From Robert Wilde,
Your Guide to European History.
FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now!

Post-Revolutionary Use
The history of the guillotine does not end with the French Revolution. Many other countries adopted the machine, including Belgium, Greece, Switzerland, Sweden and some German states; French colonialism also helped to export the device abroad. Indeed, France continued to use, and improve upon, the guillotine for at least another century. Leon Berger, a carpenter and executioner's assistant, made a number of refinements in the early 1870's. These included springs to cushion the falling parts (presumably repeated use of the earlier design could damage the infrastructure), as well as a new release mechanism. The Berger design became the new standard for all French guillotines. A further, but very short lived, change occurred under the executioner Nicolas Roch in the late 19th century; he included a board at the top to cover the blade, hiding it from an approaching victim. Roch's successor had the screen swiftly removed.

Public executions continued in France until 1939, when Eugene Weidmann became the last 'open-air' victim. It had thus taken nearly one hundred and fifty years for the practice to comply with Guillotin's original wishes, and be hidden from the public eye. Although the machine's use had gradually fallen after the revolution, executions in Nazi Europe rose to a level that neared, if not exceeded, that of The Terror. The last State use of the guillotine in France occurred on September 10th 1977, when Hamida Djandoubi was executed; there should have been another in 1981, but the intended victim, Philippe Maurice, was granted clemency. The death penalty was abolished in France that same year.

The Infamy of the Guillotine
There have been many methods of execution used in Europe, including the mainstay of hanging and the more recent firing squad, but none have quite the lasting reputation or imagery as the guillotine, a machine which continues to provoke fascination. The guillotine's creation is often blurred into the, almost immediate, period of its most famous use and the machine has become the most characteristic element of the French Revolution. Indeed, although the history of decapitation machines stretches back at least eight hundred years, often involving constructions that were almost identical to the guillotine, it is this later device which dominates. The guillotine is certainly evocative, presenting a chilling image entirely at odds with the original intention of a painless death.

Dr. Guillotin
Finally, and contrary to legend, Doctor Joseph Ignace Guillotin was not executed by his own machine; he lived until 1814, and died of biological causes.