IX. Read the text and translate it into Russian in written form.

Torture

Torture, in law, is infliction of severe bodily pain either as punishment or to make a person confess to a crime or give evidence in a trial. Among primitive societies torture has been a means of ordeal and punishment of captured enemies.

Ordeal is practice of referring disputed questions to the judgment of God, determined by certain trials.

Throughout Europe the ordeal existed in various forms. The most common kinds of ordeal were those of fire, water, and the wager of battle. High rank people faced only fire ordeal. The accused carried a piece of red-hot iron in the hand some distance or walked barefoot on it. The hand or foot was inspected three days later. If the accused had a hurt, he was guilty. Lower classes faced water ordeal. It was of two kinds, the ordeal of boiling water and of cold water. The ordeal of boiling water consisted of taking a stone out of boiling water with a hand. The ordeal of cold water was the usual mode of trial for witchcraft. The person was flung into a pool. If the accused floated he or she was guilty; if the accused sank he or she was acquitted.

By the middle of the 13th century the ordeal had died out in England and on the Continent.

Examination by torture has been used in many countries as a judicial method. It involves the usage of instruments to get evidence from unwilling witnesses.

In ancient Athens, slaves always faced the examination by torture, that was why their evidence was considered more valuable than that of freemen. Under the Roman Empire, however, by the order of the emperor, torture was frequently inflicted even on freemen to obtain evidence of the crime against a sovereign power.

During the Middle Ages the influence of the Roman Catholic church contributed to the adoption of torture by civil tribunals. Ultimately, torture became part of the legal system of every European nation except Sweden and England.

The horrors of the Inquisition and the excessive use of judicial torture from the 14th to the 16th century brought about a progressive change of social opinion, which led to the abolition of torture in all countries of Europe. In 1816 Roman Catholic church banned the use of torture in Roman Catholic countries.

In the 20th century the use of torture was revived by the National Socialist, Fascist regimes of Europe, usually as a weapon of political violence. Complaints about the use of physical and psychological torture have also been lodged against many other regimes in Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

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