Zoophilia, mass murder in the name of science, disgusting trophies. Here are 10 stories that make every normal person goofy.
All cases shown in the list come from articles published in "Curiosities of history". This time we chose texts that are better not to read while eating. And which may keep you awake at night.
It's hard not to be disgusted when you read that…
10. In ancient Rome, flogging was at best an exercise in torture. But definitely not proper torture…
The Romans especially liked skinning. Francisco Camilo, "The Skin Ripping of St. Bartholomew "(source:public domain).
When it comes to the techniques of inflicting pain on people in a way that is both cruel and spectacular, the imaginations of the ancient Romans knew no bounds. Flogging was most often administered, but under Emperor Macrinus, punishments were varied. The guilty were sewn up in oxen, burned alive and even skinned. The victims' limbs were also torn from joints, broken with a wheel, roasted while still alive, or locked with poisonous snakes (read more on this topic).
9. Zoophilia was an integral part of medieval village life
In the Middle Ages, women were also suspected of being zoophilia (source:public domain).
In the 7th century, the scholar and monk Jan Klimek described the case of a monastic shepherd who took pleasure with donkeys. Saint Hubert of Liège (7th-8th centuries) put it simply:the more "unclean" the animal was, the greater the punishment for having sex with it was to be. People who mated with animals during their lifetime were to go to hell after death and be raped by "great fiery beasts, so hideous that it is impossible to describe it." Despite this, the lumpy villagers could not give up copulation with animals. Cows, goats and even bitches were involved. And the scale of the phenomenon was really huge… and scientifically proven (read more about it).
8. Baba Yaga was real. She murdered children and made drugs out of them
Enriquet Martí i Ripollés, or Barcelona's Baba Yaga in person (source:public domain).
Bags full of bloody children's clothes, a butcher's knife, bone fragments hidden behind a wall. Clay jars and bowls filled with fragments of bodies and organs - either already preserved or still floating in clotted blood. All this was found in 1912 in Barcelona. These were the "stocks" that Enriqueta Martí and Ripollés collected. The woman kidnapped the children, abused them, knocked them, and then made potions from their remains, which she sold for large sums to wealthy townspeople (read more on this topic).
7. 28 bodies were found on a plot of a 19th-century widow
The remains of 28 men were found at Belle Gunness farm, but police suspected them of a further 21 murders, including farm workers as well as adopted children (source:public domain).
When the police arrived at the Gunness home, they saw the body of the man. There was blood everywhere. The lying man was neither stabbed nor shot. There was an ax in the victim's head. And the deceased was Peter Gunness himself. His wife Belle argued it was an unfortunate accident. The police saw no signs of a homicide. Belle's husbands were dying, leaving her with a hefty inheritance. When the woman died, the bodies of ... 28 men were unearthed in her garden. Most of them died from poison, although the agile widow was not afraid to experiment with other methods as well ... (read more on this topic).
6. Americans returning from the front brought skulls to their homes as souvenirs
Photo of Natalie Nickerson, an employee of a Phoenix factory, writing a letter to a fiancé serving in the navy, thanking him for sending her a souvenir from the fighting in New Guinea - a skull of a Japanese prisoner of war (source:public domain).
The custom of beheading Japanese soldiers was common among Americans fighting in the Far East. The skulls were hung in camps, on information boards and at road intersections. They were kept on bunks and on tables. They even served as "mascots" decorating American tanks and truck cabins. US soldiers were also preparing gifts for their relatives from the bodies of the killed Japanese. A knife made of human bone was even given to one of the American presidents ... (read more about it).
5. British pioneers of obstetrics murdered pregnant women in the name of science
A peaceful drawing? Only until you start asking questions about how it came about ... (source:public domain).
William Hunter and William Smellie, respected fathers of obstetrics, textbook authors and gynecological pioneers in gynecology were at the same time… ruthless murderers. They killed over 30 pregnant women and their children. The discoveries of both men amazed the world of science with their detail. Nobody asked where exactly two doctors obtained so many bodies of women in advanced pregnancy. The first suspicions arose at the beginning of the 19th century. Soon after the revelation emerged that the "fathers of British obstetrics" might have been ruthless butchers (read more on this).
4. The greatest sadist of the Stalinist services loved to abuse the genitals of the victims
Julia Brystiger ps. Bloody Luna. The photo comes from the book by Iwona Kienzler entitled "Bloody Luna and others" (Bellona 2016).
"Bloody Luna" was adored by party comrades and hated by opponents of communist rule. Julia Brystiger, because that was her real name, did not feel Polish, and as soon as the Red Army entered the borders of the Second Polish Republic in 1939, she accepted Soviet citizenship and became an informer of the NKVD. She performed her duties ruthlessly, quickly achieving her first successes. She ordered one of the interrogators to undress. She led the man to the chest of drawers in the room, put his penis in the open drawer, then brutally slam it shut (read more on this topic).
3. The times of the Polish People's Republic abounded with terrifying serial killers
Police photos of "The Vampire from Bytom" (source:public domain).
Władysław Mazurkiewicz killed his victims with potassium cyanide. He served the poison in tea or ham sandwiches. Zdzisław Marchwicki only murdered women. He dragged the dead victims to a secluded place where, after undressing them, he performed various sexual activities. Joachim Knychała hated women. His victims' bodies have always been dismantled and autopsies have shown that the rape was committed post mortem . Leszek Pękalski confessed to killing several dozen people. He murdered because only dead women did not refuse him sex (read more on this topic).
2. Rising stars were also victims of the spine-chilling murders
Natalie Wood was beautiful and talented. But it did not save her from cruel and premature death (photo:Jack Mitchell, license CC BY-SA 4.0-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0).
Evelyn Jane King was killed by a murderer known as "The Strangler from the Hills." Her body was later carefully dismembered. Karin Irene Schlegel was strangled by a pianist. When he got tired of grazing the corpse, he pulled a razor blade from his pockets and began cutting it. On the body of Linda Sobek, bloody ecchymoses and congestion of internal organs were found, indicating suffocation. The woman was the victim of a long-sought serial killer. Natalie Wood died on the yacht Splendor, but since she was all bruised, it's hard to believe that she just drowned (read more on that).
1. The cruel crimes of the Pol Pot regime claimed millions of lives over the course of several years
Flooding table. The prisoner's legs were chained at the top, wrists at the bottom, and water was poured over his face from a green watering can (photo:waterboarding.com, CC BY 2.0).
Murdering with shovels, slitting the throat with blunt tools, choking with plastic bags, burying alive, burning - these are only part of the rich repertoire of torture and killing techniques by the Khmer Rouge led by Pol Pot in Cambodia. In just four years of the Khmer Rouge rule (1975–1979), at least a quarter of the country's 7 million people died. Building an ideal state cost the lives of perhaps 2.5–3 million people. First of all, the intelligentsia and clergy were murdered (read more on this topic).