It was very elegant to whip their servants at social events.

In the sixteenth century the nobles established that it was elegant to whip their servants at social events. They valued knowing how to handle the whip with skill and flogging with cruelty and without showing mercy, proof of nobility and superiority.

The wealthier noble families used to keep some naked servants tied up in their finest halls, available to their younger members, whipping was a way of entertaining, training, or breaking the boredom.

Keeping naked and tied servants was proof of wealth and superiority. To be insensible to the suffering of the inferiors and to be able to keep dozens of them without working, useless, being able to even destroy them or to kill them without worrying was proof of power and wealth.

Some of the young noblemen were vain of the skill they developed, they proved capable of torturing with elegant and precise whips. Playing piano skillfully, singing, dancing, or even speaking fluently many languages ​​was less valued than knowing how to handle the whips and demonstrate carefree sadism by punishing servants. The biggest challenge was to provoke the worst pain without killing the servant.

Sometimes, out of simple vanity, the amusement was to whip the servant at length without haste, without mercy to death. Killing a servant was not a crime, not even frowned upon, could even give the noble family an excellent reputation.

The more young, handsome and well-trained the servant, the more appreciated was his martyrdom. An award-winning coachman, a jockey who had won many races, a talented court musician, the more well known the servant, the more his torture and execution was disputed.

Some ladies were famous for being so sophisticated and demanding with the servants that they were capable of flogging to death a servant who simply made a mistake in serving afternoon tea..