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A thread inspired by Lobotomist - I must give him the credit!
Brazen Bull
The Brazen Bull was a hollow brass statue crafted to resemble a real bull. Victims were placed inside, usually with their tongues cut out first. The door was shut, sealing them in. Fires would then be lit around the bull. As the victim succumbed to the searing heat inside, he would thrash about and scream in agony. The movements and sounds, muted by the bull's mass, made the apparatus appear alive, the sounds inside like those of a real bull. This effect created additional amusement for the audience, and served the added benefit of distancing them from the brutality of the torture, since they couldn't directly see the victim.
Thumbscrews
Thumbscrews represent a very insidious form of torture. You weren't likely to die from their use, but they created unendurable agony. The device consisted of three upright metal bars, between which the thumbs were placed. A wooden bar slid down along the metal bars, pressing the thumbs against the bottom. A screw pressed the wood bar downward, crushing the thumbs painfully. The thumbscrews were an elaboration of an earlier device known as the pilliwinks, which could crush all 10 fingers and resembled a nutcracker.
The Rack
The rack was used throughout Europe for centuries. It came in many forms, but here's the basic idea: The victim is tied down while some mechanical device, usually a crank or turning wheel, tightens the ropes, stretching the victim's body until the joints are dislocated. Continued pressure could cause the limbs to be torn right off. Such torture was known as being "broken on the rack," "racked," or "stretched on the rack." It could be combined with other forms of torture to make things even more painful. In one story, a Christian youth was tied to a wheel and his joints destroyed by the stretching. A fire was lit beneath the wheel, adding to the torture. Eventually, the fire was extinguished by the downpour of blood as the victim's limbs were torn free.
The Wheel
Wheels were adapted to many torturous uses. They could be part of a stretching rack, but medieval torturers were far too creative to leave it at that. Early torturers were fond of tying someone to a large wooden wheel, then pushing it down a rocky hillside. A more elaborate method involved a wheel mounted to an A-frame that allowed it to swing freely. The victim would be tied to the wheel, and then swung across some undesirable thing below -- fire was always a good choice, but dragging the victim's flesh across metal spikes also worked well. The wheel itself could also have spikes mounted on it, so the pain came from all directions. Instead of swinging, the wheel might turn on an axle. The difference was likely immaterial to the victims.
One of the most horrible wheel tortures was akin to crucifixion. The victim would have the bones in all four limbs broken in two places by strikes from an iron bar. Then, the shattered limbs were threaded through the spokes of a large wheel. Finally, the wheel would be attached to the top of a tall wooden pole and left out in the sun for days. The victim might be alive for hours, enduring the agony of his or her mangled arms and legs and the relentless sun, not to mention the attentions of crows.
The Pillory
The pillory remained in use even later than the stake. A pillory is a set of two parallel wooden boards clasped together, with holes for the neck and wrists. When opened, the victim places his or her head and arms through the holes. Then the pillory is closed, and the victim can't possibly escape.
The pillory itself does no harm to the victim, though it's certainly not comfortable. The entire apparatus was usually placed on a stage in a public place -- the entire point was to humiliate and shame the victim for his or her crimes. The crowd would throw objects at the victim, such as rotten vegetables, dead animals or feces. Stones and other blunt objects were thrown as well, which could result in painful injuries or death.
While a spell in the pillory often only lasted an hour or two, usually during the busiest times of day, its effect really depended on the nature of the crime and the mood of the crowd. Four English men who had falsely accused others of crimes to get the reward (sending innocents to the hangman's noose) were beaten to death by the crowd. Others who won the crowd's favor by refusing to pay unjust taxes or mocking government officials were showered with flowers or rescued from the pillory outright [source: Kellaway]. For lesser crimes, the victim might instead be placed in stocks, leg irons that restrained the ankles. While the goal of public humiliation was the same, the stocks allowed victims to protect themselves from thrown objects.
Sometimes, the vengeful crowd was the least of the victim's concerns. The pillory could be accompanied by other punishments, such as flogging or mutilation. British authorities favored branding the face with a mark of shame, such cutting off one or both ears, or slicing the nose lengthwise.
Iron Maiden
The Iron Maiden is a device so fiendish it was once thought to be fictional. It's an upright sarcophagus with spikes on the inner surfaces. Double doors open on the front, allowing entrance for the victim. In one example, eight spikes protruded from one door, 13 from the other. Once the victim was inside, the doors were closed. There, the strategically placed spikes would pierce several vital organs. However, they were relatively short spikes, so the wounds wouldn't be instantly fatal. Instead, the victim would linger and bleed to death over several hours [source: Kellaway]. To add to the abject horror of it all, two spikes were positioned specifically to penetrate the eyes.
The Scavenger's Daughter
The Scavenger's Daughter was invented by, and named after, a Brit named Skevington. It is alternately referred to as Skeffington's gyves. The apparatus consists of a hoop of iron with a hinge in the middle. The victim was forced to crouch on one half of the hoop while the other half was pivoted and placed over his back. (Imagine being placed into a giant set of iron dentures.) The torturer would use a screw to tighten the hinge, crushing the victim further and further into his involuntary crouch. Eventually, ribs and breastbone would crack and the spine could be dislocated. Sometimes the compression was so great that blood would gush from the fingertips and face.
Breast Ripper
This item was used both as a punitive and an interrogational device. Punitively, it was used red-hot to mark the breast of unmarried mothers. In an inquisitory nature it was used on condemned women – convicted of heresy, blasphemy, adultery, self-induced abortion, erotic white magic and any other crime that the inquisitors selected. The claws were used, either cold or heated, on a female’s exposed breasts – rendering them into bloody pulps. A variation was called the Spider. This consisted of clawed bars which protruded from the wall. A woman was pulled alongside the bars until her breasts were torn away.
The Pear of Anguish
These instruments were used in oral and rectal formats, and in the larger vaginal one. They are forced into the mouth, rectum or vagina of the victim and there expanded by force of the screw to the maximum aperture of the segments. The inside of the cavity in question is irremediably mutilated, nearly always fatally so. The pointed prongs at the end of the segments serve better to rip into the throat, the intestines or the cervix. The oral pear was often inflicted on heretical preachers, but also on lay persons guilty of unorthodox tendencies; the rectal pear awaited passive male homosexuals, and the vaginal one women guilty of sexual union with Satan or his familiars.
Head Crusher
With the head placed under the upper cap and the chin placed above the bottom bar, the top screw of this awful device was slowly turned, compressing the skull tightly. First the teeth are destroyed, shattering and splintering into the jaw. Then the eyes are squeezed from the sockets – some versions had special receptacles to catch them. Lastly, the skull fractures and the contents of the head are forced out. In earlier stages, the torturer could keep the head firmly clamped and strike the metal skull cap periodically; each blow echoing pain throughout the victim’s body.
Cat's Paw
The Cat’s Paw (or Spanish Tickler) was oftentimes attached to a handle; in size and appearance it was an extension of the torturer’s hand. In this way it was used to rip and tear flesh away from the bone, from any part of the body.
Knee Splitter
A popular torture device during the Inquisition, the knee splitter does what it says: split victims’ knees and render them useless. Built from two spiked wood blocks, the knee splitter is placed on top of and behind the knee of its victims. Two large screws connecting the blocks are then turned, causing the two blocks to close towards each other and effectively destroy a victim’s knee. This device could also be used to inflict damage on other parts of the body such as the arms.
The Judas Chair
This procedure has remained essentially unchanged from the Middle Ages until today. The victim is hoisted up and lowered onto the point of the pyramid in such a way that his weight rests on the point positioned in the anus, in the vagina, under the scrotum or under the coccyx (the last two or three vertebrae). The executioner, according to the pleasure of the interrogators, can vary the pressure from zero to that of total body weight. The victim can be rocked, or made to fall repeatedly onto the point. The Judas cradle was thus called also in Italian (culla di Giuda) and German (Judaswiege), but in French it was known as la veille, “the wake” or “nightwatch”. Nowadays this method enjoys the favour of not a few governments in Latin America and elsewhere, with and without improvements like electrified waist rings and pyramid points.
Spanish Donkey
The Spanish Donkey was a device which consisted of a main board cut with a wedge at the top fastened to two cross-beams. The naked victim was placed astride the main board as if riding a donkey, and various numbers of weights were attached to his or her feet. The agony could be ‘fine-tuned’ by using lighter or heavier weights. Sources relate that on occasion, the wedge would slice entirely through the victim as a result of the immense weight attached to his or her feet.
Lead Sprinkler
The lead sprinkler was essentially a ladle on the end of a handle. The top half of the sphere could be removed and the lower half was filled with molten metal, boiling oil, boiling water, pitch or tar. The perforated top half was then re-attached. Shaking or flicking the sprinkler towards the victim showered him or her with the boiling contents of the ladle. The victim had, of course, been pinioned in advance.
Crocodile Shears
The crocodile shears was an instrument of torture used in late medieval Europe and typically reserved for regicides – those who attempted (and, perhaps, succeeded) to assassinate the king. The shears were made of iron and were based upon the concept of pincers, but—instead of standard jaws or blades, crocodile shears ended in a pair of hemicylindrical blades that, when closed together, formed a long, narrow tube. The insides of the blades were generously lined with teeth or spikes. After being heated red-hot, the crocodile shears were applied to the erect penis, which—once exposed to sufficient tension—was torn from the prisoner’s body; or at the very least leading to severe arterial bleeding.
Garotte
This was used last in 1975!
This sort of torture was used all over the world. The Spanish version was used for execution. It had an iron collar that had an iron on its rear which penetrated the cervical vertebrae in a way that the convict died both for asphyxiation and because the spinal cord was crushed. Its kinda odd when death by hanging begins to look like a good option.
The Fork
This “fork” was made of two little forks, one set against the other and of which the points rammed into the flesh under the chin and over the chest.
A little collar supported the instrument to prevent any movement of the victim. The forks did not penetrate into vital points, so you did not die for quite some time, it was meant to prolong the torture and the suffering.
The victim’s hands were tied behind his back, he suffered that way up ’till he finally died.
The Branks
The Branks The Branks, also sometimes called Dame’s Bridle, or Scold’s Bridle comprised of a metal facial mask and spiked mouth depressor that was implemented on housewives up until the early 19th century. Many clergymen sustained in this husband’s right to handle his wife, and to use “salutary restraints in every case of misbehavior” without the intervention of what some court records of 1824 referred to as “vexatious prosecutions.” Generally, a husband would need only to accuse his wife of disagreeing with his decisions, at which the Branks could be applied. The subject would then be paraded through the streets, or chained to the market cross where she was exposed to public ridicule.
Strappado
One of the most common torture techniques. All one needed to set up a strappado was a sturdy rafter and a rope. The victim’s wrists were bound behind their back, and the rope would be tossed over the beam. The victim was repeatedly dropped from a height, so that their arms and shoulders would dislocate. This was a punishment of the Secret Tribunal until 1820.
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