Hanging

In criminal law. Suspension by the neck ; the mode of capital punishment used in England from time immemorial, and generally adopted in the United States. 4 Bl. Comm. 403.

— Hanging in chains. In atrocious cases it was at one time usual, in England, for the court to direct a murderer, after execution, to be hanged upon a gibbet in chains near the place where the murder was committed, a practice quite contrary to the Mosaic law. (Deut. xxi. 23.) Abolished by 4 & 5 Wm. IV. c. 26. Wharton.