But Roman officials weren't aware of the practice until they encountered it while fighting Carthage during the Punic Wars in the third century B.
For the next years, the Romans " perfected crucifixion " until Constantine I abolished it in the fourth century A. However, given that crucifixion was seen as an extremely shameful way to die, Rome tended not to crucify its own citizens. Instead, slaves, disgraced soldiers, Christians, foreigners, and — in particular — political activists often lost their lives in this way, Retief and Cilliers reported.
The practice became especially popular in the Roman-occupied Holy Land. When Rome's legions crucified its enemies, however, local tribes wasted no time in retaliating. For instance, in 9 A. In Rome, people condemned to crucifixion were scourged beforehand , with the exception of women, Roman senators and soldiers unless they had deserted , Retief and Cilliers wrote. During scourging, a person was stripped naked, tied to a post, and then flogged across the back, buttocks and legs by Roman soldiers.
This excessive whipping would weaken the victim, causing deep wounding, severe pain and bleeding. The cruelty didn't stop there. Resultant anoxaemia exaggerated hypovolaemic shock. Death was probably commonly precipitated by cardiac arrest, caused by vasovagal reflexes, initiated inter alia by severe anoxaemia, severe pain, body blows and breaking of the large bones. It's estimated that 6, of Spartacus's followers were killed in this way.
It is thought that Paul was beheaded - a quicker and therefore preferable death. Although there are references to crucifixions hundreds of years before the Romans these may refer to other forms of impalement - cases where offenders were nailed to trees and other frames, where they were left to die. The Latin word "crux" which is generally translated as "cross" originally had a less specific meaning, referring to any object on which victims were impaled or hanged.
More than 1, years later, however, it resurfaced as a way of killing Christians in Japan. In , 26 Christians were crucified in Nagasaki and over the following century, hundreds more were executed in the same way. The punishment began to be used against non-Christians too. In , about people were crucified after the Keian Disturbance, a failed uprising against the Shogun.
But the authorities eventually concluded such a public form of execution drew too much attention to serious crimes against the state that it would be better to hush up. There were also cases where Japanese soldiers crucified people in World War Two. The elbows and wrists would follow a few minutes later; by now, the arms would be six or seven inches longer. The victim would have no choice but to bear his weight on his chest. He would immediately have trouble breathing as the weight caused the rib cage to lift up and force him into an almost perpetual state of inhalation.
Suffocation would usually follow, but the relief of death could also arrive in other ways. This would make the lungs stiffer and make breathing even more difficult, and the pressure around the heart would impair its pumping.
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