FIGHTING WITH ROPES AND SASHES

THE WORD "THUG" CAN BE FOUND IN ANY DICTIONARY OF MODERN ENGLISH, BUT FEW PEOPLE KNOW THAT IT ACTUALLY ORIGINATED IN ANCIENT INDIA. THERE, MEMBERS OF CRIMINAL GANGS BORE THAT NAME, AND THEIR ACTIVITIES WERE KNOWN AS THUGGEE IN THE LOCAL DIALECT.

-  PATRICK KELLEY

In India, Thugs were men who led mostly nomadic lives and would fall in with other travelers and befriend them. Later, on isolated roads or in sparsely populated villages, the Thugs would rob them of their possessions and often kill them. Their preferred method for committing their crimes was strangulation using a short length of rope, belt, sash or head scarf. To a lesser degree, knives and poisons were used.

Strangulation was chosen by most Thugs because they held the erroneous belief that if arrested, they would not be executed because they hadn't spilled any blood, which was an old legal concept. The British, however, reportedly disabused hundreds of Thugs of this notion by sending them to a rendezvous with the hangman.