Epitomes of Evil

Hangmen were familiar characters from urban reality to people living in France and the Burgundian Netherlands in the late Middle Ages. These officers played an essential role in the new penal system. However, general attitudes towards public executioners were highly ambiguous, often hostile and disparaging. In past imagery, various hangman figures, real or fictitious, were closely linked to ideas of otherness, cruelty, sin and evil. They were identified with criminals, marginal people and demons. In the period of the late Middle Ages, the hangman's representations were actively exploited, shaped and modified for various reasons by different social and cultural groups in different products of culture, religious as well as secular.

This study casts light on ways of perceiving the executioner in French and Burgundian culture and society from the fourteenth to the early sixteenth century. The primary sources used in this work consist of wide and varied printed and non-printed textual materials such as chronicles, writings by legal experts and theologians, drama and poetry. Significant role is also given to the testimony offered by pictorial art, both sacred and profane, especially miniatures and panel paintings.

Cette série d'études peut être considerée comme un produit du programme de recherche 'La société urbaine dans les anciens Pays-Bas (bas Moyen Age - 16e siècle)' financé par les 'Pôles d'attraction interuniversitaires - Etat belge - Services fédéraux des affaires scientifiques, techniques et culturelles' et mené par une équipe composée par les Universités de Gand (RUG, Marc Boone, Hilde Symoens), de Bruxelles (ULB, Claire Billen), de Leyde (RUL, Wim Blockmans) et d'Anvers (UFSIA, Bruno Blondé, Guido Marnef) et du départment des manuscripts de la Bibliothèque Royale (Albertina) de Bruxelles (Pierre Cockshaw, Bernard Bousmanne). Le projet (PAI, phase V, n°10) sera développé en poursuivant quatre lignes de recherche: villes et plat-pays (osmose économique, social et culturel), contrôle des comportements, identité urbaine, histoire sociale et culturelle des classes moyennes. La série publiera les resultats de recherche du programme pendant la période 2002-2006. Compte tenu de l'importance du phénomène urbain dans l'histoire des anciens Pays-Bas, le programme de recherche contribuera également à mieux comprendre la singularité de ce espace dans le contexte européen.