Welcome back to our series of shows on brutal punishments that authorities meted out in
the past.
Today we are going to talk about an instrument that would not only cause significant pain,
but that would leave terrible scars on the victim.
While you could say some of the punishments we have mentioned in this series are worse,
we think you’ll agree that these nasty shears take the biscuit when it comes to downright
sadism.
After hearing this short history of the pain-inflicting instrument you no doubt will be left asking,
who on earth came up with this stuff?
Prepare to be very disturbed.
The people writing about crocodile shears agree that this instrument was one of the
most appalling things ever to be invented.
Right now if we asked you to imagine the worst kind of thing you could do to another man,
well, you might come up with something similar to these shears.
They were called crocodile shears because the tool was supposed to act something like
a crocodile’s mouth.
As you will know from some of our other shows, crocodiles have the hardest bite of any animal.
They also have a lot of very sharp teeth.
So, just imagine a small tool supposed to look a bit like a crocodile’s mouth.
The tool itself was kind of like an iron pincer, maybe about one foot (30 cm) long.
The blades of the pincers where hemicylindrical, which means they were contained within a tube
that when opened would be halved, somewhat like a crocodile’s mouth.
Imagine a pair of scissors except the blades are two half cylinders filled with sharp teeth.
You might ask, what would you do with that?
Well, someone’s finger could be put inside these blades and the torturer could close
it tight and then drive the blades though the finger.
If he wanted to cause more pain he could thrust the tool back and tear off all the flesh on
that finger.
Well, what was left of it.
Except from what we can see, fingers were not the body part of choice.
Now, maybe you can think of another body part that might fit in this cylinder?
Yes, you guessed it.
The thing that would be clamped in this mouth was a man’s penis.
One website writing about Medieval Times said fingers might be the object of choice for
lesser crimes, but for grave crimes, such as against the state, it was a man’s life-giving
organ that was the victim.
The thing would first be clamped in the object and torn to pieces, but then the shears could
be manipulated to cause more damage.
The shears might also have been heated up before the operation.
We are told that this mutilation could be so bad the person might die slowly from loss
of blood.
In the end, the penis would be removed from the man.
But with any instruments of torture from the past, it’s sometimes hard to find records
of when they were used.
We know for sure that some people were brutally tortured and killed because there are plenty
of records, but with some torture instruments records are scarce.
A lot of media write about these shears, but they don’t state where the source of the
information is.
We think it might be the book, “The Book of Torture and Execution”, which mentions
these shears.
That book states these things were indeed used for people accused of regicide, which
means a person who tries to or actually does kill a king.
We have seen a picture of these monstrous things, but it’s still hard to say when
or even if they were used.
While the shears appear on just about every list of torture devices from the past, we
cannot find any names as to who might have been on the wrong end of them.
We found another book called “The Wrong View of History”, which added some more
details to the tale.
It said before the man was held inside these shears his torturers would find a way to get
him aroused; perhaps a woman was called in to help with this.
It was when his manhood changed in size that it would be held and cooked and shredded and
torn off.
Yet another book called “Dictionary of Torture” has these things in it, saying the Italians
called the device, “Il Castrator”.
More sources tell us that these things might not have always been used for people accused
of regicide, but during the Spanish Inquisition the inquisitors might just have used them
to extract information.
In these cases they might have merely ripped off fingers and toes.
That’s about all we can tell you, because while crocodile shears seem to have existed
we are told that few records of them being used have survived.
We did attempt to find those “few records” but to no avail.
So, do you think they were used?
If you do believe that, how do you think it would feel to be victim of these shears?
Can you think of anything worse?
Tell us in the comments.
Also, be sure to check out our other video from the Worst Punishments In History of Mankind
series - Eaten Alive - Scaphism.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.