Stocks

For other uses, see Stocks (disambiguation).
Stocks, unlike the pillory or pranger, restrain only the feet.

Stocks are feet restraining devices that were used as a form of corporal punishment and public humiliation. The use of stocks is seen as early as Ancient Greece, where they are described as being in use in Solon's law code. The law describing its use is cited by the orator Lysias: "'He shall have his or her foot confined in the stocks for five days, if the court shall make such addition to the sentence.' The 'stocks' there mentioned, Theomnestus, are what we now call 'confinement in the wood'" (Lys. 10.16).[1]

  1. ^ "Lysias, Against Theomnestus 1, section 16". www.perseus.tufts.edu. Retrieved 2022-12-12.