Museum Pieces
Though there is little or no evidence of its being used by bandits, there are a number of extant examples of ornate and elaborate, pear-shaped devices with three or four leaves or lobes, driven by turning a key that rotates the central screw thread, which spreads the leaves. These are generally held in museums devoted to the subject of torture, and are described as instruments of torture by distension or evisceration. Some, but not all, have small spikes of uncertain purpose at the bottom of each leaf. However, these devices do not seem to match the descriptions given by Calvi or the 19th century sources.
This version of the pear has also been referred to as the "Pear of Confession", the "Pope's Pear" (these due to reports that such devices were used during the Inquisition); the "oral pear", "vaginal pear", or "anal pear"; and just "The Pear".
Read more about this topic: Choke Pear (torture)
Famous quotes containing the words museum and/or pieces:
“Life is in the mouth; death is in the mouth.”
—Hawaiian saying no. 60, ‘lelo No’Eau, collected, translated, and annotated by Mary Kawena Pukui, Bishop Museum Press, Hawaii (1983)
“To save the theatre, the theatre must be destroyed, the actors and actresses must all die of the plague. They poison the air, they make art impossible. It is not drama that they play, but pieces for the theatre. We should return to the Greeks, play in the open air: the drama dies of stalls and boxes and evening dress, and people who come to digest their dinner.”
—Eleonora Duse (1858–1924)