the execution and its message When intramural executions were introduced in various German states, women could no longer attend executions – except of course their own.130 The introduction of intramural executions was only one of many measures taken to separate executions from everyday life. Among the preparations on the night before an execution in Brussels 1847 the police evacuated nearby cabarets and bars from where inappropriately cheerful songs could be heard.131 Generally, the authorities seem to have been interested in the solemnity of the executions. Still, this interest became even more important during the nineteenth century, simultaneously with an alteration of the solemnity – the extended rituals and the divine services in public diminished while such things as efficiency and record-keeping grew in importance. This might be a reason that the crowds were less and less welcome to the scene. They should be there to learn – but they were incapable of behaving. What behaviour, then, was expected? Until 1847, the crowds at the executions at the Grand Place in Brussels were said to have either behaved scandalously or just showed their righteous approval, depending on who was passing judgement.132 The execution site was then moved to the less central Porte de Hal, and at an execution in February 1848 an even greater crowd was present at the route there and at the site.133 The way crowds came to be judged is clear: no reaction was the only acceptable reaction. Those striving to be executed and those searching for methods to hinder them in their aim could probably agree that the impression given by an execution, its messages, were important – although their perspectives and goals were quite different. The executions were the responsibility of the, mostly civilian, authorities conducting them and they also had a comprehensive power not only 130 Evans 1997 p 396 sq, 400 sq, see also the similar development inUSA, Bessler 1997 p 68 sq, 90. 131 La Belgique judiciaire 1847 col 191, see also La Belgique judiciaire 1847 col 1319. 132 Nypels 1867 p 49, 171. 133 L’Indépendance belge 19 February 1848. For an execution in Charleroi 29 March 1862 with at least as much nightlife and where some 30,000 were said to have lined the route to the execution where some 15-20,000 attended see L'Indépendance belge 29 March 1862, Het Handelsblad 30-31 March 1862, Le Précurseur 30 March 1862. 58
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