A gibbet (ˈdʒɪbɪt) is a gallows-type structure from which the dead bodies of executed criminals were hung on public display to deter other existing or potential criminals. In earlier times, up to the late 17th century, live gibbeting also took place, in which the criminal was placed alive in a metal cage and left to die of thirst. As well as referring to the gibbet as a device, the term gibbet may also be used to refer to the practice of placing a criminal on display within one. This practice is also called "hanging in chains".

Display

Gibbeting was common law

Common law

Common law is law developed by judges through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive branch action...

 punishment, which a judge could impose in addition to execution. This practice was regularised in England by the Murder Act 1752, which empowered judges to impose this for murder. It was most often used for traitors, murderers, highwaymen

Highwayman

A highwayman was a thief and brigand who preyed on travellers. This type of outlaw, usually, travelled and robbed by horse, as compared to a footpad who traveled and robbed on foot. Mounted robbers were widely considered to be socially superior to footpads...

, pirates, and sheep stealers and was intended to discourage others from committing similar offences. The structures were therefore often placed next to public highways (frequently at crossroads) and waterways. There are many places named Gibbet Hill

Gibbet Hill

Gibbet Hill is the location of, and name for the University of Warwick's southern campus, based close to the outskirts of Coventry, in the West Midlands, England....

 in England. One is between Coventry

Coventry

Coventry is a city and metropolitan borough in the county of West Midlands in England. Coventry is the 9th largest city in England and the 11th largest in the United Kingdom. It is also the second largest city in the English Midlands, after Birmingham, with a population of 300,848, although...

 and Kenilworth

Kenilworth

Kenilworth is a town in central Warwickshire, England. In 2001 the town had a population of 22,582 . It is situated south of Coventry, north of Warwick and northwest of London....

 in Warwickshire

Warwickshire

Warwickshire is a landlocked non-metropolitan county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, although the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare...

, and others are found at Frome

Frome

Frome is a town and civil parish in northeast Somerset, England. Located at the eastern end of the Mendip Hills, the town is built on uneven high ground, and centres around the River Frome. The town is approximately south of Bath, east of the county town, Taunton and west of London. In the 2001...

, Somerset

Somerset

The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...

, near Haslemere

Haslemere

Haslemere is a town in Surrey, England, close to the border with both Hampshire and West Sussex. The major road between London and Portsmouth, the A3, lies to the west, and a branch of the River Wey to the south. Haslemere is approximately south-west of Guildford.Haslemere is surrounded by hills,...

 in Surrey

Surrey

Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...

, and Mary Tavy

Mary Tavy

Mary Tavy is a village with a population of around 600, located four miles north of Tavistock in Devon in south-west England; it is named after the River Tavy. It used to be home to the world's largest copper mine Wheal Friendship, as well as a number of lead and tin mines. It borders Dartmoor...

 in Devon

Devon

Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...

.

Exhibiting a body could backfire against a monarch, especially if he was unpopular. Henry of Montfort and Henry of Wylynton, enemies of Edward II and rebels, were drawn

Hanged, drawn and quartered

To be hanged, drawn and quartered was from 1351 a penalty in England for men convicted of high treason, although the ritual was first recorded during the reigns of King Henry III and his successor, Edward I...

 and hanged before being exhibited on a gibbet near Bristol

Bristol

Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

. However, the people made relics of these bloody and mutilated remains and surrounded them with respect in violent protest. Even false miracles were organised at the spot where the bodies were hanging.

Although the intention was deterrence, the public response was complex. Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys FRS, MP, JP, was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man...

 expressed disgust at the practice. There was Christian objection that persecution of criminals should end with their death. The sight and smell of decaying corpses were offensive and regarded as "pestilential", so a threat to public health.

Pirates were sometimes executed by hanging on a gibbet erected close to the low-water mark by the sea or a tidal section of a river. Their bodies would be left dangling until they had been submerged by the tide three times. In London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, Execution Dock

Execution Dock

Execution Dock was used for more than 400 years in London to execute pirates, smugglers and mutineers that had been sentenced to death by Admiralty courts. The "dock", which consisted of a scaffold for hanging, was located near the shoreline of the River Thames at Wapping...

 is located on the north bank of the River Thames

River Thames

The River Thames flows through southern England. It is the longest river entirely in England and the second longest in the United Kingdom. While it is best known because its lower reaches flow through central London, the river flows alongside several other towns and cities, including Oxford,...

 in Wapping

Wapping

Wapping is a place in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets which forms part of the Docklands to the east of the City of London. It is situated between the north bank of the River Thames and the ancient thoroughfare simply called The Highway...

; after tidal immersion, particularly notorious criminals' bodies could be hung in cages a little further downstream at either Cuckold's Point

Cuckold's Point

Cuckold's Point is the name given to part of a sharp bend on the River Thames on the Rotherhithe peninsula, south-east London, opposite the West India Docks...

 or Blackwall Point

Greenwich Peninsula

Greenwich Peninsula is an area of South London, England, located in the London Borough of Greenwich.The peninsula is bounded on three sides by a loop of the Thames, between the Isle of Dogs and Silvertown. To the south is the rest of Greenwich, to the south-east is Charlton.The peninsula lies...

, as a warning to other waterborne criminals of the possible consequences of their actions (such a fate befell Captain William Kidd

William Kidd

William "Captain" Kidd was a Scottish sailor remembered for his trial and execution for piracy after returning from a voyage to the Indian Ocean. Some modern historians deem his piratical reputation unjust, as there is evidence that Kidd acted only as a privateer...

 in May 1701). There was objection that these displays offended foreign visitors and did not uphold the reputation of the law, though the scenes even became gruesome tourist attractions.

Variants

In some cases, the bodies would be left until their clothes rotted or even until the bodies were almost completely decomposed, after which the bones would be scattered.

In cases of drawing and quartering

Hanged, drawn and quartered

To be hanged, drawn and quartered was from 1351 a penalty in England for men convicted of high treason, although the ritual was first recorded during the reigns of King Henry III and his successor, Edward I...

, the body of the criminal was cut into four or five portions, with each part often gibbeted in different places.
So that the public display might be prolonged, bodies were sometimes coated in tar

Tar

Tar is modified pitch produced primarily from the wood and roots of pine by destructive distillation under pyrolysis. Production and trade in tar was a major contributor in the economies of Northern Europe and Colonial America. Its main use was in preserving wooden vessels against rot. The largest...

 and/or bound in chains. Sometimes, body-shaped iron

Iron

Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. It is a metal in the first transition series. It is the most common element forming the planet Earth as a whole, forming much of Earth's outer and inner core. It is the fourth most common element in the Earth's crust...

 cages were used to contain the decomposing corpses. For example, in March 1743 in the town of Rye, East Sussex

Rye, East Sussex

Rye is a small town in East Sussex, England, which stands approximately two miles from the open sea and is at the confluence of three rivers: the Rother, the Tillingham and the Brede...

, Allen Grebell was murdered by John Breads. Breads was imprisoned in the Ypres Tower and then hanged, after which his body was left to rot for more than 20 years in an iron cage on Gibbet Marsh. The cage and Breads' skull

Human skull

The human skull is a bony structure, skeleton, that is in the human head and which supports the structures of the face and forms a cavity for the brain.In humans, the adult skull is normally made up of 22 bones...

 are still kept in the Town Hall.

Another example of the cage variation is the gibbet iron, on display at the Atwater Kent Museum

Atwater Kent Museum of Philadelphia

The Philadelphia History Museum was founded in 1938 as Philadelphia's city history museum.-Founding:...

 in Philadelphia

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...

, U.S.

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 The cage, created in 1781, was intended to be used to display the body of convicted pirate Thomas Wilkinson, so that sailors on passing ships might be warned of the consequences of piracy. As Wilkinson's planned execution never took place, the gibbet was never used.

An example of an iron cage used to string up bodies on a gibbet can still be seen in the Westgate Museum at Winchester

Winchester

Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...

.

Antiquity

Public crucifixion

Crucifixion

Crucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...

 with prolonged display of the body after death can be seen as a form of gibbeting.

Old Testament

Old Testament

The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...

 (Torah) law forbids gibbeting beyond sundown of the day that the body is hung on the tree. (See Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy

The Book of Deuteronomy is the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible, and of the Jewish Torah/Pentateuch...

 21:22-23.)

England

Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....

 was gibbeted after his death, when monarchists disinterred his body during the restoration of the monarchy.

United States

Bird Island

Bird Island

-Africa:* Bird Island, Algoa Bay, South Africa* Bird Island , an artificial island in Walvis Bay* Bird Island, Seychelles-Australia:* Bird Island, one of the Whitsunday Islands, Queensland* Bird Islands , Far North Queensland...

 and Nix's Mate island in Boston Harbor

Boston Harbor

Boston Harbor is a natural harbor and estuary of Massachusetts Bay, and is located adjacent to the city of Boston, Massachusetts. It is home to the Port of Boston, a major shipping facility in the northeast.-History:...

 were used for gibbeting pirates and sailors executed for crimes in Massachusetts during the colonial era. Their bodies were left hanging as a warning to sailors coming into the harbor and approaching Boston.

Canada

Marie-Josephte Corriveau

Marie-Josephte Corriveau

Marie-Josephte Corriveau , better known as "la Corriveau", is one of the most popular figures in Québécois folklore. She lived in New France, and was sentenced to death by a British court martial for the murder of her second husband, was hanged for it and her body hanged in chains...

 (1733–1763), better known as "La Corriveau", is one of the most popular figures in Québécois folklore. She lived in New France, was sentenced to death by a British court martial for the murder of her second husband, and was hanged for it, and her body was hung in chains. Her story has become legendary in Quebec, and she is the subject of numerous books and plays.

Iran

In 838, Babak Khorramdin

Babak Khorramdin

Bābak Khorram-Din was one of the main Persian revolutionary leaders of the Iranian Khorram-Dinān , which was a local freedom movement fighting the Abbasid Caliphate. Khorramdin appears to be a compound analogous to dorustdin and Behdin "Good Religion" , and are considered an offshoot of...

 had his hands and feet cut off and was then gibbeted alive whilst sewn into a cow's skin with the horns at ear level to crush his head gradually as it dried out.

Germany

The leaders of the Anabaptist

Anabaptist

Anabaptists are Protestant Christians of the Radical Reformation of 16th-century Europe, and their direct descendants, particularly the Amish, Brethren, Hutterites, and Mennonites....

 movement in Münster

Münster Rebellion

The Münster Rebellion was an attempt by radical Anabaptists to establish a communal sectarian government in the German city of Münster. The city became an Anabaptist center from 1534 to 1535, and fell under Anabaptist rule for 18 months — from February 1534, when the city hall was seized and...

 were executed in 1536, and their dead bodies were gibbeted in iron cages hanging from the steeple of St. Lambert's Church. The empty cages are still on display there today.

Following his execution by hanging in 1738, the corpse of Jewish financier

Financier

Financier is a term for a person who handles typically large sums of money, usually involving money lending, financing projects, large-scale investing, or large-scale money management. The term is French, and derives from finance or payment...

 Joseph Süß Oppenheimer

Joseph Süß Oppenheimer

Joseph Süß Oppenheimer was a Jewish banker and financial planner for Duke Karl Alexander of Württemberg in Stuttgart...

 was gibbeted in a human-sized bird cage that hung outside of Stuttgart

Stuttgart

Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....

 on the so-called Pragsattel (the public execution place at the time) for six years, until the inauguration of Karl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg

Karl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg

Charles Eugene , Duke of Württemberg was the eldest son of Duke Karl I Alexander and Princess Maria Augusta of Thurn and Taxis .-Life:...

, who permitted the hasty burial of his corpse at an unknown location.

Bermuda

Being a seafaring nation in the 17th and 18th centuries, Bermuda

Bermuda

Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...

 inherited many of the same customs as England, including the gibbet. Located in Smith's Parish

Smith's Parish, Bermuda

Smith's Parish is one of the nine parishes of Bermuda. It is named for English aristocrat Sir Thomas Smith/Smythe .-Description:...

 at the entrance to Flatt's Inlet is Gibbet Island

Gibbet Island, Bermuda

Gibbet Island is an island of Bermuda. It is located at the mouth of Flatt's Inlet which leads to Harrington Sound. Its name arises from the fact that runaway slaves were gibbetted, or hung here as punishment...

, which was used to hang the bodies of escaped slaves as a deterrent to others. The small island was used for this purpose as it was not on the mainland and therefore satisfied the superstitious beliefs of locals who did not want gibbets near their homes.

Afghanistan

The January 1921 issue of National Geographic Magazine

National Geographic Magazine

National Geographic, formerly the National Geographic Magazine, is the official journal of the National Geographic Society. It published its first issue in 1888, just nine months after the Society itself was founded...

contains a photograph of a gibbet cage in use in Afghanistan. Commentary included with the photograph indicates that the gibbet was a practice still in active use. Criminals sentenced to death were placed alive in the cage and remained there until some undefined time weeks or months after their death.

Australia

In 1837, five years after the practice had ceased in England, the body of John McKay was gibbeted on a tree near the spot where he had murdered Joseph Wilson near Perth, Tasmania

Perth, Tasmania

Perth is a town in the north-east of Tasmania, Australia. It lies 20 km south of Launceston, on the Midland Highway. The town has a population of 1,984 and is averaging a 1% increase per year . Perth is part of the Northern Midlands Council. Federal Lyons MHR Dick Adams also has an office...

. There was great outcry, but the body was not removed until an acquaintance of Wilson passed the spot and, horrified by the spectacle of McKay's rotting corpse, pleaded with the authorities to remove it. The place where this occurred was just to the right (when traveling towards Launceston) of the Midlands Highway on the northern side of Perth and is marked by a sign proclaiming "Gibbet Hill". Though the place is not visible from the present road, the tree upon which McKay was hung still stands. It is the last case of gibbetting in a British colony.

United Kingdom

The Murder Act 1751

Murder Act 1751

The Murder Act 1751 was an Act of the Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain.-Provisions:The Murder Act included the provision "for better preventing the horrid crime of murder" "that some further terror and peculiar mark of infamy be added to the punishment", and that "in no case whatsoever...

 stipulated that "in no case whatsoever shall the body of any murderer be suffered to be buried"; the cadaver was either to be publicly dissected or left "hanging in chains".

The last two men gibbeted in England were William Jobling and James Cook, both in 1832. Their cases are good examples of the different attitudes to the practice.

William Jobling was a miner hanged and gibbeted for the murder of Nicholas Fairles, a colliery owner and local magistrate

Magistrate

A magistrate is an officer of the state; in modern usage the term usually refers to a judge or prosecutor. This was not always the case; in ancient Rome, a magistratus was one of the highest government officers and possessed both judicial and executive powers. Today, in common law systems, a...

, near Jarrow

Jarrow

Jarrow is a town in Tyne and Wear, England, located on the River Tyne, with a population of 27,526. From the middle of the 19th century until 1935, Jarrow was a centre for shipbuilding, and was the starting point of the Jarrow March against unemployment in 1936.-Foundation:The Angles re-occupied...

, Durham

Durham

Durham is a city in north east England. It is within the County Durham local government district, and is the county town of the larger ceremonial county...

. After being hanged, the body was taken off the rope and loaded into a cart and taken on a tour of the area before arriving at Jarrow Slake, where the crime had been committed. Here, the body was placed into an iron gibbet cage. The cage and the scene were described thus:
The gibbet was a foot in diameter with strong bars of iron up each side. The post was fixed into a one-and-a-half-ton stone base sunk into the Slake. The body was soon removed by fellow miners and given a decent burial.

James Cook was a bookbinder convicted of the murder of his creditor Paas, a manufacturer of brass instruments, in Leicester

Leicester

Leicester is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands of England, and the county town of Leicestershire. The city lies on the River Soar and at the edge of the National Forest...

. He was executed on Friday, 10 August 1832, in front of Leicester prison. Afterwards:

His body was to be displayed on a purpose-built gallows 33 ft high in Saffron Lane near the Aylestone Tollgate. According to The Newgate Calendar:

In 1834, England outlawed gibbeting.