@SkyBad

archiemcphee:

What you see here is a working model of a guillotine painstakingly made out of animals bones by a 19th century French prisoner in the UK during the Napoleonic Wars.

Singular, strange, poignant, and rare… thus pretty freaking awesome.

“The guillotine was crafted by a prisoner of war, probably French, who was held in Britain between 1805 and 1815 during the Napoleonic wars. He collected sheep bones from the trash, carved them and put them together with impeccable attention to detail to make the 20-inch high model of an execution. An elaborate superstructure crowns the decapitation machine which rests on a platform with a victim lying horizontally waiting for the blade to fall. The victim is surrounded by armed guards on the platform, and the base of the structure is also manned by armed guards and cannons. Each figure has a hand-painted face, the blade of the guillotine drops and the soldiers holding weapons have moveable arms.”

[via Neatorama]