Grammar Question: Hanged vs Hung

[DMark]

Ever since Saddam was sentenced to die in Iraq, I have heard supposedly intelligent reporters say, “He is going to be hung.”

Unless I slept through some new grammar rule, I thought the exception to the grammar rule was a person sentenced to die by hanging was to be hanged.

A picture is hung on the wall, but a person is hanged by the neck.

Or were grammar rules re-written while I was hanging around locker rooms showers to see who was hung?

[chowder]

He was well hung…so they hanged him by the balls.

sorry, couldn’t resist

[Marley23]

Saddam may be hung for all I know, but that won’t matter after he’s hanged.

The grammar hasn’t changed, as far as I know. But hung/hanged is a common mistake, and I’m not surprised if the newscasters make it - particularly if they’re speaking extemporaneously. If they’re reading, there’s not much of an excuse. I don’t know if TV stations have copy editors the way newspapers do, though.

[Rigamarole]

@Marley23

Saddam may be hung for all I know

Of course he is. How do you think he got to be such a big dicktator?

[The_Octagon]

I think it’s just been too long since anyone has been hanged around here that they figure it’s old usage or poor grammar. It sounds bad. It is bad, but it also sounds bad, grammatically and orally. The consonants jive - one’s way in the back and the other’s up front.

[Monty]

It seems to me that the lingo’s changed a tad over the years.

From here:

—Usage note Hang has two forms for the past tense and past participle, hanged and hung. The historically older form hanged is now used exclusively in the sense of causing or putting to death: He was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead. In the sense of legal execution, hung is also quite common and is standard in all types of speech and writing except in legal documents. When legal execution is not meant, hung has become the more frequent form: The prisoner hung himself in his cell.

From here,

1 a : to remain suspended or fastened to some point above without support from below : DANGLE b : to die by hanging – often hanged in the past <he hanged for his crimes> c : to be connected as something relevant or related <thereby hangs a tale – Shakespeare>

&

usage For both transitive and intransitive senses 1b the past and past participle hung, as well as hanged, is standard. Hanged is most appropriate for official executions <he was to be hanged, cut down whilst still alive…and his bowels torn out – Louis Allen> but hung is also used <gave orders that she should be hung – Peter Quennell>. Hung is more appropriate for less formal hangings <by morning I’ll be hung in effigy – Ronald Reagan>.

[TheLoadedDog]

Old Graffiti:

Reagan should be bloody well hung!

He is, he is. - Nancy

[Sublight]

In olden days, men who did nasty things were hung.

Nowadays, most women agree size doesn’t matter.

[Honeydew_1]

The old saying is “People are hanged; meat is hung”.

[GorillaMan]

Cambridge has them as two equal alternatives. And the ubiquitous Etymonline quote:

Hung emerged as pp. 16c. in northern England dial., and hanged endured only in legal language (which tends to be conservative) and metaphors extended from it (I’ll be hanged).

So ‘hung’ isn’t incorrect, unless you chose to rely on one dictionary which suits your point of view.

[SkipMagic]

I’ll let this hung in GQ for a while.

[Annie-Xmas]

On an old, live radio broadcast of Gumsmoke, an actor playing a hangman said “When I get through with a man, he is well hung.”

I don’t know how the cast carried on after that.

[chowder]

@Annie-Xmas

On an old, live radio broadcast of Gumsmoke, an actor playing a hangman said “When I get through with a man, he is well hung.”

I don’t know how the cast carried on after that.

Seeing as how it was Gum smoke I guess they chewed it over and just carried on

[silenus]

Blazing Saddles:

[Bart returns unexpectedly after being sentenced to death by hanging]
*Charlie: They said you was hung.
Bart: And they was right. *

[Colibri]

@Rigamarole

Of course he is. How do you think he got to be such a big dicktator?

You deserve decollation, jugulation, or perhaps defenestration for that.

[WhyNot]

So is anything besides a person ever hanged? If pictures, meat, etc. all are hung and people are hanged, then it seems like not so much a grammar issue as a colloquialism issue.

[gigi]

From Monty’s link: "The historically older form hanged is now used exclusively in the sense of causing or putting to death: He was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead. In the sense of legal execution, hung is also quite common and is standard in all types of speech and writing except in legal documents. When legal execution is not meant, hung has become the more frequent form: The prisoner hung himself in his cell. "

But it is execution only by hanging by the neck, right? For example, Christ was hung from the cross, not hanged?

[Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus]

Interesting, I never thought about contexts like “being hung in effigy”, but it does sound right tha way. OTOH for a real, official hanging, only hanged sounds right.

Given the fact that, IIRC, execution by hanging is practiced nowhere in the Anglosphere, that usage will fossilize and remain in place.

[NoCoolUserName]

They say dear Francis Hinsley,
they say that you were hung.
With red protruding eyeballs
and black protruding tongue.

(The Loved One 1965)

[chowder]

@gigi

From Monty’s link: "The historically older form hanged is now used exclusively in the sense of causing or putting to death: He was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead. In the sense of legal execution, hung is also quite common and is standard in all types of speech and writing except in legal documents. When legal execution is not meant, hung has become the more frequent form: The prisoner hung himself in his cell. "

But it is execution only by hanging by the neck, right? For example, Christ was hung from the cross, not hanged?

Christ was nailed to the cross