Foot roasting

Foot roasting is a method of torture.

In one version of foot roasting, the prisoner was immobilized on his back and his bare feet were imprisoned in a stocks of wood or iron. The soles of his feet were smeared with lard or occasionally butter and slowly barbecued over red-hot coals. A bellows was used to control the intensity of the heat, while a screen could be interposed between the feet and the coals as questions were put; if the questions were not answered satisfactorily, the screen was withdrawn and the naked soles were exposed to the flames for an ever increasing period of time. It is recorded in John Robinson's "Dungeon, Fire and Sword" (q.v.) that, when this torture was applied to the Knights Templar -- in an effort so determined and devoted that the order was essentially destroyed in a single night, which culminated in the torturous death of their leader, Jacques de Molay -- the burning was continued until the feet were charred to the bone: odd pieces of phalanges and metatarsals fell to the floor, here and there, and one particularly brave Templar was actually gifted a bag that contained pieces of bones that had fallen from his feet during the torture.

A more primitive form of this torture was employed in ancient Rome: flat plates of iron were heated red-hot and pressed to the soles of the feet. Something halfway between was employed in Brittany in the late Renaissance (from Geoffrey Abbott's Rack, Rope, and Red-Hot Pincers, q.v.) and consisted of a specially designed chair that incorporated both a stocks to immobilize the naked feet and a tray of coals that could be raised and lowered by means of a crank. As the interrogation progressed, the coals were ever so slowly cranked closer to the feet, eventually making contact and grilling the flesh.

References

• "Myth of the Spanish Inquisition" (television documentary produced for the BBC)