An Old Picture for Friday, but Nothing Nostalgic About It

I'm still working on the third part of my 1973 Golan post, but it's coming. Meanwhile, I usually leave you with a "Friday nostalgia picture." Nothing nostalgic about this one: this poor fellow is strapped to the barrel of a cannon and is about to be executed. It's said to be in Shiraz, Iran, sometime in the 19th century.

Actually, this is an old and well-attested means of execution; it even has its own Wikipedia article, and for those thinking "how barbarous these foreigners are," may I remind you that in the wake of the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the British, who had followed a pre-existing Mughal practice of using it as a punishment for desertion or mutiny, executed quite a few people this way, as this 19th-century painting depicts: