gallows

A dozen minutes from the end, there was more singing from the Scottish crowd that we can only describe as gallows humour.

From BBC ● Jun. 14, 2026

Schrader, who turns 80 in July, spoke about the coming upheaval with a mixture of fascination, resignation and dry gallows humor.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 28, 2026

Ralph Waldo Emerson declared that Brown would “make the gallows as glorious as the cross.”

From Slate ● Apr. 2, 2026

The year 1777 is sometimes called the Year of the Hangman because the last three digits resemble a gallows.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 14, 2025

There was a good deal of gallows humor among us.

From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela

The cross-pieces on the small bitts at the main and fore hatchways in flush-decked vessels, for stowing away the booms and spars over the boats; also termed gallowses, gallows-tops, gallows-bitts, and gallows-stanchions.

From The Sailor's Word-Book An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, including Some More Especially Military and Scientific, but Useful to Seamen; as well as Archaisms of Early Voyagers, etc. by Sir Edward Belcher

"I wear gallowses no more," he explained, lifting his waistcoat to show that his braces now encircled him as a belt, but even then she did not understand.

From Sentimental Tommy The Story of His Boyhood by J. M. (James Matthew) Barrie

The comical little fellow wore an unbleached cotton shirt, and tattered pantaloons, with home-made suspenders or "gallowses."

From Queer Stories for Boys and Girls by Edward Eggleston

Tildy and Johnny were married, and Johnny's gallowses never creaked any more.

From Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 12, No. 30, September, 1873 by Various

When knaves come to preferment, they rise as gallowses are raised in the Low Countries, one upon another's shoulders.

From Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series by Horatio Robert Forbes Brown