flagellant

thumb|300px|A confraternity of penitents in Italy mortifying the flesh with disciplines in a seven-hour procession; [[capirote are worn by penitents so that attention is not drawn towards themselves, but to God, as they repent.]] Flagellants are practitioners of a form of mortification of the flesh by whipping their skin with various instruments of penance. Many Christian confraternities of penitents have flagellants, who beat themselves, both in the privacy of their dwellings and in public processions, to repent of sins and share in the Passion of Jesus.

In the 14th century, a movement within Western Christianity known as Flagellantism became popular and adherents "began beating their flesh in a public penitential ritual in response to war, famine, plague and fear engendered by millenarianism." Though this movement withered away, the practices of public repentance and promoting peace were adopted by the flagellants in Christian, especially Roman Catholic, confraternities of penitents that exist to the present-day.