8.29.2011

woman in a box, left to die


I ran across this photo in these photos from Stéphane Passet. It keeps haunting me.

I found this about the photo on the internet:
"The image shown is of a female Mongolian prisoner. Passet recorded that she had been imprisoned for adultery but historians have cast doubt on this, as Mongolian culture of the time was thought to be tolerant of adultery.

The purpose of imprisoning people in a box in this way was to allow the nomadic people to transport prisoners from place to place. It was 'portable imprisonment'.

People who took pity on prisoners were allowed to leave them food and water and small bowls can be seen in the photograph, just beyond the reach of the incarcerated woman."

A different website said she would be left there to die...out in the Mongolian steep.

What was she thinking? What did she do? How could you just take a picture of her? How long would she last?

1 comment:

Amy Knizek said...

This made me so sad to read, and I had the same comments. How could you just take a picture and walk away? How sad that humans can be so cruel to one another. I can't stand it.