The apartment where I'm living is just around the corner from the building that used to house the headquarters of the Spanish Inquisition.
I was walking by there one evening, and I came upon a city tour stopped outside. The guide was sharing some of the history of the Inquisition, and he noted that first, suspected heretics were taken to the basement and tortured (for a while), then, once they had confessed, they were brought in front of a tribunal who then determined the punishment for their crimes.
Apparently one of the most popular punishments involved a barrel: the punished would have to wear a barrel (with holes cut out for arms, legs and head) for a month and they couldn't take it off--not to sleep, not to sit, not to ... you get the idea. The sole purpose for castigations such as this was not punishment (after all, they'd already been tortured), but rather public humiliation.
The very existence of the Inquisition has always seemed to me to be one of the darker times in human history: so full of suspicion, shame, punishment, treachery and fear. And it's hard to be reminded of how terribly human beings have treated others throughout history, if only because it sheds so much light on how far we still have to go. We may no longer force people to wear their shame publicly (via barrels or scarlet letters), but that doesn't mean we're any better off than our ancestors.
I was walking by there one evening, and I came upon a city tour stopped outside. The guide was sharing some of the history of the Inquisition, and he noted that first, suspected heretics were taken to the basement and tortured (for a while), then, once they had confessed, they were brought in front of a tribunal who then determined the punishment for their crimes.
Apparently one of the most popular punishments involved a barrel: the punished would have to wear a barrel (with holes cut out for arms, legs and head) for a month and they couldn't take it off--not to sleep, not to sit, not to ... you get the idea. The sole purpose for castigations such as this was not punishment (after all, they'd already been tortured), but rather public humiliation.
The very existence of the Inquisition has always seemed to me to be one of the darker times in human history: so full of suspicion, shame, punishment, treachery and fear. And it's hard to be reminded of how terribly human beings have treated others throughout history, if only because it sheds so much light on how far we still have to go. We may no longer force people to wear their shame publicly (via barrels or scarlet letters), but that doesn't mean we're any better off than our ancestors.
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