Note 1819 — Chapter IX · ENGLAND AND THE NORTHERN RACES.
Reading edition
Pike (Hist. of Crime in England I. 427) quotes a document of 1189 which seems indirectly to show that torture could be inflicted under an order of the king. The expression is somewhat doubtful, and as torture had not yet established itself anywhere in Europe as a judicial procedure the document alleged can hardly be received as evidence of its legality.