Latest recorded government sanctioned use of scaphism or cyphonism (torture)?
score:5
There are numerous references to Christian martyrs having been killed by scaphism. As best as I can tell, these are referring to reports of an execution in A.D. 363 during the reign of Julian. As it was retold in the The History of Christian Martyrdom:
Marcus, bishop of Arethusa, having destroyed a pagan temple in that city, erected a christian church in its room, on which account he was accused to Julian as a Christian. His persecutors, stripping him naked, cruelly beat him . . . and lastly, he was hung up in a basket in the heat of the sun, after having smeared him over with honey, in order to be tormented to death by wasps. As soon as he was hung up, they asked him if he would rebuild their temple? To which he answered, that he would neither rebuild it nor advance a single doit towards its being rebuilt; upon which they left him, and he fell a martyr to the stings of the insects (108).
The implication is that the Roman state sanctioned the execution, though it may have been carried out by a mob. @fdb rightly points out that Martyr Acts are of dubious historical veracity, so check out the original sources in Greek and English here.
A more recent (and definitely historical) instance of execution-by-insect (though not scaphism proper) is provided by Jeffrey Lockwood, author of "Six-Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War." Lockwood shows that torture by insects is disturbingly common throughout human history. The last state-sanctioned insect-aided execution probably comes from 19th-century Bukhara:
The epitome of insectan torture was developed by a 19th-century emir of Bukhara, in present-day Uzbekistan. He threw political enemies into a bug pit, a deep hole covered with an iron grille and stocked with sheep ticks and assassin bugs. The bite of the latter has been compared to being pierced with a hot needle, and the injected saliva digested the victims’ tissues until, in the words of the emir’s jailer, “masses of their flesh had been gnawed off their bones. (NYT)
Researching this question was mostly disheartening, but at the very least I can confidently contradict thefreedictionary.com: modern "Oriental" nations do not use scaphism/cyphonism as a method of execution. Note that the Free Dictionary definition has not been updated since 1913, and even then scaphism was probably out of fashion for a hundred years.
More post
- 📝 What's the festival shown in this illustration?
- 📝 Could someone become Empress in China more than once?
- 📝 Did the 1918 flu pandemic affect travel within USA, and in what ways?
- 📝 Did the Europeans benefit economically from the scramble for Africa?
- 📝 What is the source for this Goering quote on radar?
- 📝 What was the price of basic foodstuff in 1930 Poland?
- 📝 What name was given to Victorian era of confidence?
- 📝 Why did Thomas Jefferson almost lose the 1800 presidential election to Aaron Burr?
- 📝 What is the real story of the Lion of Gripsholm Castle?
- 📝 Pre-WW2 location of Skalat
- 📝 What happened to Hitler's personal possessions and real estate?
- 📝 Has any culture primarily worshipped an evil deity?
- 📝 Why were male oracles replaced by female oracles?
- 📝 Were there hippies in the USA in 1930?
- 📝 Why are the German and French languages so different?
- 📝 What's the history of this mortar shell?
- 📝 Is Attila The Hun's Throne actually located in The Veneto?
- 📝 Why did Allied invasion of France occur only in 1944 and not earlier?
- 📝 Will we ever be able to understand history with 100% accuracy
- 📝 What is the origin of Indian weekday names?
- 📝 Was there a "literate class" outside the Shi in Zhou-dynasty China?
- 📝 Is/was it an Indonesian tradition or custom to drink your victims' blood?
- 📝 What is this "d-mac" device?
- 📝 Why did so many countries agree to the Non-Proliferation Treaty?
- 📝 In the election of 1800, why did Burr end up with as many electoral votes as Jefferson, rather than one fewer?
- 📝 Has any ideology ever had an internal war?
- 📝 Why didn't Henry A. Wallace become President in 1945?
- 📝 Has any G7 country deliberately defaulted on sovereign debt to punish a certain country?
- 📝 Are there historical examples of non-Christian martyrs who were persecuted and killed because they claimed to be firsthand eyewitnesses of a miracle?
- 📝 When did people stop translating their names when moving from one country to another?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Latest recorded government sanctioned use of scaphism or cyphonism (torture)?
- 📝 What was the first recorded use of Aerial Weapons in warfare?
- 📝 First recorded use of a traditional tombstone?
- 📝 During the Chola dynasty how extensive was the use of Sanskrit in government and by the people?
- 📝 Is the first visually recorded use of anti-cavalry defences on the Bayeux Tapestry?
- 📝 Has a sovereign Communist government ever run, and conceded loss, on a fair election?
- 📝 Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?
- 📝 What is the first recorded dog name?
- 📝 Why exactly did telegraphs have to use "STOP" instead of a period and "QUOTE" instead of a quotation mark? (Or special codes.)
- 📝 How did the USSR manage to innovate in an environment characterized by government censorship and high bureaucracy?
- 📝 Why does Japan use the same type of AC power outlet as the US?
- 📝 Why does Ngram show an extreme spike in use of "LOL" in mid 1600s?
- 📝 Why did the Germans use the Enigma machine rather than the far superior "Lorenz" cipher machine?
- 📝 What is the first horse name recorded in history?
- 📝 Why did Hitler not order the use of poison gas in combat?
- 📝 Did active frontiersmen really eat 20,000 calories a day? How does this compare to other highly-active people in recorded history?
- 📝 How did Medieval armies survive the use of mail armor in the deserts of the Middle East?
- 📝 Was there a plan to use nuclear weapons for terrain modification in North America?
- 📝 Why did only the English adopt, evolve and use the longbow en masse in war?
- 📝 What pretext did Hitler use to justify Operation Barbarossa?
- 📝 When and why did the use of the lifespans of royalty to limit clauses in contracts come about?
- 📝 Why didn't Japanese infantrymen and samurai use shields?
- 📝 Did people use to marry much younger during the last millennium?
- 📝 Why did Meiji government consider switching from Japanese to English?
- 📝 Why, in old movies and TV series, do they always use such extremely exaggerated wheel turns when driving a car?
- 📝 Why did the grip-centered viking shield fall out of use relative to the kite shields?
- 📝 Why did Roosevelt and Churchill use voice-based telecommunication, instead of simpler text-based options which were easier to encrypt?
- 📝 Who is the earliest recorded person?
- 📝 How to explain the apparent discrepancy in the use of papyrus vs. clay tablets between Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia?
- 📝 Why did the East India Company accept the Government of India Act 1858?