Derived from the Latin decapitare— caput: the head; and de: from or down. The way the head is completely severed from a body, with invariably fatal prognosis (according to every dictionary). What Perseus did with adamantine sword to gather the Gorgon's writhing head into a sack, though guillotines, axes, chain- saws, and sometimes smaller, blunter instruments have been applied excruciatingly to the same purpose. Saints, king's wives; anarchists, captives in war, hostages turned into examples—heads on spikes, heads rolling into the executioner's basket. Cockroaches survive decapitations; swatted at, horseflies are merely stunned—a clean death: you pick them up, hold their bodies with one hand while you twist their heads and pop them off with the other.