List of methods of capital punishment

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Electric chair as used for electrocutions. The electric chair was developed in the late 1880s by a dentist with support from Thomas Edison (who had a financial interest in having direct current used in providing electricity, whereas the electric chair uses alternating current) and is still in use today.

Gas chamber (configured for lethal injection)

Crushing by elephant

[edit] Methods of capital punishment

Methods of execution used to carry out capital punishment have varied over time, and include:

Burning, especially for religious heretics and witches on the stake
Breaking wheel
Burial (alive, also known as the pit)
Crucifixion
Crushing by a weight, abruptly or as a slow ordeal - see also Various animal-related methods below.
Decapitation, or beheading (as by sword, axe or guillotine)
Disembowelment
Dismemberment
Drawing and quartering
Drowning
Electrocution (also electric chair)
Explosives
Exposure in animal skin
Flaying
Garrote
Gassing
Guillotine
Hanging
Impalement
Lethal injection
Poisoning
Pendulum Blade
Sawing
Scaphism and other similar methods
Shooting can be performed either
- by Firing squad
- by a single shooter (such as the neck shot, often performed on a kneeling prisoner, as in the PR China)
- (especially collectively) by cannon or machine gun
Slow slicing
Stabbing
Starvation and Dehydration (sometimes as immurement)
Stoning
By being thrown from a height. Rome executed murderers and traitors by flinging them from the Tarpeian Rock. Defenestration, the act of throwing someone from a window, has been used more by rebels and angry mobs than by official executions. Death flights, throwing someone off a plane or helicopter, have been used in more recent times.
Various animal-related methods
- Tearing apart by horses, e.g. Ancient China (using five horses) or "quartering," with four horses, as in The Song of Roland and Child Owlet
- Attack/devouring by animals, such as dogs or wolves, as in Ancient Rome and the Biblical lion's den; by rodents (such as rats); by alligators or crocodiles, or carnivorous fish (such as piranhas or sharks); by crabs or by insects (such as ants)
- Venomous stings from scorpions and bites by snakes, spiders, etc.
- Snake pit