16th-century torture devices
Shackles and other pain-inflicting items will be sold by Guernsey’s auction house in New York. A portion of the sales will go to Amnesy International. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
Iron masks are among the items in a collection of torture devices that will be up for sale. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
Arlan Ettinger of Guernsey’s auction house displays some of the 252 items in the collection of torture implements. The collection was kept at the Imperial Castle of Nuremberg in Bavaria until the late 1800s and is currently owned by a woman in New England. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
Arlan Ettinger of Guernsey’s auction house tries on an iron mesh mitt, which would be heated in white-hot coals and strapped onto a prisoners hand. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
The Small Iron Spider is a flesh-tearing device. This sweet little thing could grasp any part of ones body and do pain, said Arlan Ettinger of Guernsey’s auction house. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
The estimated value of the collection is $3 million. Although “I think you could argue it would be worth more than that,” Ettinger said, noting its uniqueness, age, breadth and interest to collectors. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
The anonymous seller hopes the iron implements will serve as a reminder of the gruesome nature of torture. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
The items, including a chair with spiked seat, back and arm rests, orginated in the region of the Holy Roman Empire that became Germany. “Every one of the barbarous implements have been in actual use,” says a catalog. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
