Elephants occasionally dismembered the condemned as in this 1681 drawing from An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon by Robert Knox.

Crushing by elephant was a common sentence for those condemned to death throughout south and southeast Asia, particularly India, for over 4,000 years. The Romans and Carthaginians also used this method on occasions, and it is mentioned by Josephus and the deuterocanonical book of 3 Maccabees in connection with the Egyptians. An Execution by an Eliphant, from An Historical Relation Of the Island Ceylon by Robert Knox (London, 1681) File links The following pages link to this file: Wikipedia:Unusual articles Crushing by elephant Template talk:Feature/archive1 Wikipedia:Todays featured article/April 2004 Wikipedia:Todays featured article/April... An Execution by an Eliphant, from An Historical Relation Of the Island Ceylon by Robert Knox (London, 1681) File links The following pages link to this file: Wikipedia:Unusual articles Crushing by elephant Template talk:Feature/archive1 Wikipedia:Todays featured article/April 2004 Wikipedia:Todays featured article/April... Events March 4 - Charles II of England grants a land charter to William Penn for the area that will later become Pennsylvania. ... Depiction of an execution by an elephant, from An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon is a book written by the English trader and sailor Robert Knox in 1681, describing his experiences some years earlier on the South Asian island now best known... Death by crushing, as a method of execution, has a long and bloody history, and the techniques to achieve this end varied greatly from place to place. ... Jump to: navigation, search Genera and Species Loxodonta Loxodonta cyclotis Loxodonta africana Elephas Elephas maximus Elephas recki † Stegodon † Mammuthus † Girrelephants found again! Girrelephants, they are the new species that are made when baby elephants and girrafes have kids they form the Girrelephant. ... Jump to: navigation, search Death Penalty World Map Color Key: Blue: Abolished for all crimes Green: Abolished, except for crimes committed under certain circumstances (such as crimes committed in time of war) Orange: Abolished in practice Red: Legal form of punishment Capital punishment, also referred to as the death penalty... Composite satellite image of the Indian subcontinent Map of South Asia. ... Location of Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is a subregion of Asia. ... Jump to: navigation, search The Roman Empire is the term conventionally used to describe the Ancient Roman polity in the centuries following its reorganization under the leadership of Octavian (better known as Caesar Augustus). ... A map of the central Mediterranean Sea, showing the location of Carthage (near modern Tunis). ... Josephus (ca. ... The deuterocanonical books are the books that Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Oriental Orthodoxy include in the Old Testament that were not part of the Jewish Tanakh. ... The Biblical book 3 Maccabees is found in most Orthodox Bibles as a part of the deuterocanonical books. ...

For many centuries elephants were also used for military purposes, and death under the foot of an elephant was commonplace for deserters or prisoners as well as for military criminals. Desertion is the act of abandoning or withdrawing support from an entity to which one has given an oath, or has claimed to owe allegiance, responsibility or loyalty. ... for other uses please see Crime (disambiguation) A crime is an act that violates a political or moral law. ...

Rabbi Petachiah of Ratisbon, a twelfth-century Jewish traveler, reported an execution by this means during his stay in northern Mesopotamia: Rabbi (Classical Hebrew רִבִּי ribbÄ«;; modern Ashkenazi and Israeli רַבִּי rabbÄ«) in Judaism, means teacher, or more literally great one. The word Rabbi is derived from the Hebrew root-word RaV, which in biblical Hebrew means great or distinguished,. In the ancient Judean schools the sages were addressed as רִבִּי (Ribbi or Rebbi... Also called Petachiah ben Yakov, Moses Petachiah, or Petachiah of Regensburg; Bohemian rabbi of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. ... The word Jew ( Hebrew: יהודי) is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or someone of Jewish descent with a connection to Jewish culture or ethnicity and often a combination of these attributes. ... Mesopotamia (Greek: Μεσοποταμία, translated from Old Persian Miyanrudan the fertile cresent; Aramaic name being Beth-Nahrain House of Two Rivers) is a region of Southwest Asia. ...

At Nineveh there was an elephant. Its head is not protruding. It is big, eats about two wagon loads of straw at once; its mouth is in its breast, and when it wants to eat it protrudes its lip about two cubits, takes up the straw with it, and puts it in its mouth. When the sultan condemns anyone to death, they say to the elephant, "this person is guilty." It then seizes him with its lip, casts him aloft and slays him."

The English sailor Robert Knox, writing in 1681, described a method of execution by elephant which he had seen while being held captive in Sri Lanka: A sultan (Arabic: سلطان) is an Islamic title, with several historical meanings. ... Robert Knox in the frontispiece of An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon, 1681 Robert Knox (1642-1720) was a sea captain in the service of the British East India Company. ... Events March 4 - Charles II of England grants a land charter to William Penn for the area that will later become Pennsylvania. ...

The King makes use of them for Executioners; they will run their Teeth through the body, and then taer [sic] it in pieces, and throw it limb from limb. They have sharp Iron with a socket with three edges, which they put on their Teeth at such times...
(An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon [1], Robert Knox, London, 1681)

Rousselet described this execution in Le Tour du Monde in 1868.

During an expedition to central India in 1868, Mr. Louis Rousselet described the execution of a criminal by elephant. A sketch was made of the execution showing the condemned being forced to place his head upon a pedestal, and then being held there while an elephant crushed his head underfoot. The sketch was made into a woodcut and printed in "Le Tour du Monde", a widely circulated French journal of travel and adventure. Depiction of an execution by an elephant, from An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon is a book written by the English trader and sailor Robert Knox in 1681, describing his experiences some years earlier on the South Asian island now best known... Download high resolution version (650x942, 344 KB)A Woodcut of an execution by elephant published in the 1868 issue of Le Tour Du Monde This image has been released into the public domain by the copyright holder, its copyright has expired, or it is ineligible for copyright. ... Download high resolution version (650x942, 344 KB)A Woodcut of an execution by elephant published in the 1868 issue of Le Tour Du Monde This image has been released into the public domain by the copyright holder, its copyright has expired, or it is ineligible for copyright. ... 1868 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... 1868 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... A woodcut is a method of printing in which an image is carved into the surface of a piece of wood, with the printing parts remaining level with the surface while the non-printing parts are removed, typically with chisels. ...

Occasionally, executions would be prolonged either by having the elephant drag the condemned through the streets before the execution (usually by a rope attached to the elephant's leg), or through the use of an elephant that was trained to crush limbs first, and then the chest, often with excruciating slowness.

Most rajahs kept elephants for the purpose of execution by crushing. These executions were often held in public as a warning to any who might transgress. To that end, many of the elephants were especially large, often weighing in excess of nine tons. The executions were intended to be gruesome and, by all accounts, they often were. A Raja (sometimes spelled Rajah) is a king, or princely ruler. ... The word ton or tonne is derived from the Old English tunne, and ultimately from the Old French tonne, and referred originally to a large cask with a capacity of 2526 wine gallons, which holds approximately 21000 pounds of water. ...

Some monarchs also adopted this form of execution for their own entertainment. Emperor Jahangir of India's long-running Mughal dynasty ordered a huge number of criminals to be crushed for this purpose, although the Mughals had no monopoly on death by elephant; during the 18th century the rival Marathas confederacy also used this method of execution. The Maratha Sardar Santaji Ghorpade (1764-1794) admitted to a weakness for this particular punishment and, for the slightest error, would order an offender to be crushed beneath the enormous feet of his royal elephant. Jahangir was born on 9 September 1569 at Fatehpur Sikri. ... The Mughal Empire (alternative spelling Mogul, which is the origin of the word Mogul) of India was founded by Babur in 1526, when he defeated Ibrahim Lodi, the last of the Delhi Sultans at the First Battle of Panipat. ... (17th century - 18th century - 19th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701 through 1800. ... Extent of the Maratha Confederacy ca. ... 1764 was a leap year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... 1794 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ...

Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, Muslim courts of law in South Asia commonly ordered their condemned to be crushed by elephants. Increased domination by the British Empire led to the decline and eventual end of elephant executions. Death by elephant is still not uncommon in parts of Africa and South Asia where humans and elephants co-exist, but these tend to be the result of wild elephants attacking humans rather than tame elephants being used by humans to kill other humans. Jump to: navigation, search A Muslim (Arabic: مسلم) is an adherent of Islam. ... The British Empire in 1897, marked in pink, the traditional colour for Imperial British dominions on maps The British Empire was the worlds first global power (today known as a hyperpower), a product of the European Age of Exploration that began with the global maritime empires of Portugal and...

A similar, but unrelated term is Elephant "Crushing". It refers to a method of domesticating young elephants seen mainly in Asia. The practice is condemned by animal rights groups such as PETA. Jump to: navigation, search World map showing Asia (geographically) Asia is the central and eastern part of Eurasia and worlds largest continent. ... In physics and mathematics, peta (symbol: P) is a prefix in the SI system of units denoting 1015, or 1 000 000 000 000 000. ...