With a history fraught with conflict and a succession of ruling powers, the Maltese Islands have seen some hair-raisingly horrendous punishments for even the pettiest of crimes.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, some of the harshest punishments in Malta's history took place under the Order of Saint John, from 1530 to 1798. During this time, Maltese society was made up of clearly distinct classes in terms of breaking the law, including Members of the Order, the Church (the Inquisition and all their dependents), the non-privileged Maltese (subjects of the Grand Master), and the underworld buon voglia convicts and slaves.
If you were caught gambling or duelling...
At the time, crimes committed were mainly murder, thefts and robberies, physical assaults and sexual crimes, as well as gambling, fraud, duelling, escape from quarantine on Manoel Island, and escape of slaves and convicts. Interestingly, the idea of reforming criminals was completely nonexistent - if you were found guilty and not sentenced to death, the rest of your life was made into a living hell.
During this time, cases of murder were dealt with by the Castellania, which was the supreme court of justice of the Maltese islands. The Grandmaster had absolute power to preside. With the presence of the Inquisition, the Holy See considered Malta similar to a colony, and the Inquisitor at the time reported to Rome. Torture of those convicted, however, wasn't carried out by the Inquisition, but rather the State.
There was also a special court for members of the Knights, the Church, or the Inquisitors’ families. When Knights were tried and found guilty, rather than sentenced to death, they were locked up in a hole in the ground, as can be found at Fort St Angelo.
Execution by public hanging was quite common, right up until 400 years ago. The execution not only occurred inside the prisons but, towards the end, it was even done in the squares. Often, the body would be exposed for months as an example to the population.
Stop, it's torture!
You might have been sentenced to torture for a crime, or just tortured to gain a confession out of you. The place of torture would most likely be the Valletta bastions, and there were different types of it, beginning with Judicial Torture, which was torture for the culprit's own good. Retributive Torture would be part of a sentence for culprits who had done something particularly bad. In serious cases, Mutilation After Death meant terrorising the culprit into submission and then placing mutilated body parts in various localities after death.
There was a lot of creativity involved when inventing modes of torture, but one of the most horrendous ones would probably be quartering the culprit alive (ouch!) Sometimes, slaves found guilty were tied to a raft while their arms and legs were tied and pulled by boats being rowed in different directions.
There's another method in which the culprit was stripped naked, while his hands were tied behind his back and heavy weights were fastened to his feet. A cord passed over a pulley would confine his hands. At a given signal he would be hoisted into the air, where he hung suspended by his arms, which were drawn out of their sockets. The cord would suddenly be let run, but stopped before he reached the ground, resulting in a tremendous shock to the body.
Another mode of torture was fastening the feet to an instrument and covering them with a flammable substance before lighting them on fire. A board would occasionally be placed between the feet and the fire, and then withdrawn again, in order to increase pain by intervals of cessation.
And there was slavery too, of course...
The Knights had their own fleet – the fleet needed men to row ships, and criminals were often sentenced for many years, even for a lifetime, to be galley slaves. Petty crimes, such as stealing or blasphemy, could result in a lifetime of slavery.
The list of torture modes goes on - finger breaking, teeth pulling, feet roasted, weighted body parts, amongst many others. Yet if you had a moment of freedom, you could try to take sanctuary in a church - in fact, there were 500 of them in which the Maltese people could find refuge, though this did not last - towards the end of the 1760s, there was an agreement to limit sanctuary in churches.
Throughout its five centuries of history, The Inquisitor's Palace in Birgu always hosted high-ranking officials representing the main powers on the island, who therefore ensured its survival. Formerly, the centre of power was accountable directly to the Pope. Now, it's open to visitors and still holds various torturous devices on display that were used during the time of the Inquisition. Even looking at them is enough to set your teeth chattering!