The French Revolution
Nikhil Weigel
The Guillotine and Its Significance
During the era of the French Revolution, which took place in the 1790s, the French people became disgusted with the country's leadership, which was ruled by an atrocious king and an unjust government. Influenced by enlightenment ideas, the people of France had an uprising, destroying establishment, and using ruthless measures to achieve their goals. This reflected in the technological advancements of the time, most notably being the weapon known as the Guillotine. The guillotine was a totally new invention during the French Revolution, taking inspiration from other weapons but boasting a new kind of design. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin was a French doctor, who proposed that the French government should use a more gentle method of execution, rather than the fiercely violent methods being used at the time. He came up with the guillotine in 1789, which was a weapon using an axe to chop the heads off of its victims. This was seen as a more humane way to execute people, and was also very quick to kill. The guillotine quickly became the trademark weapon of the French Revolution, as the Jacobins used it to take the head off of King Henry at the beginning of the revolution. The guillotine went from being a lightly used execution method to being used around the clock in France during the mid 1790s. In essence, the guillotine seems like a simple contraption, but is actually much more complex than it appears. It consists of a tall, upright frame, in which a large angled and weighted blade is raised up and suspended. The victim is locked in at the bottom, with their neck directly under the blade. The blade is released, quickly severing the head of the person, which falls into a basket below. The guillotine was not perfected during this period however, so often it could take 2 or 3 tries until the head was completely severed off from the body. The guillotine was responsible for around 40,000 deaths during the French Revolution a massive number when put into perspective. This advancement of technology was the product of a conflicted nation, which was consumed in anger and hatred. The guillotine shows the focus of the people of this time, and how technology went towards ending the most possible lives, rather than resolving conflict and improving them.
Guillotine Diagram/Image
Quotes About the Guillotine
"During the greater part of the day the guillotine had been kept busy at its ghastly work: all that France had boasted of in the past centuries, of ancient names, and blue blood, had paid toll to her desire for liberty and for fraternity."
-Emmuska Orczy
"...they dragged him under the axe of the guillotine, which with one stroke severed his head from his body. All this passed in a moment. The youngest of the guards, who seemed about eighteen, immediately seized the head, and showed it to the people as he walked round the scaffold; he accompanied this monstrous ceremony with the most atrocious and indecent gestures."
-Unknown
-Emmuska Orczy
"...they dragged him under the axe of the guillotine, which with one stroke severed his head from his body. All this passed in a moment. The youngest of the guards, who seemed about eighteen, immediately seized the head, and showed it to the people as he walked round the scaffold; he accompanied this monstrous ceremony with the most atrocious and indecent gestures."
-Unknown
French Domestic Manslaughter Rate Over Time
Focusing on the part of the graph in red, during the period of time when the Guillotine was being used by the public, the rate of domestic manslaughter was higher than it has ever been in the history of France. This is because ever since the Guillotine, technology used for killing has not been as widely accessible as it was during this period in the mid 1790s.
Short Documentary on the Guillotine
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The video shows the brutal nature of the guillotine, and how it was a complicated mechanism of destruction rather than a simple way of killing a person.
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