Immurement

Immurement (from Latin "immurus", meaning " wall in" or "enwall"), immuration or live entombment is a historical form of imprisonment, generally until death, in which someone is/was placed in an enclosed space with the opening walled off. Immurement has been used as a punishment and as a form of human sacrifice. As a punishment, live entombment was largely used on members of clergy (monks, nuns and ancient Rome's Vestal Virgins for example) and others whose blood was not allowed to be spilled according to custom and or law. In Mongolia, women who were accused of adultery were often immured in crates which had a holes for the head and one arm to poke through. The latest documented case of immurement as a form of execution occurred in 1906 in Morocco. The one walled up in this case was a Serial killer named Mohammed Mesfewi who was originally sentenced to crucifixion before foreign dignitaries talked the Moroccan government out of it.

As a form of human sacrifice, live entombment was intended to ensure that buildings and bridges remained standing. Immuring living people in this manner was thought to bring good luck to the structure. The song ''London Bridge is Falling Down'' may be about such sacrificial entombment. A Vestal Virgin when immured was usually given a dagger with which to kill herself. Other entombed victims would be left to dehydrate and starve to death, but sometimes they were fed regularly. In that case, immurement was more life imprisonment than a form of execution. Immurement has also been used as a form of devotion to one's faith, groups such as anchorites voluntarily had themselves walled up alive. There have been historical and fictional accounts of people being walled in alive. One story of fictional immuration is in the story The Cask of Armontillado by Edgar Allen Poe.