Medieval Japan may be known for its honor, duty, and bravery, but there was also a darker side to the Samurai clans who ruled the era. Punishments for crimes were brutal and oppressive, with extreme...
The Museum of London Docklands is hosting Executions , a major exhibition exploring the capital’s history of public punishment, from the first recorded public execution in 1196 to the last in 1868...
Elizabeth "Jane" Shore was a fiery and charismatic Englishwoman who made a name for herself as one of the many sultry mistresses of the handsome and powerful English king, Edward IV. With her...
One of the most controversial organizations in history, the Spanish Inquisition has been poorly understood by the general public. This period of religious persecution, which took place between 1478...
We’ve all had issues with family at one time or other. But the lengths taken by the Roman emperor Caracalla really take the biscuit. To ensure he would never again be reminded of his younger brother...
After a night of drinking, few things are worse than a heinous hangover. Or so I thought! For during the early modern era, heavy drinkers were faced with a far worse punishment. Those guilty of...
There was no end to medieval creativity when it came to torture , punishment and humiliation! The ‘scold’s bridle’ or ‘mask of shame’ was a concept developed in medieval Europe to punish people,...
Capital punishment (death by execution) has been a part of human society since time immemorial. Even though it is a practice as old as human civilization, perhaps the most surprising thing about...
The Roman army was one of the fiercest armies ever assembled. It was disciplined, well trained, and well equipped. This combination meant the Roman army played a crucial role in Rome’s expansion from...
In many corners of the globe, aristocrats and nobles, kings and young princes, were all deemed to be ‘ untouchable ’ and protected by divine right . To lay one’s hand on a nobleman or noble child was...
Xerxes I, also known as Xerxes the Great, was a 5th century Achaemenid king of the Persian empire. He is best known for leading the massive invasion of Greece, marked by the battles of Thermopylae,...
Researchers in China believe a skeleton found in a tomb in the northwest of the country is the earliest known example of foot amputation as punishment for a crime, reports the South China Morning...
Athens is perhaps most famous for being the birthplace of democracy. One of the cornerstones for the establishment of Athenian democracy was the introduction of a written law code that could only be...
The curious English have a predilection for heaping abuse upon the corpses of the unfortunate dead, including a cruel and unusual punishment the bodies of executed murderers were subject to in the...
The Code of Ur-Nammu is the oldest surviving law code. This text was written on clay tablets in the Sumerian language and is reckoned to have been produced towards the end of the 3rd millennium BC...
Slavery was a large part of the Roman Empire. Military expansion brought captives, to compliment the material wealth taken back to Rome. And there is strong evidence that these slaves were not always...