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Bound in His Own Skin

Bound in His Own Skin

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Highwayman, the deathbed confession of a convicted criminal, was bound in the skin of its very author in 1837.  It is held in the Boston Athenaeum, a private library.

Books bound in human skin are uncommon, but are less rare than you might think.  In the 17th through 19th centuries, it was an occasional practice to use the skin of a person executed for a crime to bind the proceedings of their criminal case, such as what happened to Henry Garnet for his connection to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

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Author: Marcie

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