Nine familial exterminations

The nine familial exterminations, nine kinship exterminations, or execution of nine relations, also known by the names zuzhu ("family execution") and miezu ("family extermination"), was the most severe punishment for a capital offense in premodern China, Korea, and Vietnam. A collective form of kin punishment typically associated with offenses such as treason, the punishment involved the execution of all relatives of an individual, which were categorized into nine groups. Nine exterminations were often done by slow slicing. The occurrence of this punishment was somewhat rare, with relatively few sentences recorded throughout history. The punishment involved the execution of close and extended family members. These included: The criminal's living parents The criminal's living grandparents Any children the criminal may have, over a certain age (varying over different eras, children below that age becoming slaves) and—if married—their spouses. Any grandchildren the criminal may have, over a certain age (again with enslavement for the underaged) and—if married—their spouses. Siblings and siblings-in-law (the siblings of the criminal and that of his or her spouse, in the case where he or she is married) Uncles and aunts of the criminal, as well as their spouses The criminal's cousins (in the case of China, this included up to second and third cousins) The criminal's spouse The criminal's spouse's parents The criminal Confucian principles also played a major role in the extent of the punishment. The killing of children was disapproved under Mencius' principle that "being offspring is not a sin" (Classical Chinese: 罪人不孥), so that children under a certain age were often spared execution. The punishment by nine exterminations is usually associated with the tyrannical rulers throughout Chinese history who were prone to use inhumane methods of asserting control (such as slow slicing, or "death by ten thousand cuts").