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Brazen bull
The brazen bull, bronze bull, or Sicilian bull, was a torture and execution device designed in ancient Greece. According to Diodorus Siculus, recounting the story in ''Bibliotheca historica'', Perillos of Athens invented and proposed it to Phalaris, the tyrant of Akragas, Sicily, as a new means of executing criminals.〔''Biblioteca Historica'', IX, 18-19〕 The bull was made entirely of bronze, hollow, with a door in one side. The bull was in the form and size of an actual bull and had an acoustic apparatus that converted screams into the sound of a bull. The condemned were locked in the device, and a fire was set under it, heating the metal until the person inside roasted to death.
==Reign of Phalaris==
Phalaris commanded that the bull be designed in such a way that its smoke rose in spicy clouds of incense. The head of the bull was designed with a complex system of tubes and stops so that the prisoner's screams were converted into sounds like the bellowing of an infuriated bull. According to legend, when the bull was reopened, the victim's scorched bones "shone like jewels and were made into bracelets."
Perillos said to Phalaris: "(screams ) will come to you through the pipes as the tenderest, most pathetic, most melodious of bellowings." Disgusted by these words, Phalaris ordered its horn sound system to be tested on Perillos himself. When Perillos entered, he was immediately locked in, and the fire was set, so that Phalaris could hear the sound of his screams. Before Perillos could die, Phalaris opened the door and took him away. Perillos believed he would receive a reward for his invention; instead, after freeing him from the bull, Phalaris threw him from the top of a hill, killing him. Phalaris himself is said to have been killed in the brazen bull when he was overthrown by Telemachus, the ancestor of Theron.
抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』
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