As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.........
I have always wondered of the grand stories of lopping off people's heads. It was said that Jim Bowie with his famous knife could accomplish such feats, but this business of even sabers lopping off heads in the heat of battle was something that the dymanics of physics just did not match the story.
For example, the Muslim head hunters, who have sort of given up on lopping off heads, had all sorts of troubles in taking heads off the trunk as well you will. Thee is a grand cut of beef roast about a human neck and then the matter of that spinal bone, just is not something that yields a great deal to the fun of head lopping.
In order to lop off a head, one has to not only cut a beef roast in two with one swipe, but also one has to hit that juncture of vertebrae exactly, as no knife is going to cut through a bone. Enough force might shatter the arm bones for a lopping, but when it all comes down to it, there is a random chance in this, in one has to hit the joint precisely or all you get is a dull thud.
Sir Samuel White Baker, who was an expert on everything and a very high judgment on his conclusions mentioned that the hill folk in Asia had a trick of lopping off bull heads with sabers, but it was a matter of stretching the neck out, a heavy blade and then of course in that tension lopping the head off.
The Nepalese produced this artform, and let it never be forgotten the demure land of buddha embarked upon this sinister entertainment.
That is part of the spell of the guillotine. Everyone sees the magic of the blade, but the real trick is that wooden block which stretches the head from the body, so when the lady's blade falls, it is a quick clean slice of weight, speed and least resistance.
The English headsman went to his work with his size and a heavy broad axe, which would overcome the human vertebrae in shattering them on the chopping block.
A knife though is a completely different matter as is a sword, because the human head is not stretched out from the body to lop the head off. It is not to say that the feat is impossible, but the grande gesture of it was such a spectacle that it is not so easily accomplished by sword or saber.
The reason I was thinking of this and writing of it, as this reality has had me bothered in all of this for some time, and with SSWB bringing the subject up in 1845, it of course was close enough to the 21st century to examine it.
SSWB, told of his own experience in a pack of hounds bringing a wild boar to bay. He moved through the jungle and came upon the head of the animal and the hounds worrying the body. The boar upon seeing Sir Sam, made a charge at the Englishman to kill him. What followed was novel in one of the girl hounds had been holding on for dear life to the ham of the boar, which stretched him out, so that when Sir Samuel made a desperate swipe with his quite large 2 pound knife, he came across the back of the pig, sliced through the hard leather, through the spine and into the organs, laying the pig open.
Everyone was quite surprised the pig died in an instant, but not regretting it as no one was killed.
It is the stretching of the neck, which affords the opportunity for the blade to move between the bone joints, which is what severs the head or lops it off. That is the key in this from soldiers to bulls to boars to chickens. Being the one in these years in having the office cutting off chicken heads to turn them into fried chicken, I get enough head lopping now to satisfy me. It never does quite work out every time for a clean beheading on a chicken under ideal conditions of hanging them by the feet, stretching out the neck, waiting for them to relax to get it done quickly as you hit bone often enough and have to give it another try.
No delights in being splashed with warm blood either about the face, as it appears Muslims do not enjoy that either as they never endeavor to write long koran prose about being bathed in a blood bath.
So like in all things in life, yes there is a chance that lopping off heads can happen. Given enough opportunity a human might raise the odds on the battlefield, but again a German spade or a Russian trencher has greater success due to the thrust is up, stretching the neck and thereby with a sharpened shovel is capable of dissecting the vertebrae at joint for a head lopping and blood spurt bath.
Yes the Japanese could do this, but again you are missing the stretching of the neck in the subject bowed, exposing the protruding hangman's vertebrae. The samurai uses two hands, his entire body is like a leopard in driven body strength, and his eye is precise in hitting the joint.
No one ever teaches that outside samurai class as it ruins the illusion, but no sword is going to slice through a human neck bone every time, and, at the time of executing a man in front of the emperor or shogun, you just do not want your sword bouncing off the bone or breaking. It would be quite losing face.
You really do learn a great deal of information here to enlighten you from your ignorance. It is a shame that the people with money do not appreciate it more.
I hear a pretty male cardinal. Time to go enjoy that. Time for you to donate.
agtG
