Defenestration

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Defenestration is the act of throwing someone or something out of a window. The term was coined around the time of an incident in Prague Castle in the year of 1618. The word comes from the Latin de (from; out of) and fenestra (window or opening).^[1]

Matthäus Merian's impression of the 1618 Defenestration of Prague

[edit] Notable defenestrations in history

Historically, the word defenestration was used to refer to an act of political dissent. Notably, the defenestrations of Prague in 1419 and 1618 helped to trigger prolonged conflict within Bohemia and beyond. It is said that some Catholics ascribed the survival of those defenestrated at Prague Castle in 1618 to divine intervention.

Other notable events in Prague's history include the defenestration of the Old-Town portreeve along with the bodies of seven murdered New-Town aldermen in 1483, and the death in 1948 of politician Jan Masaryk, whose body was found in the courtyard of the Foreign Ministry, below his bathroom window. A 2004 police investigation into his death concluded that, contrary to the initial ruling, he did not commit suicide, but was defenestrated by his opponents.

Giorgio Vasari's impression of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre

• In the book of 2 Kings in the Bible, Jezebel is defenestrated by her own servants at the urging of Jehu.
• It has been suggested by several chronicles (notably the Annals of Westhide Abbey) that King John killed his nephew, Arthur of Brittany, by throwing him from a window in the castle at Rouen, France, in 1203.
• In 1383, Bishop Dom Martinho was defenestrated by the citizens of Lisbon, having been suspected of conspiring with the enemy when Lisbon was besieged by the Castilians.
• In 1378 the crafts and their leader Wouter van der Leyden occupied the Leuven city hall. They took over the Leuven government. Most of the patricians left the city and fled to Aarschot. After negotiations between the parties, they agreed to share the government. The patricians did not accept this easily, as they lost their absolute power. Trying to turn the tide, they had Wouter van der Leyden assassinated in Brussels. The crafts wanted revenge. They handed over the patrician to a furious crowd. The crowd stormed the city hall and threw the patricians out of the window. At least 15 patricians were killed during this defenestration of Leuven.
• On April 26, 1478, after the failure of the "Pazzi conspiracy" to murder the ruler of Florence, Lorenzo de' Medici, Jacopo de' Pazzi was defenestrated.
• In 1572, French King Charles IX's friend, the Huguenot leader Gaspard de Coligny, was killed in accordance with the wishes of Charles' mother, Catherine de' Medici. Charles had allegedly said "then kill them all that no man be left to reproach me." Thousands of Protestants were killed in the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre after soldiers attacked Coligny in his house, stabbed him, and threw him out the window.
• On the morning of December 1, 1640 in Lisbon, a group of supporters of the Duke of Bragança party found Miguel de Vasconcelos, the hated Portuguese Secretary of State of the Habsburg Philip III, hidden in a closet, killed him and defenestrated him. His corpse was left to the public outrage.
• The Revolutions of 1848 led to unrest in the German states. When an agitated crowd forced their way into the town hall in Cologne on March 3, two city councillors panicked and jumped out of the window; one of them broke both his legs. The event went down in the city’s history as the "Cologne Defenestration".
• On June 11. 1903 a group of Serbian army officers murdered and defenestrated King Aleksandar and Queen Draga.
• In 1941, mafia informant Abe "Kid Twist" Reles fell to his death from a window on the sixth floor of the Half Moon Hotel on Coney Island, on the eve of his scheduled testimony. The angle of trajectory suggests that he was defenestrated rather than trying to flee.^{[citation needed]}
• On March 10, 1948 the Czechoslovakian minister of foreign affairs Jan Masaryk was found dead, dressed in his pajamas, in the courtyard of the Foreign Ministry below his bathroom window. The initial 'investigation' stated that he committed suicide by jumping out of the window, although some believe that he was murdered by the ascendant Communists.
• Shortly before midnight on December 15 1969 the Italian anarchist Giuseppe Pinelli was seen falling to his death from a fourth floor window of the Milan police station.
• On March 2, 2007 Russian investigative journalist Ivan Safronov, who was researching the Kremlin's covert arms deals, fell to his death from a fifth floor window. Friends and colleagues discount suicide as a reason and an investigation was opened looking into possible "incitement to suicide".^[2]

[edit] Defenestrations in fiction

• In 18th century works of the Marquis de Sade, defenestrations are a common (fictional) event. They are less gruesome than many of the atrocities in his works, but they are typically lethal.
• In 1997, Brian Goggin and a team of artists create an absurdist site-specific art installation on two sides of an empty four-story building at the corner of Sixth and Howard Streets in San Francisco entitled "Defenestration", which depicted seemingly animated furniture apparently leaping out the windows and off the parapet.
• In the 2005 film Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith the Jedi Master Mace Windu is defenestrated by the Sith Lord Darth Sidious after he is incapacitated by Anakin Skywalker by means of cutting off his hand.
• In the television show Dark Angel, Duvalier comments to a man he is about to throw out a window, "Know what the word “defenestration” means?", to which the man haplessly replies, "Isn’t that when you cut all the trees down?".
• In the television show Lost, Locke is defenestrated by his father out of a window 80ft above ground. He survives but his back is broken, leaving him paraplegic. His ability to walk is miraculously regained when he arrives on the mysterious island.

^[3][4]

• In the 1995 movie Braveheart. Edward Longshanks throws his son's lover out of the castle window.
• The 1986-87 Graphic Novel Watchmen opens soon after the superhero Comedian has been thrown out of his apartment window.
• In the 1984 action comedy film Beverly Hills Cop, main character Axel Foley, played by Eddie Murphy is defenestrated by a group of men out of a ground floor window for trespassing.
• In the episode "Catalysts" of The Spectacular Spider-Man, the opening starts with voice-over narration from Spider-Man saying, "The dictionary defines defenestration as the act of throwing a person or thing out a window." We then see Spider-Man flung out a window, to which the narration picks up again, "Really not my favorite word."

[edit] Scientific studies

In 1942 safety pioneer Hugh De Haven published the classic Mechanical analysis of survival in falls from heights of fifty to one hundred and fifty feet ^[5]. De Haven's work on survival in defenestrations was instrumental in the development of the seat belt.

[edit] References