Commoners were usually executed by hanging. If there was a skilled executioner around, this would be done by the "long drop" (famous from western movies) in which the condemned would have a noose placed around his or her neck, be made stand on something high, be pushed off it and the sudden stop when the rope stretched after a fall would break the neck for a quick and clean death.

Of course, there were plenty of things that could go wrong. A mouney counterfeiter in Sweden experienced the rope breaking on his descent and survived, but later hung himself in his cell while the authorities discussed the matter (rope breaking during a hanging could be considered a divine intervention for sentencing the criminal to prison instead). If the drop was too short, the condemned's neck would not break, and he or she would be slowly strangled to death. If the drop was too long, the head could be separated from the body.

Of course, if there were no skilled executioners around, just stinging people up until they died from strangulation was always an option.

In some countries, garotting (strangulation by rope or metal band by tightening it by turning a stick inserted in the noose) was a common method of execution.

Nobility usually had the right of execution by beheading with a sword, or in some countries an axe. This was usually seen as a cleaner and faster, and above all, more honourable way to die - if the executioner was skilled. In some cases vengeful judges made sure inexperienced executors needing several strikes to separate the head from the body were used.

There were several very cruel execution methods, often reserved for revolters or traitors, such as being hanged, drawn and quartered (drawn behind a horse to the place of execution, hanged until almost dead, then castrated, disembowleed and then chopped into four pieces with an axe).

The Ottoman Empire was different in this regard - high-born people were in accordance with old traditions executed by strangulation with a bowstring.