English question, please help.?

"Tar and feather" was already in the Middle Ages a form of humiliating public punishment. The "tar" was not what we think of as tar today, but probably pine resin, which was either liquid at normal temperatures or only required moderate heating. Anything resemble petroleum or road tar would inflict severe burns. The other kind of tar would not be painless, but it wouldn't cause lasting physical damage.

I would also assume that "swine" here refers to a human being rather than an actual pig.

tar and feather the swine means that they would put tar onto the pig and then put the pig into a bunch of feathers. the tar would cause the feathers to stick. they used to use this as a sort of punishment on people sometimes because it is both painful and embarassing because the tar would have to be very hot and the feathers would just look embarrassing sticking out all over your body. also they were probably calling a person a swine

This means of torture was used by the Mormons in the USA and those unfortunate were put inside a vat of tar and coated with birds feathers..........those were stuck for a long time and was difficult to remove.....really unpleasant way of punishment.......