Talk:Breaking wheel

message: The reference to "Probertenencyclopaedia - illustrated" doesn't work now. 
AWhiteC 21:54, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Broken reference

message: the article states : "In the Holy Roman Empire, it is named (alongside impalement) as a mode of execution in in the "Cautio criminalis" of the Habsburg Emperor Charles V, against traitors, highway robbers and notorious debauchees.". I questioned this, and somebody said it was from the Catholic Encyclopedia. The passage indeed seems to be derived from there, but even in context, said passage is about impossible to understand and verify. I mean : a) I can't find any references to a Hapsburg "cautio criminalis" , b) This is the first time I hear of impalement being mentioned in a Western European criminal code and c)the three crimes cited would not normally be punishable the same way, especially debauchery, which ordinarily entailed relatively light penalties, or went all the way to even worse than the wheel if it entailed such dreadful abominations as homosexuality or bestiality. So overall this passage does not make sense, and unless it can be improved in a hurry, I'm motioning to get suppressed altogether. --Svartalf 20:20, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Use in the Holy German Empire

message: The paragraph beginning with "The methods of execution by crucifixion..." needs a cleanup.  I'm not sure what it's trying to say.  The entire "Description" section should be in chronological order as best as possible. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 38.112.23.58 (talk) 16:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup 

message: I removed the following, which seemed like a haphazard collections of factoids without sources, sometimes of a dubious relevance:
David.Monniaux 13:32, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Content removed 

message: I've read the article twice through, and it lacks enough relevant imagery to help one picture what the wheel is or how it works. People were tied to a wheel? Why a wheel? You could beat someone up tied to a post or chained to a wall. What do "gaps" in the wheel have to do with it? Was the wheel vertical or horizontal? What about the "beams" and the "Saint Andrews Cross?" Is a cross a kind of wheel? I'm not deliberately trying to be snarky; the fact is, my understanding of this subject has not increased as a result of this article. I came to the article not knowing what "breaking on the wheel" means, and I left it still not knowing. 161.11.130.249 (talk) 16:28, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: 
Basics to be reworked: breaking was a TWO-fold process
1. A person was "spread-eagled", and a big wheel was smashed down, in a number of strokes, breaking his bones.
2. The mangled body, either dead or alive, was then WEAVED between the spokes of another wheel (made possible because his bones were..broken). That wheel, with the in-weaved body 8dead or alive) was then hoisted up in some position.
Obviously, under 1., you didn't really need a WHEEL to do the smashing, a cudgel would do the job equally well.
Arildnordby (talk) 12:49, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Process 

message: "The breaking wheel was used as a form of execution in Germany as recently as the early 19th century. Its use as a method of execution was not fully abolished in Bavaria until 1813, and still in use until 1836 in Hesse-Kassel. In Prussia, the punishment of death was inflicted by decapitation, with a large sword, by burning, and by breaking on the wheel. There, where atrocious criminals were required, by the penal code, to be broken upon the wheel, the king always issued an order to the executioner to strangle the criminal (which was done by a small cord not easily seen) before his limbs were broken. The last execution of this stronger form of capital punishment was on 13 August 1841.[10]"
this does not distinguish well enough between PRE-mortem breaking on the wheel ("von unten auf") and POST-mortem breaking of the condemned.
In Kurhessen, for example, the criminal was, in the 19th century, BEHEADED before his body was broken.
With either prior beheading in Kurhessen, prior strangulation in Prussia or "Gnadenstoss" (first blow on chest to kill prior to breaking of rest of body) in other states, "breaking on the wheel" was not, really a form of EXECUTION, but an indignity performed on the corpse.
As it stands, it is really muddled.
Arildnordby (talk) 12:44, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  This subsection needs substantial reworking! 

message: This needs revision, I think.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.177.33.164 (talk) 16:58, 5 June 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Current Use 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: A detailed story of torture by the breaking wheel occurs in the late 1st to early 2nd century Fourth Book of the Maccabees, chapters 9-11.  
68.55.36.161 (talk) 23:27, 12 May 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hellenistic origins 

message: Although I don't speak the language, I remember seeing a German TV movie or series which depicted this punishment. This was in the 1990s and I assume the show is also from that era. Does anyone know what this was? DancesWithGrues (talk) 23:14, 3 December 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Screen depictions