a form of torture in which the hands are tied behind a person's back and they are lifted off the ground by a rope tied to their wrists, then allowed to drop until their fall is checked with a jerk by the rope
source: WordNet 3.0
A military punishment formerly practiced, which consisted in drawing an offender to the top of a beam and letting him fall to the length of the rope, by which means a limb was often dislocated.
