El Verdugo is a tale of tragic darkness, set in Spain during the Napoleonic occupation, that poses a terrible crisis of conscience about honor and duty. A noble Spanish family, the Léganès, is implicated in an uprising against the French troops. Discovered, they are all condemned to death by the occupier. But the French general, through refined cruelty or political calculation, offers the eldest son, Juanito, a horrifying alternative: the life of one member of the family — and thus the perpetuation of the name and title — will be granted on condition that Juanito himself consents to become the executioner (el verdugo) of his own kin, and to put to death his father, mother, brothers, and sisters with his own hands. To refuse is to condemn the whole line to perish and to be extinguished in dishonor. Commanded by his own father to accept this atrocious sacrifice to save the name and honor of the house, Juanito, torn, finally obeys: under his father's command, he beheads one by one the members of his family, accomplishing this monstrous duty in the name of the survival of the lineage. Become el verdugo, he survives, marked forever by the horror of this act, heir to a name he has saved at the price of the blood of his own. Balzac pushes to the extreme the conflict between family honor and the horror of an imposed parricide, and interrogates the limits of duty and sacrifice. The tale, of terrible dramatic intensity, illustrates tragic fatality and the dark grandeur of certain limit-situations. Inscribed in the Philosophical Studies, El Verdugo meditates on the honor of the name, sacrifice, and the cruelty of history, in a brief, unforgettable narrative in which filial devotion borders on horror.