to think this country used to be bloody barbaric?

[MycatsaPirate]

We have Gunpowder on tv at the moment and it's brutal!

Thank goodness we have evolved over the last several hundred years and no longer think public torture and murder is a good way of dealing with things.

I actually feel quite sick. The horrific ways they dreamt up to kill people are unbelievable.

JonSnowsWife - I was going to say they had nothing better to do in those days, with no TV. Then I realised the irony of it all. In the 1600's people watched public torture for entertainment, in the 2000's people watch re-enactments of public tortures on their TV screens, for entertainment...

Wikipedia - Convicts were fastened to a hurdle, or wooden panel, and drawn by horse to the place of execution, where they were hanged (almost to the point of death), emasculated, disembowelled, beheaded, and quartered (chopped into four pieces). Their remains were often displayed in prominent places across the country, such as London Bridge. For reasons of public decency, women convicted of high treason were instead burned at the stake.

So which countries haven't had a barbaric past?

Most countries in the world have a barbaric past. The ones that were empires even more so. Some countries still are barbaric now.
I don’t get where the shock comes from.

Hanging, drawing and quartering was the absolute worst execution method inflicted on criminals at the time and was only used when the crime was treason. It was only used on men; women accused of treason would be burnt at the stake, as would heretics. I think one of the reasons it was used only on men was because part of the quartering involved castration - no where near as much fun to watch if it's a woman being done!

There is some debate about the 'drawing'. It's position in the punishment title suggests it's after hanging and therefore means being 'drawn down' from the noose. But it might also refer to being 'drawn' to the place of execution - which was being pulled there on a trestle, usually upside down. Being hung was to suspend you mid air between heaven and earth, as you were unworthy of both. It was the quartering that killed you. But slowly. Hanging by the neck until dead was very much the kinder (and quicker!) option.

Crimes apart from treason or heresy would merit hanging or beheading. If you were very lucky and were convicted of either of those two crimes your sentence might be commuted to one of the easier deaths (Like Lady Jane Grey should have been burnt at the stake, for treason, but was beheaded). Only the upper upper crust of aristocracy would be executed in private - most executions were public, and a jolly day out. It wasn't until late Victorian times that executions were done inside prison walls - and the general public were not happy about the change in law!

If you think about circuses in Roman times all the way up to public hangings in Victorian times - most of human history has included public execution as fun, family viewing. If the government hadn't changed the law, we'd probably still be watching them now! I think this is very much a case of the law changing and people's sensibilities following on after, rather than people's views evolving and forcing a change in law.

(Case in point - we still happy to watch brutal and grisly executions for entertainment if we know they're only pretend! we still find the violence entertaining.)

But the past is a different country, they do things differently there - it certainly isn't 'this country' that was barbaric, more like the whole of our species.

Very true littlemisscomper.

Although I was watching it mainly because my Husband was in it...

Couldn't watch it. I was sitting with my hands over my ears and asked DH to put the sound down and pat me when the awful bits were over.

I'm not going to watch anymore! Interesting story but not worth the inevitable gross stuff.

It reeks of Taboo too. Similar faces and a level of gratuitousness.

Looking back, it's a miracle we collectively survived. I just read that the queen had 7 living children and 5 losses. It's hard to imagine how terrible life was for nearly everyone.

Not just this country, humanity in general. A lot of people still are unfortunately.

Pretzel, I might be completely wrong about this but why would Lady Jane Grey be burned? I thought that was the punishment for heretics and that at the time, the punishment for treason was still execution, just as in Anne Boleyn's day?

Someone upthread mentioned CJ Sansom's books (love them!). It was in one of those books I learnt that people who were burnt at the stake were very fortunate indeed if they were considered worthy of having a pouch of gun powder tied around their neck. That way they could dip their body into the flames and die in an explosion rather than wait for the flames to lick them to an agonising death.

Oh sorry Ive found the answer

Summary - no one must see a naked woman. Sigh.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_by_burning#Historical_usage

Can I be the pedant that points out people are hanged not hung? Meat is hung, people are hanged - I just think it's important to differentiate the two. Genuinely not trying to be a twat.

Also with burning at the stake wet material might be placed on the flames in the hope of the accused dying of asphyxiation by the smoke rather than the actual flames. The last woman to be sentenced to death by burning was in 1789!

slimthistime admittedly this is information I've cobbled together from various sources, but the Lady Jane Grey specific stuff was from a book about her.

Punishment for treason if you were male was to be hung drawn and quartered, if you were female it was to be burnt. Punishment for being a heretic was to be burnt, regardless of sex. However not everyone convicted of treason would be punished that way - just like today you could got to prison for 25 years but you might only be sentenced to 15. So too, you could technically be burned/ hung drawn and quartered but you might only be beheaded.

LJG was terrified they were going to burn her, but they commuted the sentence to beheading, which was much more humane. Not everyone who committed treason were given the very worst of the punishments, hence why LJG and Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard were all beheaded. (Though actually I don't know where the law stood on female treason back in Henry VIII time, like I said the LJG stuff was from a book specifically about her and her death was over 10 years after CH and under a different monarch and religion)

Also with burning at the stake wet material might be placed on the flames in the hope of the accused dying of asphyxiation by the smoke rather than the actual flames.

And sometimes the executioner might take pity on you and smother you to death before/ as they lit the fire. Sometimes a hangman would pull on the legs of the prisoner so they would die quicker as well (if their neck hadn't broken when they dropped).

I don't think I'd like having the gunpowder tied round my neck, I don't think i'd dare dip it into the fire. But then I've never actually been on fire and I might find that the pain is so awful I'd rather explode, and in fact I'm talking out of my arse right now with my 'never been executed' privilege.

Re: hung/ hanged. Aren't they are different form of death? 'hanged' like a pair of curtains - by the neck until dead. 'Hung' if it's done in malice without the intention of killing hence: 'hung drawn and quartered'.

Wasnt Mel Gibson in Braveheart hung,drawn and quartered ? I'm sure he was hung then his entrails cut out then something else but I've forgotten sorry I've had a manic day too .

Gruesome., I couldn't sleep before now I've got no hope.

I think it's officially "hanged drawn and quartered" though, not hung. Hanged and hung were used interchangeably like a few other words that have two forms of past tense, until hanged was made the official and only past tense for execution and hang for all other situations.

TV history tends to jazz things up a bit these days. The reality of life in early modern England was probably rather dull for most people.

It's true that they had many gruesome punishments (plenty of commoners were beheaded for treason btw). Because there was no effective police force, the King's peace had to be enforced by example and deterrence. There was also much less understanding (ie, no understanding) of behavioural psychology.

Assuming human race survives much longer, perhaps a future generation will be even more baffled at our knowing degradation of the environment. I say that in case anyone is feeling particularly judgemental.

The woman being crushed to death was awful, I had to look away during the mans death. Too gruesome for me.

It was really good though....nothing to do with the gorgeous Kit Harington being in it obviously😍

I started watching it then realised it was too horrific to be enjoyable. But yes I constantly remind my son that this country has a lot to answer for! We did horrendous things in the past to our fellow countrymen and to exploit other countries and people.

Whenever I see horrific or violent stuff on tv I worry that some psycho somewhere is also watching it and taking notes..... does anyone else think this? Also I bet some unresponsive parents might have let young children watch it tonight and traumatised them. I know someone that watched the "threads" film back in the early 80s? So what to do in the event of a nuclear war, he ended up with borderline personality disorder !! So it brought on a serious mental illness. I do remember feeling the fear about a nuclear war and it kept me awake at night for a long time when I was young.

"Drawn" is surely being disembowelled, the same word is used for removing entrails from game, isn't it? I didn't think there was any disagreement about that. And people are/were definitely hanged, not hung!

Agree depiction of executions in Gunpowder completely sickening, they didn't have to make them so graphic.

Mrspitt3 My 14 year old watched it. My 8 year old has learnt about the Gunpowder plot at school so my plan was to watch it and see if it was suitable. That's obviously not happening. I think I will have nightmares myself.

that this country has a lot to answer for!

The UK has plenty to answer for in respect of what it's doing now, although in general it's a force for good.

But it makes no sense to judge the past by the standards of the present. People thought and acted in a completely different way, with different priorities, and made their decisions in a completely different context.