Creuse is still the safest place to live in France - The Bugle

FEBRUARY 2010 ○ THE BUGLE ○ www.thebugle.eu
14 ♦ FRENCH LIFE
Madame Guillotine - the terror of France
History
The guillotine is an iconic execution
device that made its name (and
indeed, took its name) during the
French Revolution. In reality,
beheading machines had already been around
for centuries. The ‘Halifax Gibbet’ and the
‘Scottish Maiden’ are well-documented
devices that date back as far as 1286. These
machines were not as precise and efficient as
the guillotine and whilst the Halifax Gibbet
is documented as having performed a total
of 53 executions, the guillotine regularly
performed that many a day in Paris alone.
abhorred it in its current form at the time.
The new execution machine was originally
proposed as a more humane, egalitarian form
of execution. In the early months of the French
used.
The completed machine comprised two
fourteen-foot uprights joined by a crossbar,
whose internal edges were grooved and greased
with tallow. The weighted blade was either
straight, or curved like an axe. The system was
operated via a rope and pulley and the whole
construction was mounted on a high platform.
The first execution by guillotine took place on
April 25, 1792, when a convicted highwayman,
Nicolas Jacques Pelletie, was executed in Paris.
these mass executions.
The history of the guillotine does not end with
the French revolution and as well as being used
in France for a further 150 years, it was also
adopted by many other European countries. In
1939, Eugene Wildman became the last person
to be publicly executed using the guillotine
and on 10th September 1977 the guillotine
was used for the last time in France when it
was used to execute Hamida Djandoubi. Four
years later the death penalty was abolished in
France.
In pre-revolutionary France, executions were
public, lengthy and often gruesome affairs.
Common methods of execution included
hanging or burning at the stake. You could
also find yourself bound to four oxen that
were then driven in four different directions,
effectively tearing you into quarters. In
the most extreme version of this type of
execution, you would first be tortured in
public in a practice known as being ‘hung,
drawn and then quartered’. If you were
rich, you could buy your way to a manual
beheading – a death that was usually reserved
for the upper classes.
The guillotine in its most famous form is
credited as the creation of Dr Joseph-Ignace
Guillotin. Dr Guillotin was not a fan of
executions. In fact, he was one of a growing
number of French philosophers during
the Enlightenment that argued for a more
humane form of capital punishment. It is not
even known if Dr Guillotin was a supporter
of capital punishment at all and certainly
1792 (left) and 1872 (right) replica guillotines
Revolution in 1789, Dr Guillotin proposed the
principle of the machine, along with a few crude
sketches, as a universal method of execution
across France - one that involved no torture,
would be performed in private and would be
used irrespective of class or wealth.
Although initially rejected, his proposals were
eventually accepted a few years later, but
executions would continue to be public affairs.
The design of the machine was then given to
Tobias Schmidt, a German harpsichord maker
who used Dr Guillotin’s sketches as his starting
point. In 1792 he completed his prototype,
and after numerous tests on animal and human
corpses, the machine was finally ready to be
At some point in the following years the
machine came to be called a Guillotine, even
though Dr Guillotin had very little input in
its actual design. Exactly when and how this
came about is not known. The blueprints were
sent to all parts of France, exact replicas were
created and soon all public executions were
being performed by Madame Guillotine. By
the end of the revolution in 1799, the guillotine
had executed up to 45,000 people.
The period 1793-1794 became known as The
Terror in France, a time when “anyone who
either by their conduct, their contacts, their
words or their writings, showed themselves
to be supporters of tyranny, of federalism, or
to be enemies of liberty” could be executed.
This loose definition could and did cover
almost everyone, and during the years 1793-
4 thousands were sent to the guillotine.
Historians have argued whether this bloody
period in French history would have been
possible without the guillotine, and whether
its invention led directly to the huge scale of
Dr Joseph-Ignace Guillotin
Contrary to popular belief, Dr Joseph-Ignace
Guillotin did not fall foul of his own creation
and lived on to die a natural death in 1814. ■
Valentine’s Day - religious festival or Hallmark holiday
A
in France and England.
small town in the heart of
Indre will again welcome
lovers from across the
country on the 14 th
February and the nearest weekend.
Why the attraction The town of
Saint-Valentin is the only place in
France to bear the name of the patron
saint of lovers. Residents deck their
homes in blooms, the jardin des
amoureaux (lovers’ garden) opens
its gates and free concerts take place
to serenade courting couples. A post
office, specially constructed for the
week, sells commemorative stamps
and postcards for the most ‘authentic’
Valentine’s card you’ll ever send.
If all that romance brings matters to a
head, it’s even possible to take things
one step further and tie the knot in the
flower garden, with everything laid
on, from hotels, hair and make-up
to wedding cars, photographers and
champagne. All you need to do is say
“I do”....
Each year, on the 14 th February, men
and women across the globe spend
billions of euros on loved ones, all in
the name of Saint Valentine. But who
was Saint Valentine and why is he
associated with love
Rather than being a ‘Hallmark’
holiday, Valentine’s day, much like
Halloween, has its root in paganism.
In ancient Rome, February was the
official beginning of spring, a time
of fertility, new life and regeneration.
Lupercalia was the main festival at this
time, celebrated between the 13 th and
15 th February and commemorated the
legend that Rome’s founders, Romulus
and Remus, were raised by a she-wolf
(lupa). During the festival, priests
would sacrifice a goat for fertility and
a dog for purification. The boys of the
town would then cut strips of hide from
the goat, dip them in sacrificial blood
and then gently slap the young women
of the town and the fields of crops.
Despite sounding gory, the women of
ancient Rome welcomed this ritual as
they believed it made them more fertile
for the coming year.
Later in the day, the names of all the
young women would be placed into an
urn from which the young men would
pick one and this pair would then be
coupled for the next year. This often
led to marriages, but was considered
un-Christian by the church and there
were repeated attempts to outlaw the
festival.
“At the time the festival was clearly
a very popular event, even in an
environment where the Christians
were trying to close it down,” says
Professor Lenski of the University
of Colorado. “So there’s reason to
think that the Christians might instead
have said, OK, we’ll just call this a
Christian festival.”
The church pledged the festival to
Saint Valentine, whose saint’s day fell
on February 14 th – right in the middle
of the Lupercalia. Little is known
about Saint Valentine. There are three
saints named Valentine or Valentinus,
but the most probable candidate is
the Saint Valentine who fell foul of
the wrath of Emperor Claudius II and
was put to death. No more is known
about him, but subsequent legends
suggest that Claudius had decreed
that all young men should remain
single, as unmarried men made for
better soldiers. Valentine, feeling this
was unjust, conducted clandestine
marriages for young lovers, until
he was discovered and sentenced to
death.
The legend was further extended
to suggest that he sent the first
Valentine’s Day card from his jail
cell, allegedly to his jailer’s daughter
who had visited him during his
confinement, which he signed “from
your Valentine”. Saint Valentine grew
in popularity and by the Middle Ages
he was one of the most popular saints
The first recorded Valentine’s card
was sent by Charles, Duke of Orléans
in 1415 to his wife while he was
imprisoned in the Tower of London
following his capture at the Battle
of Agincourt. This greeting card is
now housed in the British Library in
London.
Several years later, it is believed that
King Henry V hired a writer named
John Lydgate to compose a Valentine
note to his belle, Catherine of Valois.
In Great Britain, Valentine’s Day
began to be popularly celebrated in
the 17 th century and by the mid-18 th
century it was common for people of
all social classes to exchange items of
affection or small notes of love. The
commercialisation of Valentine’s Day
really began in earnest with the massproduction
of Valentine’s Day greeting
cards. The first cards rolled off the
lines in the 1840s in the U.S. thanks
to Esther A. Howland, who has since
become known as ‘the Mother of the
Valentine’.
Today, more than 1 billion cards are
sent every year, making it the second
biggest day for the greetings card
industry, behind Christmas when 2.6
billion are sent. ■