Talk:List of people who were beheaded

Flag for incomplete list?
I have added the Welsh woman warrior, Gwenllian ferch Gruffudd, who was beheaded by the Anglo-Normans at Kidwelly Castle in February 1136. However, although Scotland is listed, Wales has been left out, so I was compelled to add Gwenllian to the list titled "...beheaded in Great Britain after 1707". Is there a way to add Wales to the List? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.255.145.194 (talk) 02:26, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Reword title?
The verb tense in the title is odd. Why is this "people who have been beheaded" and not "people who were beheaded"? As far as I know, beheading is something that can happen to a person exactly once, so there is no need for the "have been" tense. --Orlady (talk) 00:16, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Santorini
Somebody please add the August, 2008 incident in Santorini, Greece. Unfree (talk) 18:38, 15 October 2009 (UTC)


 * According to the BBC story, the victim was Adamantia Karkali. Unfree (talk) 18:48, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Edward VI of England nitpick
I've changed "executed by Edward VI" to "executed during the reign of Edward VI". For other sovereigns the wording is fine, as the only person who could order or approve a beheading was the King or Queen. Edward's case is different because he couldn't have signed any of the orders, because he was a minor. I suppose it could say "executed by the regents of Edward VI", if there's a reliable source to substantiate that it was the Council of Regency (and not just one member) who signed every order. --NellieBly (talk) 18:52, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree entirely -- Île_flottante~Floating island   Talk  19:55, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I only partially agree - Edward VI was still the king and things like this had to be approved by him, even if he did have little influence. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BRCScriptor (talk • contribs) 12:29, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Fictional characters
This section could potentially become very long and very silly. I suggest we limit characters to this list who are notable enough to have independent articles of their own. Rklawton (talk) 15:30, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

executed by...?
Just a bit of pedantry: some of the wording in this could potentially be misinterpreted by less knowledgable people. I think instead of saying e.g. "executed by Henry IV" we should say perhaps "executed by order of Henry IV", because technically it's the executioner who does the actual beheading. Also, this article seems very England-centred, as with a lot of other articles in English. For example, I'm sure there were far more notable French people beheaded during the Ancien Regime — Preceding unsigned comment added by BRCScriptor (talk • contribs) 12:39, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Not all decapitations are "beheadings"
IMO, this list should not include accidental decapitations, or decapitations performed after a person is already dead by some other means. The online (and paywalled) Oxford English Dictionary defines "beheading" (the noun) as "the action of cutting off the head; [specifically] of execution by decapitation"; and all the examples given by the OED for both "beheading" and the verb "behead" refer to executions. I would recommend the list be pared down to include only executions or other intentional homicides in which decapitation was the intended method of death or the actual cause of death — a definition which would include bungled hangings causing the victim's head to be torn off, or drawn-out beheadings where the victim may have died from blood loss or other causes before the separation of the head was complete, but not the removal of heads from already-dead bodies, or accidents resulting in decapitation. I realize this proposal is likely to be controversial, but if people object, I hope they will do so using accepted reliable sources to back up their preferred, broader definition of "beheaded". — Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 04:44, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

I've brought up this issue again at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Death. I feel strongly about this matter, but since people continue to add accidental decapitation events from time to time, I'm hesitant to just make my proposed change per WP:BRD without some reasonable consensus first. — Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 05:56, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Requesting move to "List of people who were decapitated"

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Page not moved: it appears that another solution is preferred Ground Zero | t 01:53, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

List of people who were beheaded → List of people who were decapitated – This list includes both people who were executed or murdered by decapitation, and also people who suffered accidental or posthumous decapitation. The word beheading refers most properly and specifically to executions or other intentional homicides; see my comments at Talk:List of people who were beheaded, as well as the lead section of the Decapitation article. IMO, either the existing instances of accidental or posthumous decapitation should be removed from this list, or else it would be best to rename the list to reflect the fact that editors want it to include more than just "beheadings". Relisted. Jenks24 (talk) 12:23, 20 August 2014 (UTC) Relisted. Jenks24 (talk) 07:02, 12 August 2014 (UTC) — Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 03:57, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Split into two lists, List of people who were executed by beheading, and List of people who were decapitated, the latter being limited to accidents and other such incidents. bd2412  T 15:17, 12 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think it sounds like a reasonable split. Bali88 (talk) 18:47, 12 August 2014 (UTC)
 * If the article is split and the above titles are used, where would you propose to list people who were murdered by decapitation — not by accident, not in the course of a state-sanctioned execution, and not postmortem? —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 06:41, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Late suggestion of title names List of people executed by beheading, and List of people who were decapitated in situations other than execution. The trouble with the murder issue is that there may not be such clear proof and there may be a lot of speculation. The other difficult thing in the second situation is that it doesn't specify whether the person lost their life at the time of execution. Gregkaye (talk) 20:04, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
 * @Richwales, execution by beheading is a subtopic of decapitation. I would include on the list of people "executed" all who were intentionally killed by beheading by any entity claiming a right to do so (i.e., to include things like ISIS and Taliban remnants beheading people despite their lack of state-granted authority to do so). bd2412  T 14:04, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think if we add "in situations other than execution" it would make the title too long. I think we can make the distinction in the lead. It's not perfect, but I'd steer away from a title that is too lengthy. We could also title it "List of people who were accidentally decapitated". If we title the other article "People killed by beheading", I think that avoids the association people typically have of execution, which is that it's a governmental body doing the killing. We could do List of people accidentally decapitated for accidents and List of people killed by beheading for all deaths that were intentional; including executions, murders, and suicides. I would include a subsection of people killed by beheading for those who were decapitated post mortem. Bali88 (talk) 14:47, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I think it is presumed that when we speak of decapitation, we refer to deaths caused by it. Given enough time, everyone whose body is buried will have their head become separated from the rest. If you really want to list people whose corpses were basically ritually decapitated for whatever reason (or whose heads were stolen), that would be a separate list again. List of people executed by beheading (or List of people killed by beheading, List of people who were killed by accidental decapitatation, List of people who were ritually beheaded after death. bd2412  T 19:04, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Right, obviously we wouldn't list all of those. They mentioned posthumous decapitation in the proposal, so I assumed some of these folks were mentioned in the article and was trying to place them correctly. Bali88 (talk) 01:42, 22 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Split: Beheading is by decapitation.  If we want a separate murders by decapitation list, that could be done too, but it's not the subject of this RM discussion. If no split, then rename per nom as long as article content remains broader than executions.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  09:17, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on List of people who were beheaded. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Replaced archive link http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:fkXJqJmi-L4J:en.wikisource.org/wiki/Richard_III_%28DNB00%29+Thomas+Fauconberg+execution+middleham&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=firefox-a&source=www.google.co.uk with https://web.archive.org/web/20151208005929/https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Richard_III_%28DNB00%29 on http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Richard_III_%28DNB00%29

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 20:14, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on List of people who were beheaded. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110516170123/http://www.hrionline.ac.uk/johnfoxe/apparatus/person_glossaryG.html to http://www.hrionline.ac.uk/johnfoxe/apparatus/person_glossaryG.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070506050541/http://www.lanchidradio.hu/derektol_hianyzik_kadar_janos_tobben_orzik_a_sirkertet_20070503 to http://www.lanchidradio.hu/derektol_hianyzik_kadar_janos_tobben_orzik_a_sirkertet_20070503

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 09:51, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Mythology
The Lernean Hydra should be added under Greek mythology. 83.254.143.161 (talk) 00:46, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

Comment from Draft:List of people who were beheaded
The following comment was from Draft:List of people who were beheaded, which now redirects to this section:

Inserted a citation needed for Deir Yassin Massacre as multiple interviews with Arab refugees who were survivors of the conflict at Deir Yasson disproves many exaggerations attributed to underground fighters by politically motivated parties who were not present at the event itself but addressed it later. Prof. Eliezer Tauber, head of the Institute for the Study of Underground Movements at Bar-Ilan University and former Dean of the Faculty of Jewish Studies at the University wrote a book based on his efforts to meticulously locate and interview each and every one of the Arabs present at the incident or who died during it, to identify all of them by name and to understand the reasons for the death of each one. Hussein al-Khalidi is widely credited by multiple sources fabricating the claims of the massacre, and Al-Khalidi's assistant was responsible for the Arab radio broadcast from Jerusalem, so that the exaggerated story that they decided to spread could be immediately broadcast without British censorship. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Letterman~enwiki (talk • contribs) 19:08, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

This list is bullshit
People don't come here because they want to know who accidentally lost their head (decapitation). They want to know who was was BEHEADED, preferably BY THE STATE, as opposed to by some psychopathic loser. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 135.180.97.152 (talk) 21:24, 7 April 2020 (UTC)


 * The article is not protected, anyone can edit it, so you can remove people who were decapitated if you want to. Edit: Nevermind, I see what you mean. I will start a request to rename this article, as "beheaded" is only deliberate I think. Edit 2: Nevermind again, there already is one, and it ended in a split. I will edit the redirect. Edit 3: I have moved all accidental and animal-related deaths to List of people who were decapitated.sam1370 (talk) 07:12, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

No beheadings in Africa, or south of the US border?
I noticed there are no beheadings on two continents. Why is that? The amount of beheadings south of the border is insane. I’m tempted to add a country just to see if there is some censorship going on. “We can’t make them look bad”. Disciple4lif (talk) 05:09, 5 February 2024 (UTC)


 * If you add a beheading, make sure it is reliably sourced. Philipnelson99 (talk) 05:10, 5 February 2024 (UTC)