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Guillotine used by the Papal State
In 1798, the Roman Republic was proclaimed under Napoleonic rule and Pius VI was deported to France. It was actually the French who introduced the guillotine in the former Papal State and the first condemned prisoner to be put to death with the new instrument was Tommaso Tintori, guilty of murder, who was beheaded on 28 February 1810 by the executioner Giovan
Battista Bugatti, called Mastro Titta. The executioner used the guillotine at least fifty-six times from 1810 to 1813.
In 1815 the Vienna Congress restored Rome to the popes, and despite the aversion to the “death machine” brought in by the French, the guillotine had already been reinstated in 1816, since it was considered to be a quick, clean method of execution. Tommaso Borzoni, guilty of “premeditated murders and petty thieving”, was the first to be guillotined under the Papal Government, on 2 October 1816.
Under the Papal Government three places were designated for executions in Rome: Piazza di Ponte Sant’Angelo, Piazza del Popolo and Via dei Cerchi.
The last executions by guillotine were carried out in Rome on 24 November 1868; those beheaded were Giuseppe Monti and Gaetano Tognetti, accused of the attack on the Serristori barracks in the Borgo, which caused the death of twenty-five Zouave soldiers. The decapitations were performed by the executioner Antonio Balducci, who had been Mastro Titta’s assistant for some years, and took the “master”’s place in 1865.
The guillotine was adopted for the last time by the Papal State in Palestrina, on 9 July 1870, and the last man to be beheaded was Agatino Bellomo.
Provenance: Rome, Museo di Castel Sant’Angelo, 1934
Wicker basket
The dead man’s head fell into this basket which was always used with the guillotine.
Provenance: Rome, Confraternity of San Giovanni Decollato, 1934
