Not that I generally regard films starring Charlie Sheen and Kiefer Sutherland as being a wealth of historically accurate information…but, the scene where they are gathered to witness Rebecca De Mornay’s character’s execution has always made me wonder.
It’s just a handful of guys, an executioner and the criminal. Admittedly Kiefer’s character and another character present are noblemen, and thus I suppose already obliged to uphold the laws of the land. But would such a private execution have happened? Is there any historical basis for the way it is portrayed in the movie? What would have kept some well meaning but ignorant person (see D’Artagnan) from stumbling upon this scene unfolding and drawing steel to save the convicted woman?
The movie’s execution is different from the book’s, but even in the book it is a fairly private execution as I recall. It’s been years since I read it though. As I recall the execution in the novel is done in the executioner’s home, or just outside of it.
I don’t have any cites but I don’t think every execution was a spectacle, I mean they had dungeons were undoubtedly people were killed and such.
Even today I would find it decidedly icky if they started televising women being executed*. But as for then, I think women, especially women of quality like Rebecca, got a bit of a pass from it being so public.
Plus, and this is just my two cents, 'twere only high treason after all. If it was adultery or some other sex crime she’d probably have been hanged in the middle of town at high noon. I should add a rolleyes but I think it’s clear enough.
*Not that I want to see men being executed on TV either.
In the book, the musketeers hold a private trial and sentence her to death. The witnesses are all relatives of people she has had killed. The executioner is a relative of her first husband and also has a grudge against her. He takes her across a river and beheads her.
Since she was an agent of the Cardinal Richelieu, a French court would not have touched her. Athos presided over the kangaroo court. Since he was a nobleman, a real court would be more lenient to him. Since he was still technically her husband, he could claim to be punishing an adulterous wife, and a court would be very lenient to him.
According to the footnotes in my copy of the book, there are hints in the text that the river was the French/Belgian border. So Milady’s death technically took place outside of French jurisdiction.
In the 1974 film Athos claims the rights to “high, low, & middle justice” because he was the Comte de la Fere - was this just made up for that film to avoid awkward questions such as the OP’s?
I’ve still only read The Count of Monte Cristo by Dumas. Trying the Musketeers series has always been scary given all the cheesewhiz you see on TV that’s supposed to be based on the books.
No, it was in the original book as well. Athos claimed the right to dispense his own justice because of his noble title; it was probably a tradition from the early Middle Ages, when a feudal lord, being a representative of the King, was the only one with judicial autority in his domain.
