The Origins of the Japanese Wooden Horse Torture

An anonymous japanese fan writes:

As you described in your web site, the japanese traditional wooden horse torture enforced on japanese christians (not only missionaries) to convert their religion in the Edo period. The Tokugawa shogunate knows that martyrdom is honorable to the christians, so they tortured christians for renounce their christianity. The japanese wooden horse torture practiced for this purpose. After the torture, if they still maintaining their christianity, they were executed (by chop off their head or put on the fire). If they give up their christianity, they were banished away from their home ground. According to the “Goumonkeibatsu-shi” (written by NAWA Yumio, the japanese historical torture researcher, published in 1962), they were banished with their fingers and thumbs chopped off or with branded cross to their forehead.

There are many japanese texts and books say that the wooden horse torture practiced for above purpose in the Edo period, but there is a text named “Ochiboshu” written in 1728 by DAIDOHJI Yuhzan, the japanese strategist. It's a FAQ style case studies for japanese people about living matters. And it says there was a case that peasant who cheated paying tax get tortured by wooden horse in the Edo period. This case means that the japanese wooden horse torture practiced not only for the persecution of christianity in the Edo period.

The methods of the japanese wooden horse torture is

1. Bring the suspect to the torture room.
   (The suspects wearing “shujin-i”. It's the uniform of the shognate prisoners and suspects. The grey cotton Kimono with no prints on. The prisoners and suspects wearing this uniform for all day. But “Goumonkeibatsu-shi” says only when female christian suspects tortured by wooden horse, they forced to be naked.)
2. Tight up the suspect's hands and arms on his (or her) back with the hemp ropes.
   (Usually there are two executors for each torture. The official investigators attended too, but they only do asking and suggest the executors to what to do. And by the shogunate official law, there is one doctor must attend for suspect's life. But say the truth, the doctor mostly attended for make a proof that the suspect's death happened by legal torture. If the suspects dead by legal torture, the investigators would not be punished for their murder.)
3. Bring suspect up to the wooden horse.
   (I couldn't find the source descriptions for what kind of woods used for making wooden horse. Also the hight and the width of wooden horse is not identified too.)
4. Connect the suspect's tightened hands to the rope fixed with a beam or rope from a pulley fixed with a beam, or rope from a beam using as a pulley.
   (This is done for save the suspect from falling down and help to sustain the body weights straight down to the waist. According to the “Goumonkiebatsu-shi”, sometime rope from above connected to suspect's hair, instead of tightened hands. Because this torture makes most suspects shamed, especially for female suspects, so they often try to hide down their face from the attendances. Tight up their hair with the top rope makes their face always straight up, and let the suspect realize that the trying escape by falling horse harms head skin and neck seriously.)
5. Suspend the roped stone (or stones) to the suspect's legs.
   (I couldn't find the descriptions of the stone specifications. May be “Oshiokireirui-shu” which written in the Edo period has certain descriptions. But I haven't seen it yet.)
6. Start asking.
   (When the suspect obstinate, the investigators or inquisitors shake the wooden horse or beat the suspect with the “houki-jiri” by suggesting executors to do so. The “houki-jiri” is the Tokugawa shogunate's special rod for the tortures. It's made by several bamboo pieces gathering with tiny hemp wires and its shape seems like a baseball bat. Some texts say torture continued until the suspects got faint, death or begin to confess. But the details of the time and interval rules are not identified this time. And I guess, even the official shogunate law didn't allow the investigators to practicing torture by themselves, there might be a lot of unofficial cases that practicing by the investigators themselves.)

The origin of the japanese traditional wooden horse torture is not quit sure. I couldn't find exact historical descriptions, sorry. But I saw a japanese historical research book for making movies and novels (which published in recent years), and it says the first appearance of wooden horse in the historical text was in the Muromachi period. It usually uses for the saddle stand in the “buke-yashiki”. The “buke-yashiki” means “the residence of the samurai” and in the Muromachi period the “buke-yashiki” function as a fort too. In the Muromachi period, each samurai clans, feudal lords and japanese emperors were often struggling and battle for the all japanese islands supremacy. According to that historical research book, certain political situation made them became using the saddle stand for torturing spies and enemies, or punish their own clan members. The Muromachi period is about 1336-1573. The name of source text written in the Muromachi period is not described on the book. So I couldn't check it out this opinion exact true.

I am very grateful for this detailed description; a (partial) reenactment can be found in some japanese movies. One scene (3:49 minutes, 33 MB) can be found here, Part 1 and Part 2