Crucifixion

==== History ====

The Greek and Latin words corresponding to "crucifixion" applied to many different forms of painful execution, including being impaled on a stake, or affixed to a tree, upright pole (a [[crux simplex]]), or to a combination of an upright (in Latin, ''stipes'') and a crossbeam (in Latin, ''patibulum''). Seneca the Younger wrote: "I see crosses there, not just of one kind but made in many different ways: some have their victims with head down to the ground; some impale their private parts; others stretch out their arms on the gibbet".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/sen/sen.consolatione2.shtml|title=Dialogue "To Marcia on Consolation", 6.20.3 |publisher=[[The Latin Library]] |language=la|website=googleusercontent.com}}</ref>

Crucifixion was generally performed within Ancient Rome as a means to dissuade others from perpetrating similar crimes, with victims sometimes left on display after death as a warning. Crucifixion was intended to provide a death that was particularly slow, painful (hence the term ''excruciating'', literally "out of crucifying"), gruesome, humiliating, and public, using whatever means were most expedient for that goal. Crucifixion methods varied considerably with location and period.

One hypothesis suggested that the [[Ancient Rome|Ancient Roman]] custom of crucifixion may have developed out of a primitive custom of ''arbori suspendere''—hanging on an ''[[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#arbor felix|arbor infelix]]'' ("inauspicious tree") dedicated to the gods of the nether world. This hypothesis is rejected by William A. Oldfather, who shows that this form of execution (the ''supplicium more maiorum'', punishment in accordance with the custom of our ancestors) consisted of suspending someone from a tree, not dedicated to any particular gods, and flogging him to death.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/journals/TAPA/39/Supplicium_de_More_Maiorum*.html|title=Livy I.26 and the Supplicium de More Maiorum|publisher=Penelope.uchicago.edu|access-date=2009-12-19}}</ref> [[Tertullian]] mentions a 1st-century AD case in which trees were used for crucifixion,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.grtbooks.com/exitfram.asp?idx=3&yr=200&aa=AA&at=AA&ref=tertullian&URL=http://www.tertullian.org/latin/apologeticus.htm |title=''Apologia'', IX, 1 |publisher=Grtbooks.com|access-date=2009-12-19}}</ref> but Seneca the Younger earlier used the phrase ''infelix lignum'' (unfortunate wood) for the transom ("patibulum") or the whole cross.<ref>After quoting a poem by [[Maecenas]] that speaks of preferring life to death even when life is burdened with all the disadvantages of old age or even with acute torture ("vel acuta si sedeam cruce"), Seneca disagrees with the sentiment, saying death would be better for a crucified person hanging from the patibulum: "I should deem him most despicable had he wished to live to the point of crucifixion&nbsp;... Is it worth so much to weigh down upon one's own wound, and hang stretched out from a patibulum?&nbsp;... Is anyone found who, after being fastened to that accursed wood, already weakened, already deformed, swelling with ugly weals on shoulders and chest, with many reasons for dying even before getting to the cross, would wish to prolong a life-breath that is about to experience so many torments?" ("Contemptissimum putarem, si vivere vellet usque ad crucem&nbsp;... Est tanti vulnus suum premere et patibulo pendere districtum&nbsp;... Invenitur, qui velit adactus ad illud infelix lignum, iam debilis, iam pravus et in foedum scapularum ac pectoris tuber elisus, cui multae moriendi causae etiam citra crucem fuerant, trahere animam tot tormenta tracturam?" – [http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/sen/seneca.ep17-18.shtml Letter 101, 12–14])</ref> [[Plautus]] and [[Plutarch]] are the two main sources for accounts of criminals carrying their own patibula to the upright ''stipes''.<ref>Titus Maccius Plautus ''Miles gloriosus'' Mason Hammond, Arthur M. Mack – 1997 p. 109, "The patibulum (in the next line) was a crossbar which the convicted criminal carried on his shoulders, with his arms fastened to it, to the place for&nbsp;... Hoisted up on an upright post, the patibulum became the crossbar of the cross"</ref>

Notorious mass crucifixions followed the [[Third Servile War]] in 73–71 BCE (the slave rebellion led by [[Spartacus]]), and other [[Roman civil wars]] in the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE. [[Crassus]] ordered the crucifixion of 6,000 of Spartacus' followers who had been hunted down and captured after the slave defeat in battle.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Appian/Civil_Wars/1*.html#120|title=Appian • The Civil Wars{{snd}}Book I|website=penelope.uchicago.edu}}</ref> Josephus says that in the siege that led to the [[destruction of Jerusalem]] in AD 70, the Roman soldiers crucified Jewish captives before the walls of Jerusalem and out of anger and hatred amused themselves by nailing them in different positions.<ref>{{cite web| url = https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0148%3Abook%3D5%3Awhiston+chapter%3D11%3Awhiston+section%3D1| title = Josephus, ''The War of the Jews'', book 5, chapter 11}}</ref>

In some cases, the condemned was forced to carry the crossbeam to the place of execution.<ref name=":2">{{cite EB1911 |wstitle=Cross and Crucifixion |volume=7 |page=506 |first=Thomas Macall |last=Fallow |author-link=Thomas Macall Fallow}}</ref> A whole cross would weigh well over 135&nbsp;kg (300&nbsp;lb), but the crossbeam would not be as burdensome, weighing around 45&nbsp;kg (100&nbsp;lb).<ref name=Mississippi>{{cite journal|last=Ball|first=DA|title=The crucifixion and death of a man called Jesus|journal=Journal of the Mississippi State Medical Association|year=1989|volume=30|issue=3|pages=77–83|pmid=2651675}}</ref> The Roman historian [[Tacitus]] records that the city of Rome had a specific place for carrying out executions, situated outside the [[Esquiline Gate]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann2.shtml#32 |title=Annales 2:32.2 |publisher=Thelatinlibrary.com |access-date=2009-12-19}}</ref> and had a specific area reserved for the execution of [[Slavery in ancient Rome|slaves]] by crucifixion.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann15.shtml#60 |title=Annales 15:60.1 |publisher=Thelatinlibrary.com |access-date=2009-12-19}}</ref> Upright posts would presumably be fixed permanently in that place, and the crossbeam, with the condemned person perhaps already nailed to it, would then be attached to the post.

The person executed may have been attached to the cross by rope, though nails and other sharp materials are mentioned in a passage by Josephus, where he states that at the Siege of Jerusalem (70 CE), "the soldiers out of rage and hatred, ''nailed'' those they caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the crosses, by way of jest".<ref>{{cite web|last1=Flavius|first1=Josephus|title=Jewish War, Book V Chapter 11|url=http://www.ccel.org/j/josephus/works/war-5.htm|publisher=ccel.org|access-date=1 June 2015}}</ref> Objects used in the crucifixion of criminals, such as nails, were sought as [[amulets]] with perceived medicinal qualities.<ref>Mishna, Shabbath 6.10: see [https://books.google.com/books?id=EdbdQ-5fMr0C&pg=PA182 David W. Chapman, ''Ancient Jewish and Christian Perceptions of Crucifixion''] (Mohn Siebeck 2008 {{ISBN|978-3-16-149579-3}}), p. 182</ref>

While a crucifixion was an execution, it was also a humiliation, by making the condemned as vulnerable as possible. Although artists have traditionally depicted the figure on a cross with a loin cloth or a covering of the genitals, the person being crucified was usually stripped naked. Writings by Seneca the Younger state some victims suffered a stick forced upwards through their groin.<ref name="Seneca 1946">Seneca, Dialogue "To Marcia on Consolation", in ''Moral Essays'', 6.20.3, trans. John W. Basore, The Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1946) 2:69</ref><ref>[[Wikisource:Of Consolation: To Marcia#XX.]]</ref> Despite its frequent use by the Romans, the horrors of crucifixion did not escape criticism by some eminent Roman orators. [[Cicero]], for example, described crucifixion as "a most cruel and disgusting punishment",<ref>{{cite book|last=Licona|first=Michael|title=The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach|year=2010|publisher=InterVarsity Press|isbn=978-0-8308-2719-0|oclc=620836940|author-link=Michael Licona|page=304}}</ref> and suggested that "the very mention of the cross should be far removed not only from a Roman citizen's body, but from his mind, his eyes, his ears".<ref>{{cite book|last=Conway|first=Colleen M.|title=Behold the Man: Jesus and Greco-Roman Masculinity |year=2008 |publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-532532-4|page=67}} (citing Cicero, ''pro Rabirio Perduellionis Reo'' [http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/citequery3.pl?dbname=PerseusLatinTexts&getid=1&query=Cic.%20Rab.%20Perd.%2019 5.16] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304023505/http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/citequery3.pl?dbname=PerseusLatinTexts&getid=1&query=Cic.%20Rab.%20Perd.%2019 |date=2016-03-04 }}).</ref> Elsewhere he says, "It is a crime to bind a Roman citizen; to scourge him is a wickedness; to put him to death is almost parricide. What shall I say of crucifying him? So guilty an action cannot by any possibility be adequately expressed by any name bad enough for it."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.02.0018:text=Ver.:actio=2:book=5:section=170|title=M. Tullius Cicero, Against Verres, actio 2, The Fifth Book of the Second Pleading in the Prosecution against Verres., section 170|website=www.perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref>

Frequently, the legs of the person executed were broken or shattered with an iron [[Club (weapon)|club]], an act called ''crurifragium'', which was also frequently applied without crucifixion to slaves.<ref name="Wine">{{cite journal|last=Koskenniemi|first=Erkki|author2=Kirsi Nisula|author3=Jorma Toppari|title=Wine Mixed with Myrrh (Mark 15.23) and Crurifragium (John 19.31–32): Two Details of the Passion Narratives|journal=Journal for the Study of the New Testament|volume=27|issue=4|pages=379–391|year=2005|url=http://jnt.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/27/4/379|doi=10.1177/0142064X05055745|s2cid=170143075|access-date=2008-06-13|archive-date=2009-01-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090122113929/http://jnt.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/27/4/379|url-status=dead}}</ref> This act hastened the death of the person but was also meant to [[Punishment#Deterrence|deter]] those who observed the crucifixion from committing offenses.<ref name="Wine" />

[[Constantine I|Constantine the Great]], the first Christian [[Roman Empire|emperor]], abolished crucifixion in the Roman Empire in 337 out of veneration for [[Jesus Christ]], its most famous victim.<ref name="britannica">{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9028045|title=Encyclopædia Britannica Online: crucifixion|author=Encyclopædia Britannica|encyclopedia=Britannica.com|access-date=2009-12-19}}</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=GGJmFIf6mtIC Dictionary of Images and Symbols in Counselling By William Stewart] 1998 {{ISBN|1-85302-351-5}}, p. 120</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bible-archaeology.info/crucifixion.htm|title=Archaeology of the Bible|publisher=Bible-archaeology.info|access-date=2009-12-19|archive-date=2010-03-05|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100305152404/http://www.bible-archaeology.info/crucifixion.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref>