Some of the Most Horrifying Torture Devices in History

[Manute for Ever!]

Source: http://www.listaholic.com/12-of-the-...n-history.html

[B][U]Heretic

[lefthook00]

Nice thread! I heard about one in Asia where they tie you down onto a chair and cut the bottom of the chair out then they place you over a baby bamboo stock...and we all know how fast bamboo grows...it would grow up into your ass and out through the top of your head eventually!!!!

[LuppersGB]

someone told me in Tsarist Russia (so to people who may not know this is sort of 30+ before Stalin) they would boil your hands then peel off the skin, i can't think of many things that would be more painfull, and not life threatening

[Manute for Ever!]

...Continued

Brazen Bull

This is one particularly brutal torture/execution device. From Wikipedia:

"The brazen bull is an execution/torture device designed in ancient Greece. Perillos of Athens, a brass-founder proposed to Phalaris, Tyrant of Agrigentum, the invention of a new means for executing criminals; accordingly, he cast a brazen bull, made totally of brass, hollow, with a door in the side. The condemned was shut up in the bull and a fire was set under it, heating the metal until it became "red hot" and causing the person inside to slowly roast to death. So that 'nothing unseemly might spoil his feasting', Phalaris commanded that the bull be designed in such a way that its smoke rose in spicy clouds of incense. The head of the ox was designed with a complex system of tubes and stops so that the prisoner's screams were converted into sounds like the bellowing of an infuriated bull. "

No way those who were roasted alive in this device looked anything like the serene faces in the above picture.

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.

Inquisitional Chair

An Indian fakir would absolutely love this chair, but not those victims of the Inquisition who were unfortunate enough to sit on it butt naked. Strapped tight to it with leather straps, those who sat on this chair felt the pain of hundreds of sharp and rusty spikes piercing their flesh, and that pain is magnified even more when torturers decide to press them down against the spikes. For added fun, torturers heated this iron chair and effectively roasted slowly the poor unfortunate souls sitting on it.

The "Boots"

If you think the Knee Splitter was murder on a person's lower limbs, wait til you know what the "Boots" were about. This horrible piece of equipment was made up of wedges that fitted the legs from ankles to knees. Pure pain ensues when the torturer violently pounds the wedges with a large, heavy hammer, a process that is done repeatedly until flesh and bone are completely destroyed, with some victims even gushing marrow from their crushed legs.

The Spanish Tickler

The Spanish Tickler tickled its victims pink, and ultimately very red as this device, also known as the Cat's Paw, ripped and tore their flesh away from the bone, targeting any part of the body.

The Skull Splitter

Just as it says: it splits skulls. This one resembles an angel's halo, but there's absolutely nothing angelic or holy about it. Inside this halo are very pointy spikes, which are driven into the side of the victim's skull as the screws on the outside are tightened. The skull splitting part comes when the torturer either grabs the halo by its handles and jerks the victim side to side or hoists him or her into the air, by those very same handles. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the top of the victim's skull is violently removed by the aforementioned actions, and that brains tend to spill out all over the place in the process.

Head Crusher

Here's another torture device with a self-explanatory name. The chin of the victim is placed on the lower bar, When the questioning starts, the screw starts to turn and the cap is forced down the victim's head. Use your imagination to see what happens when that cap is pressed all the way down a person's head.
The amazing part is, the Head Crusher is said to be still in use up to this day for interrogation purposes.

Revolving Drum

Think of this one as somewhat akin to grating cheese, only this one grates a human torso ever so slowly. A popular tool in Spain for extracting information from prisoners many years ago, the Revolving Drum calls for victims to be put into it face down, their heads through the upper pillory and their legs firmly strapped. Their torsos pressed against a spiked drum, the prisoners are then asked questions. Any sign of resistance, and the torturer then slowly rotates the drum one full revolution. This process is repeated, and torturers even go to the extent of placing weights on the backs of victims to further press their torsos towards the spiked drum and cause more pain. The result, naturally, is death by very slow disembowelment.

Spanish Donkey

A number of medieval torture devices have the word "Spanish" attached to it, but this one is probably the most gruesome. The Spanish Donkey gave victims an unimaginably horrible ride, and here's why. Victims are put astride, naked, the apparatus, which is actually a vertical wood board with a sharp V-shape wedge on top. Varying weights are then attached to their feet. Eventually, the victim's own weight and the extra baggage cause the wedge to slice through their bodies, splitting them in half. Yikes.

Rat Torture

This method tortures both man and rodent, but it is man who tends to end up dying a horrifying death. A victim is completely restrained, and a full-grown rat is placed upon his or her stomach. The rat will be confined within a cage placed on top of it, which would then be heated, freaking the rat out enough to frantically burrow its way into the only way out: the victim's stomach and intestines.

[Manute for Ever!]

The Saw

Who would have thought that one of the most useful tools ever invented by man could also become one of the sickest? The saw, which has helped mankind slice through trees en route to building houses and shopping malls, also has a dark past as a torture / execution device. And the way it was used would make the strongest of stomachs churn out its lunch.
Victims of this indescribably brutal device were made to hang upside down, legs spread apart. Even this position has a purpose: to fill the victims' heads with blood, and therefore allow them to remain conscious as the torturers work the saw through their crotches, sometimes up to their midsection before they pass out or die. Just imagine the sound the whole process would have made, with the saw's serrated edge making contact with flesh and bone with each back and forth motion, on top of the victim's bloodcurdling screams of agony.

[DeuceWallaces]

Some sick shit.

[LJJ]

Per Cracked.com:

6 Ridiculous History Myths (you probably think are true)

#1. Elaborate Medieval Torture Devices

The Insanity:

Quick: What pops into your mind when we say "medieval"? We bet most of you pictured some kind of torture device ("I'm gonna get medieval on your ass!").

You can just picture a man back then, led by church officials into a sinister underground chamber. He looks around, really wishing now that he hadn't written that hilarious caption about the Pope's new hat. In front of him stands the famous Iron Maiden, a hideous vertical chamber with an interior lined with iron spikes...

As if that weren't bad enough, there was also the Pear of Anguish, which would spread open and violently tear apart whatever human orifice it was pushed into...

... and the Spanish Chair, an iron seat covered in spikes which a victim was strapped into while his feet were roasted.

The guy's last thought before being tortured to death is, "I hope somebody make a theme restaurant about this someday."

But in Reality...

Despite being one of the most famous torture devices ever (and having a heavy metal band named after them), Iron Maidens didn't exist back then, and there's no record they were ever used on anyone. If you're saying, "But I've seen them in museums!" well, that's why they exist. These kind of "horrors of the medieval times" exhibits were hugely popular in the 19th century and it appears the Iron Maidens they showed off were cobbled together for the exhibit.

That terrible pear thing that they used to punish sodomy and adultery by ripping the offending organs to shreds from the inside? Also a myth. Nobody can find any reference to the device before the 17th century, and no record at all of it being used to destroy somebody's asshole.

What about the spiked chair? It's supposedly a device of the Spanish Inquisition, but once again there's no record of them using it, or anybody else.

Discovered in Spain (On the back of a fifth grade heavy metal fan's spelling test).


Oh, don't get us wrong. The medieval times sucked, and lots of people were tortured. But the torturers apparently didn't spend nearly as much time as we think gleefully coming up with diabolical devices to inflict their horrors.

Why Do We Believe It?

As we mentioned with War of the Worlds, most of us want to believe that history is a steady march of progress towards enlightenment. The further we go back, the stupider, cruder and more brutal we want to think people were. And the Middle Ages, with fewer written records than many other periods in Western history, provide an easy target.

It's not enough that torture did take place. We need our ancestors to be creatively sadistic monsters who spent all their time coming up with new ways to mutilate people rather than inventing penicillin. Like the bra-burning myth, the fact that these torture devices involve sex and violence also makes them more likely to endure.

If you need a "medieval" article for your museum, what's going to put more asses in the seats? A faked up medieval torture instrument that was used to sodomize heretics, or the reality ...

[jbot]

man, i couldn't be an executioner or a torturer. who the hell would sit around and think up this stuff?

[Manute for Ever!]

The Garrotte


This device has a Spanish name because the official instrument of capital punishment and remained in use until 1975, yes guys

[Brunch@Five]

sick. not the good way.

[VishaltotheG]

[MagicalLA]

I am somehow not proud of my country by reading this thread.

[PistolPete]

There was a special on one of those History channels not too long ago that talked about some of these devices. The Brazen Bull always stood out to me. That one is the worst.

[dough]

Per Cracked.com:

truth.

[Agent_Zero]

some crazy stuff. nice thread, as always.