The ingenuity of the human race to devise new ways to inflict pain upon others is something that seems to know no limits. I must admit that I had a hard time narrowing this list down to just 10 devices and methods of torture and execution.
These devices and methods represent the focused effort and creativy to human cruelty. Most of us are so lucky to have been spared the full wrath of human savagery in our lives. But I am about to show you just a glimpse of what can happen, and what has happened when that dark side of humanity is unleashed. As the milgram experiment has shown, under the correct cirumstances most people can be made to actively torture other people. So there is at least a little bit of evil in most of us.
10: INTESTINAL CRANK
Here is a relatively unknown device, the intestinal crank. While they were alive, a cut was made in the victims abdominal area and the small intestine was sliced while a hook attached to a rope was strung around a crankshaft. Someone would turn the crank and the hook pulled the intestine out of the body and wound it around a pole. Remember, the victim was alive and watching this.
The small intestine is 20ft long, and the large one is 5ft – I wonder if anyone stayed conscious long enough to see the entire length spun out of their body. No one ever survived the crank.
9: PEAR OF ANGUISH
This device was initially created to be applied to just the vagina, but it didn’t take long until people figured out that it works just as well on the holes of any sex. It had four leaves that would extend as the torturer twisted the interior screw. After it was inserted into the orifice (vagina, anus, or mouth), the unfortunate victim would have this thing expanded inside their body until the pressure became too much and their flesh was ruptured. It was designed with sharp pointed tips to help itself rip into the cervix/intestines/throat.
After all this interior ripping was complete the victim would be in incredible pain, but the pear wasn’t intended to be a direct means of death. It was intended to force a confession. But that didn’t mean that it didn’t cause many deaths as it was bound to take many hours, or days to succumb to the wounds.
8: IRON CHAIR
A common device of the times, some version of a torture device like this can be found nearly all over the globe in history. They were completely covered in somewhere between 500 to 1500 spikes, none long enough to puncture any vital organs. The person would be strapped into this thing and then the restraints would be twisted ever tighter. When the spikes penetrated the body, they had a tendency to seal the wound and minimize the loss of blood – allowing the torture to go on for very long lengths of time. To increase the effect, sometimes the torturer would light a fire underneath or drop heavy weights upon the victim, just to change things up a bit.
If the person was ever released from the chair alive, as soon as they were let up all those punctures of the body would spurt streams of blood and they would soon be dead.
7: BRAZEN BULL
This one dates all the way back to ancient Greece. The story goes that Perillos of Athens, looking to get some big money, dreamt up and built this thing for the tyrant Phalaris (said to be a cannibal and had eaten suckling babies). It appeared to be a statue and it was the size was the same as a real life bull, but made of bronze and hollow. There was a locking hatch that the victim was forced into, and a fire would be lit beneath the belly. The person would slowly roast alive as the metal and air inside was heated up. As a creative bonus, Perillos invented a special acoustic design inside that turned the victims screams into the exact sound a bull bellows – much to the amusement of the crowds.
To test that it worked, the tyrant made Perillos the first victim of it. But don’t worry, Phalaris was eventually overthrown and put in the bull himself.
6: THE WHEEL
Victims of this method were placed on a spoked wheel and their limbs were hit with an iron bar, repeatedly. Then the suitably mashed up appendages were twisted around the spokes like a spaghetti noodle. Tied to that position, they would be left exposed to the elements or animals to die. A death that could be many, many hours or days away. If the executioner was kind enough though, at some point a blow of mercy would be applied to their skull or chest.
5: RATS
Sometimes it doesn’t have to be so complicated. Starve some rats, strap down your victim and slice open his stomach, then place the rats in an box with the opening facing the wound. If the rats need any more encouragement, heat the box. The rats can squirm into the body cavity and chew on the intestines and other bits inside, this allows the victim to feel the writhing vermin eating them alive.
It doesn’t have to be the stomach, place a cage of hungry rats around a victim’s head and watch them eat the soft bits like the eyeballs, nose, cheeks, and ears. The novel American Psycho had a version of this too. In that book the main character kidnaps a woman and shoves a rat into her vagina, staples it shut and watches the rat eat her from the inside out.
4: THE RACK
A favorite method employed by the Spanish Inquisition, the rack was said to be the worst of all. The victim would have each hand and foot tied or chained to long rollers on each side. When the rollers were turned the restraints were tightened, pulling on the limbs. Dislocations would cause loud cracks and pop as the cartilage and ligaments were stretched. If the rollers were continued to be turned, eventually the limbs would be ripped from the torso. The pain of having your ligaments and spine pulled apart is said to be excruciating. It lives on in our definition of the word ‘rack’: to cause extreme physical or mental pain to; subject to extreme stress.
The French ‘improved’ the effect of the rack by adding spikes to the center of the machine and it is known that many Knight Templars were killed using this method during their 1307 arrest and torture by order of the French King Philip. The number of Templar limbs removed from the dungeons was said to be in the hundreds.
3: JUDAS CRADLE
Another favorite of the Inquisition, this pedestal culminated in a pyramid point for piercing of the anus or vagina of some poor soul. The victim would be lifted above this thing by use of ropes and have the chosen hole impaled by the point. Then the torturer could slowly lower the body onto it, allowing deeper penetration. Or if they wanted they could quickly raise and lower the victim so that they repeatedly fall on the tip, pounding the vagina/scrotum/taint/anus. Often the victim would be positioned with the point inside them and then have weights attached to their feet and left like that overnight.
To help get the whole thing started, olive oil would sometimes be spread on the device as a lube – how thoughtful. I doubt these things were ever cleaned between uses, so even if the victim survived an infection would be likely.
2: HEAD CRUSHER
In this method the victim’s head was placed underneath a metal cap and their jaw rested on a lower metal bar. The cap was connected to a screw, which the torturer would twist to tighten the cap down crushing the head. Medieval descriptions of this device stated the process in which the victim suffered. The first thing that would happen would be the jaw would dislocate and either be pushed outward from the face, or would be cracked and shattered. Then the eyes would usually extend from their sockets and be squeezed out, or the eyes would stay in and be crushed like a grape. Eventually the ever increasing pressure would crack the skull and everything inside, like blood and brain, would burst out.
Some even were said to have optional eye catching cups, ya know, to keep it civilized in here. I can just imagine some Duke sitting on the privy with a medieval Sears catalog thinking about whether or not they should splurge on that option.
"I should treat myself, but I said I would take the kids on the Crusades in the Spring. And they haven't tried to have me killed recently. So I really should be saving up for that."
This is one of those things that I hope the torturer didn’t stop halfway through and go home, leaving the victim with a shattered jaw and crushed eyes waiting overnight.
1: SAWING
So simple and so gruesome. You can find examples of this method throughout the known world. I find the version of hanging a person by their feet and sawing from taint to torso the most gruesome of all. By being upside down it ensured that the brain received blood flow until the end. Sometimes the sawing would be stopped just after the buttocks at the base of the torso, ensuring that the victim could suffer longer.
I can't even imagine having that happen to me.