Crucifixion

Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the condemned is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross, beam or stake and left to hang until eventual death.^[1]^[2] It was used as a punishment by the Persians, Carthaginians, and Romans,^[1] among others. Crucifixion has been used in some countries as recently as the 21st century. ^[3]

This article is about crucifixion as a method of capital punishment. For other uses, see Crucifixion (disambiguation).

The crucifixion of Jesus is central to Christianity,^[1] and the cross (sometimes depicting Jesus nailed to it) is the main religious symbol in Christianity.

History and religious texts[edit]

Pre-Roman states[edit]

Crucifixion (or impalement), in one form or another, was used by Persians, Carthaginians, and among the Greeks, the Macedonians.

The Greeks were generally opposed to performing crucifixions.^[49] However, in his Histories, ix.120–122, Greek writer Herodotus describes the execution of a Persian general at the hands of Athenians in about 479 BC: "They nailed him to a plank and hung him up ... this Artayctes who suffered death by crucifixion."^[50] The Commentary on Herodotus by How and Wells remarks: "They crucified him with hands and feet stretched out and nailed to cross-pieces; cf. vii.33. This act, supposedly unusual on the part of Greeks, may be explained by the enormity of the outrage or by Athenian deference to local feeling."^[51]

Sculpture construction: Crucifixion, homage to Mondrian, by Barbara Hepworth, United Kingdom (2007)

Allegory of Poland (1914–1918), postcard by Sergey Solomko

Car-float at the feast of the Virgin of San Juan de los Lagos, Colonia Doctores, Mexico City (2011)

Antisemitic American political cartoon, Sound Money magazine, April 15, 1896, issue

Protester tied to a cross in Washington D.C. (1970)

Crucifixion, by Jan Van Eyck (c. 1430–1440)

Christ Crucified, by Diego Velázquez (1632)

The rebel slaves of the : Between 73 and 71 BCE, a band of slaves, eventually numbering about 120,000, under the (at least partial) leadership of Spartacus were in open revolt against the Roman republic. The rebellion was eventually crushed and, while Spartacus himself most likely died in the final battle of the revolt, approximately 6,000 of his followers were crucified along the 200-km Appian Way between Capua and Rome^[163] as a warning to any other would-be rebels.

Third Servile War

: Jewish man who was crucified around the same time as Jesus; it is widely accepted that his ankles were nailed to the side of the stipes of the cross.

Jehohanan

: His death by crucifixion under Pontius Pilate (c. 30 or 33 CE), recounted in the four 1st-century canonical Gospels, is referred to repeatedly as something well known in the earlier letters of Saint Paul, for instance, five times in his First Letter to the Corinthians, written in 57 CE (1:13, 1:18, 1:23, 2:2, 2:8). Pilate, the Roman governor of Judaea province at the time, is explicitly linked with the condemnation of Jesus by the Gospels, and subsequently by Tacitus.^[164] The civil charge was a claim to be King of the Jews.

Jesus

: Christian apostle, who according to tradition was crucified upside-down at his own request (hence the Cross of Saint Peter),^[165] because he did not feel worthy enough to die the same way as Jesus.

Saint Peter

: Christian apostle and Saint Peter's brother, who is traditionally said to have been crucified on an X-shaped cross (hence the Saint Andrew's Cross).

Saint Andrew

: second Bishop of Jerusalem, crucified in either 106 or 107 CE.^[166]

Simeon of Jerusalem

: the founder of Manicheanism, he was depicted by followers as having died by crucifixion in 274 CE.^[167]

Mani

was venerated as a saint. According to her hagiography, she was stripped naked, tortured, and ultimately crucified on an X-shaped cross.^[168]

Eulalia of Barcelona

was venerated as a saint and represented as a crucified woman, however her legend comes from a misinterpretation of a full-clothed crucifix known as the Volto Santo of Lucca.

Wilgefortis

The : Japanese martyrs who were crucified and impaled with spears.

26 Martyrs of Japan

Breaking wheel

Crucifixion darkness

List of methods of capital punishment

Positional asphyxia

Tropaion

"Forensic and Clinical Knowledge of the Practice of Crucifixion" by Frederick Zugibe

Jesus's death on the cross, from a medical perspective

at the Wayback Machine (archived February 12, 2012)