1845 Fisher Son & Co Antique Engraving Ordeal Touching Dead Body Medieval Trial

This 1845 engraving from Fisher, Son & Co.'s People's Gallery of Engravings documents a striking medieval judicial practice—the ordeal of touching a dead body, believed to reveal a murderer through the corpse's supposed reaction. The bilingual print (English and French) captures a fascinating moment where law, folklore, and superstition intersected in historical belief systems. As an original 19th-century piece on period paper, it bears authentic signs of age including foxing and brittleness, making it a genuine artifact for collectors of historical legal oddities and medieval studies.