ABSTRACT
The earliest record of the use of entomology in a criminal investigation is described in a book published in China in the thirteenth century. The book, called His Yuan Lu (“The Washing Away of Wrongs”), contains a description of a murder investigation in a rice paddy. The incident involved a homicide committed by one of the workers. The investigator lined up the workers and told them to lay their sickles on the ground. One of the implements contained very faint traces of blood. Although this could not have been identified as blood scientifically at that time, it almost immediately attracted flies. Since the only implement that could have caused the murder was a sickle and the murderer had to be one of the workers, the flies “identified” the guilty worker’s sickle as having blood on it. The perpetrator of the crime was, in effect, caught red-handed and he confessed.
