Only slightly dented, this 150-year-old guillotine is a steal at less than $10,000
Paris — A 150-year-old guillotine with "a few dents on the blade" will go under the hammer in Paris on Wednesday. The 3m-tall instrument of execution, which was used to dispatch criminals in France until 1977, is in working order. But the Drouot auction house has insisted that the model was built as a replica and has never been used to behead anyone. The sale of guillotines has been highly controversial in France where the death penalty was only abolished in 1981, with the French auction watchdog already objecting to the auction. "They should not be selling this guillotine," a spokesperson told Le Parisien newspaper. "Objects like the clothes of people who were deported to the [Nazi death] camps and instruments of torture are sensitive." That did not, however, stop another going for €220,000 in the same saleroom in 2011 when US pop star Lady Gaga was reportedly among the bidders. Nor does the watchdog have the power to stop the proceedings because the guillotine is part of a bankrup...
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