ARTICLE: VANISHED OCCUPATIONS: The Guillotineer

Revolution, Nazis, serial killers and a wizard from the Lord of the Rings

Today I’m giving you the second in the series of articles looking at jobs that no longer exist. Last time out it was collecting whale oil with the aid of nothing but a pointy stick, and this time, I’m looking at the men who operated one of the most disturbing machines in the history of state-sanctioned murder. A few weeks ago I found a tiny little paperback from 1965 by Alister Kershaw, looking at the history of the guillotine, and it got my brain whirring. Who operated these things? What did their lives look like, what did people think of them and how did they remember their own experiences? Buckle up, because somehow, this one includes the French Revolution, Nazi’s despicable serial killers and a wizard from Lord of the Rings…

(New Line Cinema)

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The History of the Guillotine

First off, the guillotine was not a French invention. Pinning the first time a machine was used to execute someone by means of cutting off their head is difficult. According to Kershaw, who refused to draw a conclusion for a lack of evidence, five men were ‘executed by the medium of a machine at Zittau in 1300, which, if true, would give Germany a seven-year lead over the Irish contenders, and that Conrad of Swabia was similarly dealt with at Naples in 1266, which would put Italy still further ahead.’ The English were at it too, with the Halifax Gibbet.

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