Facts about Hanging

A ladder was also commonly used with the condemned being forced to ascend, after which the noose was tied and the ladder pulled away or turned, leaving the victim hanging.

Hanging is the suspension of a person by a ligature, usually a noose or cord tied in a "Hangman's knot" wrapped around the neck, causing death.

On March 9 2006, an official of Iraq's Supreme Judicial Council confirmed that Iraqi authorities had executed the first insurgents by hanging.

A type of hanging comparable to full suspension hanging may be obtained by self-strangulation using a ligature of the neck and only partial weight of the body (partial suspension).

Efforts were made to improve the hanging technique to ensure swift and painless death.

Suspension hanging is similar, except the gallows themselves are movable, so that the noose can be raised once the condemned is in place.

Full suspension is not required, and for this reason hanging is especially commonplace among suicidal prisoners.

Hanging is the oldest but most widely used method of execution in the world today, with over 300 people hanged during 2006, many in public.

Hanging was the method of execution in the United States until the mid-twentieth century, and was commonly employed in lynchings.

Hanging was a method of execution employed by the Nazis during World War II.

Hangings were seen as a public spectacle, with people even using the occasion for a family picnic.

Canada used hangings as its method of execution as late as 1962.

A mechanized form of hanging, the "upright jerker," was also experimented with in the nineteenth century.

Iran has continued to use hangings into the twenty-first century.

The materials necessary for suicide by hanging are relatively easily available to the average person, compared with firearms or lethal poison.

The first recorded use of judicial hanging is in the Persian Empire approximately 2,500 years ago.

The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck," although it formerly also referred to crucifixion.

Usually hanging involves the use of a noose, gallows, and hood often with the pinioning of the arms.

Formerly, hangings were conducted in public squares and used as a demonstration of the state's power and to embarrass the person being executed.

Many people have criticized the death penalty in general, saying that "two wrongs do not make a right," and thus added their voices in opposition to hanging.

By the last decade of the twentieth century hanging had been replaced by lethal injection as the standard method of carrying out the death penalty in states which retained this punishment.

Iraq also continues to use hanging as its method of execution.

Along with widespread rejection of the death penalty as a punishment in many countries, hanging has come to be seen as a brutal method of execution.

Others, such as Great Britain, abolished the death penalty itself; while still others continue with hanging as their method of execution, although the death penalty is rarely applied.

Suspension hanging is a common method of suicide.

The first recorded use of judicial hanging is in the Persian Empire approximately 2,500 years ago.

The use of hanging ended only with the abolition of the death penalty in 1964.

The death penalty is used for many offenses and is the only punishment for rape, murder, and child molestation, with all hangings taking place in public.

Formerly, hangings were conducted in public squares and used as a demonstration of the state's power and to embarrass the person being executed.

In 2006, judicial hangings occurred in Bangladesh, Botswana, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Japan, Jordan, Kuwait, Pakistan, and Singapore.

A type of hanging comparable to full suspension hanging may be obtained by self-strangulation using a ligature of the neck and only partial weight of the body (partial suspension).