this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2024
95 points (99.0% liked)
Historical Artifacts
660 readers
208 users here now
Just a community for everyone to share artifacts, reconstructions, or replicas for the historically-inclined to admire!
Generally, an artifact should be 100+ years old, but this is a flexible requirement if you find something rare and suitably linked to an era of history, not a strict rule. Anything over 100 is fair game regardless of rarity.
Generally speaking, ruins should go to [email protected]
Illustrations of the past should go to [email protected]
Photos of the past should go to [email protected]
founded 7 months ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I wondered if the prisoner's stance in the engraving was normal for a sword execution, it seemed like it would be more efficient for everyone to place your neck on a backstop like the chained log. With the backstop you wouldn't have to worry about your flopping body absorbing any of the executioner's swing energy.
So to wikipedia I went, and based on the images in that article both of the prisoners are shown either standing or kneeling rather than resting their necks on a backstop. Ouch.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Beheading_Fac_simile_of_a_Miniature_on_Wood_in_the_Cosmographie_Universelle_of_Munster_in_folio_Basle_1552.png
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1f/Scharfrichterschwert-ffm002.jpg
I once saw a video of an execution in Saudi Arabia, the prisoners were just kneeling with their heads bowed a little.
The french form of beheading was to have them kneel upright during a beheading instead of putting their neck on a block.
It's how Anne Boleyn was decapitated by the swordsman from Calais.