Here are 20 of the slowest and most painful historical torture methods you would not want to endure: A disputed historical method of inflicting immense pain upon a victim, bamboo torture is a form of punishment wherein bamboo shoots are employed to grow into, and subsequently through, the body of the subjected person. The Spanish Inquisition, lasting from 1478 until 1834, existed for a sufficiently long period of time to incrementally perfect the art of torture. Torture methods are known to be brutal ways of enforcing punishment and squeezing out the truth from perpetrators. Appearing repeatedly throughout modern popular film, television, and literature, rat torture is an especially cruel method of punishment. At best, an army could hope to break through a citys gates by rushing at it with a log, often while archers fired down on them from below. Since the victim would most likely lose consciousness after one or two severe wounds. *H{kI)-wr`-4'DL Xoi)0Mo)ls}T[3 t0p`CF/.Dr7!aLpjBO*\NbaosG.^({B$JGfWtf}-GQEN]3;TFyebpn$D. Captured soldiers were supposedly tied above infant bamboo shoots, which, over the course of several days, would grow at a rapid pace and pierce the prisoners. Public Domain. A millennium later, the Neo-Assyrian King Sennacherib (r. 705-681 BCE) is recorded as impaling surviving Judeans after the Siege of . and remained in use up to the 19th century. Wikimedia Commons. 434 19 On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. That in days to come the site of that city, and its temples and gods, might not be remembered, I completely blotted it out with floods of water and made it like a meadow., One Assyrian king recorded sparing some of the people he invaded but only after they shamelessly humbled themselves before him. This was Assyriathe first nation to make its military might its central policy and the first nation to torment its enemies with psychological warfare. The society also used torture to persecute others for their religious affiliations. Wikimedia Commons. This is more commonly called skinning . Living persons, either willingly or forced as part of entombed chattel, were frequently buried alongside deceased people of status. There were no accurate details of how this method of execution was carried out. Neros Torches, depicting the martyrdom of a group of early Christians in Rome, by Henryk Siemiradzki (c. 1876). The captives I have killed by the sword and flung on the dung heap. He has been a guest speaker on numerous national radio and television stations and is a five time published author. updated March 31, 2020, 8:32 pm, by updated November 28, 2017, 8:39 pm, by <<7a948a1f817a16499a21d19a53bed43a>]>> In the sixth season of the television series, This page was last edited on 1 March 2023, at 13:11. and there were a lot of them. Tortured by the Syrian Bashar al-Assad regime in prison for seven years, Muhlis al-Drubi cannot forget the horrors he experienced, including having boiling water poured over him and reverse. In some accounts, there were cuts that numbered to 100 (Yuan Dynasty) and some were over 3,000 (Ming Dynasty). The Ancient Assyrians Flayed Their Enemies To Frighten Them Stone carvings from the time of ancient Assyria around 800 B.C.E. A Tudor woodcut print of Keelhauling (c. 1485 1603). The Assyrian population grew around the region known as Mesopotamia in modern-day Iraq. 0000000689 00000 n If the individual survives the initial shock and avoids critical loss of blood during the torture, then they will likely die days later due to infection. Men had to right to murder adulterous wives. It involved trapping the naked victim within two, narrow boats joined together with his head, hands, and feet protruding. I don't think torturers can be human. As a form of punishment, crucifixion exists still today, notably in Saudi Arabia and Iran, where the most recent known occurrences of crucifixion occurred as recently as the early 2000s. 0000001680 00000 n Immurement, derived from the later im in and murus wall, literally comprises the entombing of an individual inside a wall or enclosed space without means of exit. Middle Ages Torture, devices, techniques and facts. Several English writers during the 17th century recorded keelhauling on naval ships; however, there remains no formal note of these actions in the ships logs. Known also to have been used throughout Scotland on various occasions between 1200 and 1600, the Holy Roman Empire also employed boiling as the legal punishment for coin forgery. 0000001458 00000 n Known to have been used as a punishment prior to the Roman civilization, appearing in ancient Persia, Macedon, and Carthage, Alexander the Great famously order the crucifixions of 2,000 survivors of the siege of Tyre in 332 BCE. Accused of attending anti-regime protests, al-Drubi, 42, was detained in 2012. Murderers were handed over to the victims family, who were free to do with them as they willed. By the reign of Queen Margaret I of Denmark (r. 1387-1412 CE), female adultery was punished with premature burial (whilst men merely got off with a quick beheading), and until 1689 Russia employed the torturous experience as punishment for the murder of a husband. wn Also, their land was a geographical passage for various armies marching towards their enemies on the way. Their reputation was so fierce that Jonah fled in fear when God commanded him to speak in Ninevah, Assyria's capital (Jonah 1:1?3).Assyrian soldiers were equipped with the latest weaponry, including barbed arrows, catapults, and siege machines. This practice, in addition to causing immense suffering, was supposed to represent the spiritual defilement of the individual, with their eternal soul unable to reside in one piece in future lives. The brazen bull, also known as the Sicilian Bull, was a disputed torture device allegedly stemming from Ancient Greece, specifically the city-state of Akragas. Adriana John They were known for ruthless battle tactics and Executions have often served as a kind of revenge, a way of inflicting pain and mental torture on the convict. [citation needed]. This method of torture was executed in several ways, like; Tying the victim to a pole and peeling his facial skin first, or submerging the victim in boiling water before the flaying. Centuries before the United States of America would adopt the use of sleep deprivation and enforced standing to entice confessions and acquire intelligence, the Inquisition developed two ruthless mechanisms to achieve the same end: the Heretics Fork and Neck Traps. The article "Grisly Assyrian Record of Torture and Death" by Erika Bleibtreu gives an insight into the ways of the Assyrian military campaigns and battles. His website is regularly updated with everything he writes. Differing from immurement by both method and intent, those subjected to premature burial are interred with the purpose of execution, and, in contrast to the entombing of persons within walls, the victims die far quicker when buried. Wikimedia Commons. The Assyrian Empire originally began as a small city-state under the Akkadian Empire, which dominated Mesopotamia from 2334 - 2154 BCE. They poured boiling water over us, burned us with cigarette butts.". This is often referred to as flaying alive. empires.. Assyria was located in the northern part of Mesopotamia, which corresponds to most parts of modern-day Iraq as well as parts of Iran . Then, in the third year, they would be allowed to live with their familiesbefore starting the cycle again. This nasty torture method uses rats to torment the victim by forcing the rodents to gnaw their way into the humans flesh. 0000002742 00000 n Life under the threat of Assyrian was horrifyingfor the Assyrians as well as their victims. December 23, 2019, 10:09 am, by Middle Assyrian Period. Although disputed for historical veracity, Plutarchs account has nonetheless proved influential. It should be noted, nevertheless, that the Dutch did not intend the practice to be fatal and allowed for respites in the torture to recover. $iU-PGiSit::")SD.@&qk=mUi/6d07*w` Ormerod, Dorset Press (1987), Von Ursprung des Schindens in Assyrien, Ernst G. Jung, in Kleine Kultrugeschichte der Haut, Spring Verlag (2007), Buried Alive: The Terrifying History of Our Most Primal Fear, Jan Bondeson, W.W. Norton & Company (2002), Vampires, Burial and Death: Folklore and Reality, Paul Barber University Press (1988), Crucifixion in Antiquity: An Inquiry into the Background and Significance of the New Testament Terminology of Crucifixion, Gunnar Samuelsson, Mohr Siebeck Publishing (2013), Crucifixion in the Roman World: The Use of Nails at the Time of Christ, John C. Robison, Studia Antiqua (June 2002), Death by a Thousand Cuts, Timothy Brook, Jerome Bourgon, and Gregory Blue, Harvard University Press (2008), The Cambridge Ancient History: Assyria and Babylon, c. 1370-1300 B.C., C.J. The method was done by tying the victim in a wooden frame and then cutting the flesh in varied, multiple and non-deadly slices. The result was one of the strongest armies in the world. to deny an afterlife); sometimes the skin is used, again for deterrence, esoteric/ritualistic purposes, etc. The Assyrians were so brutal that their military campaigns even put themselves through hell. However, a 2008 Mythbusters investigation verified that bamboo shoots can penetrate several inches of ballistic gelatin (comparable in strength to the human skin) in less than three days. In contrast to common depiction, most crucifixions did not involve the nailing of the victims hands or feet to the cross. Unknown to him, she was sacrificed, with the priest appearing during the festival dinner wearing her skin as part of the ritual. The device is rarely washed, so the victim either dies from impalement or infection. [2] Already from the times of Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883859 BC), the practice is displayed and commemorated in both carvings and official royal edicts. Several variations of the device existed, reflecting its use in a number of circumstances. The Blood Eagle is a haunting form of execution used by the Vikings. The men worked in a three-year cycle. Both were commonly inscribed with the Latin phrase abiruo I recant: an objective often achieved due to the eventual breaking of the subjects will. N')].uJr Crucifixion, an ancient method of capital punishment, is perhaps the most famous means of torture in history due to its association with the Christian narrative of Jesus. HyTSwoc [5laQIBHADED2mtFOE.c}088GNg9w '0 Jb Photo credit: Wikimedia. In so doing, the individual, should they survive punishment, would be marked for life, unable to breastfeed any future children and thus prevented from fulfilling the chief role of women in Medieval society. }?9{we#5SS"&~j[}mwD { 4A6*({[OUq.-1!>4?izc^(a7-=HkN{i,J~WnxjWwcON>Egjmd.pC =r*5o@/g e_?+\ VO7o:\~{[eWirG7a{8Nx?= 9^+:2Z From his capital at Ashur, Ashur-uballit extended Assyrian control over the rich farming . Known to have occurred as early as 2500 BCE, with archaeological evidence in the Sumerian city of Ur depicting the practice, it was also a prominent feature of early imperial China. They'd cut off the tongues of their captives so their screaming wouldn't be as loud when they were skinned alive. A similar mode of execution was used as late as the early 18th century in France; one such episode is graphically recounted in the opening chapter of Michel Foucault's Discipline and Punish (1979). "The name of the person who tortured me was Somar al Wahid. The use of torture and mutilation as a fear tactic did not become a more common practice until the Assyrian Empire was built. They laid cities to waste, tortured the survivors, and spread terror everywhere they went. I flayed many right through my land and draped their skins over the walls, he boasts in one. The cutting off of feet, lips and noses, blinding, gutting and the ripping out of the heart were all standard punishments in this corner of the ancient world (Hamblin). After llas capture at York in 867, they caused the bloody eagle to be carved on the back of lla, and they cut away all of the ribs from the spine, and then they ripped out his lungs. Their artistic propaganda relishes every detail of torture, massacre, battlefield executions and human displacement that made Assyria the dominant power of the Middle East from about 900 to. Then, he told me to kneel. The stake would be hammered in with a mallet, and it would come out at either his breast, head, or shoulders. Usually, a cage filled with rats would be placed on top of the restrained victims stomach. Under the Habsburgs, the number of strikes inflicted was used as a measure of the severity of criminal conduct by the condemned. The former, stemming from Elizabethan England, is based on claims the Tower of London contained a Rats Dungeon wherein a cell blow high-water mark would draw in rats from the River Thames and victims would have fleshtorn from the arms and legs. Whilst historians have questioned whether or not the brazen bull truly existed or was merely an early form of propaganda against an unpopular ruler, it enjoys a prolonged legacy nonetheless. Assyrian International News Agency Books Online www.aina.org. The victim would suffer hours of agonizing pain as the rats dig a hole through his body, after which he would inevitably die. By the time their armies reached your walls, these stories would have spread. Made from iron and heated to ensure an easier tear, the spikes of the ripper would be attached to a convicted womans breast. Although women were excluded from these practices and doctors were required to be present, the Inquisition nevertheless enjoyed near limitless authority to inflict suffering upon those entrusted to their custody. Those convicted, commonly murderers and robbers, would be broken by the wheel for their sins, whereupon they were staked out and endured having their limbs broken. Gradually, his body was consumed after seventeen days of being eaten from both within and without. Whilst some intended to kill, albeit resulting in slow, torturous deaths, others were intended to merely maim and hurt without fatal outcomes. They brought us to the military base in the village of Dayr al-Shimal in western Hama, where they beat us with plastic tubes," he told Anadolu Agency. These horrific and brutal images would surly make any enemy fear the wrath of Lagash. Thats exactly the experience of modern-day soldiers whove been involved in close hand-to-hand combat.. Grisly Assyrian Record of Torture and Death. VEerzLB(%_E|=".hq%%}]|~8P[Cxwf{7B_`s@jKSbJAsxAP,XRY\HmY8@iCK3rT ,4 _f,alNsg3kCQ87{i$js/8ZuU5{3{$\^75Bp,?q[Y0WB:Zi>PTYa,j0a'Np^ee6d1}$|>U}co~UE~OeXm7lfb}@;`b\v+Tu:2ylCYac0A-z~wg0y'4>-{3Qka3EJ?4uObNW=IeZ6oKq'Rcca.PvFz4Mw_Wsn>!);? Wikimedia Commons. The boot, or 'Spanish boot' as it was sometimes called, was like a rack for the legs which would be placed in tightly fitted iron or wooden boots. The convicted would be taken to a public stage and tied on the floor. Mark Oliver is a regular contributor to Listverse. Eventually, it is claimed that the tyrant was himself murdered with the very instrument of his cruelty by Telemachus. Instead, they were more frequently attached by rope in order to prolong the torture. In their royal edicts, the Neo-Assyrian kings seem to gloat over the terrible fate they imposed upon their captives, and that flaying seems, in particular, to be the fate meted out to rebel leaders. Life behind a citys walls when the Assyrian army drew close was terrifying. The British Museum. . . The bandit Ishikawa Goemon, being boiled to death for the attempted assassination of Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 16th-century Japan (c. mid-19th century). Reserved for crimes of an especially heinous nature, notably treason, mass murder, or the killing of close family members, lingchi was designed as a cruel method of causing incrementally unbearable agony for its victims. The nobles and elders of the city came out to me to save their lives, he declared. Native Americans flayed their captives to make them suffer for as long as possible. . This article has been adapted from its original source. The blood eagle - a ritualized method of torture and execution allegedly practiced by the Norse Vikings - opened up the ribs of the victim to craft their lungs into wings. My skin peeled off. I don't know where he is from, nor who he is. The Assyrian empire dominated Mesopotamia and all of the Near East for the first half of the first millennium B.C.E., led by a series of highly ambitious and aggressive warrior kings. Ironically, in a reversal of fortunes for the Babylonians, Darius I of Persia would later impale 3,000 of their own in vengeance. At least two individuals, Richard Roose and Margaret Davy, in 1531 and 1542 respectively, are known to have suffered this particular fate before abandonment under Edward VI in 1547. Although theres no exact date as to its origins. Diederik Sonoy, an ally of the revolts leader, William of Orange, allegedly used pottery bowls filled with rats to enact the torture and elicit information. The Assyrians were known for being very barbaric when it came to torturing slaves and prisoners of war. It shows the decapitated heads of the enemy Ummite soldiers being carried away by vultures. Similarly, neck traps prevented the victim from adjusting the angle of their neck to a more comfortable position. The passage of the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1791, prohibiting cruel and unusual punishments, was a direct response to this wartime practice and an attempt to prevent any further applications in the fledgling nation. 4. I let the leaders of the conquered cities be flayed, and clad the city walls with their skins. If the king was merciful, they would be sent to a ruined kingdom on the outskirts of the nation that would be forced to rebuild. The United States has continued to use the method as recently as 2003, when, under interrogation by the CIA, Manadel al-Jamadi was killed after just 30 minutes at Abu Ghraib Prison.