TORTUROUS TUDORS
Although often associated with the medieval period, torture methods were ‘finessed’ further in Tudor times. Burning at the stake and beheading continued, but many other grisly forms of punishment were also introduced.
Boiled alive
In 1531 Henry VIII forced through the ‘Acte of Poysoning’ in response to the case of Richard Roose – a Lambeth cook accused of serving poisoned gruel to two people in a botched attempt to assassinate John Fisher, the Bishop of Rochester. It declared murder by poison an act of high treason, with the punishment of being boiled alive. The act was made retroactively, and Roose met his bubbling end.
Pressed to death
You couldn’t face a jury unless you entered a plea of guilty or not guilty. Being pressed to death involved the placing of heavy stones onto the accused until they decided to make a plea or expired under the weight. Due to a legal loophole, some people chose this punishment despite its lethality, hoping to evade the confiscation of lands that usually followed a court conviction.
Broken on the wheel
This punishment was popular in Europe, and made its way over to Scotland. In io one Robert Weir was found guilty of murdering the Lord of Warriston. He was tied to a wooden wheel in spread-eagle fashion, then his limbs were broken with the coulter of a plough.
Once the body had been shattered, the condemned person would either be strangled, given a mortal blow or left to die in agony.
Beheaded by the Halifax gibbet
This Yorkshire invention was essentially a large axe attached to a wooden block, and was 200 years ahead of the guillotine’s adoption in Revolutionary France. The town of Halifax adopted it to punish even lowly crimes like petty theft, and it remained in use until the mid-17th century. It inspired another device – the maiden – first used in Scotland during Mary Queen of Scots’ reign.
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