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Execution by pressing - Definition and Overview |
| Related Words: Acquittal, Action, Administration, Agency, Angary, Annexation, Art, Assassination, Attachment, Ax, Bane, Beheading, Block, Blood, Bloodletting, Burning |
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Pressing (also known in England by its French name, peine forte et dure) was a form of torture and capital punishment carried out by lying a prisoner on the ground and placing a board on top of them. Rocks or other weights were then placed on top of the board until his or her body was crushed. It was abolished as a judicial punishment in England in 1772.
Pressing as a mode of torture was carried out in Arthur Miller's The Crucible when an elderly man, Giles Corey, refused to answer to charges of witchcraft: "All he would say was, more weight".
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