The Blood Eagle was a cruel execution method used by the Vikings (according to Norse literature). The victim was placed face down, and a sharp dagger was then used to make a large cut across the back, exposing the ribcage.
At this point the ribs were broken and pulled back, making it appear as if the victim had bloody wings, but the torture did not end there, immediately after the lungs were removed from the rib cage and left hanging outside the body, leaving the victim to die from blood loss or suffocation.
According to historical sources, the most famous recorded case of someone who suffered this atrocious death is that of King Aelle II of Northumbria (a region in the north of England). In fact, when the Vikings conquered the city of York in 867, then the capital of the Kingdom of Northumbria, they executed the tyrant using this method.
Historians have debated whether this ritual was a real practice or an invention of 13th-century saga writers, based on a misunderstanding of an 11th-century skaldic poem.
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