The Halifax Gibbet

SUNDAY

A trip down Halifax this afternoon gave me the opportunity to have a wander. My first stop was the Piece Hall, then a walk up ti the Halifax Gibbet and then to M&S cafe.

The Gibbet was an early type of guillotine using a weighted axe head to execute the victim. 

The jurisdiction of the Gibbet Law applied within the confines of Sowerbyshire where the Lord of the Manor had authority to execute any thief caught with stolen goods to the value of 13½ d

The first recorded execution was in 1286 and the instrument continued to decapitate people up until 1650.

The Gibbet blade of 1650 still survives in the Calderdale Museum. The current reproduction Gibbet, located on the original stone plinth, was built in 1974.