The Guillotine and the Reign of Terror

1. The Guillotine and the Reign of Terror

3. Presentation Overview • Capital Punishment • Joseph Guillotin • Guillotin’s proposal • History of the National Razor • How it worked • Phase IV: The Reign of Terror • Final thoughts

5. Capital Punishment A. Various means to end life 1. Hanging, Wheel, Quartering, Rack, Burning & Drowning B. Beheading 1. Greeks & Romans - most honorable death 2. Reintroduced into Europe 1000s

6. Joseph Guillotin • 1738 - born • 1789 - National Assembly • Seeks more enlightened and egalitarian approach to public execution

7. Guillotin’s Proposal 1.Offences of the same kind will be punished by the same kind of penalty. 2.In all cases where the law imposes the death penalty on an accused person, the punishment shall be the same, whatever the nature of the offence of which he guilty; the criminal shall be decapitated; this will be done solely by means of a simple mechanism. 3.In view of the personal character of crime, no punishment of a guilty person shall involve and discredit to his family. The honor of those belonging to him shall be in no way soiled, and they shall continue to be no less admissible to any kind of profession, employment and public function. 4.No one shall reproach a citizen with any punishment imposed on one of his relatives. Whosoever ventures to do so shall be publicly reprimanded by the judge. The sentence imposed on him shall be written up on the offender's door. Moreover, it shall be written up on the pillory and remain there for a period of three months. 5.Confiscation of the condemned person's property shall in no case be imposed. 6.The corpse of an executed man shall be handed over to his family on their request. In every case, he shall be allowed normal burial and no reference shall be made on the register to the nature of his death.

8. History of the National Razor • 1300s • England • Farms • Joseph Guillotin & Tobias Schmidt • work to perfect it • Sheep & cadavers • Louis XVI - advice • 1792 - up and chopping

9. How it worked • Blade • 77 pounds • Fell about 7 feet • 1/30 second to sever neckFlash Guillotine

10. “Look around! You've been betrayed! You're hungry, while there are a lot of goods in stores… Your government, ninnies and cowards, are afraid to set a revolutionary order. They've betrayed us to aristocrats, moneylenders, and profiteers… We'll clean ourselves! All parasites to the guillotine! That is the way to save the Revolution!” John Marat 1792

11. Phase IV:The Reign of Terror (1793 - 94) • Girondins (moderates) vs. Jacobins (extremists) • Robespierre = Jacobin • Committee of Public Safety (1793)-controls France • Deal with internal & external enemies • Reign of Terror 1793-`794 • 20 - 50,000 executed • 85% peasants (Counter Revolutionaries) • Ends with death (guillotine) of Robespierre

12. “What constitutes a republic is the total destruction of everything that stands in opposition to it.” (Sant-Just - 1794)

13. Thee are “only two parties, the party of good citizens and the party of evil ones.” Maximillien Robespierre

14. During the Reign of Terror every citizen became a “potential customer for the guillotine.” Susan Dunn’s Sister Revolutions (92)

15. Final Thoughts • Adopted throughout world • Nicknames • The widower • The machine • Madame Guillotine • National Razor • French history • 1939 - last public use • 1965 - 1977 - 8 executions • 1981 - Abolished capital punishment

16. Final Thoughts