Torture Display at Kryal Castle
capital punishment, punishment, torture, Kryal Castle, castle, Keith Ryall, tourism, rat, cage, tower, battlements, leisure, recreation, re-creation, entertainment, functions, Ballarat, Melbourne, VIC, Victoria, barbarism, cruelty
An image taken at the Kryal Castle model Medieval Torture display. This mannequin is being tortured using a rat in a cage, an effective form of capital punishment used in the Middle Ages.
About Kryal Castle:
Located 8km from Ballarat in Victoria, Kryal Castle is a local tourist attraction. Described as ‘Australia’s unique medieval castle’, Kryal Castle can be hired for weddings, conferences, functions, and special events. It was built in 1972 and opened in 1974 by Keith Ryall. Its medieval architectural features include crenellation, a moat, and a defended gate with flanking towers, drawbridge and a porticullis.
Jeffrey, N.
2007
N. Jeffrey, 2007
Digital Photograph; JPEG
‘Inferno, canto XIII: The Forest of Suicides’ by Fiona Hall
Afterlife, allegory, art, artwork, birds, canto, Dante Alighieri, dogs, epic poem, forest, Giacomo of Sant’ Andrea, harpies, Hell, ‘Illustrations to Dante’s Divine Comedy’, Inferno, journey, Lano, medieval literature, mastiffs, medieval world-view, modern art, Pier della Vigna (c.1190-1249), photograph, poem, punishment, sin, soul, suffering, The Divine Comedy, The Forest of the Suicides, The National Gallery, trees, underworld, Virgil, wounded.
<p>This photographic artwork by Australian artist Fiona Hall belongs to a series titled ‘Illustrations to Dante’s Divine Comedy’. It is held by The National Gallery of Australia and depicts a scene from canto XIII of Dante Alighieri’s ‘Inferno’, the first part of his famous medieval Italian poem <em>The Divine Comedy</em>. Written between 1308 and 1321,<em> The Divine Comedy</em> tells of Dante’s journey through hell, purgatory and paradise respectively, guided at first by the Roman poet Virgil and then by his ideal woman, Beatrice. In canto XIII, Dante and Virgil descend into the second ring of the seventh circle of hell, where people who committed suicide were cast. They come across a thorny, tangled forest of gnarled trees that bleed and cry in pain when they are broken. One of the trees, who identifies himself as Pier della Vigna, a prominent figure at the imperial court of Frederick II, explains to Dante that people like himself who committed suicide were sent by Minos to the wood where they would grow into trees, all the while being wounded by harpies (half woman/half-bird creatures) who would tear and feast on their leaves. They are then disturbed by the sight of two figures running frantically through the forest. The slower of the two, subsequently identified as Giacomo of Sant’ Andrea, takes refuge in a bush, only to be pounced upon by a number of black female mastiffs who ‘rent him piecemeal’.</p>
<p>For an English translation of ‘Inferno, canto XIII’, translated by the Rev. H. F. Cary, see: <a href="http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/d/dante/d19he/canto13.html">http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/d/dante/d19he/canto13.html</a></p>
Fiona Margaret Hall
The National Gallery of Australia
The National Gallery of Australia
1988
The National Gallery of Australia
Photograph, 53.3cm x 61.5cm.
Medieval "Torture Chamber" at Kryal Castle
capital punishment, punishment, torture, Kryal Castle, castle, Keith Ryall, tourism, tower, battlements, leisure, recreation, re-creation, entertainment, functions, Ballarat, Melbourne, VIC, Victoria, barbarism, cruelty
An image taken at the Kryal Castle model Medieval Torture display. The mannequins have been chained to the wall as prisoners in a medieval 'torture chamber.'
About Kryal Castle:
Located 8km from Ballarat in Victoria, Kryal Castle is a local tourist attraction. Described as ‘Australia’s unique medieval castle’, Kryal Castle can be hired for weddings, conferences, functions, and special events. It was built in 1972 and opened in 1974 by Keith Ryall. Its medieval architectural features include crenellation, a moat, and a defended gate with flanking towers, drawbridge and a porticullis.
Jeffrey, N.
2010
Image used with the permission of N. Jeffrey
Digital Photograph; JPEG
"Torture Wheel" at Kryal Castle
wheel, breaking wheel, capital punishment, punishment, torture, Kryal Castle, castle, Keith Ryall, tourism, tower, battlements, leisure, recreation, re-creation, entertainment, functions, Ballarat, Melbourne, VIC, Victoria, barbarism, cruelty
An image taken at the Kryal Castle model Medieval Torture display. This mannequin is being tortured upon the breaking wheel, an effective form of capital punishment used in the Middle Ages.
About Kryal Castle:
Located 8km from Ballarat in Victoria, Kryal Castle is a local tourist attraction. Described as ‘Australia’s unique medieval castle’, Kryal Castle can be hired for weddings, conferences, functions, and special events. It was built in 1972 and opened in 1974 by Keith Ryall. Its medieval architectural features include crenellation, a moat, and a defended gate with flanking towers, drawbridge and a porticullis.
Jeffrey, N.
2010
Image used with the permission of N. Jeffrey
Digital Photograph; JPEG
Distinctions
bench, church court, Cope, County Court, court, crime, criminal classes, criminal justice, criminal law, ecclesiastical court, General Sessions, judge, judiciary, judicial, justice, Kalgoorlie, law, legal profession, magistrate, Nolan, offence, punishment, Quinlan, religion, sentence, sessions, Skinner, tribunal, WA, Western Australia
In this article from the Kalgoorlie Western Argus, an opening statement about the strength and integrity of the County Court bench in 1900 is contrasted with comments about the incompetence of former members of the judiciary. Four judges are identified as having been ‘lame ducks’, the worst of whom was a man named Quinlan. He, the author suggests “was more fitted for an ecclesiastical medieval tribunal than a secular modern court†because he allowed his religious zeal to influence his decisions, sentencing a defendant who stole from a church with much more severity that one who stole from a private dwelling. “These distinctions between the house of God and that of plain Bill Smith may be acceptable in older countriesâ€, the article continues, “but not in this new landâ€.
Anon.
National Library of Australia
Kalgoorlie Western Argus
17 May 1900, p. 25.
Kalgoorlie Western Argus
PDF; Newspaper Article
English
Untitled article: “the medieval barbarities of our state criminal factoriesâ€
criminal justice, justice, crime, criminal, just, Fremantle, Fremantle prison, gaol, Geraldton Express, incarceration, imprisonment, innocence, medieval barbarity, parliamentary enquiry, penal system, prison, prison reform, prison sentence, punishment, reform, Royal Commission, violence, WA, Western Australia
In the second half of this article, an excerpt from the Geraldton Express discussing the Royal Commission into the penal system in Western Australia is reprinted. The Commission, it asserts, had already succeeded in awaking public opinion to the need for reform and had led to the release of a number of innocent men from prison. In an attempt to emphasise the obsolete practices and inhumane punishments of the penal administration, the author associates them with the pre-modern past. The role of the Commission is described as being “to inquire into the Chamber of National Horrors at Fremantle and the medieval barbarities of our state criminal factoriesâ€.
Anon.
National Library of Australia, <a href="http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article32632366" target="_blank">http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article32632366</a>
West Australian Sunday Times
25 December 1898, p. 18.
West Australian Sunday Times
Newspaper Article
English
Medieval "Justice" Had Strange Ways
accused, barbarity, criminal, criminality, crime, divine intervention, fire, guilt, innocence, justice, law, legal, medieval law, oath, ordeal, Ordeal by Fire, Ordeal by Water, punishment, water
This article from the Junior Argus section of Melbourne newspaper The Argus describes what the author regards as 'strange' methods for ascertaining guilt or innocence in the medieval past. Short of finding reputable people to swear to a person’s innocence upon oath, the article outlines the three different methods used in trials by ordeal. In the Ordeal of Fire, it explains, an accused person was forced to hold a red hot brazier and guilt was determined by whether the hands healed or blistered within a matter of days. Sometimes boiling water was used instead of fire. Alternatively the accused was restrained and thrown into a pool of water, and guilt was determined by whether they sank or swam. The premise of these ordeals was that God would intervene to protect the innocent. The author of the article concludes by drawing modern parallels between these ‘terrible’ and ‘unjust’ medieval practices and the ‘barbaric’ methods of punishment that were still being used in some countries.
Unknown
National Library of Australia: <a href="http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article11264482" target="_blank">http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article11264482</a>
The Argus
5 October 1939
No Copyright
Newspaper article