Decimation (punishment)

In the military of ancient Rome, decimation (from Latin decimatio 'destruction of a tenth') was a form of military discipline in which every tenth man in a group was executed by members of his cohort. The discipline was used by senior commanders in the Roman army to punish units or large groups guilty of capital offences, such as cowardice, mutiny, desertion, and insubordination, and for pacification of rebellious legions. The historicity of the punishment during the early and middle republic is questioned, and it may be an ahistorical rhetorical construct of the late republic. Regardless, the first well-attested instance was in 72 BC during the war against Spartacus under the command of Marcus Licinius Crassus. Further instances followed in the next century, mostly occurring during times of civil strife, before falling out of use after AD 69. There is evidence of the punishment's revival in the post-classical world, such as during the Thirty Years' War and World War I. In modern English, the word is used most commonly to mean total destruction or annihilation.