Punishing the Dead

Above we see the corpse of Pope Formosus, put on trial by his successor, Pope Stephen VI, in the year 897.  Formosus' body was exhumed at the command of Stephen and tried for several reasons at a Church Synod which has come to be called, for obvious reasons, "The Cadaver Synod."

To the surprise of no one, Formosus was found guilty.  It seems that an unfortunate Deacon was selected either to represent the corpse or speak for it.  I wonder what kind of defense was offered by the deceased.  I like to think of the corpse and its lawyer/advocate/representative huddling together regarding strategy or how to respond to questions asked.  I suspect their conferences were either very short or very long.   I'm ashamed to admit that I've also pictured the Deacon manipulating the corpse as a ventriloquist's doll, a la Charlie McCarthy or Senor Wences, while responding to the prosecutor's examination.

The corpse was duly punished.  Three fingers of its right hand were chopped off (they were used for blessing the unworthy).  All of the Formosus' acts were annulled, and the body was ultimately thrown in the Tiber, something of a Roman tradition in pagan and Christian times.

This wasn't the only time we exhumed and punished corpses.  There are more than a few famous or infamous instances of posthumous execution.  That of Oliver Cromwell is equally notorious.  After the Restoration his body was dug up, hung in chains in public, and beheaded, in vengeance it seems for regicide in connection with Charles I.

Desecration of the dead is far more common.  If what has been alleged is true, then members of the Israeli Defense Force have done this in cemeteries in Gaza.  The body-snatching done to supply corpses to medical schools is referenced fairly often in the media, and this would seem to me to constitute desecration regardless of whatever advancement in medical care took place as a result, if any.  And of course it isn't unreasonable to claim that archaeologists desecrate the bodies of those they dig up, routinely it seems, despite the fact that it is especially clear in some if not all cases that those who once lived did not want their remains disturbed.  Desecration in the name of knowledge has been excused, for one reason or another.

Why punish the dead, though?  Why "execute" them?  In the case of Formosus it can be said that Stephen VI had practical, political goals in mind in staging the macabre trial.  The trial resulted in the annulment of the acts of Formosus as Pope, something which could have been quite useful to Stephen and his friends.  But it's unclear why it was thought that putting his corpse on trial was needed to accomplish the nullification.  Are the dead entitled to due process?

In Cromwell's case, however (or rather in the case of his corpse) it would seem that vengeance was the primary if not the only reason for the posthumous execution.  It's possible also that it was thought that the effort involved in the show was justified as it might serve to convince all of the danger of regicide--Behold, Charles II may be saying, if you kill a king even your mortal remains won't be safe from vengeance!

It's hard to believe that it was thought that the dead would be harmed in some way by what was done to their corpses, but this was apparently true in some cases.  Native Americans (if that appellation is still appropriate) are said to have mutilated the dead bodies of their enemies so they wouldn't have the use of whatever part of their bodies was mutilated in the afterlife.  In ancient Greece, the failure to grant funeral rights and treat dead bodies with respect seemingly doomed their souls to a piteous afterlife.  Achilles refused to agree to Hector's suggestion that they each promise that the victor won't dishonor the corpse of the loser.  He roped Hector's body to his chariot and dragged him around the city of Troy in full sight of his mother and father.

There appears to be no question that defiling a corpse is considered taboo in most cultures.  It must require a good deal of hate to violate that taboo.  And a kind of need as well.  When the object of your hate is dead, what would prompt you to violate his corpse except the feeling that mere death isn't enough to satisfy you?  Death is not enough in some cases, for some of us at least.

I suppose this is another way in which we humans are distinct from other living organisms.  We're not content that our enemies die, we wish to punish those we hate even beyond death and have pursued that goal in ways which are highly imaginative.  This must be why some take comfort in the belief that others are writhing in Hell, for all eternity.  

What a piece of work is man, as Hamlet would say.