Hamida Djandoubi smoked a few cigarettes in the last moments before he was executed by guillotine in a Marseilles prison, the ultimate punishment for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet.

The idea behind the guillotine is this: If you’re going to execute someone, you may as well do it efficiently and humanely, at least by 18th-century standards. Decapitating the condemned with an ax or ...

A common rumor holds that Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, the Frenchman who invented the guillotine, was also eventually executed with the device. But as the Dictionary of Eponyms notes, "Dr. Joseph ...

Originally designed by Dr. Antoine Louis back in the late 18th century, the guillotine is one of the few design classics you don’t really want to have first-hand insight into. As part of a new ...

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... NANTES, France – A 19th century guillotine in perfect working order goes up for auction in France on Thursday and is expected to fetch up to $82,000, the ...