Joseph-Ignace Guillotin
Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin (28 May 1738 – 26 March 1814) was a French physician who proposed on 10 October 1789 the use of a device to carry out death penalties in France. While he did not invent the guillotine, and in fact opposed the death penalty, his name became an eponym for it. The actual inventor of the prototype was Antoine Louis.
Read more about Joseph-Ignace Guillotin: Biography, In Modern Fiction