Pranger

Renaissance pranger in Poznań in the form of a column.

The pranger is a German physical punishment device related to the stocks and the pillory. The Middle Low German word means "something that pinches badly".

The pranger chained the victim's neck to a pair of leg restraints fastened around the ankles. Often the chain was short so that the offender was placed in an uncomfortable half-kneeling position.

In another type of pranger (pillory), the condemned person was tied to a column that stood in the town center for public view. The pranger was only used for public humiliation as punishment, not for painful interrogation or coercion.

In German the word was also used for the scold's bridle.

Sources

(incomplete)

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press