Ducking-stool

Ducking-stool, an apparatus at one time in use in England for the punishment of scolding wives. The cucking-stool, ducking-stool, and tumbrel have often been confounded, and indeed most writers appear to consider them but different names for the same thing, but, as Mr Llewellyn Jewitt points out, they are all three distinct varieties of punishment. The cucking-stool is mentioned in Domesday Book as having been in use in Chester, and the name (cathedra stercoris) casts a light upon the degrading nature of its origin. In it the culprit, who might be of either sex, was placed, usually before his own door, to be pelted and insulted by the mob. On the tumbrel again he was drawn round the town or village, seated in the chair, which was sometimes so constructed as to be suitable also for ducking; but the ducking-stool par excellence was specially made for purposes of immersion. There were various examples of the ducking-stool. Sometimes it 'consisted of a rough strong chair attached to one end of a beam, which worked on a pivot on a post bedded into the ground at the edge of the dam,' or the river, as the case might be. 'The woman was placed in the chair with her arms drawn downwards; a bar was placed across her back and in front of her elbows;' another bar held her upright, and there were cords to tie her securely in. The executors of the punishment then took hold of a chain at the opposite end, and gave her a ducking on the 'see-saw' principle. Many ducking-stools and chairs are still in existence; that at Leominster was used as recently as 1809. The beam to which the chair was attached was 23½ feet in length, the ducking being administered in the manner previously described. Some ducking-stools consisted of an upright and transverse beam, either movable or fixed, from which the chair was suspended by a rope or chain. The practice of ducking commenced in the latter part of the 15th century, and prevailed generally throughout the kingdom until the first part of the 18th century, and in isolated cases, as we have seen, even into the 19th century. See an excellent paper by Llewellyn Jewitt in the Reliquary (vol. i. 1860-61).