[Red Badger]

A new study of the skeletal remains of the man, found near Venice in 2007, reveals a lesion and unhealed fracture on one of the heel bones that suggests his feet had been nailed to a cross.

Arms were not always nailed, sometimes they were tied with ropes above the head to make it harder to breathe..................

[Robert A Cook PE]

Physically, nailing hands/wrists is a very weak way of securing body up. Death was by suffocation as the body slumped down, so the weight was only the shoulders-arms-hands/wrists to the nails or rope. Or both.

Hence, when the legs were broken, the weight could not be pushed up to breathe, and death came quickly. Which was NOT the goal of “excruciating” punishment for treason, rebellion, or slave revolt that the Romans needed.

Biblically, the two criminals were still alive, so their legs were broken. Jesus was just then dead, so He was left intact - as prophesied.