This question - particularly the question of whether someone could die from pain - may be one for /r/AskScience (Medicine), but you will find a few examples in these posts

• How were wounded soldiers treated during battle in formation-heavy armies (Roman legion, phalanx, Napoleonic line infantry, etc)?

• How did people get through an operation before anesthetic?

• How likely was a Roman soldier to survive being wounded in battle?

• Why didn't they use Guillotines for amputations during the Civil War?

• US Military History: I made it back alive, but I've been shot in the thigh. What sort of medical attention do I receive and what are my chances for survival in 1862, 1917, 1944, 1968, and 1991?

• With Opium being available throughout history, why did the invention of anesthesia - like ether - play such an important role in changing surgical medicine?

If you could die from pain, torturers would be out of work.

The Roman military had a very robust surgical corps, and they used "tears of the poppy" regularly. Ironically, they also used wine to wash out wounds, although they didn't know why it helped (bacteria wasn't discovered until the 1870s).

During the middle ages, poppies generally only grew in hot, dry areas under Muslim control, so alcohol replaced opium until the 1800s. The big killers were infection and gangrene, so amputation was more common than other surgeries, and cutting into a body cavity was nearly unknown. The poor people had little access to surgery, so they mostly died, but it was from infection, not pain. Surgery on common folk was left to (I'm not making this up) barbers. Nobles and rich people could afford doctors, but that was mostly medicine, not surgery.

Lots of Greek and Roman knowledge and technology fell out of favor (and memory) and was rediscovered during the Renaissance (due to getting Arabic/Persian translations of Greek and Roman documents). The reopening of trade with the east made spices and medicines available again, and the church's losing its stranglehold on knowledge meant that doctors were able to do research and exchange ideas.

In war, treatment of non-officers didn't become commonplace until almost the industrial age, and wasn't institutionalized until much later. Napoleon didn't think medical personnel were worth the trouble, and the British resisted taking any medical supplies or doctors to the Crimean War in 1854! Nursing volunteer Florence Nightingale brought the situation to the public's notice, and founded the Red Cross. During this period, you could hope for whiskey and something soft (like lead) to bite on while they cut you (the origin of the saying "bite the bullet"). Even so, most people died from disease rather than trauma, and anything surgical was likely to be fatal.

Other big heroes in providing medical care for the rank and file were Frederick the Great and Marie Antoinette (See "Battlefield Medicine," Haller, or "Military Medicine," McCallum).

Ether came in during the early 1800s, and was used during the American Civil War. Opioids came into general use after that, and the understanding of sanitation (preventing infection) meant that injured people lived long enough to make surgery worthwhile.