We’ve already covered a few animal trials, but there are many more cases worth mentioning. Far from being an oddity, trying animals for crimes was a solemn and frequent affair, especially in medieval Europe. It was also legally important, persuading people that everything was under control—its control. And of course punishing “theft” whatever the species helped to prop up the notion of property.

Charges ranged from case to case but they all had one thing in common: they were batsh*t insane. In ascending order of lunacy, here are 10 of the worst offenders—listed by the species in the dock.

10. Monkeys

When, during the Napoleonic Wars, some English found a monkey on a beach, they were immediately suspicious. Its appearance followed the wreckage of a French ship nearby and this was the only survivor, washed to shore on debris, soaked through and miserable-looking. Having never seen a Frenchman (only propagandist caricatures with claws and tails), they took this monkey to be one. It also didn’t help that, as the French ship’s mascot, it was dressed as a human sailor. After a hasty trial right there on the beach, they found it guilty of espionage, sentenced it to death, and hanged it from the mast of a fishing boat. This was extrajudicial– mob law—unlike the others on this list. But unfortunately it wasn’t uncommon. Although frowned upon, people often took the law in their own hands when it came to punishing animals. 

Disturbingly in this case, there may be more to the tale. According to one theory, it wasn’t a monkey they hanged but a child employed as a “powder monkey” for priming the cannons with gunpowder. Whatever the case, the people of Hartlepool are still known as “monkey hangers” today—although they’ve come to embrace the name. In fact, their football team’s mascot is a monkey called H’Angus. And in 2002 a mayoral candidate dressed as the monkey promised free bananas for school children (and won).

9. Termites

When the Portuguese invaded Brazil they took their insanity with them, embarrassing themselves in front of the natives by charging some termites with vandalism. Ironically, the plaintiffs were Franciscan friars—that is, followers of a man who five centuries earlier preached sharing and kinship with animals. Still, they sought to excommunicate the termites for eating their food and furniture.

It was actually the defense lawyer that most resembled Saint Francis, arguing that the termites had, like all of God’s creatures, a clear right to sustenance. He even claimed their industriousness put the idle grey friars to shame. Besides, he said, the termites were on the land first.

In January 1713, the trial finally ended with a “compromise”. The cloister of friars would set up a reservation where the termites could live undisturbed. The decision was announced to the termite mounds: “No sooner was the order of the prelatic judge promulgated by being read officially before the hills of the termites than they all came out and marched in columns to the place assigned.” Naturally, this was interpreted as proof of their submission to God.

8. Weevils

After ravaging some vineyards in a hamlet in France, weevils were personas non grata. But they had a good lawyer. The trial concluded, in the spring of 1546, with the judge ordering locals to beg for mercy from God, who, being the “supreme author of all that exists” had created the earth for all of his creatures. The hamlet also held three masses “in solemn procession with songs and supplications round the vineyards.” And it seems to have worked—for a time.

Forty years later, the weevils returned and were put on trial again. This second case, brought before “the prince-bishop of Maurienne, … the reverend lord his vicar-general and official”, and recorded on 29 folia with a very long title in Latin, lasted for several months. Again it was argued the people were guilty for incurring God’s wrath, since the weevils had the right to eat plants. The defense even pointed out it was “absurd and unreasonable” to apply human laws to insects. But the counsel for the plaintiffs, on the other hand, the local vine-growers, claimed the weevils were subject to man.

The case was adjourned repeatedly while each side considered the case. Eventually, the weevils’ legal team countered that even if they are subject to man, that doesn’t give us the right to punish them—especially with excommunication. That was God’s job. Two and a half months after the trial began, the people were ordered to set aside some land for the weevils, fenced off so they could live in peace. But it didn’t work. One month later, the case was back in court. The plaintiffs begged the judge to order the weevils to return to their enclosure under threat of excommunication. Meanwhile, the defense team said the enclosure was too barren with not enough food for the animals. Again, the case was adjourned numerous times and it wasn’t for another month and a half that a verdict was finally reached. What it was, however, we won’t ever know because the final page of the court records was eaten by weevils.

7. Cows

Because of their size, weight, and temper, cows were frequently charged with attacks. In 1314, for instance, a bull escaped from a farm in France and gored a man to death. Then it was captured by the Count of Valois’s men, imprisoned, and sentenced to hang. But since the Count had no jurisdiction in Moisy, the sentence was overturned (sadly after the bull had been killed).

There are numerous other examples of murderous cows being hanged. However, given the value of cows and bulls, they (like horses) were typically confiscated instead. In 12th-century Burgundy it was actually written into law that “if an ox or a horse commit one or several homicides, it shall not be condemned to death, but shall be taken by the Seignior [feudal lord] within whose jurisdiction the deed was perpetrated”, who would sell it and keep the profits. “But if other beasts or Jews do it,” the law continued, “they shall be hanged by the hind feet.”

As a rule, executed animals—even the organic grass-fed cows of the pre-industrial world—were never eaten as meat. Once an animal “had become the peer of man in blood-guiltiness and in judicial punishment,” it was felt that eating it “would savour of anthropophagy”, or cannibalism. So they’d usually get buried with human criminals. There were exceptions, though. One example is a cow killed in Ghent, Belgium, in 1578; its flesh was sold to a butcher in order to compensate the victim. But her head was impaled near the gallows.

6. Dogs

Dogs were different to livestock; they were already treated as people. Like women and serfs, they were even included in the weregild (insurance payable by their killers to their owners). In Old Germanic law, dogs (as well as cats and cocks) could even be witnesses in court if, for example, they were the only ones present when their owner’s house was burglarized. In this case, the homeowner would bring their dog to court, along with three straws from the roof thatch to symbolize the house.

Having sex with them, however, was—to Christian sensibilities—as bad as having sex with a Jew. In fact, when a Parisian man was burned alive for “coition with a Jewess,” or “sodomy,” the court said it was “precisely the same as if a man should copulate with a dog.” (Naturally, the woman was burned alive too.) Examples are many, but one stands out: In 1606 a Chartres man was sentenced to hang for sodomizing a dog, but he ran away before they could do it. So while authorities killed the victim with a knock on the head, they hanged a portrait of the rapist instead.

But dogs weren’t always sentenced to death. Sometimes they were simply imprisoned. This was the case in 1712 when a drummer’s dog bit a councilor in the leg; instead of execution, it was sentenced to one year’s imprisonment in the Narrenkötterlein, an iron cage over the marketplace.

5. Donkeys

Just like humans, animals were entitled to appeals. One donkey sentenced to hang, for example, was saved by appeal to a higher court and her sentence was commuted to a knock on the head.

Appeals could even lead to acquittal. In 1750 a donkey condemned for seducing her rapist was acquitted when the Vanvres parish priest delivered a certificate attesting to her good character. He and other parishioners of good standing, it read, were “willing to bear witness that she is in word and deed and in all her habits of life a most honest creature.”

Another donkey, or a mule rather, was not so popular. Raped by a man, it was sentenced to burn at Montpelier in 1565. Worse, because it was “vicious and inclined to kick” (vitiosus et calcitrosus, according to court records), the executioner took it upon himself to cut off its feet before burning—an extra-judicial mutilation for which he was presumably scolded. Courts didn’t like their hired thugs adding anything to the sentence.

4. Rats

Even as recently as the 19th century, rats were served a “writ of ejectment [or] … letter of advice … to induce them to quit any house.” And, because there was a good chance the rats wouldn’t read it, it was rubbed in grease to attract their attention. One such letter, from Maine, even expresses sympathy for the rats, advising them to leave 1 Seaview Street for 6 Incubator Street, where they could live in a cellar full of vegetables or a barn full of grain. It finished by advising the rats that if they didn’t leave, they’d be killed off with poison.

Centuries earlier, in the 1500s, rats were summoned to court for eating all the barley in Autun, a French province. The court knew they wouldn’t come and planned to punish the rodents accordingly. However, as their defense lawyer pointed out, there were too many rats in Autun for a single summons to suffice; it could never be seen by all the rats. The judge reluctantly agreed and ordered a second summons “to be published from the pulpits of all the parishes” in the province. Then, when they still failed to come, their defense lawyer argued that the cats on the route made the journey too dangerous for the rats. This meant they had “the right of appeal and [could] refuse to obey the writ”.

3. Caterpillars

In 1659, five Italian communes brought a complaint against caterpillars for devastating their crops. The summons were nailed to trees in the forests. And, while they didn’t show up for the trial, the caterpillars were conceded in court to have the same right “to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as man—as long as theirs didn’t infringe on the latter’s.

Talking of charismatic insects, even bees were put on trial. In 864, the Council of Worms (i.e. the Rhineland city, not the species) sentenced a hive to be suffocated for stinging a human to death. This was to be done as soon as possible, before it could produce any honey—which, on account of the “murder”, would be “demoniacally tainted” and unfit for Christian consumption.

2. Slugs

For devastating crops in 1487, the slugs of Autun were “generously forewarned” by three days of public processions—during which they were ordered to leave “under penalty of being accursed.” As crazy as it sounds, the same thing happened the following year at Beaujeu; slugs were warned three times that if they didn’t get out of the province, they would be excommunicated. Whether slugs even considered themselves members of the Church was irrelevant. Excommunication served an important legal purpose for ecclesiastical courts: it made an animal free game to kill.

Even snails were prosecuted, in 1487, 1500, 1543, and 1596—all in France. But it’s unknown how they were punished.

1. Pigs

Pigs were among the most commonly prosecuted animals. One reason for this was the way they roamed around the towns unattended, munching on whatever they found—including consecrated wafers and children. There are numerous examples of the latter, for which the pigs were usually hanged. In 1567, for example, “a sow with a black snout” was hanged from a tree for devouring a four-month-old child’s head, left hand, and upper chest. In another case, the plaintiff made a special point of the fact that a pig killed and ate a child “although it was Friday”, which, because it violated the Catholics’ proscription of meat, was a seriously aggravating factor.

Sometimes the punishment was “an eye for an eye”. In 1386, a pig that tore the face and arms off a child was sentenced to hang after being “mangled and maimed in the head and forelegs”. It was even dressed as a man for the occasion. Another particularly grisly punishment for pigs was getting buried alive. More popular, however, was burning them alive—although in this some judges were merciful, ordering they only be “slightly singed” before strangling them to death and throwing their corpses on the fire.

Like dogs, cows, and other animals, pigs were often jailed before they were executed, sometimes for weeks on end and in the same jails as humans.

Court scenes are usually filled with drama, tension, emotion, twists, and even violence. That’s why they often make for good television. And then, of course, there are those that are simply… odd. History is full of bizarre and unique court proceedings, so today we’re taking a look at ten of them.

10. The Impiety of Socrates

As a general rule, if you’re standing trial, it’s probably not a good idea to mock and taunt the jury that gets to decide your fate. Socrates, however, did not get the memo.

In 399 BC, the famed philosopher was charged with impiety against the gods and for corrupting the youth of Athens. As per Athenian law, Socrates was judged by a jury of 501 peers, all of them citizens in good standing. They found him guilty by a vote of 281 to 220. 

Not ideal so far, but now came the crucial part – the sentencing. Again, according to Athenian customs, the defendant was free to suggest his own punishment and Socrates could have probably avoided a severe sentence if he would have shown a bit of contrition. Instead, he mocked the jury, saying that instead of giving him a fine, they should be thanking him. 

Well, the good news is that they didn’t give him a fine. The bad news is that they sentenced him to death by a vote of 361 to 140, which means that Socrates got 80 people who didn’t even vote him guilty to want to see him dead.

9. The Limitations of Statues

We’re staying in Ancient Greece for this one, but moving on to a famed Olympian called Theagenes. The guy brought a lot of victories and prestige to his native island of Thasos, so when he died, they commemorated him with a bronze statue. 

Not everyone was a fan, though, and one of his former opponents who never managed to defeat Theagenes regularly visited the statue, mocking it, hitting it, and denigrating it as if it was Theagenes himself. One night, the man got too animated with his actions and the statue got its revenge by toppling onto him and killing him.

One might call it karma, but the deceased man’s sons did not agree and, instead, they brought a charge of murder against the statue of Theagenes. And what’s more, the inanimate object was found guilty. It was sentenced to exile and, since Thasos is an island, this meant that they chucked it into the sea.

8. The Mice of Stelvio

While Ancient Greece didn’t find it weird to put inanimate objects on trial, medieval Europe was into trying animals for various offenses. Many of them had something to do with witchcraft, but not all of them, as was the case in 1519 when a group of field mice was put on trial in Stelvio, Italy, charged with damaging crops by burrowing.

To give the people of Stelvio credit, they did take this seriously and appointed a man named Hans Grinebner to defend the rascally rodents. His argument was that the field mice did more good than harm to the crops by eating the insects and enriching the soil. The judge wasn’t entirely convinced, but he was lenient with his sentencing. He gave the mice 14 days to depart, even promising them safe passage from dogs, cats, and other predators.

7. Bushell’s Case

From a forgiving judge, we move on to a not-so-forgiving judge, one who thought that he could bully, threaten, and coerce the jury to get his way and, instead, had a landmark decision made against him that is still crucial to English law.

The year was 1670 and it was supposed to be a straightforward case where two Quakers, William Mead and William Penn, stood accused of unlawful assembly since, according to the recently passed Conventicle Act, religious assemblies of five or more people were only allowed under the auspices of the Church of England. 

William Penn gave an impassioned testimony, convincing the jury that they only gathered to worship and not to start any trouble. Therefore, the jury found the Quakers only guilty of speaking in Gracechurch Street which, even back then, was not unlawful.

The judge, however, would not have it. He threatened to lock up the jury without food, water, or tobacco until they returned a guilty verdict that the Court would accept. Instead, the jury delivered the Court a proper middle finger when, after two days of imprisonment, they came back with a verdict of “not guilty.” As you might expect, the judge was none too pleased about that, so he fined the jurors for contempt of court and imprisoned them until they paid their fines.

One of the jurors, Edward Bushell, refused to pay and instead took the case to the Court of Common Pleas, where Chief Justice Sir John Vaughan sided with him and established beyond question the independence of the jury in English law.

6. Beyond the Call of Duty

The story of Clement Vallandigham is one often told, but we simply cannot talk about strange trials without mentioning the lawyer who killed himself and proved his client innocent.

The year was 1871 and Clement Vallandigham was a former Ohio congressman-turned-lawyer who was defending a man named Thomas McGehan. His client stood accused of shooting and killing a man named Thomas Myers during a bar brawl, but Vallandigham wanted to show the jury that it was more likely that Myers accidentally shot himself while trying to draw his pistol from a kneeling position. 

To accomplish this, Vallandigham wanted to stage a demonstration before the jury. The day before his appearance in court, he was at the Lebanon House Hotel in Ohio with his entourage and showed them what he intended to do. He had two guns: the actual murder weapon that shot Myers and his own pistol, which he used to conduct his own forensics à la CSI. One was loaded and the other one was not. You can probably guess where this is going.

Vallandigham picked up the loaded gun by mistake, put it in his pocket, and tried to draw it. Just like he thought it would happen, the pistol got stuck and discharged by accident. The lawyer died after 12 agonizing hours but, on the plus side, his client was acquitted.

5. Heretical Heliocentricity

When Copernicus presented his heliocentric model which stated that the Sun was at the center of the Universe, the Catholic Church wasn’t too thrilled with the idea, mainly because it contradicted biblical teachings which placed the Earth at the center. However, it didn’t act immediately. It wasn’t until a few decades later when the idea started getting popular with other astronomers, that the Inquisition decided to put its foot down and get out the comfy chair.

The most famous case is Galileo, who was found guilty of heresy and placed under house arrest for the rest of his life. However, he got off easy compared to Giordano Bruno, who was actually burned at the stake for his beliefs. 

After his teachings made him persona non grata in Italy, Bruno wandered through Europe during the late 16th century, seeking refuge in countries that were a bit more tolerant towards his radical ways. Then, for whatever reason, in 1591 he decided to return to Italy. He was betrayed by a Venetian noble named Giovanni Mocenigo who denounced him to the Inquisition and he was placed under arrest in 1592. 

From Venice, Bruno was deported to Rome in 1593, where his trial lasted almost seven years, mainly because the inquisitors wanted to track down as many of his heretical writings as possible. During this time, Bruno refused to denounce his ideas and, when he was found guilty and sentenced to death, he replied: “You may be more afraid to bring that sentence against me than I am to accept it.”

4. Trial by Fire Put on Ice

According to 15th-century Italian preacher Girolamo Savonarola, everything that’s fun in life is a sin: sex, frivolity, poetry, jokes, gambling, nice clothes, and luxuries of any kind. He was so extreme that even the Catholic Church thought he should tone it down a bit, which isn’t that hard to imagine since, at the time, the Church was ruled by Pope Alexander VI from the Borgia family.

But even so, the Dominican friar refused to lighten up with the “fire and brimstone.” Eventually, a Franciscan rival told him to put up or shut up and challenged him to trial by fire. If he was speaking the truth, then surely God would be on his side.

The ordeal was supposed to take place on April 7, 1498, but it didn’t. Some reported that heavy rain poured from the heavens and extinguished the fire. Thus, a divine sign that Savonarola was in the wrong. Others said that the Franciscan friar simply didn’t show up. Either way, the public blamed Savonarola because they turned up expecting to see a miracle.

Once he had lost public opinion, the Church quickly imprisoned Savonarola and two of his closest followers. They were convicted of heresy, tortured, hanged, and then burned at the stake.

3. Who Killed You?

Murder trials would be a lot easier if you could simply ask the victim who killed them. That was the thinking that a group of jurors had in 1994 during the trial of Stephen Young for a gruesome double murder. However, the problem is that dead people are pretty hard to reach… unless, of course, you have a Ouija board.

One night, during the trial, four jurors decided to consult the spirits using an improvised Ouija board made using paper and a wine glass. Fortunately for them, the ghost of one of the victims was in a chatty mood that night, and he confirmed that Young had killed him and instructed them to vote guilty. 

Which they did. Stephen Young was found guilty and only later did it emerge that some of the jurors had been swayed by testimony from the other side. Unsurprisingly, a retrial was ordered. 

2. The Last Duel

If you’ve seen Ridley Scott’s The Last Duel, then you will already be familiar with this story of trial by combat between two French knights that took place on December 29, 1386. 

A decade earlier, Jean de Carrouges and Jacques Le Gris were close friends who fought side by side. However, the latter assaulted and raped the former’s wife, Marguerite. Le Gris expected her to keep quiet to avoid being dishonored, but Marguerite not only told her husband, but even took Le Gris to court. This was a lot riskier than you might imagine because if Marguerite was found guilty of false witness, she could have been burned at the stake.

Trials by combat had become a rarity in France by the end of the 14th century. However, King Charles VI not only authorized this one but presided over it. There are several firsthand accounts of the duel and, although they are not all the same, they agree that Le Gris landed the first hit on his opponent’s thigh. However, this seemed to fill Carrouges with bloodlust and he grabbed Le Gris’s helmet with one hand and threw him to the ground. He demanded him to admit the truth and, when Le Gris refused, Carrouges “drew his sword and killed his enemy with great difficulty, because he was encased in armor.”

1. The Cadaver Synod

As far as bizarre court scenes are concerned, it is unlikely that you will find any stranger than the so-called Cadaver Synod where a pope put his deceased predecessor on trial.

It was January 897 AD. The accuser was Pope Stephen VI, while the defendant was Pope Formosus who had died the previous year and had been buried for six months. For reasons that are too long and complicated to get into here, the two of them did not like each other. So when Stephen gained the upper hand on his rival (by still being alive) he saw it as the perfect opportunity for revenge.

Stephen had Formosus dug up and put on trial, accusing him of multiple crimes including illegally serving as a bishop and coveting the Papacy. You’ll be stunned to discover that Formosus was found guilty. There’s little you can do to punish a corpse, but Stephen still tried his hardest. He had all of Formosus’s consecrations and appointments voided. He stripped him of his fancy garments and dressed him in rags, and, lastly, cut off the three fingers that Formosus used to give blessings. After that he had the body thrown into the Tiber River.

Case closed, you might say, but Formosus still had the last laugh from beyond the grave. The people of Rome were so outraged by the Cadaver Synod that they rioted. Pope Stephen VI was imprisoned and strangled to death a few months later.