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Lunchtime Seminar: ‘Shame in Early Modern Public Execution’, Una McIlvenna (Queen Mary University of London)

Friday 12th June, 2015

1pm, Room 136, Arts 1 Building, Mile End campus

‘Do you know what the world will do to you? It will make you understand that these things bring you great shame and wrong you: the tolling of the bell, the reading of the condemnation, your being tied and led before the people…’

Bologna Comforters’ Manual in The Art of Executing Well, ed. Nicholas Terpstra (Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Press, 2008)

This paper looks at how the emotion of shame was conceived around early modern public execution, and further, how shame was then portrayed in the broadside ballads that broadcast information about executions. It seems paradoxical that in the moments before their death condemned criminals were deeply concerned about the shame their punishment would create. Why would a person about to die care about feeling shame? I explore how, in contrast to our current understanding of it as a private, personal emotion, shame was conceived as a communal emotion in the early modern period, one that people shared, and which had tangible consequences for one’s family and friends. In that sense, can shame even be considered an emotion in early modern thought? I discuss these issues from the perspective of the ballads that were sung about these executions. How did balladry perpetuate – or subvert – the message of shame that was central to the purpose of execution?