The New Murrey and Blue blog

Today in 1417, Sir John Olcastle was hanged and burned at Smithfield , as a leading Lollard and political rebel who had previously escaped from the Tower. He had been a High Sheriff of Herefordshire, an MP and a soldier under the Prince of Wales in Wales and France, all in Henry IV’s reign.

One mystery remains, and it must have been important to Oldcastle. Was he:
1) Hanged until dead and then burned.
2) Hanged with the fire lit during this stage.
3) Hanged and burned, beginning simultaneously (as the portrait or woodcut suggests).

The similar case that first comes to mind is that of Savaronola some eighty years later.