Spierenburg's work reverts to a language of progress and increased humanity in punishment, a language which had become unfashionable. He revives evaluative language reminiscent of Durkheim's 'lesser intensity', which had been challenged by more recently fashionable accounts which minimized the association between penal change and heightened humani- tarianism, instead seeing changes in the techniques of punishment as being the outcome of changed control needs and more sophisticated possibilities of control with modern technology, psychiatry and pharmacology. Rather than returning to Durkheimian notions such as the conscience collective, however, Spierenburg draws on the work of Norbert Elias (1978; 1982) and his analysis of 'the civilizing process'. This process of civilization of behaviour and 'mentalities' among the populace of Europe, according to Elias, consists in a gradual refinement of 'sensibilities', as evidenced, for example, in more delicacy in eating manners, performing bodily functions only in private, and gentlemanly behaviour in the presence of females: generally, the enhancement of self-control and restraint in physical self- expression. Elias connects this development of 'conscience' to wider pro¬cesses of civilization which came about with the formation of the European nation-states, and with the greater personal safety that came with the more settled state. Spierenburg applies this self-restraint, this lessening of physical expression, this general refinement of sensibility, to public executions, and shows that public punishment declined as the spectacle of suffering became less entertaining and more repellent to public sensitivity.