 Although the guillotine as a method of beheading is most closely associated in the popular imagination with late 18th-century Revolutionary France, several other decapitation devices had long been in use throughout Europe.It is uncertain whether Dr Guillotin was familiar with the Halifax Gibbet, but its design was reported to have been copied by James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton, in the production of a similar device that became known as the Scottish Maiden, now on display in the National Museum of Scotland.The Maiden was rather shorter than the Halifax Gibbet, standing only tall, the same height as the French guillotine.