Machine used to behead people sentenced to capital punishment
The guillotine is a machine that began to be used in the Middle Ages and would become even more important at the request of the French Revolution in the 18th century to behead people.
It was at that time the most widespread instrument in European countries to apply the death penalty to prisoners.
It is made up of a wooden frame on which a hyper-sharp blade falls, which is responsible for cutting the head of the prisoner who is placed on his knees so that the objective of cutting the neck is fulfilled.
A violent, cruel and famous method
Without a doubt, the guillotine is one of the most violent and cruel death penalty methods that have been applied in the history of mankind and, as we have pointed out, it gained fabulous popularity during the late 18th century when it was widely used. to execute persons sentenced to capital punishment or the death penalty. As happened with the French monarch Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette, who were guillotined after the judicial process that began against them after the French Revolution that would put an end to the institution of the monarchy. The monarch and his wife were executed in the famous Plaza de la Revolución.
It takes its name from the French physician and deputy who promoted its use during the French Revolution
Its name derives from the French doctor and deputy Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin who proposed its use in the France of the revolution. In any case, and as we have already pointed out lines above, Guillotin was not its creator, much less since similar machines were used since the 13th century.
We must emphasize that although this doctor was the promoter of the use of the guillotine when he held a seat in the assembly, paradoxically, he knew how to demonstrate against capital punishment. His proposal had the basis in proposing a more humane method of execution to those that had been used up to that moment.
In those years and of course in previous centuries, executions were characterized by their tremendous violence and cruelty.
Fortunately, in the early years of the twentieth century, its use died out with the abolition of the death penalty in many states.
