does anyone know why it is correct grammar to say Saddam will be HANGED and not HUNG?

Answer 1

I'm glad you asked. My husband drives me nuts when he uses "hanged". I looked up the word. He wins the bet. The answer is "hanged." It is apparently reserved primarily for choking to death by rope from above. And for cussing:

Dictionary.com for: hanged
20.(used in mild curses and emphatic expressions, often as a euphemism for damn): I'll be hanged if I do. Hang it all!

Answer 2

I like all the grammar notes on here, but I think it's interesting that if you said, for example, Mr Appleby was hung in the morning, about 100% of English speakers would know exactly what you meant... I mean, how could they not? The percentage that then were annoyed because the verb was used in an incorrect way would be smaller... it's the difference between communicative and prescriptive grammar, how people speak, and how grammarians think people should speak based on how they once spoke... Who knows, there could be a language change and the past participle hung may become as valid as hanged to describe the act of hanging... the difference is no longer useful. This example 'he was well hanged' compared with 'he was well hung'... I just think the difference isn't meaningful in any way, and maybe it should disappear... Probably, this will occur long before hanging itself is abolished however.


Also, after the grisly act is done, it would be alright to say 'the body hung'- the person has been executed, and all that's left is an inanimate piece of meat...

Answer 3

If you are hung you are suspended.
If you are hanged you have a hemp rope tied around your neck to extinguish your life.
hung can apply to anything from a picture to raw meat but hanged is the act of execution.
to change the word means to change the act.
In 1844 a small town judge decreed that the word had special significance and henceforth should only be used for lawbreakers that were executed that way.
It stuck!
The only exception is the saying -'hung drawn and quartered'
which predates the judges decree by about 5 hundred years.
This penalty was traditionally reserved for those accused of treason. The meaning of this was -
1. Dragged on a hurdle (a wooden frame) to the place of execution. (drawn)
2. Hanged by the neck, but removed before death (hanged).
3. Disembowelled, and the genitalia and entrails burned before the victim's eyes (often mistaken for drawing).[1]
4. Beheaded and the body divided into four parts (quartered).

Answer 4

The verb 'to hang' is a conflation of verbs from two sources: the West Germanic hangen, which was intransitive and weak (i.e. no vowel change in the past tense) and the Old Norse hanga, which was transitive and strong (i.e. change of vowel in the past tense). The strong verb was used in northern dialects of Old English and the weak verb in southern dialects, including that of London. The northern form gradually displaced the southern form, except in the mouths of lawyers, who stuck conservatively to the London dialect, which was where most of the senior lawyers lived, then as today. Since the idea of hanging a person derives from enforcing the law, the weak form (past tense and past participle 'hanged') became associated uniquely with capital punishment; in all other cases, the normal, strong form was used.

I've just thought of something: Perhaps they could ask this same question of Saddam Hussein and, if he gets the right answer, his sentence will be commuted to life imprisonment !

Answer 5

I personally think it sounds better to use hung all the time, but I know it's not correct grammar.

Here's how an English teacher explained it: People get hanged, and coats/material objects get hung.

Answer 6

The short version: That's just the way it is and will be until everybody decides to stop correcting people.

The long version (Quoting the source):

Hanged, as a past tense and a past participle of hang, is used in the sense of "to put to death by hanging," as in Frontier courts hanged many a prisoner after a summary trial.

In all other senses of the word, hung is the preferred form as past tense and past participle, as in I hung my child's picture above my desk.

The issue really has to do with changes in the declension of regular and irregular English verbs over time. Old Anglo-Saxon words commonly were strong and therefore would change their past tense forms. ("To run" becoming "ran" is an easy example.) French influence helped bring about the passive ending "-ed" for the past tense. ("To walk" becomes "walked" of course.) Over centuries and millions of speakers, the regular forms begin to take precedence over the irregular. This can be seen in the old fashioned "learnt" vs. our more common "learned." It's the same with "burnt/burned" or "dove/dived." Some forms are in more flux than others. The argument is that in hundreds of years English speakers will say "runned" instead of "ran" no matter how horrendous it sounds to us now.

Answer 7

Hung is the past tense. He hasn't been hanged yet!

Hang is present tense. To make it into future, it will be hanged.

To say he will be hung is a bit like saying I will ate this apple.

Or, actually, there are two meanings, what I just wrote was wrong lol

when Hang means "to kill someone by putting a rope around someone's neck and leaving them in a high position without any support", we use different verbs: Hang-Hanged-hanged

Answer 8

Saddam will be HANGED because he's (still) a living and breathing being, - The washing was hung outside to dry - the washing are things, and therefore without a soul.

Answer 9

It's hung - i'm not exactly sure why though i guess it would be because its in the future tense (so....i am going, i will be doing etc - in this case Saddam will be......). However if you then use both terms in the past tense they are both correct - he was hung, he was hanged.

i guess one of those mysteries like is it bath with the sound going down or up (northern soutern divide )

Answer 10

The laundry has been hung out to dry. Saddam will be hanged. Past tense: Saddam was hanged.....

Answer 11

"Hanged" is the proper past-tense for hanging a person, in all other cases the past-tense is hung. My guess it's probably a legalistic thing, i.e. you are sentenced to hAng, you die by hAnging, so yesterday you were hAnged. Legalisticly, if you were hUng yesterday, some sharpie lawyer could probably argue the sentence wasn't properly carried out.