noun Etymology: French, from Joseph Guillotin died 1814 French physician Date: 1793 a machine for beheading by means of a heavy blade that slides down in vertical guides, a shearing machine or instrument (as a paper cutter) that in action resembles a guillotine, closure by the imposition of a predetermined time limit on the consideration of specific sections of a bill or portions of other legislative business, guillotine transitive verb
