Editing Death by burning (section)

====Assyria====
In the [[Middle Assyrian period]], paragraph 40 in a preserved law text concerns the obligatory unveiled face for the professional prostitute, and the concomitant punishment if she violated that by veiling herself (the way wives were to dress in public):
{{blockquote|A prostitute shall not be veiled. Whoever sees a veiled prostitute shall seize her ... and bring her to the palace entrance. ... they shall pour hot [[Pitch (resin)|pitch]] over her head.<ref>''Schneider'' (2008), [https://books.google.com/books?id=4hHLe60cYBcC&pg=PA154 p. 154]</ref>}}

For the [[Neo-Assyrian Empire|Neo-Assyrians]], mass executions seem to have been not only designed to instill terror and to enforce obedience, but also as proof of their might. Neo-Assyrian King [[Ashurnasirpal II]] (r. 883–859 BC) was evidently proud enough of his executions that he committed them to monument as follows:<ref>''Olmstead'' (1918) [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1946342 p. 66]</ref>{{blockquote|I cut off their hands, I burned them with fire, a pile of the living men and of heads over against the city gate I set up, men I impaled on stakes, the city I destroyed and devastated, I turned it into mounds and ruin heaps, the young men and the maidens in the fire I burned.}}