This paper will examine the psychological containment of notorious murderers in the late Elizabethan genre of domestic tragedy. To remove their perceived and potentially destructive volatility, notorious figures were placed within a fixed narrative of temptation, followed by sin, followed by repentance and reconciliation with God. This spiritual reconciliation took place within the structure of the scaffold, instruments of punishment on display in order to limit further volatility. By stepping into this liminal space between life and prescribed death, the notorious person became a sanctified sacrifice for their own crime: just as the blood of their victim marked them as an outcast, their own death marked reunion with society and an end to the cycle of destructive violence.
Prison/Exile: Controlled Spaces in Early Modern Europe 