Guillotine is top of lots at auction

A FUNCTIONAL 19th-century guillotine is the prize lot in an auction in Nantes on Thursday.

Lot number 201 is expected to fetch between €50,000 and €60,000 when it goes under the hammer at the Talma auction house.

Auctioneer François-Xavier Duflos, however, warned that the estimate was historic setting - a castle or public collection.”

The guillotine bears the inscription “Army of the Republic”, and Mr Duflot believes, was used on several battlefields in the 1800s.

According to the auctioneers, it has been in the same family since was bought in the Lyon area in the early 20th century by the current owner’s grandfather.

In 2011, a guillotine bearing a similar inscription fetched €223,056 at auction.