They may have worn nice red uniforms, but the Inquisitors of medieval Spain were not an amusing lot. Having railed slightly against the trend for revising history in my earlier “Bloody Eagle” article, I’m now going to redress the balance and offer a few documented facts why Tomas de Torquemada’s notorious gang of rampaging heretic-bashers ought not to be coloured quite so red…however, the origins of the institution are very dark indeed, and this is in no way an apology for what was in some ways a blueprint for the origins of latter-day atrocities.

For centuries following the Crusades, Spain had become one of the more racially-tolerant and civilised nations in Europe. The Moorish Arab influence in the South granted the Alhambra, and Jews mixed freely with the indiginous Catholic population enjoying the benefits brought by occuptaions such as jewellery merchants, doctors and lawyers. However, Good King Ferdinand and Isabella came along and when they weren’t paying Christopher Columbus to “fail to discover” India, they decided that this cultural melting pot was far from being a Good Thing for their Good Catholic subjects.

Growing religious intolerance led to forced conversion of thousands of Muslims and Jews, creating new sub-cultures thus: Moriscos, who were ex-Muslims, and Conversos, who were ex-Jews, but now ostensibly practicing Catholics. But this wasn’t enough for Ferdinand, who decided to believe that these erstwhile heathens could not possibly be true to the True Faith, and were continuing to practice their loathsome pagan rites in secret, undermining both Church and State.

So a body was set up to weed out these subversive pseuds, who could only be working for a religious revolution from the inside. The myth of a Grand Jewish Conspiracy to overthrow Christendom was enthusiastically spread from the late 1400s, a myth which later begat the nauseating forgery “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” in the 19th Century, and helps to show that the seeds of 20th-Century genocide were sown centuries before (incidentally, without the finance of Jewish conversos, Columbus’ first trip in 1492 would never have happened).

Thus, the Spanish Inquisition was born, from social unrest and chronic paranoia - to persecute Jews and Muslims. Its remit was soon extended, however, to include heretics, and this is what the Inquisition is most notorious for, since the nature of religious persecution is, at best, a thorny one.

Fear certainly became the Inquisition’s main weapon. A culture of paranoia was created, with neighbours and even families torn by doubt, terror and insecurity. Fathers lived in fear of their children, siblings betrayed one another to the authorities, and scores between relations, former friends and neighbours were soon settled by running to the offices of the Inquisition with a fanciful charge of heresy on one’s lips. False witness was found to be one of the most common complaints across many of the regional offices of the Inquisition. One was never formally charged with a specific crime. The accused was removed to an Inquisitorial gaol, and told to confess. If you were innocent, you were in for a hard time of it - to what, exactly, should I confess? The fact that I don’t like to eat pork, or that I dared to wash my linen on a Sunday?

Under the guidelines of the Holy Inquisition torture alone was never often used to elicit a final confession - the accused was usually granted twenty-four hours to recover, and then interrogated again, without torture, to confirm the statement. Confessions could also be obtained from leaving the accused in conspectu tormentorum - which involved simply holding the individual in a cell overnight in the company of the proposed torture instruments, presumably granting plenty of nightmares (assuming sleep came at all) and much reflection upon the forthcoming day’s events. Physical torture was usually a last resort (but that was little comfort in itself if, in the final verdict, you were found guilty and sentenced to a public humiliation followed by burning at the stake).

Torture was most vigorously applied to cases of suspected “Judaizing” (practicing the Jewish faith in secret), or just as heinous, Protestantism. One doctor from Seville, in 1702, submitted a claim for expenses for his presence at “434 sessions of torture”.

In practice, both male and female prisoners were stripped of clothing before being subjected to one of the three main forms of bloodless and non-fatal procedures stipulated by Church law, as follows:

i) the Garrucha, in which the accused was hung by the wrists from a pulley in the ceiling, with weights attached to the feet or ankles (some illustrations depict the weights attached to the toes, and the ropes binding the thumbs). The prisoner was raised slowly upward, then dropped sharply toward the floor again. Dislocation of joints was the usual result;

ii) the Toca, in which the accused was bound to a rack and a linen cloth stuffed down his throat. Water was then poured into the forcibly-opened mouth, slowly, from a number of jars;

iii) and the Potro, which became the staple for the Inquisition after the 1500s, involved being bound around the body by cords or garottes which were then tightened by the torturer. By twisting the ends of the cords, they bit tighter into the flesh of the accused, the number of turns therefore increasing the severity. The actual words of prisoners subjected to the potro, as recorded by secretaries present at the scene, make for disturbing and graphic reading: “…Senores, for God’s sake have mercy on me…take these things from my arms - Senor, release me, they are killing me!…do you not see how these people are killing me? I did it - for God’s sake let me go!” And in that instance, all because she didn’t eat pork, and changed her linen on a Sunday.

No set limit was imposed on grounds of sex, age, or health, with cases reported of female victims aged between 70 and 90 as having been subjected to the potro, and in Valencia in 1607, it is recorded that a thirteen-year old female was also tortured.

Not all torture was physical. Prison life was harsh in the extreme (though seemingly much improved over secular gaols of the time - reports exist of common prisoners confessing to heretical charges in order to be transferred to the “relative luxury” of an Inquisitorial gaol!). Given that most Inquisitorial prisons for common people involved stale bread, lack of water and daylight, the presence of rats, fleas, and being deprived of clothing, one can only imagine the state of their secular counterparts.

Imprisonment was not intended as a punishment, though given the above nuisances and the fact that a prisoner could remain there for years pending their trial, meant that they often became so. Insanity and suicide became regular occurrences, as did death by fever and plague. Whole families could be cast into prison together, as in the case of a 40-year old seamstress and her four sons, two of whom died after six months in a Valladolid prison. Prisoners sometimes died in gaol before their trials even began, in which case they were often tried in absentia and then burned in effigy.

The Inquisition also ran the best witness protection scheme ever seen. After being accused, a prisoner was presented with all the evidence that had been compiled against him, except that, following the instructions of Valdés in 1561, “any evidence liable to betray a witness could be omitted”. The accused was not made aware of who was bringing the charges and was unable to access the full facts of the case, unlike his Inquisitors, and sometimes was recorded as having argued his innocence on what he believed to be the accusation, when in truth the actual case consisted of another incident entirely.

The real horror of the Inquisition is not just the living bodies which were broken and burned over the centuries, but the many more innocent individuals who lived their lives in fear and in isolation; who were fingered by jealous neighbours or wrathful family members out of spite, who watched their children taken away from them, their hard-earned riches sold to pay for their time in prison (sometimes as much as five or ten years, depending when the trial finally came to pass) and who died in misery and penury for no reason. For “heresy”, we would now substitute “the right to freedom of speech”. A classic sketch by Goya, “For Opening His Mouth in Dissent”, shows a penitent hunched miserably in a dark gloomy cell, chained and bound beneath a barred window, a depiction of human misery as complete as it can be.

Post Script: In the Year of Our Lord 1994, the Vatican finally publicly denounced the workings of the Holy Office as having violated Human Rights. Better late than never, I guess.

Principle reference: “The Spanish Inquisition: An Historical Revision” Henry Kamen, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1997.

Dentures may not strike the reader as something so horrific as to be included in “History Horrors,” and I agree it’s nothing like murder or war crimes, but losing one’s teeth is a small horror.

While we’re young we often take our teeth for granted, we even experience losing them one by one which can turn into the ceremonial event whereby one ties a string to the tooth and then to a door. It’s all morbid fun because we know we have replacements growing in. Unfortunately when we grow old and our teeth begin to fall out again, it’s permanent.

That loss has prompted mankind to find some way of re-enabling the elderly to be able to chew again. And tooth loss didn’t mean age 70 back when dental care was a rag you wiped your chompers with. People started losing teeth as early as their twenties due to cavities. Without modern tools, Dentists couldn’t fill the holes, they simply pulled the offending tooth.

Replacement teeth came in various forms: “In the past, false teeth have been made out of ivory, bone, porcelain, and, conveniently enough, actual human teeth, dating from as early as Etruscan civilizations of modern-day Italy in the pre-Roman period around 700 B.C. and on.” This is from Suite101.com.

“Actual human teeth” came from the battlefields. Whenever the dead were lying on the ground and the smoke had cleared, soldiers or scavenging locals would go from body to body to stick their fingers in the mouths of the fallen. If someone with their brains blown out or their intestines spilled on the grass had a nice smile it was time to pull out the pliers.

The only problem with receiving dentures from the dead is that you might get an existing condition, like tooth rot–now that can’t taste good.  The other problem with dentures in general, as noted by Suite101.com, is that the body doesn’t recognize them as teeth. It’s wanting to digest them. Therefore the saliva keeps dripping as if you were trying to eat something.

I wonder if there ever has been an incident where a man was killed for his nice teeth? It may be unwritten, but I bet there were more than a few murders related to dentures.

Read more: “A History of Dentures: The Ancient Origins of Dental Hardware | Suite101.com” - http://ancienthistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/a_history_of_dentures#ixzz0H6LVmNOi&A

 

Another contribution to our morbid collection from author Chaz Wood.

Come in, children. Come in, it’s always lovely to see so many happy, smiling faces.

That’s all about to change as we take a quick tour among some of the most heinous and barbaric instruments of unpleasantness ever devised by our devious-minded ancestors. Ah, you may think this will be funny, cool or even just a bit spooky, eh…but wait until you come face to face with these sadistic gadgets.

Our First Lady of the Exhibition is our very own Virgin of Nuremberg, otherwise popularly known by the name taken by the world’s most famous heavy metal band, the “Iron Maiden”.

Contrary to popular belief this device wasn’t intended to execute the condemned (although death could easily follow before very long due to combined trauma and blood loss). The upright sarcophagus was carved in wood, with the face of a ‘maiden’ roughly corresponding to the position of the victim’s head when placed inside. The very thick outer shell would deaden screams when closed.

The doors in front and back bore metal spikes, aimed at non-vital organs, which would transfix the body repeatedly as the doors were opened and closed upon the inhabitant. (Think of that scene in the movie Saw IV where the middle-aged couple are impaled together by metal spikes - her wounds are cunningly placed in non-fatal areas, but designed to cause excruciating agony when removed…oh, you thought that was “Boring”, did you? Well perhaps you’d like to try her out for size…?)

Moving onwards, children…don’t touch the exhibits, little boy, you don’t want to think about where this one has been. A decidedly non-sexist device, known as the ‘pear’, due to its basic shape.

Consider a metal pear, halved lengthways and with a spike or probe attached to the bottom. A screw mechanism opened the two halves gradually apart, the spikes creating extra discomfort as the device was designed to be forced into the rectum or vagina.

Women guilty of adultery would be unlikely to re-offend after a session with this barbaric device, likewise those believed to be sodomizers, or witches guilty of sexual relations with the Devil. As such, its use was also inflicted upon heretics and blasphemers, in which instances it was more commonly inserted in the mouth.

Monty Python’s Spanish Inquisition had the ‘Comfy Chair’, but the reality of Inquisitorial furniture was less amusing for those condemned to an uncomfortable seat. Common characteristics included spikes protruding from the back, on the arm-rests, on the seat (of course) and on the feet rests and leg rests.

To prevent wriggling, one would be bound tight in the chair with rope or cord, or in more elaborate variations, by metal bars attached to screws to maximize the penetrating power of the spikes and immobilize the sitter.

As if that wasn’t enough, the iron version of the Un-Comfy Chair could be heated by a brazier placed beneath. The chair was a popular method of torture across Europe until the late 1700s. The Museo di Criminologia Medioevale in San Gimignano, Siena, Spain, hosts a chair whose entire surface is covered in iron spikes, and bears a screw-driven wooden bar to pierce and lacerate the backs of the legs by means of two very large wing-nuts. Pleasant, isn’t it?

The Spanish Tickler or Cat’s Paw - despite its lewd-sounding name, is one of those instruments that’s so simple, it’s barbaric.

Resembling rather a two or three-pronged garden fork designed for pulling up the weeds from between your garden slabs, this was used on the naked flesh of individuals condemned either to death, or brutal torture at the hands of secular institutions. The long, pointed iron claws tore and shredded flesh and muscle alike.

One characteristic of the more extreme and bloody tortures is that they were usually inflicted upon persons bound head-down, to allow a continued flow of blood to the brain during the ordeal, and hence prolong the suffering (and the entertainment of the spectators, one supposes, if the spectacle were to be public). In addition, the accused at public executions were usually very well-fed beforehand to ensure their ability to stay conscious for longer amounts of time during the final indignity.

Now, be quiet at the back. For speaking out of turn in days of old, you may find yourself clapped into the iron Mask of Infamy.

Like Leonardo diCaprio in The Man in the Iron Mask, but much worse. In some ways, this was as cruel a device as any. The wrongdoer first having been presented to public ridicule (either in the stocks - which locked the ankles in place - or the pillory, which locked the head and hands) - the mask was placed on the head to increase the suffering and show the community what one had been guilty of.

Iron prongs, gags, balls and other devices often existed inside the mask to stifle the wearer’s speech, breathing, or to hold the tongue in place - a common treatment for women who nagged. Ridiculous or demonic appendages and features were often a part of the mask, symbolizing what the individual was believed to be guilty of. (On a side note, the pillory was often far crueller than often depicted, as the height of the device could be adjusted to force the accused to stand on tiptoes for the duration of the humiliation - often a day, or even longer - while being pelted, stoned and generally abused by the passing populace.

I have also heard of cases when the hands were pinned through the palms to the wood of the pillory, and once the punishment was over and the head and wrists unlocked, it was the guilty party’s job to remove their own hands…suddenly I’m reminded of the crucifixion scene at the feast in The Sword and the Sorceror.)

So, children, I hoped you enjoyed your tour of our little museum. Go home now and consider what your ancestors once had to put up with in the name of justice and retribution, and consider it deeply before you next think consider complaining about your hateful, dire, life and all the pain you’re forced to put up with from your teachers and parents…

Ref: “tortura Inquisizione Pena di Morte”, Dr Aldo Migliorini, Lalli Editore.

Dr. J Marion Sims is considered to be the Father of Modern Gynecology. As with all Fathers, you look up to them until you find all of their dirty secrets. Dr. J was a man of his times. I don’t think he meant to be intentionally cruel, he just didn’t know any better and in the name of medical science proceeded forth into unknown territory.

That territory was the vagina. In the mid to late 1800s the vagina was still a mystery–not just to men, but to women as well. Because it involved sexual guilt, studying it became a moral question and not a medical question. After all, if you say, “I’m off to work to look at pussy two inches from my eyeball,” your wife and the neighbors are going to think you’re a pervert on your way to hell. Forget that without gynecological help, numerous women suffered and even died.

At the time it was only acceptable to palpate a vagina, which basically means to do an examination of the size, firmness, or location to determine if something may be wrong. From there, where do you go? Most doctors at the time did not know. They could tell a woman something was wrong with her plumbing, but not how to fix it. What good is that?

Since African slaves brought to America were considered sub-human and looking at their equipment was not the same as revealing a white woman’s area, Dr. J Marion Sims began to experiment with them to learn his craft. While it is admirable that the man found a way around the moral system, it also meant that he did not treat these black women like real patients. And when you’re dealing with the vagina, the last thing you want is a doctor who is sticking his fingers in and is not concerned if he tears something or causes bleeding. 

I’ve always found it fascinating after seeing the series “Roots” on TV when I was a kid that we still consider white women’s bodies to be more valuable than black women’s. It’s fine to see black boobs on TV or on a coffee table magazine like National Geographic, but once a white woman exposes herself everyone gets upset. The standard of beauty has been set so that we think arousal only occurs with white skin and black skin is more like seeing a naked animal–you tolerate it because a dog is a dog and you can’t dress them up. It’s really quite offensive if you stop to think about it.

Fortunately, I do believe that attitude has changed as more interracial dating has become normal and black celebrities have emerged as power players that make taking off their clothes worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

According to this article found on the web, black women were required to be on all fours on Dr. Sims’ examining table–again, another animal-like insult–as he poked and  prodded them with a shoe horn. If they had resulting pain, he gave them drugs which could lead to addiction. He operated without the aid of anesthesia even though it was available at the time. This could be due to expense or because much like we treat animals, they assumed black women felt less pain than “humans” or even no pain at all. I’m not sure why we think that way when pain evolved for almost every species as a way to let the creature know their body was in trouble and needed to be attended to.

Slaves were not allowed to read or write.  There isn’t much evidence left behind to show us the extent of Dr. Sims gynecological horrors. Was he on the same level with the Nazi Doctor Mengele or was he an ignorant pioneer who if enlightened that black women weren’t lab animals would have mended his ways? Without ethical constraints, I think an individual can go too far in their efforts to discover scientific truths we need, leaving a wake of destroyed bodies and destroyed lives. Gynecology may have Sims to thank, but the victims aren’t clapping.

One of his known victims, amongst the faceless, was a slave named Anarcha. It is said that she underwent 34 experimental operations at the hands of Dr. Sims. I think most slaves would have rather taken the occasional whipping and working in the cotton fields to that kind of treatment. Degradation, the pain of the vaginal exploration at the cold hands of a gynecologist who didn’t know what he was doing, and an America that didn’t give a damn unless a white woman was involved–surely that must have been a thoroughly depressing life to live without no signs of hope.

I know we’ve covered some pretty awful torture methods on History Horrors, but this one…I’m getting chills and my anus is tightening up.

Take a close look at the picture, give it a moment…

That’s a chair. That thing is meant for people to sit on. It’s called a Judas Chair because obviously whoever earned the right to take that seat must have betrayed the government or God (God and government are often the same thing in history).

The Judas Chair, which is also called The Judas Cradle, is said to have been used by The Spanish Inquisition. This, however, is in dispute by historians who say The Spanish Inquisition would never use such a device because it would be considered a “sexual deviancy” and it would break the skin (one of their restrictions in torturing). Seeing as how The Spanish Inquisition hardly represents true morality and leaned towards corruption and hypocrisy, other historians maintain that just maybe some of the Spanish hierarchy got off on inventing such malevolent ways of “purging sin” and gaining a confession.

Now if you haven’t guessed what happens to the victim of the Judas Chair, let me enlighten you. You sit on it. Not in your clothes, in the nude. As it is shaped like a pyramid, where do you think that will lead to as you slip slowly down and…yep, straight up into the buttocks to find the hole. Over several hours the weight of your body would increase the size of your once small orifice and eventually it would begin to rip.

If the Spanish weren’t responsible, then who?

It is possible the device was not used specifically to aim for the anus, or in some cases the vagina? The victim may have been strapped to ropes that once lowered could cause pain in several different areas of the body such as the buttocks, lower or upper spine or flip the victim over and pain could be inflicted on the chest or stomach. Certainly that may have been one way the chair was used but why go to so much trouble to torture other areas of the body using such an inconvenient torture device. The chair, by all appearances, seems to be shaped perfectly for torturing someone who is force to sit on it.

We’ll let the historians battle it out. Maybe someone from the past is having a laugh at us and designed the thing as a hoax. Knowing how horrific history can be though, I would bet The Judas Chair split at least a handful of assholes in its day.

For the ears, I was told a story by a co-worker one time of another employee’s brother who fought in Vietnam–and loved it. He went back voluntarily. This co-worker told me this Vietnam war hero was such a “bad ass” that he would kill as many “gooks” as he could and cut off their ears. After which, he strung up the ears and displayed them to show how many lives he had taken.

I never got to see the photograph, but there was supposed to be a picture of him holding the line of ears next to a pile of dead bodies and him with a smile on his face.

If you think hair, teeth and ears are pretty nasty items to keep as souvenirs, how about someone’s “willy”?

In the East, the victors of hard fought battles would slice off their dead enemy’s privates and keep them to claim their power and have control of their women. I’m not sure how they displayed them? Hung a pair of balls off their belt as a decoration?

Here’s a Bible story for Sunday School. Remember King David? Remember the story where he slaughtered enough Philistines to cut off 100 foreskins to bring as a tribute to King Saul? This was before David had actually become King.

The story is found in the book of Samuel. King Saul was jealous of David’s talents and that God favored him so this incident was one of his attempts to get the poor boy killed in battle. David wanted to wed Saul’s daughter Michal so he set the price of her beauty at 100 foreskins.

There does seem to be some debate as to whether it was 100 foreskins or 200.  Does it really matter? Any number of foreskins isn’t exactly a compliment when it comes to a girl being bought.

I would like to see this particular story told in an upcoming film for the religious holidays. The special effects crew can spend hours replicating the ends of penises with latex. 

I’m sure the story has spirtual value somehow, otherwise why would it be in The Bible? I know when I hear it I miss my foreskin…and I didn’t even get to spend it on a female.

There’s been a long and serious tradition as of late to “revise” history for modern readers.

Usually, this means providing evidence (of varying strength) that certain individuals, tribes or organizations were nowhere near as brutal as the legends and popular myths have painted them. Thus the Spanish Inquisition burned thousands of people at the stake, but actually many were only done so in effigy, or in absentia; Elizabeth Báthory didn’t murder anything like 600 maidens nor bathe in their blood, and child rapist/mass murderer/sadist Gilles de Rais was framed in complicated power struggles over land, fortune and influence.

Inevitably, this trend of humanizing and de-mystifying the pariahs of the past  would be applied to that eternal tribe of proto-Hell’s Angels and everyone’s favourite bad boys, the Vikings. So, were they not truly cultured poets, mariners, traders and lawmen after all, who only occasionally indulged in a spot of recreational rape (and furthermore, pillage) ? Well, yes, they were all that and more, though they were not without their truly eye-watering pastimes when it came to matters of vengeance and victory. One of which, the notorious Bloodeagle (or rista blóthrn, in the rugged Old Norse tongue), consists of the following procedure:

a living victim was bound over a stone and executed by means of splitting the ribs from the spine with a blade, breaking them and folding them back to resemble the wings of a bird. The lungs were then pulled out of the chest cavity and thrown over the back, after which, salt was poured into the bloody holes, and the victim left to die on the spot.

Ever broken a rib really badly while playing sports? Well, multiply that by about 24, and then imagine your diaphragm being emptied, none too gently, by the hairy hands of bearded warriors while still conscious. By the time your blood has started to soak into the earth and your breathing system strangled for air, the salt will probably be the least of your concerns.

Unlike some grotesque methods of execution (crucifixion comes to mind), death would actually come pretty quickly, probably due to the absence of support for the lungs, shock, and massive blood loss and general body trauma. The other slim advantage (?) of this execution is that the victim is spared the sight of his own body collapsing or being disassembled before him, unlike crucifixion, burning, or the English tradition of hanging, drawing and quartering.

The rite is famously documented thus:

“…they found Halfdan Long-Leg. Einarr had his ribs cut from the spine with a sword and the lungs pulled out through the slits in his back…” (Orkneyingasaga 8, “Sagas of the Kings of Orkney, Penguin Classics, 1978).

Einar dedicates the victim of Odin, the god of war, and composes a jolly verse about the event.

Another bloodeagle is recorded by the 13th C. Danish historian Saxo, one of those old writers about whom we know nothing apart from his name:

“Meantime, Siward and Biorn…declared war against the king…and when they had captured him, they ordered the figure of an eagle to be cut in his back, rejoicing to crush their most ruthless foe by marking him with the cruellest of birds. Not satisfied with imprinting a wound on him, they salted the mangled flesh. Thus Ella was done to death…” (”The Nine Books of the Danish History of Saxo Grammaticus”, translated by Oliver Elton (Norroena Society, New York, 1905))

Some have argued against the historical veracity of the Sagas and Saxo, trying to pass off the tales as “misunderstandings”, “mistranslations”, or possibly just good old-fashioned  spite on the part of the Christian chroniclers. Certainly, good Christian monks and bishops have hardly been backward at coming up with vomit-inducing methods of extracting confessions from “heretics” under the auspices of their own various Inquisitions. But that’s another article, and I doubt it would have taken their learned ancestors much effort to concoct such a barbarous myth to demonize their hated heathen enemies, who desecrated and destroyed the ecclesiastical coastlines of the British Isles for generations, starting from 793 AD.

However, what is definitely known is that the Vikings, like all Germanic tribes, practiced the blood sacrifice (blót), the highest form of which was that of a human victim, dedicated usually to Odin (according to Tacitus’ Germania). Rudolf Simek certainly believes that the bloodeagle was possibly a real sacrificial rite, also reserved for the King of the Gods, and could also have led to the procedure becoming a special form of revenge against the murderer of one’s father (”Dictionary of Northern Mythology”, Brewer, 1993.) From what we do know of the Vikings’ celebratory attitude to war, weapons and vengeance, there is no hard historical reason not to assume the existence of the bloody eagle in some form.

With all the recent talk of modern pirates in the news–which feels absurd and archaic, can’t someone spot their pathetic pirate ship and blow it out of the water with a drone–I thought I’d write about seafaring punishment from the 17th and 18th centuries.

It’s officially called “keelhauling” and was performed not by just pirates but by navy ships of varying countries for acts of onboard rebellion…or if the captain just wanted some entertainment. In the old days, if you were in the navy–the navy owned you.

The idea is to have a rope that encircles the vessel from the bow to the stern, or the front of the ship to the rear, and tie a man to it. Kick him overboard and it’s up to the crew to pull him under the ship’s hull and back out of the water. Depending on the length of the ship he may be holding his breath for quite some time.

This inevitably led to the victim’s drowning which is a fairly permanent punishment. If the victim didn’t drown it may have been because he was pulled fast and tight against the hull (bottom of the ship) in which case his back would have been scraped against all of the barnacles that commonly like to grow there.

If you’re not aware of what a barnacle is, it’s a type of arthropod related to lobsters and crabs. It has a hard exterior shell nasty with edges. If you go to the beach you can usually see them growing on rocks. Try rubbing your hand over a couple of them and then you’ll get the picture of what kind of damage they could do to a man’s back.

Some films have suggested that a person being keelhauled could be attacked by a shark. It is unlikely that would bethe main concern of someone drowning and being dragged along the bottom of the ship with their skin being stripped away, though blood could start to flow.  If the ship was in a heavily populated area filled with the swimming carnivores I’m sure they might consider taking a nibble.

You have to also remember that sea water doesn’t allow for the victim to open their eyes during the act of keelhauling. You can’t see when your turmoil will come to an end and the time from the bow to the stern would seem like an eternity. I would bet that many a man blacked out and I’m not sure CPR techniques would have been available to revive the punished man. Someone probably gave the man a slight kick and pronounced him dead.

It is incredible that ”civilized” societies like the Dutch and British would allow keelhauling as an official punishment. They perpetrated many sanctioned acts of violence by the royal crown but keelhauling sounds very juvenile. It reminds me of a horrible hazing incident conducted by a frat of jocks.  

I guess the only thing worse than being keelhauled with your back to the ship would be to be keelhauled with your front to the ship. Your valuables might snag on those barnacles and with your hands tied…ooh, the image. Maybe being eaten by a shark at that point would be a good thing.

I figured since Easter is coming up that instead of writing about the methods used to hunt Easter Rabbits (a rare history indeed) that I would highlight the “how to’s” of crucifying, whether that be a human or a human claiming to be a god.

We all have the familiar imagery in our heads of one beam stuck in the ground and another cross beam used to stretch out the arms, but there were crucifixions where there were no crossbeams–just a pole. The arms would be pulled up over the head and nailed above.

Personally, I would prefer the crossbeam. I like to stretch my arms out to the sides versus having them rub against my ears. But to each his own. The only problem I see with choosing the crossbeam is that you were required to carry it through the streets to your place of execution. That seems like a lot of work to go through just to be killed.
We really ought to be thankful for modern methods of execution. Even the firing squad is preferable.

Here’s a quote from Seneca The Young to consider. Seneca was a philosopher and politician in Rome.   “I see crosses there, not just of one kind but made in many different ways: some have their victims with head down to the ground; some impale their private parts; others stretch out their arms on the gibbet.”

Did you get that part about impaling private parts? In other words, your penis was nailed to the wood too. I wouldn’t have even imagined in jest such a torture. Thankfully in those times most women covered up, however, I’m sure there was the stray hooker who might do some flashing. The last thing you want when your dick is crucified is to get aroused.

If you’ve watched the torture show that is Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ, you’ll also know that victims of crucifixion–often slaves or criminals–were flagellated or whipped. I took a Biblical studies course back in college and the professor seem to delight in the details of this whipping.

The whip itself, according to this professor and backed up by Wiki, was embedded with sharp bone, broken pottery, or metal so that when the whip ends were flung onto the back of the victim they stuck. Then when the whip was pulled back it would peel off strips of flesh, thus ripping open the back.

If you were able to carry your crossbeam after that kind of abuse you were one hell of a man.Sometimes instead of having the crossbeam tied to your arms in order to cart it to its destination they even pre-nailed your hands. That way you were sure not to drop it–genius!

There’s been plenty of discussion as to where the nails actually went. Those who have studied the physical effects of crucifixion note that if the nails were placed directly into the palms, the weight of the victim might not hold. The hands might literally tear off and the crucifixee would fall flat on his face. How embarrassing.

That problem could be remedied by providing a seat for the victim on the cross pole or resting the feet somehow so that the weight strain was alleviated from the hands. But where’s the fun in that?

It is more likely the nails were sunk into the wrist area, between the radius and ulna. Inbetween those bones would provide more support. And the wrists could also be tied onto the cross with rope. If crucifixion was allowed in modern times they could have even used superglue on the backs of the hands to keep them in place.

The nails, while visually important, were not the culprits that killed a crucifixion victim. Heat exposure, the previous scourging, and the uncomfortable position on the cross that doesn’t allow for proper breathing would eventually end a life through numerous painful hours.

Ultimately, crucifixion was a humiliation to be witnessed by the public; a deterrent to criminal activity or political unrest. When we’re dying in pain in such a gruesome manner, you would want to be alone–not gawked at like horror movie fans eating popcorn.

Sometimes the vehicle designs that put a smile on our face while shopping for a new car have a past drenched in blood.

Hitler, the savy economic brainstormer, wanted a vehicle for the people. One that everyone could afford. That is is you were a pure German I guess. Those Jews could just walk on foot.

He called Ferdinand Porsche into his office back in 1933 to discuss his “people’s car.” You might recognize the name Porsche since it is now a status symbol car bought by people who have not opted for the other ostentatious status symbol: “The Hummer.”

Porsche was already experimenting with a vehicle similar to what Hitler described at the time of his conference. The idea was simple: make a car that the average German citizen could afford and was efficient with gas mileage. Porsche then finalized his design into the Volkswagen Bug. The one we associate in the sixties with hippie love.

In America, The Bug has been embraced as if it were designed in the states, a pop culture icon. So American in fact that Disney created “Herbie, The Love Bug.” No one seems to have acknowledged that it was actually “The Anti-Semite Bug.” The word has gotten out as of late due to The History Channel who every month or so seems to run all Hitler documentaries, including one on Hitler’s relationship with Porsche.

It’s true that you can’t deny the people innovative engineering and technology just because it was implemented by a war mongering madman. It’s simply interesting that a cheerful vehicle with personality like The Bug was pushed onto the assembly line by a guy who was the antithesis of everything we feel about “the people’s car.”