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Garrote - Definition and Overview |
| Related Words: Asphyxiate, Asphyxiation, Behead, Beheading, Bowstring, Burke, Burn, Burning, Choke, Choking, Crucifixion, Crucify, Decapitate, Decapitation, Defenestrate, Defenestration, Drown, Drowning, Electrocution, Execute, Execution |
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A garrote (alternative spellings include garotte and garrotte) is a handheld weapon, most often referring to a ligature of chain, rope, or wire used to strangle someone to death. This was the tactic commonly employed by the Thugs and is sometimes used in assassination.
Some incidents of garroting have involved a stick used to tighten the garrote. One of the reasons possession of a nunchaku is illegal in many jurisdictions is that it can easily be employed as a garrote in some configurations.
The term also refers to a torture execution device which had been used by the Spaniards until Franco's dictatorship as recently as 1974, consisting of a seat binding the condemned person while the executioner tightened a metal band around his neck with a crank or a wheel. Some versions of this device incorporated a fixed sharp metal blade directed at the spinal cord, to kill the executee when he was no longer able to resist.
In the James Bond thriller The World Is Not Enough, the character of Elektra King places the hero in a garrote intending to kill him, but he miraculously escapes.
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