The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 373 This Is Not Torture

In the empty courtyard in the middle of Yekaterinburg, on the square in front of the entrance steps of the main building of the castle.

The emperor ordered the imperial envoy Wang Yinzhi and the special commissioner of the Military Court to stand under the porch to preside over the execution, while the former Russian Tsar Alexander supervised the execution on the ground below the steps.

A group of military law officers from Shuntian Prefecture dragged out Yang Yuchun, the resigned governor of the Central Asian Theater of the Ming Dynasty, and Alexander's wife Elizabeth.

The officers verified the identities of the two persons according to the procedure and asked Alexander to personally confirm that Elizabeth was not arrested by mistake.

The officers then pinned the two men to the ground and pulled their pants down to their knees. Then two or four officers each picked up a stick as tall as a person and started beating them.

Yang Yuchun and Elizabeth were ultimately punished for adultery. Elizabeth was a married woman, so both of them were given ninety sticks.

A stick as thick as their wrists hit them, and both of them screamed in pain.

Yang Yuchun was born a soldier, so he was able to endure a little and not scream heart-wrenchingly like ordinary people.

But Yang Yuchun was in despair at this moment, and his screams were a way to vent his pain and regret.

His self-debasement was so successful that the emperor directly relieved him of all his duties and recalled him to the capital to leave him idle.

Before that, I have to be judged as an ordinary officer.

The worst result would be that he would gain no military merit this time and would never have the opportunity to lead troops in battle again.

If I had known this earlier, I should have honestly accepted the credit this time.

There is a great probability that he can get the title of Duke, and then he can enter the Privy Council to drink tea and live out his retirement, and then retire and return home at the age of seventy.

Before the stick hit him, Yang Yuchun already understood what was going on.

The monarch he was facing now was not the traditional monarch in history books and stories at all, but a so-called "sage monarch" who was eccentric and had a strong desire for control.

In order to prevent Europe from getting out of control, he forced himself into the European war immediately after conquering America ten years ago.

In order to keep the war situation under control, the world unification war was postponed for seven years. Extremely detailed preparations were made, leaving twelve points of margin and redundancy.

If the ministers do things exactly as he arranges, then everything will go smoothly and they will be rewarded generously in the end.

Even if the situation was not suitable at the time and they could not get the best reward, he would find another opportunity to make up for it, or even deliberately make up for it for them.

Just like this world unification war, he stuffed retired generals into the staffs of various war zones in order to give them a collective boost in qualifications.

Let these first-generation veterans of the Tiangong Dynasty have a sense of participation in the unification of the world, and come to sign in and receive medals in this event.

But he obviously hated uncontrollable factors. If his subjects had their own ideas and acted without consulting him, the consequences would be very serious.

What he did this time was equivalent to evading the arrangements he had made, which was something he could not tolerate.

Yang Yuchun felt that his military command career was completely over.

In fact, Zhu Jianxuan himself does not realize that his plans, actions and habits will be viewed completely differently by different people.

At the same time, Russian Tsar Alexander was also extremely surprised by the current situation.

A general who presided over a war of annihilation and the queen of a powerful enemy country were publicly stripped of their pants and beaten with a stick by the emperor.

The charge was adultery. When Alexander read books introducing Ming culture, he knew that this was a very serious crime in the Ming Dynasty.

However, due to my living environment, I have never felt any real sense of this matter.

Now I have experienced it myself.

Even someone like Yang Yuchun would be publicly executed if he committed adultery.

At the same time, while Alexander was stunned by the reality, he regained his composure mentally.

After Alexander was captured, he was shocked and puzzled by Yang Yuchun's actions, which mainly overturned his previous imagination of the Ming Dynasty.

Now the imperial envoy sent by the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty has come and declared that what Yang Yuchun did before was wrong, which in turn proves that his previous understanding and imagination were correct.

General Yang Yuchun is just an arrogant madman.

Alexander's feelings for his wife were not particularly deep, but their relationship was normal.

Although he was quite unhappy about his wife's affair with Yang Yuchun, European aristocrats did not consider adultery as a serious crime.

So when Alexander's wife was beaten at the beginning, seeing her screaming and begging for mercy, Alexander felt a sense of relief.

But as the beating lasted longer and longer, and his wife almost didn't have the strength to even scream, Alexander slowly began to feel a little bit sorry for her.

Alexander listened to the numbers counted by the officer next to him and was a little worried that his wife might be beaten to death after ninety blows.

When the number of sticks reached over sixty, Elizabeth could hardly scream.

Alexander finally couldn't help it and turned to the imperial envoy next to him and said:

"Your Excellency, I think Elizabeth is almost dying. Will this beating kill her?"

Wang Yinzhi said with a straight face:

"If a married man commits adultery with another, he deserves to be beaten to death."

Alexander was stunned for a moment:
"This... No, you mean, if he is really beaten to death, then he will die in vain?"

Wang Yinzhi continued:

"What do you mean by died in vain? Do you still have any mercy on this whore?"

Alexander felt there was a problem:
"Elizabeth was a noblewoman, the queen of Russia and a princess of Germany. If she was to be executed, she should have been beheaded directly, not tortured like ordinary people.

“Although there is no technique involved in this form of punishment, slowly beating someone to death should indeed be considered torture.

"Besides... having an extramarital affair does not warrant the death penalty. It is a particularly serious sin in Europe..."

Wang Yinzhi interrupted Alexander before he finished listening, and reminded and warned him very seriously and even harshly:
"The prince is guilty of the same crime as any common people, and he is no longer a queen or princess, but just a commoner in Russia.

"At the same time, caning is not torture, and we didn't intend to torture her.

“It’s about using her as an example to warn others not to follow suit.

"What is an extramarital affair? That's adultery! What is not a particularly serious sin? That's a matter of reputation!
"You are already citizens under the rule of the Ming Dynasty, so you must naturally abide by the laws of the Ming Dynasty.

"Adultery shall be punished with eighty strokes of the cane, and a married man with ninety strokes.

"We are sentencing according to the law."

Alexander opened his mouth and subconsciously felt that it was inappropriate to directly use Ming Dynasty laws to govern Europeans, especially things like adultery were not worth discussing.

Although Yang Yuchun and Elizabeth are being punished now, Alexander himself also has mistresses.

Will I be punished if I have any contact with my mistress again in the future?
That's not appropriate.

But what Wang Yinzhi said is also true. Now that the Ming Dynasty has conquered Russia, the Ming Dynasty's laws should indeed be effective in Russia.

Simply enforcing this kind of law by force will definitely cause a lot of trouble.

From now on, sheriffs in various places will no longer have to do anything else but to focus on beating the nobles who commit adultery every day.

Alexander felt that his and Wang Yinzhi's thinking logic was not in the same direction, and the customs and habits of the Ming people and Europeans were also very different.

It is not appropriate to directly apply the laws of the Ming Dynasty here.

The key point is that Alexander was a monarch before and was not good at direct debate.

The key point is that now he has become a prisoner, and what he says is not an order, so the generals and officials of the Ming Dynasty will not listen to him at all.

In fact, when it comes to criminal law, ancient Europe and China actually had similar traditions.

For example, "No punishment shall be imposed on doctors."

If the traditional nobles of Shenzhou committed serious crimes, they were encouraged to commit suicide rather than being tortured.

However, this tradition is very old in Shenzhou, at least it was left over from the Spring and Autumn Period or even earlier. After the Warring States Period, people began to advocate that "princes who break the law should be punished the same as common people."

Similar situations in Europe continued until the late 19th century and even the early 20th century, when they gradually disappeared.

European nobles of this era who committed serious crimes were eligible for simple and direct execution.

For example, beheading by guillotine or hanging.

Beheading was a privilege of the nobility, but commoners basically had to face torture, and the death penalty for commoners was by default torture.

Torturing civilians who committed crimes with the intent to kill them was a common phenomenon and a justifiable treatment in ancient Europe, rather than a special punishment for certain extremely evil people.

Publicly torturing prisoners until they die has long been a typical folk entertainment, and it can even be considered a European cultural tradition.

In the technical field of torture, there are many legends in ancient China, as well as many speculations that are chilling for modern people to imagine.

However, whether in terms of the richness of torture or the extent of its use, Shenzhou cannot catch up with Europe.

The reason for this is that Shenzhou matured too early in the classical empire era, and the power to sentence the death penalty was returned to the emperor very early on.

During the Warring States Period, the seven major powers of China entered the imperial era, with the king and court officials directly ruling the country, replacing the multi-level feudal system.

By the Western Han Dynasty, the classical empire that encompassed the entire core area of ​​Chinese civilization was officially formed.

It also happened that the famous story of Ti Ying saving her father occurred, which led to Emperor Wen of Han's decision to abolish corporal punishment. This event was in line with the historical trend.

After the power to sentence the death penalty in the entire civilized world was vested in the emperor, at the public official legal level, no one could torture a prisoner with the intention of killing him unless the emperor gave an order.

Therefore, most tortures in ancient Shenzhou were private punishments, and if they were official acts, they would be criticized as brutal.

In the entire civilized world, there is only one person who can legally order the execution of a person, so it is difficult to accumulate torture technology legally and openly.

Moreover, because the cultural environment did not support it, even if a talented cruel official occasionally appeared and used divergent thinking to create various unique tortures, it was usually difficult for them to be passed on.

Civilian lynching is accumulated in an illegal environment. It is slow to innovate and difficult to spread and communicate. Once discovered by the authorities, it is easy to be cut off directly.

The key point is that in ancient Shenzhou, private individuals and officials used torture, and the purpose was basically to obtain intelligence through interrogation, and torture was a means.

Torture in Europe is sometimes a means, but most of the time torture itself is the end.

In ancient Rome, Europe, as a slave state, was accustomed to using torture to torture slaves, captives and prisoners. It also had the bronze bull punishment similar to the Shang Dynasty's burning of people with fire.

The cross is a common instrument of torture with a long tradition.

The victim's hands and feet were nailed to the cross with nails. Due to the weight of the victim's body, the wounds would continue to be torn, but they would not fall off.

The victim could hang on the cross for several days before dying.

In the Middle Ages and later, Europe was in a state of division for a long time and adopted the feudal system for a long time.

In Europe at that time, especially in the German region in central Europe, a small lord who only owned a village had the legal power to sentence and execute people.

In addition, Europe retained the serfdom system for a long time. Serfs were not considered free people and faced arbitrary punishment from their lords at any time.

In European feudal manors where there was a lack of entertainment, torture became a typical entertainment activity.

Therefore, torture is not considered cruel. It is a technology that can be openly and legally researched and passed on, and it is also a technology that can be exchanged and discussed for innovation.

There are records in Germany of manor lords exchanging serfs and torturing and killing them for fun.

Feudal lords of all sizes and their craftsmen have lived in similar circles since childhood, and have been influenced by them and passed down their knowledge from generation to generation.

They have developed countless highly specialized techniques on how to torture prisoners without killing them immediately, and their executioners understand the human body better than doctors.

When the masters of the Shenzhou Empire's court used lingchi to torture prisoners, they could usually only keep the prisoners alive for two to three days.

A craftsman in a German village could torture a prisoner for seven to nine days.

In the basements of castles of all sizes throughout Europe, there are a large number of torture instruments, which are historical relics that were once frequently used.

The torture in reality in Shenzhou is usually very simple and crude. The torture in the story often has a lot of imagination that is inconsistent with biology because there is no real practice.

European torture methods were diverse and had solid techniques.

For example, the Shenzhou people imagined skinning by making an incision and then pouring mercury into it, but this method is feasible for birds but not for mammals.

Whoever imagined this torture didn't know that chicken skin and human skin have different structures.

European craftsmen continued to explore and upgrade their techniques, such as the development of their skinning technology.

There are records of the initial attempts to skin people alive, which gradually developed to the point where ordinary craftsmen could skin half a skin, and finally to the point where they could stably and completely skin a whole skin without causing death.

When Europeans skinned the natives in America to make boots, it was not because they wanted to torment or insult the natives on purpose; it was a mature technology they had.

The nobles and clergy in their European homeland used this technology to deal with the serfs under their own management.

The legends of Bloody Mary and vampires both have universal historical prototypes. In European history, there were indeed nobles who liked to squeeze the blood of virgins to drink.

The European tradition of torture continued into the late 19th century, spreading throughout the world as they expanded across the globe.

The atrocities committed by Leopold II in Congo were the colonial embodiment of Europe's tradition of torture.

It was not until capitalism entered the era of monopoly and European and American countries truly became a whole that various forms of torture finally subsided.

Louis XVI improved the guillotine in the late 18th century, allowing prisoners to die more easily and quickly.

It also allowed civilians to be executed directly by guillotine instead of being tortured to death, which was indeed a benevolent policy in Europe at that time.

The understanding of criminal law by Europeans like Alexander is very different from that of Ming people like Wang Yinzhi.
So the two of them were talking irrelevantly.

Alexander was unable to convince Wang Yinzhi, but his wife Elizabeth was not killed in the end.

The Ming Dynasty officials in charge of executions were all experienced. They would decide whether to beat the prisoners to death based on the direct or indirect instructions of their superiors.

They could beat a person to death with thirty or forty sticks, or half to death with a hundred sticks.

The Ming Dynasty officials had accumulated sufficient experience in this technology, and they were not instructed to beat the prisoners to death directly during this mission.

So they controlled the severity of the stick according to the actual situation of the prisoners.

It gets lighter and lighter towards the end.

Elizabeth and Yang Yuchun had very different physical abilities, but in the end both were completely exhausted, yet neither of them suffered internal injuries that could have resulted in death.

After the execution, Wang Yinzhi asked the military doctor to give the two men medicine and sent them back to their room to recuperate on the bed.

Then he ordered the Military Court to continue investigating and handling other officers.

Due to the leadership of Yang Yuchun, the chief officer, and the fact that the local European women did not have the Chinese concept of chastity, many similar cases occurred.

The Military Court continued to enforce the law in Yekaterinburg, dealing with all the officers and soldiers who had committed crimes one by one.

Groups of people were spanked publicly in the square.

In the name of the emperor, he read out a reprimand for Yang Yuchun and all the officers and soldiers who did not obey the law, and reiterated the seriousness of military law and Ming Dynasty laws.

The local garrison was asked to curb their reckless attitude and act with caution.

A month later, the Military Court had basically completed its work, and the military discipline of the Yekaterinburg garrison had been cleared up, which was obviously much better than before the Military Court arrived.

The governor, Yang Yuchun, was beaten and dismissed from his post. This kind of punishment for senior military officers has a good deterrent effect.

Yang Yuchun and Elizabeth only suffered minor injuries without any broken bones. After a month of recuperation, they can now move around somewhat.

Then Yang Yuchun and all the punished officers, Russian high-ranking officials such as Elizabeth and Alexander, were escorted by officials on the journey back to Shuntian Prefecture.

Yang Yuchun also had to return to Shuntian Prefecture to report to the emperor, and Alexander had to pay a visit to the Ming Emperor as a surrendered foreign monarch.

(End of this chapter)