History
The earliest known archeological evidence for mounting heads on stakes has been identified in Sweden, at a Mesolithic site in Kanaljorden, in the floor of a dried lake, dating to 8,000 years ago. [1] There, archeologists recovered human crania with the remnants of wooden stakes still in place within the two crania. The crania exhibited evidence of blunt force trauma that looked to have resulted from a violent confrontation. Archeologists interpreted the wooden stakes as evidence that the heads had been mounted for display by members of the Swedish Mesolithic hunter-gatherer culture. [1]
In England, the heads of criminals, especially those convicted of treason, were mounted for display on London Bridge from about 1300 until about 1660. [2] [3] Heads were usually dipped in tar to slow down the decomposition process. Criminal punishment was sometimes posthumous, as the body of Oliver Cromwell was exhumed so that it could be hanged, drawn, and quartered, and his head was mounted on a spike and displayed for 30 years. [4]
In medieval and early modern-era Egypt, wars with crusaders and the Mongols would lead some of severed heads from enemies to be displayed at the Bab Zuweila. When the Mongols sent envoys demanding Mamluk Sultan Qutuz to surrender Egypt, he responded by executing them and displaying their heads at Bab Zuweila.
After the Alexandria Expedition of 1807, when British forces failed to conquer Egypt due to resistance from local Egyptians peasants and forces under Muhammad Ali, many hundreds of severed from slain British troops were displayed to the public in Cairo.
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