Word.ws English Dictionary

hang, draw and quarter

hang, draw and quarter verb: to execute (someone) by hanging until nearly dead, followed by castration, disembowelling, beheading and quartering; especially as a punishment for high treason.

Verb

hang, draw and quarter (third-person singular simple present hangs, draws and quarters, present participle hanging, drawing and quartering, simple past hanged, drew and quartered or hung, drew and quartered, past participle hanged, drawn and quartered or hung, drawn and quartered)

  1. (historical, transitive) To execute (someone) by hanging until nearly dead, followed by castration, disembowelling, beheading and quartering; especially as a punishment for high treason.
    • […]- and The Postgate, an inn named after a local priest, Father Nicholas Postgate, who was one of England's last Roman Catholic martyrs. He was hung, drawn and quartered at York in 1679 after baptising a child into the Roman faith.1980, AA Book of British Villages, Drive Publications Ltd, page 171, about Egton Bridge
  2. (figuratively, transitive) To savagely attack, or attempt to utterly destroy.
    • hanged, drawn and quartered by the press
    • One ASLEF representative believed: "We have been made to a degree the scapegoat of many politicians. We have been hanged, drawn and quartered by Dr Beeching in order that some people can prove the failure of public ownership."2023 March 22, Mike Esbester, “Staff, the public and industry will suffer”, in RAIL, number 979, page 39

Forms of hang, draw and quarter

third-person singular presenthangs, draws and quarters
present participlehanging, drawing and quartering
pasthanged, drew and quartered
pasthung, drew and quartered
past participlehanged, drawn and quartered
past participlehung, drawn and quartered

Origin of hang, draw and quarter

From hang + draw and quarter.

Questions about hang, draw and quarter

What does hang, draw and quarter mean?
Hang, draw and quarter means to execute (someone) by hanging until nearly dead, followed by castration, disembowelling, beheading and quartering; especially as a punishment for high treason.
What part of speech is hang, draw and quarter?
Hang, draw and quarter is a verb.
What is the past tense of hang, draw and quarter?
The past tense of hang, draw and quarter is hanged, drew and quartered.

Words near hang, draw and quarter in the dictionary

  1. hang up one's spurs
  2. hang up the boots
  3. hang upon
  4. hang with
  5. hang'd
  6. hang, draw and quarter
  7. hang-around
  8. hang-arounds
  9. hang-bies
  10. hang-by
  11. hang-bys

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hang, draw and quarter (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-hang, draw and quarter.wav.

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