Death by 1000 cuts: The gruesome history of the notorious ancient Chinese punishment of Lingchi

The first mention of Lingchi as a capital punishment seems to appear in the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907), but it was during the later Song (960-1279), Ming (1368-1644), and Qing (1644-1912) Dynasties that it became a particularly prominent. 

Imperial Chinese society was built upon a strict hierarchy, with the emperor at the top as the 'Son of Heaven', who was the ultimate source of all authority. 

Beneath him was a layered social structure consisting of the scholar-officials, peasants, artisans and merchants, in that order. 

This was supported by a growing legal code that was enforced by judges who assigned punishments according to a person’s rank.

The severity of these punishments was determined by a range of factors, including the offender's social status, the victim's social status, the nature of the crime and the perceived motivation behind it. 

As such, Lingchi was a punishment that was only reserved for the most serious of crimes, such as high treason, patricide, matricide, or the murder of one's master or employer. 

The gruesome nature of Lingchi was thought to be enough to deter potential criminals, but it also had spiritual implications tied to traditional Chinese beliefs about the body, the soul, and the afterlife.

Traditional Chinese beliefs valued the human body as a gift from parents and, as such, mutilating it was seen as a sign of deep disrespect. 

Also, in this view, any physical damage to the person’s flesh also affected the fate of their soul, since it was that a body which was damaged or incomplete could not find peace in the afterlife. 

As a result, the process of gradual cutting was a means to inflict spiritual damage and physical torture. 

The process of carrying out Lingchi developed into a carefully planned public show in order to ensure maximum suffering and social shame. 

The exact number of cuts applied to a single person could vary, often ranging from 100 to 3,000, based on legal or ceremonial consideration. 

Regardless, the idea was simple: death was to be as long and as painful as possible. 

The condemned individual was typically tied to a wooden frame in a public place, where crowds could gather to watch. 

The executioner would then begin by making a series of cuts on the body, starting at less vital areas and then moved slowly to more essential parts. 

In some accounts, certain parts of the body, such as the heart, were left intact until the very end, while other reports state that limbs were cut off before the cutting began. 

Throughout the process, the executioner took care to prevent the victim from losing awareness through shock or blood loss since, if the executioner caused death too quickly, they also could face punishment. 

Some accounts describe occasions where wealthy family members paid the executioner to ensure a faster death. 

While the eventual death of the condemned ended the physical punishment, the shame continued. 

In many cases, the remains were not given a proper burial. In traditional Chinese beliefs, this was a final act of disgrace. 

A well-known case in history where this punishment was carried involved the scholar and government official Fang Xiaoru, who refused to write an order confirming the Yongle Emperor's rise to power. He was executed by Lingchi in 1402. 

In the late Qing Dynasty, a servant named Wang Weiqin killed his master’s family. By doing so, he transgressed the social order and was sentenced to death by Lingchi. 

The last recorded case of Lingchi happened in 1905 with Fu Zhu Li, a Mongolian guard who had killed his employer, a Mongolian prince. 

The photographs of this execution, which were taken by a French soldier, are among the clearest records we have of the practice.

The end of Lingchi happened because of a mix of factors inside China and from abroad. 

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, China had come under growing influence from Western countries. 

As a result, the country saw large social and political change as it worked to modernise and reform its systems, and to defend itself against foreign invasion. 

Such reforms covered social and legal systems, as well as military and economic traditions that had changed little in 500 years. 

At the time, Chinese reformers realised that practices like Lingchi looked quite ‘backward’ and ‘barbaric’ to Western observers and was holding China back on the world stage. 

Then, when the photographs of the execution of 1905 by the French soldier were released, they images spread widely in the West and caused countries to protest it practice. This added additional pressure on the Qing rulers to act. 

In response, the government under Emperor Guangxu officially declared an ended to Lingchi in 1905. 

Ultimately, it was part of a larger move towards more humane systems of punishments more in line with Western models.