Editing Non compos mentis (section)

== Prosecution of suicide ==
''Non compos mentis'' and ''[[felo de se]]'' (the Latin word for "self-murder") presented two different verdicts in the case of a [[suicide]]. In the finding of a [[jury]], the deceased who was [[social stigma|stigmatized]] ''felo de se'' would be excluded from burial in consecrated ground and would forfeit their estate to the Crown, while these penalties would not apply to the deceased affirmed ''non compos mentis''.<ref>{{Cite book|title='Medicalization of Suicide: Medicine and the Law in Scotland and England, circa 1750-1850' in Histories of suicide : international perspectives on self-destruction in the modern world. eds. John C. Weaver and David Wright.|last=Houston|first=Rab|publisher=University of Toronto Press|year=2009|location=Toronto|quote=91-94}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=The history of suicide in England, 1650-1850, vol. 5|editor-last=Merrick|editor-first=Jeffrey|publisher=Pickering & Chatto|year=2013|location=London|pages=xi}}</ref>

Suicide was a severe crime in [[Tudor period|Tudor]] and early [[Stuart period|Stuart]] England and was considered a form of [[murder]]; a [[sin]] not only in the eyes of the Church but also defined by criminal law. The state of mind of self-killers at the time they committed their fatal deed was crucial. To be judged guilty of "self-murder", one had to be sane. Men and women who killed themselves when they were mad or otherwise mentally incompetent were considered innocent. The verdict would be made by a jury. The penalty for suicide in England originated in the ancient world and evolved gradually into their early modern form; similar laws and customs existed in many parts of Europe. Born of domestic beliefs, the ritual of punishing suicide, which is usually concerned with the suicidal corpse, embodies the notion that suicide is polluting, and that the suicide should be ostracized by the community of the living and the dead. The theological and legal severity increased in the [[High Middle Ages]]. The medieval theologian [[Thomas Aquinas]] extended [[Augustine of Hippo|Augustine]]'s arguments against suicide and added the new interpretation of "violation of [[natural law]]" to it. Most western European governments began to promulgate laws to confiscate some of a suicide's property.<ref>{{cite book|title=Sleepless Souls: Suicide in Early Modern England|last2=Murphy|first2=Terency R.|date=1990|publisher=Oxford University press|location=Oxford|pages=15–18|last1=MacDonald|first1=Michael}}</ref>

However, attitudes to suicide changed profoundly after 1660, following the [[English Civil War|English Revolution]]. After the civil war, political and social changes, judicial and ecclesiastical severity gave way to official leniency for most people who died by suicide. ''Non compos mentis'' verdicts increased greatly, and ''felo de se'' verdicts became as rare as ''non compos mentis'' had been two centuries earlier.<ref>MacDonald and Murphy, ''Sleepless Souls'', pp. 109–110.</ref> However, the [[Suicide legislation|laws against suicide]] and the verdicts ''felo de se'' and ''non compos mentis'' did not fade until the late nineteenth century.