Historical Connections with The Executioner's Daughter

The first historical connection I noticed were those relations to medicine in The Executioner's Daughter. The Executioner and his family used medieval medicines. They performed bloodletting to take out all the bad blood from Alyce, The executioner's wife. They also use herbs to make poultices and drinks to heal patients. Then, I also noticed how important the church was. When a women stole some candles from the church, the resulting punishment was a hanging! And they were only candles! I also noticed that the punishments were very barbaric at the time., as described in my History textbook. For example, the executioner had to cut off somebody's hand with a scythe when he stole something from the market. These are the most important historical connections that I can make.