ABSTRACT
Flagellation has long held a prominent place among military punishments. The Romans set the example to later nations, as may be proved from passages in Livy, Polybius, and Tacitus. According to these authors, soldiers were often so violently flogged or whipped that they fainted under the hands of the executioner; and the excessive abuse of the fustuarium supplicium was not seldom the cause of mutiny and riot—the more especially that the number of blows was not determined by law, but left to the will of arbitrary commanders. Most European nations have, in more modern times, resorted to flagellation for the maintenance of military discipline. It is on record that during the thirty years’ war the greatest generals were generally the greatest floggers.
