Scientists: These are the worst ways to die!

The fear of death is deeply rooted in every living being, but some deaths are obviously worse than others. Thus most people would love to die in sleep, and scientists point out the worst ways of dying through history:

1.) Crucifixion

Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the victim is tied, nailed, or otherwise attached to a large wooden beam and left to hang for several days until eventual death from exhaustion and asphyxiation. Crucifixion was usually intended to provide a death that was particularly slow, painful, gruesome, humiliating, and public, using whatever means were most expedient for that goal. The length of time required to reach death could range from hours to days depending on method, the victim's health, and the environment. There are several possible causes of death:

-> cardiac rupture,
-> heart failure,
-> hypovolemic shock,
-> acidosis,
-> asphyxia,
-> arrhythmia,
-> pulmonary embolism.

Death could result from any combination of those factors or from other causes, including sepsis following infection due to the wounds caused by the nails or by the scourging that often preceded crucifixion, eventual dehydration, or animal predation.

2.) Flaying

Flaying, also known colloquially as skinning, was a method of slow and painful execution in which skin is removed from the body. Generally, an attempt is made to keep the removed portion of skin intact. Typical causes of death due to flaying are shock, critical loss of blood or other body fluids, hypothermia, or infections, and that the actual death is estimated to occur from a few hours up to a few days after the flaying.

3.) Boiling to death

Death by boiling is a method of execution in which a person is killed by being immersed in a boiling liquid. Executions of this type were often carried out using a large vessel such as a cauldron or a sealed kettle that was filled with a liquid such as water, oil, tar, or tallow, and a hook and pulley system.

4.) Blood eagle

The blood eagle is a ritualized method of execution, detailed in late skaldic poetry. According to the two instances mentioned in the Sagas, the victim (always a member of a royal family) was placed prone, the ribs severed from the spine with a sharp tool and the lungs pulled through the opening to create a pair of “wings”.

5.) Impalement

Impalement, as a method of execution and also torture, is the penetration of a human by an object such as a stake, pole, spear, or hook, often by complete or partial perforation of the torso. The survival time on the stake is quite variedly reported, from a few seconds or minutes to a few hours or 1 to 3 days. The Dutch overlords at Batavia, present day Jakarta, seem to have been particularly proficient in prolonging the lifetime of the impaled, one witnessing a man surviving 6 days on the stake, another hearing from local surgeons that some could survive 8 or more days. A critical determinant for survival length seems to be precisely how the stake was inserted: If it went into the "interior" parts, vital organs could easily be damaged, leading to a swift death. However, by letting the stake follow the spine, the impalement procedure would not damage the vital organs, and the person could survive for several days.

Thankfully, nowadays these methods are no longer in use, but try to imagine what amount of pain our ancestors have been suffering.

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