16th-century gallows and dozens of skeletons discovered in France

Archaeologists in France have discovered the remains of a 16th-century gallows where bodies of the condemned were displayed after they were hanged. The corpses of the men — and a few women — were then buried in mass graves nearby.

During an excavation just outside the city of Grenoble in 2024, archaeologists with the French National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research (INRAP) found a square brick structure and 10 burial pits dating to the 16th century, INRAP announced on Friday (Dec. 12).

These discoveries initially baffled archaeologists, who thought the structure and burials might have been part of a leper colony, a Catholic chapel graveyard or a military cemetery. But the archaeologists looked at historical construction records that showed a timber-framed gallows, which led them to conclude they had found Grenoble's public execution area.

Based on the archaeological finding and construction records from 1544 to 1547, the gallows measured about 27 feet (8 meters) on each side and had eight stone pillars that rose around 16.5 feet (5 m) high. Crossbeams jutting out from the pillars created a gibbet — a hangman-style structure that served to both execute and display the condemned.

The newly identified gallows structure would have enabled the judicial authorities in Grenoble to hang and display up to eight people at once.

Within the mass burial pits, the archaeologists identified 32 people, most of whom were men. Historical archives revealed the names of two of the men who were executed on the gallows and likely buried in one of the pits.

The Protestant Benoît Croyet was accused of participating in an attack on Grenoble in 1573, and Charles Du Puy Montbrun was the leader of the Huguenots of Dauphiné until he was executed in 1575. Both were condemned to death because they rebelled against royal authority.

"Burying a condemned person in this way was a means of prolonging the sentence pronounced during their lifetime into death; the individuals found during the excavations were therefore deliberately denied burial," according to the translated INRAP statement. Some of the people in the pits had also been subjected to "shameful treatment" after death, including dismemberment and decapitation.

The discovery of the gallows and the burial pits is providing archaeologists at INRAP with new insight into historical places of justice. It appears that the Grenoble gallows was abandoned as a method of applying the death penalty in the early 17th century due to changing political and religious norms.

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