This post will feature one of the most gruesome torture devices, and as such, don't read it if you aren't a fan of it.

This post will feature one of the most gruesome torture devices, and as such, don't read it if you aren't a fan of it.

The brazen bull was a hollow, life sized bronze bull that could fit a man inside of it. Once inside the only way to draw a breath was from a ‘trumpet-like’ tube that was attached to the bull’s mouth (on the inside).

 Once the unfortunate was placed inside, a fire was lit underneath the bull rapidly heating the interior of the brazen bull. Sometimes the victim would have been soaked in water as to boil/steam them and other times they would do it dry, and be baked alive. Flesh would burn and peel off, organs would start to fail and it generally would not have been a family friendly event.

The victim’s breath’s soon turned to shrieks and screams but the clever design of the mouthpiece turned those shrieks into ‘bull-calls’. The inventor (Perillos) was roasted inside the bull by the guy he proposed the idea to (Phalaris), since he was so disgusted by Perillos’s idea to convert screams to bull-calls. He was apparently taken out just before he died and thrown off a hill. 

Despite Phalaris' horror at the invention, the brazen bull was still a popular attraction at parties. It was like magic to the guests who had no idea what was actually going on. To them it looked as if the bronze bull statue itself was making the noise in response to the fire beneath it.