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GARROTTE.
A device that chokes a person to death. Used in Spain until 1978 when the death penalty was abolished. This type of execution on a special chair, a metal hoop was thrown around the neck. Behind the back of the criminal was the executioner, who actuated a large screw, located in the same place at the back. Although the device itself is not legalized in any country, training in its use is still carried out in the French Foreign Legion.
There were several versions of the garrote, at first it was just a stick with a loop, then a more “terrible” instrument of death was invented. And the “humanity” consisted in the fact that a pointed bolt was mounted in this hoop, at the back, which pierced the convict’s neck, crushing his spine, getting to the spinal cord. In relation to the criminal, this method was considered "more humane", because death came faster than with a conventional loop. death penalty still common in India. Garrotte was also used in America, long before the electric chair was invented. Andorra was the last country in the world to outlaw its use in 1990.
SCAPHISM.
The name of this torture comes from the Greek "skafium", which means "trough". Skafism was popular in ancient persia. The victim was placed in a shallow trough and wrapped in chains, watered with milk and honey to cause severe diarrhea, then the body of the victim was smeared with honey, thereby attracting various kinds of living creatures. Human excrement also attracted flies and other nasty insects, which literally began to devour the person and lay eggs in his body. The victim was given this cocktail every day to prolong the torture by attracting more insects to eat and breed within his increasingly dead flesh. Death, eventually occurring, probably due to a combination of dehydration and septic shock, was painful and prolonged.
HANGING, evisceration and quartering. Half-hanging, drawing and quartering.
Execution of Hugh le Despenser the Younger (1326). Miniature from Froissart by Ludovic van Gruutuse. 1470s.
Hanging, gutting and quartering (English hanged, drawn and quartered) - a type of death penalty that arose in England during the reign of King Henry III (1216-1272) and his successor Edward I (1272-1307) and officially established in 1351 as punishment for men found guilty of treason.
The sentenced were tied to a wooden sled, resembling a piece of wicker fence, and dragged by horses to the place of execution, where they were successively hanged (not letting them suffocate to death), castrated, gutted, quartered and beheaded. The remains of the executed were paraded in the most famous public places of the kingdom and the capital, including London Bridge. Women sentenced to death for high treason were burned at the stake for reasons of "public decency".
The severity of the sentence was dictated by the seriousness of the crime. High treason, which endangered the authority of the monarch, was considered an act deserving of extreme punishment - and although during the entire time that it was practiced, several of the convicted were commuted and they were subjected to a less cruel and shameful execution, to most traitors to the English crown (including many Catholic priests who were executed during the Elizabethan era, and a group of regicides involved in the death of King Charles I in 1649), the highest sanction of medieval English law was applied.
Although the Act of Parliament defining the notion of high treason is still integral part In the current legislation of the United Kingdom, during the reform of the British legal system, which lasted most of the 19th century, execution by hanging, gutting and quartering was replaced by dragging by horses, hanging to death, posthumous decapitation and quartering, then obsolete and abolished in 1870.
More details of the above-mentioned execution process can be observed in the film "Braveheart". The participants in the Gunpowder Plot, led by Guy Fawkes, were also executed, who managed to escape from the arms of the executioner with a noose around his neck, jump off the scaffold and break his neck.
BREAKING IN TREES - Russian version of quartering.
They bent down two trees and tied the executed to the tops and released "to freedom." The trees unbent - tearing the executed.
LIFTING ON PIKE OR STAKE.
Spontaneous execution, carried out, as a rule, by a crowd of armed people. Usually practiced during all kinds of military riots and other revolutions yes civil wars. The victim was surrounded from all sides, spears, pikes or bayonets were stuck into her carcass from all sides, and then synchronously, on command, they were lifted up until she stopped showing signs of life.
LANDING ON THE COUNT.
Impaling is a type of death penalty in which the condemned person was impaled on a vertical pointed stake. In most cases, the victim was impaled on the ground, in a horizontal position, and then the stake was set vertically. Sometimes the victim was impaled on an already staked stake.
Impaling was widely used in ancient Egypt and the Middle East. The first mentions date back to the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. e. Execution was especially widespread in Assyria, where impalement was a common punishment for residents of rebellious cities, therefore, for instructive purposes, scenes of this execution were often depicted on bas-reliefs. This execution was used according to Assyrian law and as a punishment for women for abortion (considered as a variant of infanticide), as well as for a number of especially serious crimes. On the Assyrian reliefs, there are 2 options: with one of them, the condemned person was pierced with a stake in the chest, with the other, the tip of the stake entered the body from below, through the anus. Execution was widely used in the Mediterranean and the Middle East at least from the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. e. It was also known to the Romans, although it did not receive much distribution in Ancient Rome.
For a large part of medieval history, the execution by impalement was very common in the Middle East, where it was one of the main methods of painful death penalty.
Impaling was quite common in Byzantium, for example, Belisarius suppressed the rebellions of soldiers by impaling the instigators.
The Romanian ruler Vlad Tepes (Rom. Vlad Tepes - Vlad Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, Vlad Kololyub, Vlad the Impaler) distinguished himself with particular cruelty. At his direction, the victims were impaled on a thick stake, the top of which was rounded and oiled. The stake was inserted into the vagina (the victim died almost within a few minutes from heavy uterine bleeding) or anus (death occurred from a rupture of the rectum and developed peritonitis, the person died for several days in terrible agony) to a depth of several tens of centimeters, then the stake was installed vertically . The victim, under the influence of the gravity of his body, slowly slid down the stake, and sometimes death occurred only after a few days, since the rounded stake did not pierce the vital organs, but only went deeper into the body. In some cases, a horizontal bar was installed on the stake, which prevented the body from sliding too low, and ensured that the stake did not reach the heart and other critical organs. In this case, death from blood loss occurred very slowly. The usual version of the execution was also very painful, and the victims writhed on a stake for several hours.
PASSING UNDER THE KEEL (Keelhauling).
Special naval variant. It was used both as a means of punishment and as a means of execution. The offender was tied with a rope to both hands. After that, he was thrown into the water in front of the ship, and with the help of the indicated ropes, the colleagues pulled the patient along the sides under the bottom, taking it out of the water already from the stern. The keel and bottom of the ship were covered with shells and other marine life a little more than completely, so the victim received numerous bruises, cuts and some water in the lungs. After one iteration, as a rule, they survived. Therefore, for execution, this had to be repeated, 2 or more times.
DROWNING.
The victim is sewn into a bag alone or with different animals and thrown into the water. It was widespread in the Roman Empire. According to Roman criminal law, the execution was imposed for the murder of a father, but in reality this punishment was imposed for any murder by a younger elder. A monkey, a dog, a rooster or a snake were planted in a bag with a parricide. It was also used in the Middle Ages. An interesting option- add quicklime to the sack, so that the executed person, before choking, is also scalded.
The main positive brand of France is the revolutionaries of the 1780-1790s. approached the matter responsibly, significantly improving and diversifying the process. Three main "know-hows" of the Great French Revolution, which undoubtedly significantly advanced humanity in the direction of freedom, equality and fraternity:
1. The crowd is driven into the sea, where it sinks cheaply and angrily.
2. Execution in wine tanks. They loaded it - filled it with water - drained it - unloaded it - loaded the next portion - and so on until the bourgeois issue was completely resolved.
3. In the provinces, they didn’t think of such engineering - they simply drove them into barges and drowned them. Experience with tanks has not taken root, but barges are used regularly in the world, up to the present.
A rare subspecies of the above is drowning in alcohol.
For example, under Ivan the Terrible, those who violated the state monopoly were forced to brew a whole barrel of beer, and to improve the taste, they drowned the violating brewer in it. Or they were forced to drink a bucket (or as much as they like) of vodka at a time. However, sometimes the condemned himself wanted to say goodbye to the world, in that which he loved most of all. So George Plantagenet, the first Duke of Clarence, was drowned in a barrel of sweet wine - malvasia for treason.
FILLING INTO THE THROAT OF MELTED METAL OR BOILING OIL.
It was used in Russia in the era of Ivan the Terrible, medieval Europe and the Middle East, by some Indian tribes against the Spanish invaders. Death came from a burn of the esophagus and strangulation.
During the Thirty Years' War, captive Protestant Swedes were baptized into Catholicism by pouring molten lead.
As a punishment for counterfeiting, the metal from which the criminal cast coins was often poured. By the way, the Roman commander Crassus, after being defeated by the Parthians, also knew all the delights of this execution, with the difference that molten gold was poured into his throat: Crassus was one of the richest Roman citizens. Probably Spartak, in the next world, looked with pleasure at the unappetizing execution of his winner.
Also, Indians poured gold into the throats of the Spaniards.
- Are you thirsty for gold? We will quench your thirst.
Who is interested in the video - you are welcome to watch the Game of Thrones: the prince was given the promised crown on his head. In liquid form.
In general, this execution (with gold) is deeply symbolic: the executed person dies from what he craves most of all.
HUNGER OR THIRST.
It was used by subtle connoisseurs of the process (sadists), or those who tried to persuade the stubborn to something.
Japanese variant - last used on Far East in the 1930s: the executed (tortured) with his hands tied is seated at the table, tied to a chair, and every day fresh food and drink are placed in front of him, which after a while they take away. Many went crazy before they died of hunger or thirst.
For the Chinese, everything was exactly the opposite - the convict was fed, and very well. They just gave him exclusively boiled meat. And nothing more. The first week, the executed cannot get enough of such humane conditions of detention. The second week he starts to feel a little worse. For the third week, he already senses something was wrong and, if he is weak in spirit, falls into hysterics, and after the fourth it usually ends. Of course, there is an alternative - not to eat this very meat. Then you will die of hunger in about the same time.
Stoning is a form of capital punishment familiar to the ancient Jews and Greeks.
After the appropriate decision of the authorized legal body (the king or the court), a crowd of citizens gathered who killed the guilty person by throwing heavy stones at him.
In Jewish law, only those 18 types of crimes for which the Bible expressly prescribes such an execution were sentenced to stoning. However, in the Talmud, stoning was replaced by throwing the condemned on the stones. According to the Talmud, the condemned should be thrown from such a height that death occurs instantly, but his body was not disfigured.
The stoning happened like this: the sentenced by the court was given an extract of narcotic herbs as an anesthetic, after which he was thrown off a cliff, and if he did not die from this, one large stone was thrown on top of him.
BURYING.
As a method of the death penalty is known in ancient Rome. For example, a Vestal Virgin who broke her vow of virginity was buried alive with a supply of food and water for one day (which did not make much sense, since death usually occurs from suffocation within a few hours).
Many Christian martyrs were executed by being buried alive. In 945, Princess Olga ordered the Drevlyan ambassadors to be buried alive along with their boat. In medieval Italy, unrepentant murderers were buried alive. In the Zaporozhian Sich, the murderer was buried alive in the same coffin as his victim.
A variant of execution is burying a person in the ground up to his neck, dooming him to a slow death from hunger and thirst. In Russia in the 17th - early 18th centuries, women who killed their husbands were buried alive in the ground up to the neck.
According to the Kharkiv Museum of the Holocaust, a similar type of execution was used by the Nazis in relation to the Jewish population of the USSR during the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945.
And the Old Believers in Russia buried themselves in the name of God and to save their souls. For this, special dugouts were dug with a hermetically sealed exit - mines, candles and a sawn pole in the center were placed in them. Death was either "light" or "hard". A hard death guaranteed good karma, but most people could not endure the torment and chose an easy one, for this it was enough to push the pole in the center of the mine and you were immediately covered with earth. In all documentary details, one such case was described by V. V. Rozanov in the book “Dark Face. Metaphysics of Christianity” or Borya Chkhartishvili (Akunin) in the story “Before the End of the World”.
Immuring - a type of death penalty in which a person was placed in a wall under construction or surrounded by blank walls on all sides, after which he died of starvation or dehydration. This distinguishes it from burial alive, where a person died from suffocation.
USING LIVING NATURE.
Since ancient times, man has been finding new ways to put our smaller brothers at the service of mankind, and execution is no exception. The application is both the largest and the smallest: the Indians specifically train elephants to crush to death, and the Indians launch ants at the enemies (or simply put a person in an anthill).
You can put a rat in a pot, tie it to the victim's stomach, pour burning coals on top and wait until it, escaping from the heat, eats its way out.
In Siberia, they liked to leave a scoundrel naked in the taiga to be eaten by a gnat that could drink all the blood from a person in two days (however, the end will come much earlier, from simuliotoxicosis. Well, as an option - launching snakes (or rats) into the insides or infecting some disgusting (microbes are also living creatures).
In ancient Rome, criminals or Christians were poisoned by wild predators. In addition, an extremely interesting method was used for the execution of the patricians (among others): they gave a knife and threw rose petals. The convict had a choice: kill himself or suffocate from the suffocating smell. The thing is that the flowers emit methanol with some volatile compounds, which in small quantities gives us pleasant aromas, and large ones lead to death through fumes poisoning. By the way, fruits have a similar effect.
DEFENESTRATION.
The same kind of death penalty, unauthorized, occurring spontaneously, without reading the sentence, but in the presence of the crowd. And, yes, the crowd was waiting for it. Literally - throwing out of the window (Latin fenestra). Victims were thrown out window openings- on pavements, in ditches, in a crowd or on spears and lances raised with their points upwards. Most famous example- the second Prague defenestration, during which, however, no one died.
For the first time such an execution was applied in ancient Rome. The subject was a young man who betrayed his teacher Cicero. The widow of Quintus (Cicero's brother), having received the right to reprisal against the Philologist, forced him to cut pieces of meat from his own body, fry and eat them!
However, the real masters in this matter were of course the Chinese. There, the execution was called Ling-Chi, or "death by a thousand cuts." This is a prolonged death by cutting out individual pieces of the body. This type of execution was mainly used in China until 1905. They were condemned for high treason and for the murder of their parents. The convict was usually tied to some kind of pole, usually in a crowded place, in the squares. And then slowly cut out fragments of the body. To prevent the prisoner from losing consciousness, he was given a portion of opium.
In his History of Torture of All Ages, George Riley Scott quotes from the notes of two Europeans who had the rare opportunity to be present at such an execution: their names were Sir Henry Norman (he saw this execution in 1895) and T. T. Ma-Dawes: "There is a basket covered with a piece of linen, in which lies a set of knives. Each of these knives is designed for a certain part of the body, as evidenced by the inscriptions engraved on the blade. The executioner takes one of the knives at random from the basket and, based on the inscription, cuts off the corresponding part of the body. However, at the end of the last century, such a practice, in all likelihood, was supplanted by another, which left no room for chance and provided for cutting off parts of the body in a certain sequence with a single knife. According to Sir Henry Norman, the condemned man is tied to the likeness of a cross, and the executioner slowly and methodically cuts off first the fleshy parts of the body, then cuts the joints, cuts off individual limbs and ends the execution with one sharp blow to the heart.
Read more about the Chinese punitive system of the times before the 1948 revolution - read here.
http://ttolk.ru/?p=16004
An analogue of Ling Chi - skinning a living person has long been practiced in the Middle East. For example, the fourteenth-century Azerbaijani poet Nasimi was executed. Contemporaries are more familiar with Afghan developments in this area.
In the event that we are talking specifically about the death penalty in this way, as a rule, after peeling off the skin, they try to save it for demonstration in order to intimidate. Most often, the skin was torn off already from a person killed in another way - a criminal, an enemy, in some cases a blasphemer who denied the afterlife (in medieval Europe). Peeling off part of the skin can be part of a magical ritual, as is the case with scalping.
Flaying is an ancient, but, nevertheless, still not widely used practice, which was considered one of the most terrible and painful types of execution. In the chronicles of the ancient Assyrians, there are references to the skinning of captured enemies or rebellious rulers, whose whole skins were nailed to the walls of their cities as a warning to all who challenged their power.
There are also references to the Assyrian practice of "indirect" punishment of a person by flaying his young child before his eyes. The Aztecs in Mexico skinned their victims during ritual human sacrifices, but usually after the victim's death. Flaying the body was sometimes used as part of the public execution of traitors in medieval Europe. A similar method of execution was still used at the beginning of the 18th century in France.
In some chapels in France and England, large pieces of human skin have been found nailed to doors. In Chinese history, execution has become more widespread than in European history: this is how corrupt officials and rebels were executed, and, in addition to execution, there was also a separate punishment - peeling off the skin from the face. The emperor Zhu Yuanzhang was especially “successful” in this execution, who massively used it to punish bribe-taking officials and rebels. In 1396, he ordered the execution of 5,000 women accused of treason in this way.
The practice of flaying disappeared from Europe in the early 18th century and was officially banned in China after the Xinhai Revolution and the establishment of the Republic. However, in the 19th and 20th centuries, different parts In light of this, isolated instances of flaying have taken place, such as executions in the Japanese-created puppet state of Manchukuo in the 1930s.
The Judgment of Cambyses, David Gerard, 1498.
Red tulip is another option. The executed person was intoxicated with opium, and then the skin near the neck was cut and pulled off, pulling it down to the very waist so that it dangled around the hips with long red petals. If the victim did not die immediately from blood loss (but they were usually skinned skillfully, without hitting large vessels), then after a few hours, when the drug's effect ended, pain shock and insects were waiting for her.
BURNING IN THE LOG.
A type of execution that arose in the Russian state in the 16th century, was especially often applied to the Old Believers in the 17th century, and was used by them as a method of suicide in the 17th-18th centuries.
Burning as a method of execution began to be used quite often in Russia in the 16th century during the time of Ivan the Terrible. Unlike Western Europe, in Russia, those sentenced to burning were executed not at the stake, but in log cabins, which made it possible to avoid turning such executions into mass spectacles.
The log cabin for burning was a small structure made of logs filled with tow and resin. It was erected specifically for the moment of execution. After reading the sentence, the suicide bomber was pushed into the log house through the door. Often a log house was made without a door and a roof - a structure like a wooden fence; in this case, the convict was lowered into it from above. After that, the log house was set on fire. Sometimes a bound suicide bomber was thrown inside an already burning log house.
In the 17th century, Old Believers were often executed in log cabins. Thus, the archpriest Avvakum with three of his associates were burned (April 1 (11), 1681, Pustozersk), the German mystic Quirin Kuhlman (1689, Moscow), and also, as stated in the Old Believer sources [what?], An active opponent of the reforms of the patriarch Nikon Bishop Pavel Kolomensky (1656).
In the XVIII century, a sect took shape, the followers of which considered death through self-immolation a spiritual feat and a necessity. Usually, self-immolation in log cabins was practiced in anticipation of repressive actions by the authorities. When the soldiers appeared, the sectarians locked themselves in the prayer house and set it on fire without entering into negotiations with the authorities.
The last burning known in Russian history took place in the 1770s in Kamchatka: a Kamchadal sorceress was burned in a wooden frame on the orders of the captain of the Tenginskaya fortress Shmalev.
HANGING BY THE RIB.
A type of death penalty in which an iron hook was thrust into the side of the victim and hung up. Death came from thirst and blood loss after a few days. The hands of the victim were tied so that he could not free himself. Execution was common among the Zaporizhian Cossacks. According to legend, Dmitry Vishnevetsky, the founder of the Zaporizhzhya Sich, the legendary "Baida Veshnivetsky", was executed in this way.
FRYING ON A FRYING PAN OR IRON GRID.
The boyar Shchenyatev was fried in a frying pan, and the king of the Aztecs Kuautemok was fried on a grill.
When Cuauhtemoca was roasted on coals with his secretary, asking where he hid the gold, the secretary, unable to withstand the heat, began to beg him to surrender and ask the Spaniards for indulgence. Cuauhtemoc mockingly replied that he was enjoying himself, as if he were lying in a bath.
The secretary didn't say another word.
SICILIAN BULL.
This death penalty device was developed in ancient greece for the execution of criminals. Perillos, a copper foundry, invented the bull in such a way that the bull was hollow inside. A door was mounted on the side of this device. The condemned were closed inside the bull, and a fire was set underneath it, heating the metal until the man was roasted to death. The bull was designed so that the screams of the prisoner would be translated into the roar of an infuriated bull.
FUSTUARY (from Latin fustuarium - beating with sticks; from fustis - stick) - one of the types of executions in the Roman army.
He was also known in the Republic, but came into regular use under the principate, was appointed for serious violation of guard duty, theft in the camp, perjury and escape, sometimes for desertion in battle. It was made by a tribune, who touched the convict with a stick, after which the legionnaires beat him with stones and sticks. If a whole unit was punished with a futuary, then rarely all the perpetrators were executed, as happened in 271 BC. e. with the legion in Rhegium in the war with Pyrrhus. However, taking into account factors such as the age of a soldier, length of service or rank, the futuary could be canceled.
WELDING IN LIQUID.
It was the most common type of death penalty in different countries peace. In ancient Egypt, this type of punishment was applied mainly to persons who disobeyed the pharaoh. The pharaoh's slaves at dawn (specially so that Ra saw the criminal) lit a huge fire, over which there was a cauldron of water (and not just water, but from the very dirty water where waste was dumped, etc.) Sometimes entire families were executed in this way.
This type of execution was widely used by Genghis Khan. In medieval Japan, boiling water was applied mainly to ninja who failed an assassination and were captured. In France, this execution was applied to counterfeiters. Sometimes intruders were boiled in boiling oil. There remains evidence of how in 1410 in Paris a pickpocket was boiled alive in boiling oil.
PIT WITH SNAKE - a type of death penalty, when the executed is placed with poisonous snakes, which should have led to his quick or painful death. Also one of the methods of torture.
It arose a very long time ago. The executioners quickly found practical use poisonous snakes that caused a painful death. When a person was thrown into a pit filled with snakes, the disturbed reptiles began to bite him.
Sometimes the prisoners were tied up and slowly lowered into the pit on a rope; often this method was used as torture. Moreover, not only in the Middle Ages, during the Second World War, Japanese militarists tortured prisoners during the battles in South Asia.
Often the interrogated person was brought to the snakes, pressing his legs to them. Women were subjected to the popular torture, when the interrogated person was brought a snake to her bare chest. They also loved to bring poisonous reptiles to the face of women. But in general, snakes dangerous and deadly to humans were rarely used during torture, since there was a risk of losing a captive who did not testify.
The plot of execution through a pit with snakes has long been known in German folklore. Thus, the Elder Edda tells how King Gunnar was thrown into a snake pit on the orders of the leader of the Huns, Attila.
This type of execution continued to be used in subsequent centuries. One of the most famous cases is the death of the Danish king Ragnar Lothbrok. In 865, during a Danish Viking raid on the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria, their king Ragnar was captured and, by order of King Aella, was thrown into a pit with poisonous snakes, dying a painful death.
This event is often mentioned in folklore in both Scandinavia and Britain. The plot of Ragnar's death in the snake pit is one of the central events of two Icelandic legends: "The sagas of Ragnar Leatherpants (and his sons)" and "The Strands of the Sons of Ragnar".
Wicker Man
A human-shaped cage made of wicker, which, according to Julius Caesar's Notes on the Gallic War and Strabo's Geography, was used by the Druids for human sacrifice, burning it along with people locked up there, condemned for crimes or intended as sacrifices to the gods.
At the end of the 20th century, the ritual of burning the “wicker man” was revived in Celtic neopaganism (in particular, the teachings of Wicca), but without the accompanying sacrifice.
EXECUTION BY ELEPHANTS.
For thousands of years it has been common in the countries of the South and South-East Asia and especially in India by the method of killing those sentenced to death. Asian elephants were used to crush, dismember, or torture captives in public executions.
The trained animals were versatile, capable of killing prey immediately or torturing them slowly over long periods of time. Serving rulers, elephants were used to show the absolute power of the ruler and his ability to control wild animals.
The view of the execution of prisoners of war by elephants usually aroused horror, but at the same time the interest of European travelers was described in many magazines and stories about the life of Asia at that time. This practice was eventually suppressed by the European empires that colonized the region where execution was common in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although execution by elephants was primarily characteristic of Asian countries, this practice was sometimes used by the Western powers of antiquity, in particular Rome and Carthage, mainly to massacre rebellious soldiers.
IRON MAID (eng. Iron maiden).
An instrument of death or torture, which was a cabinet made of iron in the form of a woman dressed in the costume of a 16th-century townswoman. It is assumed that having put the convict there, the closet was closed, and sharp long nails, with which the inner surface of the chest and arms of the “iron maiden” was seated, stuck into his body; then, after the death of the victim, the movable bottom of the cabinet fell, the body of the executed was thrown into the water and carried away by the current.
The “Iron Maiden” is attributed to the Middle Ages, but in fact the tool was not invented until the end of the 18th century.
There is no reliable information about the use of the iron maiden for torture and execution. There is an opinion that it was fabricated during the Enlightenment.
Crowding caused additional torment - death did not occur for hours, so the victim could suffer from claustrophobia.
For the comfort of the executioners, the thick walls of the device muffled the cries of the executed. The doors closed slowly. Subsequently, one of them could be opened so that the executioners checked the condition of the subject. The spikes pierced his arms, legs, stomach, eyes, shoulders and buttocks. At the same time, apparently, the nails inside the “iron maiden” were located in such a way that the victim did not die immediately, but after a rather long time, during which the judges had the opportunity to continue the interrogation.
DEVIL WIND (eng. Devil wind, there is also a variant of English. Blowing from guns - literally “Blow from guns”) in Russia is known as the “English execution” - the name of the type of death penalty, which consisted in tying the sentenced to the muzzle of a cannon and then firing from it through the victim's body with a blank charge.
This type of execution was developed by the British during the Sepoy Rebellion (1857-1858) and was actively used by them to kill the rebels.
Vasily Vereshchagin, who studied the use of this execution before writing his painting “The Suppression of the Indian Uprising by the British” (1884), wrote the following in his memoirs: “Modern civilization was scandalized mainly by the fact that the Turkish massacre was carried out close, in Europe, and then the means of committing atrocities were too reminiscent of Tamerlane times: they chopped, cut their throats, like sheep.
The British have a different matter: firstly, they did the work of justice, the work of retribution for the violated rights of the victors, far away, in India; secondly, they did a grandiose job: hundreds of sepoys and non-sepoys who rebelled against their rule were tied to the muzzles of cannons and without a projectile, with gunpowder alone, they shot them - this is already a great success against cutting the throat or tearing open the stomach.<...>I repeat, everything is done methodically, in a good way: guns, how many there will be in number, line up in a row, slowly bring to each muzzle and tie one more or less criminal Indian citizen by the elbows, different ages, professions and castes, and then on command all guns fire at once.
They are not afraid of death, as such, and they are not afraid of execution; but what they avoid, what they fear, is the need to appear before the highest judge in an incomplete, tormented form, without a head, without arms, with a lack of members, and this is precisely not only likely, but even inevitable when shooting from cannons.
A remarkable detail: while the body is shattered into pieces, all the heads, breaking away from the body, spirally fly upwards. Naturally, they are later buried together, without a strict analysis of which of the yellow gentlemen this or that part of the body belongs to. This circumstance, I repeat, greatly frightens the natives, and it was the main motive for introducing execution by shooting from cannons in especially important cases, such as, for example, during uprisings.
It is difficult for a European to understand the horror of an Indian of a high caste, if necessary, only to touch a brother of a lower one: he must, in order not to close his opportunity to be saved, wash himself and make sacrifices after that without end. It is also terrible that modern orders falls, for example, on railways sit elbow on elbow with everyone - and then it can happen, no more, no less, that the head of a brahmin with three cords will lie in eternal rest near the pariah's spine - brrr! From this thought alone the soul of the hardest Hindu shudders!
I say this very seriously, in full confidence that no one who was in those countries or impartially familiarized himself with them from the descriptions will contradict me.
(Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878 in the memoirs of V.V. Vereshchagin.)
Those who wish to further enjoy this topic can read the book - "Torture Stories of All Ages" by George Riley Scott.
With the development of civilization, human life has gained value regardless of social status and wealth. It is all the more terrible to read about the black pages of history, when the law did not just deprive a person of life, but turned the execution into a spectacle for the amusement of ordinary people. In other cases, the execution could be of a ritual or instructive nature. Unfortunately, also in modern history there are similar episodes. We have compiled a list of the most brutal executions ever practiced by humans.
Executions of the Ancient World
Skafism
The word "skafism" is derived from the ancient Greek word "trough", "boat", and the method itself went down in history thanks to Plutarch, who described the execution of the Greek ruler Mithridates at the behest of Artaxerxes, the king of the ancient Persians.First, a person was stripped naked and tied inside two dugout boats in such a way that the head, arms and legs remained outside, which were thickly smeared with honey. The victim was then forcibly fed a mixture of milk and honey to induce diarrhea. After that, the boat was lowered into stagnant water - a pond or lake. Lured by the smell of honey and sewage, the insects clung to the human body, slowly devoured the flesh and laid their larvae in the formed gangrenous ulcers. The victim remained alive for up to two weeks. Death came from three factors: infection, exhaustion and dehydration.
Execution by impalement was invented in Assyria (modern Iraq). In this way, residents of rebellious cities and women who had an abortion were punished - then this procedure was considered infanticide. 
The execution was carried out in two ways. In one version, the convict was pierced in the chest with a stake, in the other, the tip of the stake passed through the body through the anus. Tormented people were often depicted in bas-reliefs as an edification. Later, this execution began to be used by the peoples of the Middle East and the Mediterranean, as well as Slavic peoples and some European ones.
Execution by elephants
This method was used mainly in India and Sri Lanka. Indian elephants lend themselves well to training, which was used by the rulers of Southeast Asia. 
There were many ways to kill a person with an elephant. For example, armor with sharp spears was put on the tusks, with which the elephant pierced the criminal and then, still alive, tore it apart. But most often, elephants were trained to press down the convict with their foot and alternately tear off the limbs with their trunk. In India, a guilty person was often simply thrown at the feet of an angry animal. For reference, an Indian elephant weighs about 5 tons.
Tradition to the beasts
Per beautiful phrase“Damnatio ad bestias” covers the painful death of thousands of ancient Romans, especially among the early Christians. Although, of course, this method was invented long before the Romans. Usually lions were used for execution, less popular were bears, panthers, leopards and buffaloes. 
There were two types of punishment. Often a person sentenced to death was tied to a post in the middle of a gladiatorial arena and wild animals were lowered onto it. There were also variations: they threw it to a cage to a hungry animal or tied it to its back. In another case, the unfortunate was forced to fight against the beast. From the weapons they had a simple spear, and from the "armor" - a tunic. In both cases, many spectators gathered for the execution.
death on the cross
The crucifixion was invented by the Phoenicians, an ancient people of seafarers who lived in the Mediterranean. Later, this method was adopted by the Carthaginians, and then by the Romans. The Israelites and Romans considered death on the cross to be the most shameful, because this was how hardened criminals, slaves and traitors were executed. 
Before crucifixion, a person was undressed, leaving only a loincloth. He was beaten with leather whips or freshly cut rods, after which he was forced to carry a cross weighing about 50 kilograms to the place of crucifixion. Having dug a cross into the ground near the road outside the city or on a hill, a person was lifted with ropes and nailed to a horizontal bar. Sometimes the convict's legs were crushed with an iron rod beforehand. Death came from exhaustion, dehydration or pain shock.
After the prohibition of Christianity in feudal Japan in the 17th century. crucifixion was used against visiting missionaries and Japanese Christians. The scene of execution on the cross is present in Martin Scorsese's drama Silence, which tells about this period.
Bamboo execution
The ancient Chinese were champions of sophisticated torture and execution. One of the most exotic methods of killing is the stretching of the culprit over the growing shoots of young bamboo. The sprouts made their way through the human body for several days, causing incredible suffering to the executed. 
ling chi
"Ling-chi" is translated into Russian as "bites of the sea pike." There was another name - "death by a thousand cuts." This method was used during the reign of the Qing Dynasty, and high-ranking officials convicted of corruption were executed in this way. Every year, 15-20 people were recruited. 
The essence of "ling-chi" is the gradual cutting off of small parts from the body. For example, after cutting off one phalanx of the finger, the executioner cauterized the wound and then proceeded to the next one. How many pieces to cut off from the body, the court determined. The most popular verdict was cutting into 24 parts, and the most notorious criminals were sentenced to 3,000 cuts. In such cases, the victim was given opium to drink: so she did not lose consciousness, but the pain made its way even through the veil of drug intoxication.
Sometimes, as a sign of special mercy, the ruler could order the executioner to first kill the condemned with one blow and torture the corpse already. This method of execution was practiced for 900 years and was banned in 1905.
Executions of the Middle Ages
blood eagle
Historians question the existence of the Blood Eagle execution, but it is mentioned in Scandinavian folklore. This method was used by the inhabitants of the Scandinavian countries in the early Middle Ages. 
The harsh Vikings killed their enemies as painfully and symbolically as possible. The man's hands were tied and laid on his stomach on a stump. The skin on the back was carefully cut with a sharp blade, then the ribs were pryed with an ax, breaking them out in a shape resembling eagle wings. After that, the lungs were removed from the still living victim and hung on the ribs.
This execution is shown twice in the Vikings series with Travis Fimmel (in episode 7 of season 2 and episode 18 of season 4), although the audience noted the contradictions between the serial execution and the one described in the Elder Edda folklore.
"Bloody Eagle" in the series "Vikings"
Tearing by trees
Such an execution was widespread in many regions of the world, including in Russia in the pre-Christian period. The victim was tied by the legs to two inclined trees, which were then abruptly released. One of the legends says that Prince Igor was killed by the Drevlyans in 945 - because he wanted to collect tribute from them twice. 
Quartering
The method was used as in medieval Europe. Each limb was tied to horses - the animals tore the sentenced into 4 parts. In Russia, they also practiced quartering, but this word meant a completely different execution - the executioner alternately chopped off his legs with an ax, then his hands, and then his head. 
wheeling
Wheeling as a form of the death penalty was widely used in France and Germany during the Middle Ages. In Russia, this type of execution is also known at a later time - from the 17th to the 19th centuries. The essence of the punishment was that at first the guilty person was tied to the wheel, facing the sky, fixing his arms and legs on the knitting needles. After that, his limbs were broken and in this form they were left to die in the sun. 
Flaying
Flaying, or skinning, was invented in Assyria, then passed to Persia and spread throughout to the ancient world. In the Middle Ages, the Inquisition improved this type of execution - with the help of a device called the "Spanish tickler", a person's skin was torn into small pieces, which were not difficult to tear off. 
Welded alive
This execution was also invented in antiquity and received a second wind in the Middle Ages. So they executed mostly counterfeiters. A person convicted of counterfeiting money was thrown into a cauldron of boiling water, tar or oil. This variety was quite humane - the offender quickly died from pain shock. More sophisticated executioners put the condemned man in a cauldron with cold water, which was heated gradually, or slowly lowered into boiling water, starting with the feet. The welded muscles of the legs were moving away from the bones, and the man was still alive.This execution is also practiced by the extremists of the East. According to Saddam Hussein's former bodyguard, he witnessed an acid execution: first, the victim's legs were lowered into a pool filled with caustic substance, and then they were thrown entirely. And in 2016, ISIS militants dissolved 25 people in a cauldron of acid.
cement boots
This method is well known to many of our gangster movie readers. Indeed, they killed their enemies and traitors with such a cruel method during the mafia wars in Chicago. The victim was tied to a chair, then a basin filled with liquid cement was placed under his feet. And when it froze, the person was taken to the nearest reservoir and thrown off the boat. Cement boots instantly dragged him to the bottom to feed the fish. 
Flights of death
In 1976, General Jorge Videla came to power in Argentina. He led the country for only 5 years, but remained in history as one of the most terrible dictators of our time. Among other atrocities of Videla are the so-called "death flights". 
A person who opposed the tyrant's regime was drugged with barbiturates and unconsciously carried on board the plane, then thrown down - certainly into the water.
We also invite you to read about the most mysterious deaths in history.
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May 20th, 2012
To date, the death penalty on our planet has been abolished in an area equal to South America... So
that if you think that the electric chair is a relic of the past, you are deeply mistaken. Truth,
the guillotine is no longer used - since 1939 ...
It's terrible, but everything you read about in the scariest books in democratic North America
still exists safely ... And this country still has something to brag about in terms of guns
executions, and in different states they have a variety of modifications! .. And it all started with the courts
Lynch - that is, mass hangings ...
Sometimes the perpetrators were also burned to be sure ...
Negroes were hanged, at least in the South, everywhere (the lynching has great amount victims in the 20th century, in 1901
130 people were lynched in a year)...
The Indians were often executed by punishers who avenged the massacre of the white population. In the Wild West at the same time
the sheriffs acted, executing at their own discretion (sometimes with their own hands). The death penalty was used in the USA
also for political reasons against socialists, communists, anarchists.
By the end of the 19th century, they were no longer hung up somehow, but professionally. A "professional" gallows was approved, so to speak,
on which it was possible to hang people of any height ... It is in front of you ...
The prisoner's hands were bound...
And a special bag was put on his head - so that those watching the execution would not be shocked by the expression on his face
gallows...
V late XIX century, the electric chair was invented in the USA, first used in 1890 ... It was a breakthrough ...
It very soon came into general use, and in many states superseded the hanging. And with the advent of the chair
came up with the so-called "open executions", where the city administration was invited (in special cases
state) and relatives of the victim of the perpetrator ...
Gradually, the chair improved and improved ...
A special mask was put on the head of the condemned...
Attach separate contacts to hands...
But from these improvements, the suffering of the prisoner has changed little ...
Although death for the average person comes quickly, there are cases in the history of executions when the condemned
I had to "kill" 20-30 minutes ...
The Americans introduced the gas chamber even earlier than in Germany, namely in 1924 ...
Vapors are used for execution potassium cyanide, and if the convict breathes deeply, death comes almost
immediately...
Then came a truly infernal invention - the Armchair of Death. The method is still performed in Utah and Idaho,
as an alternative to lethal injection. To carry out the execution, the prisoner is tied to a chair with leather straps.
across the waist and head. The stool is surrounded by sandbags that absorb blood. A black hood is worn
head of the condemned. The doctor locates the heart and attaches a round target. At a distance of 20
feet are five shooters. Each of them aims a rifle through a gap in the canvas and fires. Prisoner
dies as a result of blood loss caused by rupture of the heart or a large blood vessel, or rupture
lungs. If the arrows miss the heart, either by accident or on purpose, the condemned man dies a slow death...
Soon appeared and last view American execution, now the most common, and in many states the only one:
lethal injection ... Before you is a special couch (gurney) for the condemned ...
The composition of the lethal injection was developed by physician Stanley Deutsch. It consists of three chemical components. First
substance - sodium pentothal - plunges the condemned into a deep sleep. Pavulon - paralyzes the muscles. Finally,
potassium chloride stops the work of the heart muscle. After an examination at the University of Texas, this
method has been approved. It soon became widespread. Opponents of the death penalty gave him
the name of the "Texas cocktail". Today, of the 38 states that, after 1976, re-introduced on their territory
the death penalty, only Nebraska does not resort to injections, preferring the electric chair to them.
Poisons are stored like this...
The killing of the prisoner takes place with poison injected into a vein on his right leg ...
But the most terrible state of affairs with executions is still in Asia and the Middle East ... There are still means
executions used since ancient times: stoning, beheading with a sword and hanging. Frame in front of you
city execution - a man is simply lynched by a crowd ...
But these quite decent people throw these stones at him ...
And they are simply trying to dismantle the guilty ...
The corpse, which is being dragged to demonstrate to the "boss" ...
Hanging...
And just suicide...
And in China, execution is still widely used. They shoot in this country the keepers of brothels,
dishonest officials, dissidents, and so on and so forth...
Moreover, especially mass executions happen before the New Year ...
Among other things, such sentences are pronounced publicly, in front of a large gathering of people ...
The execution is carried out by conscripts...
And the bodies are buried in specially designated places - they are not given to relatives ...
Russia ... On May 16, 1996, Russian President Boris Yeltsin issued a decree "On the phased reduction
application of the death penalty in connection with Russia's entry into the Council of Europe. Since August 1996, in accordance with this
by decree, death sentences are not carried out. Suicide bombers are serving life sentences...
Before you very rare shot prisoners of the Orenburg prison "Black Dolphin" ...
There are three more such prisons in Russia. They don't come out. Nobody ever. So human rights activists bitterly joke "If they
residents were able to vote on the use of the death penalty, most of them would vote yes.
Look how discreet it looks, this most famous prison in Russia ... Those who are inside this
red-brick building dating back to Catherine's time, when there was already lifelong penal servitude, never
did not see the sculptures of those same dolphins from the fountains, which gave this terrible institution such
poetic name...
Today in Russia there are more than three and a half thousand people sentenced to life
conclusion. And "Black Dolphin" today is the largest specialized prison for death row...
Since ancient times, people brutally dealt with their enemies, some even ate them, but mostly they were executed, deprived of their lives in terrible and sophisticated ways. The same was done with criminals who violated the laws of God and man. Over a thousand-year history, a lot of experience has been accumulated in the execution of the condemned.
Decapitation
The physical separation of the head from the body with the help of an ax or any military weapon (knife, sword) later, a machine invented in France, the Guillotine, was used for these purposes. It is believed that during such an execution, the head, separated from the body, retains sight and hearing for another 10 seconds. Decapitation was considered a "noble execution" and was applied to aristocrats. In Germany, beheading was abolished in 1949 due to the failure of the last guillotine.
Hanging
Strangulation of a person on a rope loop, the end of which is fixed motionless. Death occurs in a few minutes, but not at all from suffocation, but from squeezing the carotid arteries. In this case, the person first loses consciousness, and later dies.
The medieval gallows consisted of a special pedestal, a vertical column (pillars) and a horizontal beam, on which the condemned were hung, placed above the likeness of a well. The well was intended for falling off parts of the body - the hanged remained hanging on the gallows until complete decomposition.
In England, a type of hanging was used, when a person was thrown from a height with a noose around his neck, while death occurs instantly from a rupture of the cervical vertebrae. There was an “official table of falls”, with the help of which the necessary length of the rope was calculated depending on the weight of the convict (if the rope is too long, the head separates from the body).
A variation of hanging is garrote. A garrote (an iron collar with a screw, often equipped with a vertical spike on the back) is generally not strangled. She breaks her neck. The executed in this case does not die from suffocation, as happens if he is strangled with a rope, but from crushing the spine (sometimes, according to medieval evidence, from a fracture of the base of the skull, depending on where to put it on) and a fracture of the cervical cartilage.
The last high-profile hanging - Saddam Hussein.
Quartering
It is considered one of the most cruel executions, and was applied to the most dangerous criminals. When quartered, the victim was strangled (not to death), then the stomach was cut open, the genitals were cut off, and only then the body was cut into four or more parts and the head was cut off. Body parts were put on public display "where the king deems it convenient."
Thomas More, the author of Utopia, sentenced to quartering with burning of the inside, on the morning before the execution was pardoned, and the quartering was replaced by decapitation, to which More replied: "God spare my friends from such mercy."
In England, quartering was used until 1820, formally abolished only in 1867. In France, quartering was carried out with the help of horses. The convict was tied by the arms and legs to four strong horses, which, whipped by the executioners, moved in different directions and tore off the limbs. In fact, the convict had to cut the tendons.
Another execution by tearing the body in half, noted in pagan Russia, was that the victim was tied by the legs to two bent young trees, and then released. According to Byzantine sources, Prince Igor was killed by the Drevlyans in 945 because he wanted to collect tribute from them twice.
wheeling
A common type of death penalty in Antiquity and the Middle Ages. In the Middle Ages, it was common in Europe, especially in Germany and France. In Russia, this type of execution has been known since the 17th century, but wheeling began to be regularly used only under Peter I, having received legislative approval in the Military Charter. Wheeling ceased to be used only in the 19th century.
Professor A.F. Kistyakovsky in the 19th century described the wheeling process used in Russia as follows: St. Andrew's cross, made of two logs, was tied to the scaffold in a horizontal position. On each of the branches of this cross two notches were made, one foot apart from the other. On this cross, the criminal was stretched so that his face was turned to the sky; each end of it lay on one of the branches of the cross, and in every place of each joint it was tied to the cross.
Then the executioner, armed with an iron quadrangular crowbar, struck at the part of the penis between the joint, which just lay above the notch. In this way, the bones of each member were broken in two places. The operation ended with two or three blows to the stomach and a breaking of the backbone. The criminal, broken in this way, was placed on a horizontally placed wheel so that the heels converged with the back of the head, and they left him in this position to die.
Burning at the stake
The death penalty, in which the victim is burned at the stake in public. Along with immuring and imprisoning, burning was widely used in the Middle Ages, since, according to the church, on the one hand, it happened without “shedding blood”, and on the other hand, the flame was considered a means of “purification” and could save the soul. Heretics, "witches" and those guilty of sodomy were especially often subject to burning.
The execution became widespread during the period of the Holy Inquisition, and only in Spain about 32 thousand people were burned (excluding the Spanish colonies).
The most famous people burned at the stake: Giorgiano Bruno - as a heretic (was engaged in scientific activity) and Jeanne d'Arc, who commanded the French troops in the Hundred Years' War.
Impalement
Impaling was widely used in ancient Egypt and the Middle East, its first mention dates back to the beginning of the second millennium BC. e. Execution was especially widespread in Assyria, where impalement was a common punishment for residents of rebellious cities, therefore, for instructive purposes, scenes of this execution were often depicted on bas-reliefs. This execution was used according to Assyrian law and as a punishment for women for abortion (considered as a variant of infanticide), as well as for a number of especially serious crimes. On the Assyrian reliefs, there are two options: with one of them, the condemned person was pierced with a stake in the chest, with the other, the tip of the stake entered the body from below, through the anus. Execution was widely used in the Mediterranean and the Middle East at least from the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. e. It was also known to the Romans, although it did not receive much distribution in Ancient Rome.
For a large part of medieval history, the execution by impalement was very common in the Middle East, where it was one of the main methods of painful death penalty. It became widespread in France during the time of Fredegonda, who was the first to introduce this type of execution, conferring on her a young girl of a noble family. The unfortunate was laid on his stomach, and the executioner drove a wooden stake into his anus with a hammer, after which the stake was driven vertically into the ground. Under the weight of the body, the person gradually slid down until, after a few hours, the stake came out through the chest or neck.
The ruler of Wallachia, Vlad III Tepes (“the impaler”) Dracula, distinguished himself with particular cruelty. According to his instructions, the victims were impaled on a thick stake, in which the top was rounded and oiled. The stake was inserted into the anus to a depth of several tens of centimeters, then the stake was placed vertically. The victim, under the influence of the gravity of his body, slowly slid down the stake, and sometimes death occurred only after a few days, since the rounded stake did not pierce the vital organs, but only went deeper into the body. In some cases, a horizontal bar was installed on the stake, which prevented the body from sliding too low, and ensured that the stake did not reach the heart and other critical organs. In this case, the death of rupture of internal organs and great blood loss did not come very soon.
King Edward of England was executed by impalement. The nobles rebelled and killed the monarch by driving a red-hot iron rod into his anus. Impaling was used in the Commonwealth until the 18th century, and many Zaporizhian Cossacks were executed in this way. With the help of smaller stakes, rapists were also executed (they drove a stake into the heart) and mothers who killed their children (they were pierced with a stake after being buried alive in the ground).
Hanging by the rib
A type of death penalty in which an iron hook was thrust into the side of the victim and hung up. Death came from thirst and blood loss after a few days. The hands of the victim were tied so that he could not free himself. Execution was common among the Zaporizhian Cossacks. According to legend, Dmitry Vishnevetsky, the founder of the Zaporizhzhya Sich, the legendary “Baida Veshnivetsky”, was executed in this way.
stoning
After the appropriate decision of the authorized legal body (the king or the court), a crowd of citizens gathered to kill the guilty person by throwing stones at him. At the same time, small stones should have been chosen so that the condemned person would not be exhausted too quickly. Or, in a more humane case, it could be one executioner, dropping one large stone from above on the condemned.
Currently, stoning is used in some Muslim countries. On January 1, 1989, stoning remained in the legislation of six countries of the world. An Amnesty International report gives an eyewitness account of a similar execution in Iran:
“Next to a wasteland, a lot of stones and pebbles were poured out of a truck, then they brought two women dressed in white, bags were put on their heads ... A hail of stones fell on them, turning their bags red ... The wounded women fell, and then the guards of the revolution broke through their heads with shovels to finally kill them.
Throwing to Predators
The oldest type of execution, common among many peoples of the world. Death came because the victim was bitten by crocodiles, lions, bears, snakes, sharks, piranhas, ants.
Walking in circles
A rare method of execution, practiced, in particular, in Russia. The victim's stomach was steamed in the area of the intestines, so that he would not die from blood loss. Then they took out an intestine, nailed it to a tree and forced it to walk in a circle around the tree. In Iceland, a special stone was used for this, around which they walked according to the verdict of the Thing.
Buried alive
A type of execution not very common in Europe, which is believed to have come to the Old World from the East, but there are several documentary evidence of the use of this type of execution that have come down to our time. Burial alive was applied to Christian martyrs. In medieval Italy, unrepentant murderers were buried alive. In Germany, female child killers were buried alive in the ground. In Russia of the 17th-18th centuries, women who killed their husbands were buried alive up to the neck.
crucifixion
Condemned to death, the hands and feet were nailed to the ends of the cross or the limbs were fixed with ropes. This is how Jesus Christ was executed. The main cause of death during crucifixion is asphyxia caused by developing pulmonary edema and fatigue of the intercostal muscles and muscles involved in the breathing process. abdominals. The main support of the body in this position is the hands, and when breathing, the abdominal muscles and intercostal muscles had to lift the weight of the whole body, which led to their rapid fatigue. Also, squeezing the chest with tense muscles of the shoulder girdle and chest caused stagnation of fluid in the lungs and pulmonary edema. Additional causes of death were dehydration and blood loss.
Welding in boiling water
Welding in liquid was a common type of death penalty in different countries of the world. In ancient Egypt, this type of punishment was applied mainly to persons who disobeyed the pharaoh. The slaves of the pharaoh at dawn (specially so that Ra saw the criminal) made a huge fire, over which there was a cauldron of water (and not just water, but the dirtiest water, where waste was poured, etc.) Sometimes whole families.
This type of execution was widely used by Genghis Khan. In medieval Japan, boiling water was applied mainly to ninja who failed an assassination and were captured. In France, this execution was applied to counterfeiters. Sometimes intruders were boiled in boiling oil. There remains evidence of how in 1410 in Paris a pickpocket was boiled alive in boiling oil.
Pouring lead or boiling oil down the throat
It was used in the East, in Medieval Europe, in Russia and among the Indians. Death came from a burn of the esophagus and strangulation. The punishment was usually set for counterfeiting, and often the metal from which the offender cast coins was poured. Those who did not die for a long time were cut off the head.
Execution in a bag
lat. Poena cullei. The victim was sewn into a bag with different animals (snake, monkey, dog or rooster) and thrown into the water. Practiced in the Roman Empire. Under the influence of the reception of Roman law in the Middle Ages, it was adopted (in a slightly modified form) in a number of European countries. Thus, in the French code of customary law "Livres de Jostice et de Plet" (1260), created on the basis of Justinian's Digest, it is said about the "execution in a bag" with a rooster, a dog and a snake (the monkey is not mentioned, apparently for reasons of rarity this animal for medieval Europe). Somewhat later, an execution based on poena cullei also appeared in Germany, where it was used in the form of hanging a criminal (thief) upside down (sometimes hanging was carried out by one leg) together (on the same gallows) with a dog (or two dogs hung on the right and left from the executed). This execution was called the "Jewish execution", since over time it began to be applied exclusively to Jewish criminals (it was applied to Christians in the rarest cases in the 16th-17th centuries).
Excoriation
Skinning has a very ancient history. Even the Assyrians skinned captured enemies or rebellious rulers and nailed them to the walls of their cities as a warning to those who would challenge their power. The Assyrian ruler Ashurnasirpal boasted that he flayed so many skins from the guilty nobility that he covered the columns with it.
Especially often used in Chaldea, Babylon and Persia. In ancient India, the skin was removed by fire. With the help of torches, she was burned to meat all over her body. With burns, the convict suffered for several days until death. In Western Europe, it was used as a method of punishment for traitors and traitors, as well as to ordinary people who were suspected of having love affairs with women of royal blood. Also, the skin was torn off the corpses of enemies or criminals for intimidation.
ling chi
Ling-chi (Chinese: “death by a thousand cuts”) is a particularly painful method of the death penalty by cutting off small fragments from the body of the victim for long period time.
It was used in China for high treason and parricide in the Middle Ages and during the Qing dynasty until its abolition in 1905. In 1630, a prominent Ming commander Yuan Chonghuan was subjected to this execution. The proposal to abolish it was made back in the 12th century by the poet Lu Yu. During the Qing dynasty, ling-chi was performed in public places with a large gathering of onlookers for the purpose of intimidation. Surviving descriptions of the execution differ in detail. The victim was usually drugged with opium, either out of mercy or to prevent her from losing consciousness.
In his History of Torture of All Ages, George Riley Scott quotes from the notes of two Europeans who had the rare opportunity to be present at such an execution: their names were Sir Henry Norman (he saw this execution in 1895) and T. T. Ma-Dawes:
“There is a basket covered with a piece of linen, in which lies a set of knives. Each of these knives is designed for a certain part of the body, as evidenced by the inscriptions engraved on the blade. The executioner takes one of the knives at random from the basket and, based on the inscription, cuts off the corresponding part of the body. However, at the end of the last century, such a practice, in all likelihood, was supplanted by another, which left no room for chance and provided for cutting off parts of the body in a certain sequence with a single knife. According to Sir Henry Norman, the convict is tied to the likeness of a cross, and the executioner slowly and methodically cuts off first the fleshy parts of the body, then cuts the joints, cuts off individual limbs and ends the execution with one sharp blow to the heart ...
