Historical Methods of Torture and Execution
Europe is the place to visit if this is what you're into. Many cities and towns have medieval torture museums. We liked one that we visited at Mont St. Michel in France. For those of you who can't afford to travel, check out the movie version of Edgar Allen Poe's The Pit and the Pendulum starring Lance Henrickson. Don't know how historically accurate it is, but it's great atmospherically.
Beheading by Axe or Sword
An executioner, usually hooded, chops off the person's head. Quite trendy in England in the 1500-1600's. The axe used for the last beheading in 1747 can be viewed at the Tower of London.
Beating to Death
An example of this is when American slaves were beaten to death by their masters until they died.
Boiling Alive
Another form of cooking people, popular in the Middle Ages
Buried Alive
Widely used around the world throughout the ages. For example, in India they buried women in sand up to their necks, then left them, head emerged only, to bake in the sun.
Burned at the Stake
Popular during the Inquisition for heretics, witches, and uppity women.
Eaten by Animals
The early Christians were thrown to the lions. Also, we don't know whether it's based in reality or not, but check out the scene in the movie The Vikings where they throw Ragnar into the wolf pit.
Skinning/Flaying
The skin is removed in strips.
Drawn and Quartered
The person is carved into pieces while alive. It was often combined with hanging and used for extremely serious crimes such as high treason, where mere hanging alone was not enough.
Impaling
Stakes are driven through the person's body in such a way that vital organs needed for...
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...s in the limbs are pre-cut.
Water Death
Person is forced to drink water until death.
Water Torture
Used in U.S. prisons in the nineteenth century. Water was poured on top of the prisoner's head and a large bucket of water was also placed under their chin to simulate the feeling of drowning. To see pictures, including an actual photograph, click here.
The Gag
This device was placed in prisoners' mouths and kept in place by locking the chain around their necks. Used in U.S. prisons in the nineteenth century.
The Cage
Giant oddly-shaped metal cages were placed on prisoners' heads and worn throughout the waking hours. Used in nineteenth century American prisons. To see a picture, click here.
The Cat
Prisoners were whipped with leather straps and cat-o'-nine tails until their flesh was raw and bleeding. Used in nineteenth century American prisons.
First of all, the guards use the box to discipline the prison inmates. The box is a tiny, single person hut in which inmates have to spend a night in if they did not abide by the rules. Anyone who does not keep his spoon with himself will spend a night in the box. If an inmate had a grudge against someone will have to wait till Saturday afternoon to box. If an inmate fight in the building will spend a night in the box. Anyone who forgets his laundry number spend a night in the box. Any of these rules broken by an inmate will result in a night in the box.
It represented a new world of confinement that removed the convict from his community and regimented his life. It introduced society to a new notion of punishment and reform. (Curtis et al, 1985)
The guillotine was one of the fastest and most painless ways to kill people. Before that though there were a lot more painful and torturous ways to execute people. For example, they used to hang people but they would also torture them, to make their death even more painful. During the Enlightment, people favored human rights and their well being, so they didn’t torture people as bad as before. During the Enlightment, people got more rights so they couldn’t be tortured as much like former executions. The guillotine made execution a lot better. The guillotine was an enlightened way to execute people.
trap African Americans in a virtual (and literal) cage,” he is saying that “Blacks are now incarcerated seven times as often as whites.” He is addressing that mass incarceration is another way to control black people. This leaves his readers shock realizing that slavery is happening all over again but in invisible way that people wouldn 't realize so easily.
Capital punishment, also referred to as the death penalty, is the judicially ordered execution of a prisoner as a punishment for a serious crime, often called a capital offence or a capital crime. In those jurisdictions that practice capital punishment, its use is usually restricted to a small number of criminal offences, principally, treason and murder, that is, the deliberate premeditated killing of another person. In the early 18th and 19th century the death penalty was inflicted in many ways. Some ways were, crucifixion, boiling in oil, drawing and quartering, impalement, beheading, burning alive, crushing, tearing asunder, stoning and drowning. In the late 19th century the types of punishments were limited and only a few of them remained permissible by law.
When someone dies their bones are burned and crushed into ash and consumed by the relatives. It puts a persons soul at peace to find a resting place within their family, it would be an abomination to bury them in the ground. Once this ceremony is finished the person is gone. Their name or person is never to be mentioned again.
They were all charged with armed robbery and burglary, told their legal rights, handcuffed, and shoved into a police to be taken to the police station. There the suspect went through the entire system. According to Zimbardo in his journal, they were booked, warned of their rights, finger-printed, identified, taken to a holding cell and blindfolded until they were transferred to the mock prison. There, each prisoner is brought in to be greeted by the warden one at a time. Being strip searched and then issued a uniform. The uniforms consisted of a dress, and heavy chain for the ankle, sandals, and stocking caps, each crucial to the emasculation and reality of the prison. In addition, prisoners were stripped of their real world identification and given numbers to be identified as. Combined with a disgracing uniform, this made prisoners lose all individuality, especially after having their heads shaved.
The first prisons in the United States were established as penitentiaries, were offenders paid for their sins. The English Workhouse was one of the United States first penitentiaries. This place was early designed for punishment of the poor. As time passed, the English realized they should imprison criminals of all kind. The workhouse was a place of hard labor. People that supported the wo...
today’s first private prisons. Initially being built to reduce overcrowding and cut cost from the regular
With electrocution the prisoner had to be prepped, his head and one calf would be shaved, making for better contact of the leads (Powell, 2014). The prisoner is strapped into the electric chair at the wrists, waist...
Robert states that it was the Americans that invented the prison. "The history of prison in America is the history of a troubled search for solutions." Before we had prisons in America, criminals where dealt with in a swift and brutal manner. Many prisoner where dealt with by corporal or capital punishment. Jails did exist in this time but they were "primarily for pretrail detention" stated Pray.
The constables brought in a wooden cross, which was a torture device and "made Hsu kneel down with his back to this cross and lashed his throat. His wrists were put through two holes at the ends of the crossbar, and his hands tied securely to the bar, so that they could not slip through. They passed a thick, round pole between the back of his thighs and his calves, and finally laid a long, heavy wooden beam across his lap." (194) After the device was set up "Judge Dee ordered them to
The knot when made with a large enough diameter rope creates a noose. The wraps create a large cylinder mass right above the loop. When placed around the condemned’s neck the noose is usually putt behind the left ear. This knot was designed so that when the person being hanged fell, the knot would deliver a striking blow to the back of the head causing it to snap the fourth and fifth vertebrae in the spinal cord.
Prisons have dated back to the twentieth century when the United States had almost two million people confined in prisons or jails. Prisons have been a form of government punishment that has shaped our nation to what it is today. The first jail was established in Philadelphia, in 1970. It was called the Walnut Street Jail and was recorded as the first use of imprisonment through solitary confinement. The basic principles of the new system were to reform those in prison, and to segregate those according to age, sex, and type of offenses charged against them (Schoenherr). The second prison was called Sing-Sing a...
The basket was used to catch the falling heads. In the early revolution Richard Clark said that originally a wicker basket lined with an oil cloth had been used to catch the head. Later on a metal bucket was used to prevent the blood from flowing through the streets. Since they guillotined so any people the bucket became a necessity to have. Along with this it helped to prevent the smell of death in the streets.