Note 29 — Chapter XIV · —(Continued).

M. Jules Gérard (Appendix III.) seems to imagine that the mutilation preceded the execution, which I believe is not the case. The same error has been noticed in Mr. Duncan (vol. i. p. 220). Mr. Norris, in 1772, exactly describes the gibbets, with the naked and mutilated victims hanging by the ankles, and he says that they had been clubbed on the head, as by the old Roman “Ammazzatore.” A few days afterwards I saw, in the market-place, a dog similarly suspended, as a Vo-sisa, or fetish to prevent disease.