Robert Bartlett is Wardlaw Professor of Medieval History at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. He is the author of The Making of Europe: Conquest, Coloniziaton and Cultural Change, 950-1350. Seven hundred years ago, executioners led a Welsh rebel named William Cragh to a wintry hill to be hanged. They placed a noose around his neck, dropped him from the gallows, and later pronounced him dead. But was he dead? While no less than nine eyewitnesses...