11. A hollowed-out giant bronze sculpture of a bull, the brazen bull would entomb an unfortunate individual and be heated until the prisoner roasted alive.
The “brazen bull”, also known as the Sicilian Bull, was a disputed torture device allegedly stemming from Ancient Greece, specifically the city-state of Akragas. Designed during the reign of the tyrant Phalaris (r. 570-554 BCE) by Perillos of Athens, the bull, as recorded by Diodorus Siculus, was supposedly made from bronze but hollowed out and with a door on one side. Once the victim was contained within, a fire would be lit beneath, heating the metal until either death or release. Using an intricate system of tubes and piping, the screams of the roasting prisoner were transmuted into sounds reminiscent of a raging bull.
Whilst historians have questioned whether or not the brazen bull truly existed or was merely an early form of propaganda against an unpopular ruler, it enjoys a prolonged legacy nonetheless. After Perillos created his device, Phalaris allegedly ordered the engineer demonstrate its effectiveness with his own flesh. Eventually, it is claimed that the tyrant was himself murdered with the very instrument of his cruelty by Telemachus. Centuries later, the Roman Emperor Hadrian reputedly used such a device to torture and kill Christians. The Bishop of Pergamon, killed during the reign of Domitian, the first martyr of Asia Minor, was burned to death in 287.