NORSK
Å henrette folk er
en gammel og velkjent måte å straffe forbrytere på. Det
foregår fremdeles over store deler av verden og metodene for
å gjennomføre henrettelsene er mange og fantasifulle. Man kan
bli hengt, få giftsprøyte, bli skutt, steinet og mye annet.
Anne Pedersdatter Beyer ble brent som heks på Nordnes i 1590.
Den siste henrettelsen i Bergen i fredstid foregikk da
svensk-norske Jacob A. J. Wallin fikk hugget hodet av seg på
Nordnes i 1876.
Wallin var fra
grensetraktene ved Finnskogen, og ble kanskje aldri helt enig med
seg selv om han var svensk eller norsk. Foreldrene var norske, men
han var født i Sverige. Etter hvert ble Wallin fast gjest i både
norske og svenske fengsler, forbrytelsene han ble dømt for var
løsgjengeri og tyveri. Han ble kjent for å være en vanskelig fange.
Wallin kom til Bergen etter at han skulle ha ledet an et
fangeopprør i Christiania. Han ble satt i tukthus i
Manufakturhuset, og der tok han livet av underinspektør Hammer med
kniv. Han fikk dødsstraff.
Jacob Wallin ble henrettet den 25. januar 1876 på en lekeplass ved
de militære lavetthusene på nordøstsiden av Nordnes.
”[…] han ble ført til vollene der hvor Akvariet og
Havforskningsinstituttet er i dag. Skafottet var bygd på flaten mot
sjøen, nedenfor festningsvollene. En merkelig plassering, siden
denne var en av byens mest attraktive promenadeplasser.” (C. J.
Harris, Bergensposten des. 2001)
Tusener av byens
folk fulgte Wallin til retterstedet, og de ble beskrevet som et
underlig skue. Dette var ikke byens ”pene” mennesker, snarere var
de blant de laveste samfunnsklasser. Byens dannede klasser hadde
kanskje fulgt oppfordringen fra en annonse i Bergens Tidende, hvor
alle humane innvånere blir oppfordret til å holde seg borte fra
retterstedet. Det foregikk nemlig en samfunnsdebatt om dødsstraff i
Norge og Europa på denne tiden. Mange land som ”man sammenliknet
seg med” hadde avskaffet dødsstraff, og andre land tok livet av
sine dødsdømte inne i fengslene, snarere enn på offentlig sted med
plass til talløse publikummer. Bare Danmark og Norge lot publikum
ta del i drapene. Debatten gikk høyt, likevel ble to andre
mennesker henrettet i Norge fram til den nye straffeloven av 1902
kom, og forbød dødsstraff i fredstid.
Anne
Pedersdatter Beyer, enken etter presten og lektoren Absalon
Pederssøn Beyer ble dømt til døden for hekseri og brent på Nordnes
i 1590. Det var forholdsvis uvanlig at en kvinne av hennes stand
ble dømt for å være heks, og det har vært spekulert i om saken mot
henne kunne ha vært politisk motivert. Vanligvis var ”heksene”
kvinner fra lavere sosiale lag. Anklager om hekseri grunnet gjerne
i mindre eller større uhell i dagliglivet, alt fra en ku som melket
dårlig til skip som gikk ned.
Bergen har hatt
mange forskjellige rettersteder. På Nordnes har både øst- og
vestsiden vært benyttet, Rakkerhaugen på Sydneshaugen, Tyveholmen
(Kristiansholm) i Sandviksbukten, og sist Sverresborg, hvor
landssvikere og tyske krigsforbrytere ble henrettet etter 2.
verdenskrig.
Les mer
her
ENGLISH
Execution is an old and
well-known way of punishment. It still goes on in many countries,
and the methods in use are plentiful and imaginative. You may be
electrocuted, hanged, given an injection of poison, get shot,
stoned or be executed in many other ways. Anne Pedersdatter Beyer
was burnt as a witch at Nordnes in 1590. The last execution
performed in Bergen during peace time was when Swedish-Norwegian
Jacob A. J. Wallin was beheaded at Nordnes in
1876.
Wallin grew up
in the border area of Finnskogen, and may never have come to terms
with himself whether he was Swedish or Norwegian. His parents were
Norwegian, but he was born in Sweden. As he grew up, Wallin’s face
became well known in prisons on both sides of the border, his
crimes being vagrancy and theft. He was said to have been a
difficult prisoner to handle. Wallin was sent to Bergen, supposedly
after having been a leading figure in a riot in Kristiania (Oslo).
He was put in jail in the Manufactory House, where he killed an
inspector with a knife. For this crime he was given the death
penalty.
Jacob Wallin was executed on 25th January 1876 on the point of
Nordnes. People followed Wallin to the execution place in the
thousands. The crowd was described as an odd view, as the people
were not among the town’s “good people” – they were rather from the
lower classes of Bergen. Perhaps the cultured classes had followed
the request printed in the newspaper, asking all humane citizens to
keep away from the execution place?
At the time death punishment was debated in Norway as well as in
Europe. Many countries had already abolished the death penalty,
other countries kept their executions inside the prisons rather
than making them public appearances with large crowds as audiences.
Only Denmark and Norway allowed the public to participate in the
killings. In spite of the heated debates, two more people were
executed in Norway in the following months, but those were the last
executions in Norway. A new penal code was passed in 1902, which
prohibited death penalty in peace time.
Anne Pedersdatter Beyer was a clever and important woman in Bergen
in the 16th century. She was also the widow after priest and
lecturer Absalon Pederssøn Beyer. She was given the death penalty
for sorcery and was burnt at Nordnes in 1590. It was quite uncommon
for a woman of her position to be convicted as a witch, and the
question has been asked by a number of people whether the case
against her may have been politically motivated. “Witches” were
usually women from lower social groups. Accusations about sorcery
were usually based on small or big accidents in daily life, for
example cows milking poorly or shipwrecking.
In our time we may wonder what motivated the extensive witch hunts,
where an estimate of more than 50 000 people in Europe and Northern
America – mainly women – were tortured and killed. The Church made
its standings and its actions legitimate through the book Malleus
Maleficarum – the Witch Hammer – written in 1486 by the South
German Inquisitor Heinrich Krammer and Professor of Theology in
Cologne Jacob Sprenger. The book was used as a manual for witch
hunting inquisitors.
Mass hysteria and hatred towards women have been launched as
possible explanations to why the women were executed. But we should
explain the witch hunts by trying to enter the minds of medieval
people. What was their perception of witches and magicians? They
really, truly believed in their existence, and that they in fact
were accomplices of Satan. In order to maintain God’s order these
witches and magicians must be executed. Probably these people were
mostly wise women or practicing midwives with knowledge and ideas
about diseases and healing processes. They were often in difficult
positions; no matter if the patient died or was healed – either way
it signified powers out of the ordinary.
In Bergen Mary Geith was convicted and burnt as a witch on Nordnes
in 1615. Mary had paid another woman to shipwreck a vessel with
many people on board. The woman who had done the deed for money,
had her neck wrung in the basement of the Town Hall, supposedly by
Satan himself!
The witch hunts decreased during the 17th century. A general
increase in knowledge made society’s elites ask for evidence when
witches were charged. In time people stopped believing that there
existed phenomenons like broom flights in the night.
Different sites have been used as places of execution in Bergen.
Some of the places were later given names that serve as reminders
of their previous use, such as “Holm of Thieves” or “Executioner’s
Hill”. The last time anyone was executed in Bergen was after the
Second World War, when convicted German war criminals were shot at
Sverresborg. Today Norway prohibits death penalty during war
time.