Ancient Japanese justice

This is a bit of information about the Tokugawa justice system that I came across back when I was researching my Master's thesis.

In 1837, a samurai named Oshio Heihachiro incited a peasant riot that left 20% of Osaka burned to the ground. He died in the aftermath of the riot, but the penal custom of the Tokugawa government required that his corpse be preserved in salt while he stood trial, so that the sentenced corporal punishment (in this case crucifixion) be carried out afterward.

Evidently, any corporal punishment would be carried out on your corpse if you didn't survive to your own sentencing. Including, according to my sources, flogging.

I love the little tidbits that come across your way when you research a topic really deeply. This was also a perfect example of how inefficient research would be if the goal was really just the production of single documents - in the end, the half day of research I did on the Tokugawa justice system led to a single clause in a single sentence in my paper.