It's another new day, and another addition to our worst punishment series.
This time we're bringing you something definitely not for the squeamish, so if you've got a
weak constitution or recently ate, maybe click over on another one of our videos.
For those of you brave enough though, stay tuned for this episode of The Infographics
Show, Worst Punishments: sawing in half.
People have been thinking up ingenious ways to kill each other for... well for as long
as there's been people around.
Sometimes though humanity turns murder into something of an art form, and particularly
gifted artists have been looking to outdo each other for millenia as they invent ever
more creative ways of killing people.
The saw was first invented sometime around the 31st century BC, making it one of humanity's
oldest tools.
While history is unsure of when the saw was then turned to the nefarious purpose of torture
and execution, our expert team of historians here at The Infographics Show have deduced
that it happened approximately five minutes after its invention, and as proof they quote
the terrible nature of man itself... which we gotta admit is pretty compelling proof.
Whatever the case, the saw has a rich history of being used as both a torture and execution
device, with the aim being to prolong the suffering of an individual as long as possible.
It would after all be easier to simply chop someone's limbs or head off, but far less
entertaining.
One of the earliest and verified accounts of execution via sawing occurred during the
reign of Darius II in ancient Persia.
Darius II's half-sister and wife, because that's how they got down in those days, was
well known to be the real power behind the throne, and after being slighted by the siblings
of her daughter in law, she ordered them killed.
The first sibling to be killed was sawn in half, likely while hanging upside down.
If you thought that execution via saw was something reserved for ancient antiquity though,
then you should know that as late as 1848 during the Hungarian Revolution thousands
of women, children, and old men were mutilated, roasted over fires, and sawn to pieces.
The torture of sawing comes in a few different varieties, and the technique varies with the
aims.
Sometimes sawing is used as a form of punishment, and not necessarily an outright execution.
Thieves, liars, and other minor offenders in some ancient cultures would have hands
or feet sawn off, or perhaps entire limbs.
This was meant not just to punish and deter crime, but to serve as a very visual warning
to everybody else.
If you were thinking about shoplifting a candy bar but happened to see a guy with a limb
sawn off, you'd probably think twice about nicking that precious sweet.
Punishments varied, but criminals could expect to have fingers sawn off individually, or
perhaps the entire hand or foot.
For more serious offenses the leg or arm might be sawn off, though perhaps just below the
elbow or knee, or the entire limb may be amputated depending on the severity of the crime.
You've probably heard of the expression, paying your eight pounds of flesh- well in this case
it was taken quite literally.
While those who are convicted to punishment via suffering were not meant to die from the
experience- or at least from the blood loss, as many would die of infection afterwards-
sawing with intent to kill was far more common.
In that case, the executioners faced a peculiar dilemma, in that the human body is rather
floppy- specially if your victim is screaming and flaying around in agony.
To resolve the problem many cultures got rather inventive about the act.
If you've seen our other episodes on punishments and torture, then you already know that the
ancient Chinese were rather clever about coming up with ways to maim and mutilate, and when
faced with the problem of sawing a floppy human victim in half, they put their best
minds to the task.
The obvious solution of course would be to simply saw a person along the midsection,
and this proved quite popular not just in China but around the world.
Lumberers in particular were fond of tying a victim to a tree and then sawing through
the victim and into the tree itself.
Victims could also be tied to upright wooden poles and then sawed through the middle.
Another technique would be to tie a person down to the ground, and saw them in half using
a two-person saw with heavy weights on top of the blade, to force the blade to bite down
into flesh.
But all of these methods quickly became boring and repetitive, and while it was satisfying
to watch someone sawn in half horizontally, the real prize was to saw a person vertically.
For many years this holy grail of execution by saw eluded mankind's best scientists and
engineers, until two separate solutions were drawn up in the far east and in Europe.
In China executioners came up with the clever idea of sandwiching a person between two boards,
which could then be pressed together via a system of gears at the top and bottom.
The individual would thus be slightly crushed between the two boards, and flail and scream
as they might, the task of sawing through their body was made relatively easy.
In Europe and the middle east, victims were strung up and hung upside down, literally
turning the world of torture by saw on its head.
A person would be tied to two poles, with each foot fastened to a pole, and the hands
fastened at the bottom of those poles.
This kept the victim firmly in place as the executioners moved the saw between the legs
and began to saw downwards.
While techniques varied, leading death-by-saw researchers were quick to discover that of
the two methods of death by sawing- vertical and horizontal- the vertical sawing ensured
that a victim remained alive the longest.
This was because when you sawed an individual horizontally, they would often die from massive
blood loss relatively quickly.
However when you flipped them upside down the blood would rush to the head and ensure
a victim remained alive and conscious for much longer than normal.
Victims killed in this way would stay alive even as the saw reached chest level, and there
was of course the added satisfaction of watching a victim's blood and guts fall down onto their
own faces as they screamed in agony.
It was quality family entertainment.
Yet, some curious mind wondered, what if you sawed a person vertically but from the top
down?
Well given the general reluctance by victims to rudely refuse to keep their heads still,
a style similar to that employed by the chinese was necessary, and so victims had their head
strapped to a pole or plank, and the sawing would commence from the victim's right to
the left.
Unfortunately for all involved, and to the surprise of absolutely nobody, this technique
resulted in pretty quick death since the brain is extremely allergic to being sawed into.
Still, sometimes the technique may be handed out as a mercy- sure, you're going to be executed
by sawing in half but hey, you're getting a real bone tossed to you here because you're
going to get sawed from the top down.
Incredibly, victims still complained this was a cruel and unusual punishment.
Honestly, there's just no pleasing some people.
Throughout history there have been several fans of sawing in half.
Caligula, the infamous and very crazy Roman emperor in 40 AD was fond of having people
sawn in half while he ate, considering the suffering as an appetizer to dinner.
Next time we're out at a restaurant, we know what we're ordering before the main course.
Thanks to the fact that Caligula was stark raving mad, there was no shortage of sawing
victims either, as he was particularly good at making enemies while declaring himself
God, replacing the heads on the statues of gods with his own, and generally doing as
he pleased with anyone's wife or daughter in his vicinity.
Fourteen hundred years later in 1450 AD, the Ottoman Empire resurrected the sawing craze
under the patronage of Mahomet the Conqueror.
Likely very annoyed by the fact that his next-door neighbor Vlad had cemented a special place
in history with the amazing nickname of Vlad the Impaler, Mahomet stewed in his palace
determined to get a cool nickname of his own.
Mahomet the Strangler?
Nah, sounds too creepy.
Mahomet the Disembowler?
Kind of cool, but also far too barbaric and not fitting of royalty.
Mahomet the Sawer?
Hmm, now there's something.
Mahomet got his chance to put this new nickname to the test when his armies conquered Constantinople
in 1453 AD.
Mahomet gave his army a three day pass to do as they pleased with the citizens of the
conquered city, and for three bloody days soldiers exercised every imaginable cruelty
on the population.
Sawing people in half though was featured prominently, and Mahomet decided that Vlad
may have had his impaling, but he'd get his sawing.
Years later when his army conquered another small city, five hundred prisoners were sent
to Constantinople where they were each sawn in two.
A year before that though four hundred Christian knights had surrendered to the Ottoman forces
under the promise that they would have their lives spared.
Mahomet agreed, then immediately changed his mind and had each man sawn in half.
Yet despite his best efforts, Mahomet the Sawer would never stick, probably because
it's a pretty dumb nickname, and instead he'd have to make do with the Conqueror instead.
Sawing in half has been a mainstay of human history since its invention, but thankfully
the practice seems to have gone out of style during the 19th century.
Sadly, humanity now has to face a future where we'll never get to experience the delights
of sawing people in half with the great variety of different saws modern technology has developed.
We'll never get to see someone sawn in half by a bandsaw for instance, or a chainsaw.
And what about a water saw- a device that shoots water at such a high pressure it can
cut directly into the hardest steel.
We bet ancient torturers are right now shedding tears that they never got to see that one
actually happen.
Yet, as we are well aware humanity is absolutely terrible, so keep your chin up because odds
are that eventually civilization will collapse into itself and we'll all be getting sawed
in half by the angry robots that rule us all.
Would you have preferred to be sawn in half vertically or horizontally?
Let us know in the comments!
Also, be sure to check out our other video Most Horrifying Punishments in the History
of Mankind.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.