‘Hanged, drawn, quar- tered, beheaded, shot – even boiled…” From its outset, the National Archive’s exhibition Treason: People, Power and Plot makes clear the stakes in- volved in being caught up in conspir-acies against the state – including being attached to a stake oneself.
This is a creditably unbloodthirsty exhibition, though, despite its portentous beginning. There are few grisly depictions of executions or displays of racks and axes – those more inclined to dip their handkerchiefs in the blood of the scaffold might prefer to swing by Executions at the Museum of London Docklands, which was reviewed in these pages last month. Instead, Treason is a thoughtful and at times highly affecting exploration of state power and its maintenance, as well as those people who – wittingly or not – found themselves drawn into its toils.
