The Greek word usually denotes men who had charge of instruments of torture, by which unwilling witnesses were compelled to testify, and the agonies of execution in some cases were protracted. The same men, however, were keepers of prisons and jails; and it is probably with reference only to their office as jailers that the word is used in Mt 18:34.
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American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
A Dictionary of the Holy Bible, American Tract Society, c. 1859, edited by W. W. Rand.