The prisons of the classical ancients consisted of “souterains,” or,
sometimes, of only simple vestibules, where the prisoners saw their
friends, &c.: it was in this latter kind of confinement that Socrates
was placed. Their “latomiæ” and “lapidicinæ” were caves or vast
quarries, guarded at the entrance: in the “latomiæ” prisoners could move
about; but in the “lapidicinæ” they were chained and fettered. The
famous “latomiæ” at Syracuse made a capital prison. The prisoners bribed
the lictor or executioner to introduce food, and allow them to visit
friends, &c. Some prisoners had merely chains upon the legs, others were
set fast in stocks. There were also free prisons; as committal to the
house of a magistrate, or custody of the accused in his own house.[277]
Felix, at Cesarea, commanded a centurion to keep Paul, and to let him
have liberty, and that he should forbid none of his acquaintance to
minister or come to him. At Rome, Paul was suffered to dwell by himself
with a soldier that kept him; and while in that custody the chief of the
Jews came and heard him expound. He spoke to them of being “bound with
this chain.” He dwelt two whole years in his own hired house preaching
and teaching with all confidence, no man forbidding him.[278]
In the middle age there were prisons provided with collars, handcuffs,
and other fetters, without doors or windows, and descended into only by
ladders. Other prisons were made like a cage, with portcullised doors,
as now; and there was a kind of prison, called “pediculus,” because in
it the feet were bound with chains, and prisons were made dark on
purpose.
Anglo-Saxon prisons were annexed to palaces, with a work-place in them;
the prisoners were chained and had guards. In castles there were
dungeons, consisting of four dark apartments, three below, and one
above, up a long staircase, all well secured; in the uppermost, a ring
to which criminals were chained. Prisons were sometimes guarded by dogs,
and prisoners bound in chains, brought in carts, and discharged upon a
new reign.[279]
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