Source: Tormenta: The
Execution of Robert Francois Damiens, 1757
At the Midsummer's Fair in mid-sixteenth-century Paris,
cat-burning was a regular attraction. A special stage was built so that a large
net containing several dozen cats could be lowered onto a bonfire beneath. The
spectators, including kings and queens shrieked with laughter as the animals,
howling with pain, were singed, roasted, and finally carbonized. Cruelty was
evidently thought to be funny. It played its part in many of Europe's more
traditional sports, including cock-fighting, bear-baiting, bull-fighting, and
fox-hunting.
Two hundred years later, on 2 March 1757, Robert Francois Damiens was condemned in Paris to make honorable amends: Damiens was being punished for attempted regicide. His
immediate family were banished from France; his
brothers and sisters ordered to change their last names; and his house was
razed. He had approached Louis XV as the King was entering his carriage, and he
had inflicted a small wound with a small knife. He made some sort of complaint
about parliament and made no effort to escape, saying he only wanted to give
the King a fright Nowadays, he would be assessed as a
crank.
He was brought in a tumbrel, naked except for a smock, and
carrying a torch of burning wax in his hand. The scaffold
-stood on the Place de Greve. Pincered
-at the breasts, arms-, thighs and calves, his right hand holding the knife,
with which he perpetrated the said act, he was to be burned on the hand with
sulfur, to be doused at the pinion points with boiling oil, molten lead, and
burning resin, and then to be dismembered by four horses, before his body was
burned, reduced to ashes, and scattered to the winds.
When the fire was lit, the heat was so feeble that only the skin
on the back of one hand was damaged. But then one of the executioners, a strong
and robust man, grasped the metal pincers, each one foot long, and by twisting
and turning them, tore out huge lumps of flesh, leaving gaping wounds which
were doused from a red-hot spoon.
Between his screams, Damiens repeatedly
called out, 'My God, take pity on me!' and Jesus, help me!' The spectators were
greatly edified by the compassion of an aged cure who
lost no moment to console him.
The Clerk, of the Court, the Sieur de
Breton, went up to the sufferer several times, and asked him if he had anything
to say. He said no . . .
The final operation lasted a very long time, because the horses
were not used to it. Six horses were needed: but even they were not enough . .
.
The executioner asked whether they should cut him in pieces, but
the Clerk ordered them to try again. The confessors drew close once more, and
he said 'Kiss me, sires', and one of them kissed him on the forehead.
After two or three more attempts, the executioners took out
knives, and cut off his legs . . .
They said that he was dead. But when the body had been pulled
apart, the lower jaw was still moving, as if to speak
. . . In execution of the decree, the last pieces of flesh were
not consumed until 10:30 in the evening.