A cudgel used to give someone a beating on the soles of the feet.

Roget 972: punishment, punition^†; chastisement, chastening; correction, castigation.    discipline, infliction, trial; judgment; penalty etc. 974; retribution; thunderbolt, Nemesis; requital etc. (reward) 973; penology; retributive justice.    lash, scaffold etc. (instrument of punishment) 975; imprisonment etc. (restraint) 751; transportation, banishment, expulsion, exile, involuntary exile, ostracism; penal servitude, hard labor; galleys etc. 975; beating etc. v.; flagellation, fustigation^†, gantlet, strappado^†, estrapade^†, bastinado, argumentum baculinum [Lat.], stick law, rap on the knuckles, box on the ear; blow etc. (impulse) 276; stripe, cuff, kick, buffet, pummel; slap, slap in the face; wipe, douse; coup de grace; torture, rack; picket, picketing; dragonnade^†.    capital punishment; execution; lethal injection; the gas chamber; hanging etc. v.; electrocution, rail-riding, scarpines^†; decapitation, decollation^†; garrotte, garrotto [It]; crucifixion, impalement; firing squad; martyrdom; auto-da-fe [Fr.]; noyade^†; happy dispatch.    [suicide as punishment] hara-kiri, seppuku [Jap.]; drinking the hemlock.    ... show more

A form of torture in which the soles of the feet are beaten with whips or cudgels.

synonym: falanga.

Beat somebody on the soles of the feet.

Roget 972: punish; chastise, chasten; castigate, correct, inflict punishment, administer correction, deal retributive justice; cowhide, lambaste [Slang].    visit upon, pay; pay out, serve out; do for; make short work of, give a lesson to, serve one right, make an example of; have a rod in pickle for; give it one.    strike etc. 276; deal a blow to, administer the lash, smite; slap, slap the face; smack, cuff, box the ears, spank, thwack, thump, beat, lay on, swinge^†, buffet; thresh, thrash, pummel, drub, leather, trounce, sandbag, baste, belabor; lace, lace one's jacket; dress, dress down, give a dressing, trim, warm, wipe, tund^†, cob, bang, strap, comb, lash, lick, larrup, wallop, whop, flog, scourge, whip, birch, cane, give the stick, switch, flagellate, horsewhip, bastinado, towel, rub down with an oaken towel, rib roast, dust one's jacket, fustigate^†, pitch into, lay about one, beat black and blue; beat to a mummy, beat to a jelly; give a black eye.    tar and feather; pelt, stone, lapidate^†; masthead, keelhaul.    execute; bring to the block, bring to the gallows; behead, decapitate, guillotine; decollate; hang, turn off, gibbet, bowstring, hang draw and quarter; shoot; decimate; burn; break on the wheel, crucify; empale^†, impale; flay; lynch; electrocute; gas, send to the gas chamber.    torture; put on, put to the rack; picket.    banish, exile, transport, expel, ostracize; rusticate; drum out; dismiss, disbar, disbench^†; strike off the roll, unfrock; post.    suffer, suffer for, suffer punishment; be flogged.    be executed, suffer the ultimate penalty; be hanged &c.; come to the gallows, mount the gallows, swing [Coll.], twist in the wind, dance upon nothing, die in one's shoes; be rightly served; be electrocuted, fry [Coll.], ride the lightning [Coll.]; face the firing squad.    ... show more