Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The limbs collected from this and other punishments of the time were "emptied by the hundreds". Sometimes, this method was limited to dislocating a few bones, but the torturer often went too far and rendered the legs or arms (sometimes both) useless. In the late Middle Ages, some new variants of this instrument appeared.
The execution of Hugh Despenser the Younger, as depicted in the Froissart of Louis of Gruuthuse. To be hanged, drawn and quartered was a method of torturous capital punishment used principally to execute men convicted of high treason in medieval and early modern Britain and Ireland.
The punishment has been used since antiquity; Greek mythology makes several references to blinding as divine punishment, which reflects human practice. In the Byzantine Empire and many other historical societies, blinding was accomplished by gouging out the eyes , sometimes using a hot poker, and by pouring a boiling substance, such as vinegar ...
Public humiliation or public shaming is a form of punishment whose main feature is dishonoring or disgracing a person, usually an offender or a prisoner, especially in a public place. It was regularly used as a form of judicially sanctioned punishment in previous centuries, and is still practiced by different means (e.g. schools) in the modern era.
Used as punishment for high treason in the Ancien régime; also used by several others countries at various points in history. Drowning: Execution by drowning is attested very early in history, by a large variety of cultures, and as the method of execution for many different offences. Drawing and quartering: English method of execution for high ...
Damnatio ad bestias (Latin for "condemnation to beasts") was a form of Roman capital punishment where the condemned person was killed by wild animals, usually lions or other big cats. This form of execution, which first appeared during the Roman Republic around the 2nd century BC, had been part of a wider class of blood sports called Bestiarii .
Whipping was the most commonly used form of punishment, especially in the American South with slaves. Other frequently used punishments included branding, cutting off ears, and placing people in the pillory. These punishments were sometimes harsher, depending on the crimes committed. In Colonial America, executions were less common than in Europe.
Execution wheel (German: Richtrad) with underlays, 18th century; on display at the Märkisches Museum, Berlin The breaking wheel, also known as the execution wheel, the Wheel of Catherine or the (Saint) Catherine('s) Wheel, was a torture method used for public execution primarily in Europe from antiquity through the Middle Ages up to the 19th century by breaking the bones of a criminal or ...