In medieval France, murderous pigs faced trial and execution

It’s a common scene in many films set in medieval Europe: a wooden cart makes its way through a crowd of jeering townspeople, carrying a condemned man to the gallows.

However, sometimes reality is stranger than fiction. Because sometimes the criminal walking around town wasn’t human. Sometimes the prisoner at the end of the rope was a pig, hung upside down until it died. In medieval Europe, pigs were put on trial – and to the gallows – surprisingly often.

Most of us don’t live on farms today, so it’s easy to forget how dangerous pets can be. Cows can trample people to death, horses can kick people to death, and they’re just herbivores. Pigs, on the other hand, are omnivores. Throughout history, this made them useful because they could be fed scraps and kitchen waste. Yet a pig allowed to roam free could easily overpower a small child and as a result there are hundreds of cases of pigs killing and eating children throughout medieval Europe.

Medieval pigs could kill children

In 1379, a group of pigs in the village of Saint-Marcel-lès-Jussey in eastern France killed a swineherd’s child. In 1386, a sow in Falaise, Normandy, savaged a young boy who died from his injuries. In 1457, a sow killed five-year-old Jehan Martin in the village of Savigny in Burgundy. Unfortunately, the sow’s six piglets were nearby, covered in blood.

“We are used to this pink, fluffy or quite chubby animal that would be quite slow, but the pig in the Middle Ages was much closer to the wild boar,” explains Sven Gins, a historian and researcher at the University of Groningen, as well as the author of Doing justice to pigs: Late medieval pig trials as examples of human exceptionalism. “So they were very fast, very strong, and they ate everything, including sometimes human meat.”

Some pigs were even tried for their crimes

In France, these incidents have often given rise to trials, with the pig being treated almost like a human defendant. “A lot of documents say, ‘This pig went to prison. This pig was transported in a cart. We found an executioner from Paris and we paid him,'” says Gins. “These are very serious legal proceedings, in many cases. Almost mundane, in fact. For us, it was sensational that they could try a pig, but at the time it seemed that [like] an ordinary thing to do.

Gins notes that, as crazy as the pig trials may seem, their goal may have been practical. “One thing that is often forgotten is that justice in general at the time was very focused on reconciliation between the two parties,” he says. Sometimes all it took was a payment from one side to the other to resolve a problem. “But if a child is killed, that’s pretty serious, and money won’t always be enough. In that case, it helps for the law to step in and say, ‘We’ll take it from here.’

Bringing a pig to justice gave authorities the opportunity to dig deeper. “They sometimes wanted to know if there was any bad intention there? If you know a pig is dangerous, why would you let it roam around in the presence of young children? Sometimes even the parents themselves were suspicious. They wanted to know if it was an unwanted child that they had left near the pigs, or if it was just the owner who had been negligent,” says Gins. “I would say the court really stepped in to gain clarity and provide a consistent narrative for everyone. »

Some pig trials even took place in front of local dukes

Sometimes higher authorities were involved in local trials on pigs. In the 1379 affair, a group of pigs, some belonging to the local abbey, were accused of murdering a swineherd’s son.

The abbey, says Gins, wrote to Duke Philippe the Bold. Gins summarizes the letter: “Can you please let our pigs go? Because we are sure they were not involved in the murder. They are well-behaved pigs.” The duke listened and wrote a letter of pardon for the pigs of the abbey.

There’s more to pig trials than meets the eye

In recent centuries, writers and historians have viewed trials against pigs and other animals as senseless revenge on the part of crude peasants. However, animal testing could also serve a cold political purpose for local authorities, as the right to execute criminals and even build a gallows was considered a privilege.

A murderous pig in the 15th century, Gins notes, ended up in prison for five years before his execution. “This doesn’t make me scream a little rage. Formal letters were sent to the Duke asking: ‘Can we please build a gallows to execute this animal?’ “ “It was quite a victory for the local lord,” he adds, “that Duke John the Fearless finally acquiesced. Not only was the lord able to show his power by building his own gallows, but he was finally able to release the pig from its prison and stop paying for its food.

Dr Damian Kempf, a lecturer at the University of Liverpool, is an expert on medieval European monsters. He said the animal trials were also intended to “restore order when there was chaos.” Despite popular belief, he notes, humans were often not put to death for crimes: such punishments were reserved for the most wicked acts, such as infanticide.

“For medieval people, the world was created by God in a very logical way, with animals created first, in order to serve and help human beings created in the image of God,” Kempf explains. Trial and public execution, even of a pig, was seen as a surefire way to “restore what had been broken.” A pig eating a child was an intolerable inversion of the natural order, one that the courts of medieval France did not allow to go unpunished.

In This time whenPopular Science tells the strangest, surprising, and little-known stories that have shaped science, engineering, and innovation.

PopSci Outdoor Gift Guide 2025

20+ Editor-Approved Gifts for the Hikers on Your List