Editing Disembowelment (section)

==Suicide==
[[File:Seppuku-2.jpg|thumb|right|''[[Ukiyo-e]]'' woodblock print of warrior about to perform ''[[seppuku]]'', from the [[Edo period]]]]
In [[Japan]], disembowelment played a central part as a method of execution or the ritualized [[suicide]] of a [[samurai]]. In killing themselves by this method, they were deemed to be free from the dishonor resulting from their crimes. The most common form of disembowelment was referred to in Japanese as ''[[seppuku]]'' (or, colloquially, ''hara-kiri''), literally "stomach cutting," involving two cuts across the abdomen, sometimes followed by pulling out one's own [[Viscus|viscera]].{{fact|date=April 2024}}

The act of [[decapitation]] by a second (''kaishaku-nin'') was added to this ritual suicide in later times in order to shorten the suffering of the samurai or leader, an attempt at rendering the ritual more humane. Even later the knife was just a simple formality and the swordsman would decapitate before the subject could reach for it.  The commission of a crime or dishonorable act was only one of many reasons for the performance of seppuku; others included the atonement of cowardice, as a means of apology, or following the loss of a battle or the surrender of a [[Japanese castle|castle]].{{fact|date=April 2024}}

The Japanese tradition of ''seppuku'' is a well known example of highly ritualized suicide, within a wider cultural world of norms and symbolism. However, reported examples of suicides exist, in which a person performed disembowelment on himself or herself, without any ambient culture of approved, or expected, suicide.{{fact|date=April 2024}}

The Spartan king [[Cleomenes I]]  is reported, in a fit of madness, to have slit his stomach open, and ripped his own [[bowels]] out.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lauremberg|first=Peter|title=Neue und vermehrte Acerra philologica|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wcRCAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA985|page=985|year=1708|publisher=Johann A. Plener|location=Frankfurt and Leipzig|access-date=2013-03-16}}</ref>

Roman statesman [[Cato the Younger]] committed suicide in [[Utica, Tunisia|Utica]], after [[Cato the Younger#Caesar's civil war|his side]] lost to [[Julius Caesar|Caesar]], by plunging a knife in his own gut, in the dead of night. According to [[Parallel Lives|Plutarch]], Cato's son heard the commotion from a nearby room, and called a doctor who stitched the wound closed; after his son and the doctor left, Cato tore the stitching open with his hand and died. On account of his tragic, highly symbolic suicide, Cato is often termed ''Uticensis'' ("of Utica"), in order to differentiate him from his homonymous ancestor, [[Cato the Elder|Cato "the Elder" or "the Censor"]].{{fact|date=April 2024}}

In 1593, a suicide occurred in [[Bad Wimpfen|Wimpfen]]. A young, pregnant woman, who had become a widow a few weeks before, was lying in her bed. She took a large knife, opened her belly in a cross, and threw out the fetus, her own intestines, and dug out her spleen and flung it out as well. She lived for 10 hours after the act, and when the priests sought to bring her a final consolation and blessing, she said it would all be in vain, because she was a daughter of the devil, and was beyond any sort of redemption. Then, she died, was put in a sack, and was thrown in the river. She was affluent, so it was clear that poverty had not driven her to this act.<ref>Forty years earlier, in 1555 Seidenberg (nowadays [[Zawidow]]), a woman who had become pregnant by another man than her (absent) husband sought to preserve her honour by cutting out the fetus. Having pulled it out, along with much else, she began screaming of pain, but no one could help her, and she died three days later. {{cite book|last=Döpler|first=Jacob|title=Theatrum Poenarum, volume 2|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LZlBAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA313|pages=313–14|year=1697|publisher=Friedrich Lanckischen Erben|location=Leipzig|access-date=2013-03-16}}</ref>

In 1617, a merchant in the municipality Grossglockau<ref>For status as municipality, see:{{cite book|last=Janssen|first=Johannes|title=History of the German People at the Close of the Middle Ages|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N509AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA336|page=336|year=1896|publisher=Taylor and Francis|location=London|access-date=2013-03-16}}</ref> slit his abdomen so that the intestines fell out; he then pulled out his stomach and threw it on the bed. The chronicler notes he lived long enough to regret his action.<ref>{{cite book|last=Khevenhüller|first=Franz C.|title=Annales Ferdinandei, volume 7-8|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TnFZAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PT138|page=column 1158|year=1723|publisher=M.G. Weidmann|location=Leipzig|access-date=2013-03-16}}</ref>