The device consists of a tall, upright frame with a weighted and angled blade suspended at the top. The condemned person is secured with a pillory at the bottom of the frame, holding the position of the neck directly below the blade.
The blade is then released, swiftly and forcefully decapitating the victim with a single, clean pass; the head falls into a basket or other receptacle below. The guillotine is best known for its use in France , particularly during the French Revolution , where the revolution's supporters celebrated it as the people's avenger and the revolution's opponents vilified it as the pre-eminent symbol of the violence of the Reign of Terror. Use of an oblique blade and the pillory-like restraint device set this type of guillotine apart from others.
Display of severed heads had long been one of the most common ways European sovereigns exhibited their power to their subjects.
The design of the guillotine was intended to make capital punishment more reliable and less painful in accordance with new Enlightenment ideas of human rights. Prior to use of the guillotine, France had inflicted manual beheading and a variety of methods of execution, many of which were more gruesome and required a high level of precision and skill to carry out successfully. After its adoption, the device remained France's standard method of judicial execution until the abolition of capital punishment in The use of beheading machines in Europe long predates such use during the French Revolution in Although the device is imaginary, its function is clear.
Within these three openings are the hallows set for them. And behold what I would do to them if their three heads were therein She setteth her hand toward the openings and draweth forth a pin that was fastened into the wall, and a cutting blade of steel droppeth down, of steel sharper than any razor, and closeth up the three openings.
