The Nineteenth-Century Invention of the Gothic Executioner

Many of the popular images we have of medieval and early modern executioners—hooded and grim sadists—are in fact the product of nineteenth-century imaginations.  This paper will explore how this figure became an icon in the service of a variety of agendas: legal reform, anticlericalism, romance fiction, and tourism.  Specifically I will focus on events triggered by the 1803 publication of the personal journal kept by executioner Meister Frantz Schmidt (1554-1634), a forty-five year veteran of the profession.  Enlightenment-influenced legal reformers were naturally drawn to his accounts of various outdated tortures and punishments as useful tools for their own progressive agendas.  Romantic and other authors likewise found the figure of the “medieval” executioner—as they imagined him—irresistible, in the process making their own lasting contributions to the newly emerging stereotype. Secularist liberals eagerly made many equally unfounded (yet influential) connections between past cruelties and the very nature of organized religion.  Finally, in Nuremberg an industrious local businessman opened a “torture museum,” which quickly became an internationally famous tourist destination.  Many, if not most, of the items displayed were in fact high quality forgeries, including the famous Iron Maiden.  Some of the historical fabrications were perhaps based on misunderstandings of historical references, others were intentional distortions.  I will conclude with some examples of the pervasive influence of this stereotype today as well as a comparison to my own findings while working with Schmidt’s journal and various archival sources from the period.