prison bars in 1000 A.D

You people still surprise me with the depth of your historical knowledge. Here's a good one for you...
Were there any prisons using iron bars being used, ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD, in 1000 A.D.? It is my understanding that in Europe, at least, there was little need for such a restraint, and "prison cells", as we know them today, simply did not exist then. "Stocks", dungeons, maybe?
I know iron was being shaped into weapons well before 1000 A.D., but would good iron have been laboriously shaped into prison bars?    
    

Edited by Svantoretro - 29-Oct-2006 at 11:08

I know that in the Early Middle Ages (and in Roman times as well), prisons were indeed not very common. Imprisonement was used on a small scale to keep people while waiting for trial, but imprisonement as punishment did not exist. People were fined and had to pay either the victim or the king, or both, and if they could not, they would get physical punishment, like beatings or mutilations.

If you are interested in the evolution of punishment a good book on the topic would be Michel Foucault's Discipline and Punish this book is a look at the evolution of the penitentiary system. Another book that might be of use would be Trevor Dean's Crime in Medieval Europe specifically chapter 6 entitled Punishment. I think that your question should be revised.    Prisons as we know them today serve a different function than they did in the middle ages as some of the previous posters have noted. The modern sense of imprisonment is a product of more recent theory/ideas of punishment. However we still have very similar ways of punishing criminals as were present in the middle ages and earlier. We still use pecuniary punishments which one could argue were just as if not more important than corporial punishment (in the Middle Ages). Imprisonment at least in c.1200 was not just confined to high-ranking individuals but rather anybody. If anything high-ranking individuals were less likely to spend time in "prison" because they would be able to buy their way out by paying a fine. It also should be noted that imprisonments in the later Middle Ages were normally for short periods of time rather than years.