution of the Marquess of Ayamonte on the 11th. of December 1645 Described in "Varios relatos diversos de Cartas de Jesuitas" (1634–1648) Coll. Austral Buones Aires 1953 en Dr. J. Geers "Van het Barokke leven", Baarn 1957 Bl. 183–188.
  73. ^ "Iran: Violation of Human Rights 1987–1990". Amnesty International. 1 December 1990. Archived from the original on 9 December 2018. Retrieved 5 November 2019.
  74. ^ Text of the Iran Democracy Act Archived 5 November 2019 at the Wayback Machine, United States Senate
  75. ^ "Saddam halshögg 50 prostituerade" [Saddam beheaded 50 prostitutes] (in Swedish). 11 December 2000. Archived from the original on 26 February 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  76. ^ Ignatieff, Michael (14 November 2004). "The Terrorist as Auteur". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 28 May 2015. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  77. ^ "Beheading video tops web searches The decapitation of American Nick Berg and the Iraq war have replaced pornography and pop stars as the main internet searches". Al Jazeera. 18 May 2004. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  78. ^ "Saudi executioner tells all". BBC News. 5 June 2003. Archived from the original on 1 April 2009. Retrieved 11 July 2011.
  79. ^ Weinberg, Jon (Winter 2008). "Sword of Justice? Beheadings Rise in Saudi Arabia". Harvard International Review. Archived from the original on 20 March 2014. Retrieved 26 August 2017.
  80. ^ "Saudi Arabia: An upsurge in public executions". Amnesty International. Archived from the original on 1 May 2020. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  81. ^ "Justice by the Sword: Saudi Arabia's Embrace of the Death Penalty". International Business Times. 11 September 2012. Archived from the original on 7 April 2014. Retrieved 5 April 2014.
  82. ^ a b "Death Sentences and Executions 2013" (PDF). Amnesty International. 2014. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2017. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
  83. ^ "Syrian Rebels used a child to behead a prisoner". Human Rights Investigation. 12 December 2012. Archived from the original on 6 April 2013. Retrieved 22 March 2013.
  84. ^ "Jihadist rebels behead 2 Syrian soldiers in northern Syria". AMN – Al-Masdar News. 13 August 2019. Archived from the original on 15 August 2019. Retrieved 14 August 2019.
  85. ^ "Syrian opposition group that killed child 'was in US-vetted alliance'". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 3 January 2019. Retrieved 9 April 2020.
  86. ^ "Nearly 45 regime and Turkish soldiers and rebels killed in shelling and violent battles on Al-Nayrab frontline, east of Idlib". SOHR. 21 February 2020. Archived from the original on 11 March 2020. Retrieved 9 April 2020.
  87. ^ Grayson, George W. (February 2009). "La Familia: Another Deadly Mexican Syndicate". Foreign Policy Research Institute. Archived from the original on 3 September 2009.
  88. ^ Grayson, George W. (2012). The Executioner's Men: Los Zetas, Rogue Soldiers, Criminal Entrepreneurs, and the Shadow State They Created (1st ed.), p. 46, Transaction Publishers. ISBN 9781412846172
  89. ^ Paterson, Thomas; Clifford, J. Garry; Brigham, Robert; Donoghue, Michael; Hagan, Kenneth (2014). American Foreign Relations: Volume 2: Since 1895. Cengage Learning. ISBN 9781285433332. Archived from the original on 8 June 2024. Retrieved 30 December 2019.
  90. ^ "US created monsters: Zetas and Kaibiles death squads". Archived from the original on 24 December 2016. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  91. ^ badanov. "Borderland Beat: Los Zetas recruit Las Maras in Guatemala". Archived from the original on 25 February 2021. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  92. ^ "Los Zetas fueron entrenados por la Escuela de las Américas" [The Zetas were trained by the School of the Americas]. cronica.com.mx (in Spanish). La Crónica de Hoy. Archived from the original on 25 February 2021. Retrieved 30 December 2019.
  93. ^ "U.S.-trained ex-soldiers form core of "Zetas" | SOA Watch: Close the School of the Americas". 18 April 2017. Archived from the original on 18 April 2017.
  94. ^ Washington, Harriet A. (2006). Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present. New York. London. Toronto. Sydney. Austin.: Doubleday. p. 126, paragraph 3.
  95. ^ Turse, Nick (2013). Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam. New York: Metropolitan Books. p. 163.
  96. ^ Turse, Nick (2013). Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam. New York: Metropolitan Books. p. 162.
  97. ^ Turse, Nick (2013). Kill Anything that Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam. New York: Metropolitan Books. p. 161.
  98. ^ Miller, Wilbur R. (2012). The Social History of Crime and Punishment in America: An Encyclopedia. Sage. p. 1856. ISBN 9781412988766. OCLC 768569594.
[edit]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Decapitation&oldid=1257312447"