Forensic description of impalement and associated torture lesions by Napoleon troops (Egypt, 1800)

• Published in: Legal medicine (Tokyo, Japan) Japan), 2023-11, Vol.65, p.102300-102300, Article 102300
• Main Authors: Charlier, Philippe, Bourdin, Virginie, Huynh-Charlier, Isabelle
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: execution; forensic anthropology; impalement; Life Sciences; medical ethics; retrospective diagnosis; Sacrum fracture
• ISSN: 1344-6223; 1873-4162
• DOI: 10.1016/j.legalmed.2023.102300

•Paleopathology is a medical discipline that carries out retrospective diagnoses on ancient human remains.•The case presented here makes it possible to better describe and understand lesions of impalement and deep peri-mortem burns.•These examples of “past patients” are particularly useful in identifying disease processes and causes of death in contemporary skeletal elements in a forensic context. Impalement bone traumas are very rarely described in the medical literature. We here present the first case of such a diagnosis carried out on a skeleton. The patient is Soleyman el-Halaby, executed in June 1800, who was the 24-year-old murderer of the Napoleonic general Kléber. The skeleton is now held in the National Museum of Natural History (Paris). This report describes the traumatic lesions diagnosed after a careful forensic anthropological examination. Such a case is important from a medical point of view, whether the origin of the pelvic or abdominal impalement is accidental or criminal. Forensic examination of skeletons conserved in anthropological collections may help reconstruct the modalities of death, and give data for an eventual repatriation process to the original community.