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The author of The Way of the Gladiator continues his exploration of the dark side of history with this grisly account of pain and punishment through the ages. Human beings have a deep-seated instinct for cruelty, and, so far, have not evolved much past it. History is rife with examples of the infliction of pain used as penalty or execution. In The History of Torture, Daniel P. Mannix takes you from the crucifixions of ancient Rome, to the hanging of women during the Salem witch trials, to the atrocities discovered at Nazi concentration camps. The act of torture has shifted from simple barbarism to advanced psychological techniques thanks to science and technology. Now it's not just an actual flogging that will have a prisoner spilling his guts, but law enforcement's coercive tactics that might prompt a confession. Follow Mannix as he: leads you into the chambers of Inquisitors, who elevated torture to an art form; illuminates the myriad miseries of the slave trade, America's greatest contribution to the torture hall of fame; and explains the most terrible and famous of all Chinese tortures, the Ling-chez or ""death of a thousand cuts."" No country or culture is spared in this wide-reaching survey of suffering.

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Daniel P. Mannix was an award-winning American author and journalist, as well as a magician and filmmaker. Mannix's magazine articles about his experiences in the carnival, where he performed under the stage name ""The Great Zadma,"" became popular in the mid-1940s and were compiled with the assistance of his wife in the book Step Right Up! His dozens of books and extensive essays range in subject from children's animal stories, environmental issues, and hunting accounts to historical examinations of the Hellfire Club, the Atlantic slave trade, and the Roman gladiatorial games. Mannix was particularly interested in the Wizard of Oz canon and composed a biography of L. Frank Baum for American Heritage magazine in the 1960s.

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