Hanging in Chains

Hartshorne, Albert, 1839-1910Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.0

Word count: 101K words
Chapters: 11

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Hanging in Chains by Albert HartshorneAuthor: Hartshorne, Albert, 1839-1910,Language: English, Class: HV: Social sciences: Social pathology, Social and Public Welfare, Release Date: Jul 27, 2014

Editor's review

This book, Hanging in Chains, is Albert Hartshorne's specialized study of the British custom of the gibbet, an obscure but solid piece of literature at the intersection of social history and the history of punishment. Drawing on physical remains and historical records, the author examines the forms of hanging chains, how they were used, and their symbolic function in judicial deterrence; the prose carries the antiquarian style of late nineteenth-century British scholarship. Its value lies not in grand narrative but in restoring a small, concrete instrument of punishment to its historical context, showing how premodern justice constructed authority through public display. The Project Gutenberg edition is easy to search and cite and is suitable as supplementary material for social history, legal history, and material culture studies. Note its period limitations: the author's prose assumes a Victorian reader's familiarity with punishment, and descriptions of torture details may upset some readers. Overall, this is a short specialized study for researchers rather than a popular history.

Who it's for

A good fit for

University teachers and students studying British penal history and the social history of justice
History enthusiasts interested in material culture and antiquarian research
Social science researchers needing obscure primary sources for papers
Readers interested in premodern European systems of public punishment

Not a good fit for

General readers seeking popular history stories or biographies
People sensitive to descriptions of torture, death, and corpses
Beginners expecting a systematic general history rather than a short specialized essay

Reading tips

First read the introductory passages to clarify the gibbet's place in the British penal system, then move into detailed antiquarian discussion.
Read alongside general works on British legal history to avoid understanding a single instrument of punishment in isolation.
Note the sources the author cites as you read, for later verification and further research.
Skim passages describing torture, focusing on institutional function rather than sensory detail.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a general history or a specialized study?

It is a specialized discussion centered on the gibbet as a specific instrument of punishment. It is short and focuses on form, use, and symbolic meaning rather than covering the whole history of punishment; it is suitable as supplementary specialized material, not an introductory work.

What background knowledge is needed to read it?

A basic understanding of early modern British justice and the custom of public execution is helpful; otherwise detailed antiquarian discussion may read as isolated facts. Researchers with a foundation in social or legal history will find it smoother.

Is the e-book suitable for academic citation?

The Project Gutenberg edition is convenient for searching the text and locating passages and can serve as a reading and preliminary citation copy; for formal academic writing, however, check authoritative print or academic database editions to confirm pagination and textual differences.

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About the author

Hartshorne, Albert, 1839-1910 Author

Albert Hartshorne (1839–1910) was an English antiquary and writer on historical subjects, though published information about his life is limited. His principal work to survive is Hanging in Chains, a study of the historical practice and custom of suspending the bodies of executed criminals in iron chains for public display. The book stands at the intersection of penal history and antiquarian folklore. Working in a scholarly manner, Hartshorne gathered relevant records, surviving remains and local traditions, and his text weighs documentary evidence against physical relics, reflecting the nineteenth-century English antiquarian emphasis on collecting materials and describing details. Though brief, the work offers a useful compilation of primary material for the study of early modern penal display, attitudes to death and local memory, and it is still cited by scholars and general readers interested in this obscure subject.