Over the many myriads of humankind, our species has devised countless treacherous and barbaric forms of punishment. Across civilisations, we seem to have conceived every possible way to brutalise a person in the most savage manner. Personally, I would wager there are few more horrific ways to die than having a desperate and panicking rodent clawing through your abdomen. That is what we will be covering this week on The WORST of History: Rat Torture.
The Premise of Rat Torture
The tortured victim would be tied down, with a closed-bottom container placed on top of them. Some starved, still-living rats would be placed inside the container, which would then be heated. In their panic to escape, the distressed rats could not bite or scratch through the container, so they would gnaw downwards — into the victim’s flesh.
They would tear through the intestines and bowels, drilling through the body in search of safety. As the screams of the tortured rang out, the rats continued their frantic escape attempt.
History of the Horror
A re-enactment of the torture method with a rat in a cage (Photo courtesy of History of Yesterday)
Ancient Rome is where this method originated — unsurprising given the amount of brutality that era produced. Rats would be trapped in a container and heated, prompting them to burrow through the victim’s body. Emperor Nero was reportedly a fan of this execution method.
Another Roman variation involved starving rats dumped into a barrel containing a human, with more rats added over time to devour the victim. Sometimes the torturers would even open the victim’s abdomen beforehand to give the rats a starting point.
The Torture Museum notes that on the Indian subcontinent, there was another variation: rats were poured into the trousers or underwear of the victim, mauling the genitals and attacking the loins until confession.
Medieval and Early Modern Examples
In Medieval Germany, torturers would burn a cage containing rats. This way, both the victim and the rats were subjected to heat, causing the animals to penetrate the victim’s skin in desperation. Sometimes this was done over the face; the rats would eventually die, their bodies left to rot in the cage.
In England, some victims were locked in rooms full of rats, similar to the “Rats’ Dungeon” in the Tower of London, where water from the River Thames would wash in, bringing rats hungry for human flesh.
One of the first documented, specific cases occurred in the 17th century during the Dutch Revolt. An ally of William the Silent, Diederik Sonoy, used a pottery bowl filled with hot charcoal to force rats to “gnaw into the very bowels of the victim,” according to later accounts.
The Torture Museum describes the method’s grim effectiveness:
“This method was very successful in terms of interrogation, as the offender would feel a powerful combination of disgust, fear, and pain. Often he would confess, without waiting for the rodents to dig their holes.”
If the victim resisted, the account continues:
“They quickly tear through the intestines, deepening the womb, digging up a viscous broth of human entrails… his entire body doubled over in convulsion.”
20th Century Resurgence
As much as we’d like to think of this as a long-forgotten horror, that is sadly not the case.
In the latter half of the 20th century, rat torture saw a resurgence in South America, particularly under the dictatorships of Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay. The most infamous use, however, was in Argentina under dictator Jorge Rafael Videla.
Between 1976 and 1983, around 30,000 people were killed or “disappeared” during the so-called National Reorganisation Process. Women would sometimes vanish right after childbirth, taken to torture chambers where unimaginable cruelty awaited them.
One particularly horrific method involved a “recto-tube” — a pipe leading rats into the rectum or vagina of the victim. This was especially targeted at Jewish citizens.
A Modern Case
Even in 2010, in New Jersey, a case was reported in which David Wax used rat torture on Israeli citizen Yisrael Bryskman to coerce him into granting his wife a get (a Jewish divorce document).
This was only part of a wider plan that included urination, acid burns, and being buried alive. The act was connected to the “New York divorce coercion gang,” which had operated from the 1980s until 2013, attacking Jewish men to force divorce agreements (gittin). Many members received lengthy prison sentences. Thankfully, such cases remain extremely rare.
Epilogue
Of all history’s methods of torture, Rat Torture could easily be one of the most horrifying. To be actively eaten alive by a frantic pack of rats — devouring everything from bowels to eyeballs — is almost unimaginable.
This method has also crept into popular culture. Sigmund Freud’s infamous “Rat Man” case involved a patient obsessively imagining rats torturing a female friend and his father. In George Orwell’s 1984, protagonist Winston is locked in Room 101 with his greatest fear — rats poised to chew through his head.
Edgar Allan Poe, unsurprisingly, drew inspiration from this cruelty in The Pit and the Pendulum, where rats scurry across the narrator’s chest while he faces other grisly torments.
Film and TV have also depicted it as the ultimate interrogation tool — notably in 2 Fast 2 Furious and Game of Thrones.
As Orwell himself wrote in 1984:
“Nothing in the world was so bad as physical pain… of pain, you could wish only one thing: that it should stop.”
