What are the motifs in The Pit and the Pendulum by Edgar Allan Poe?

Isolation and confinement are recurring ideas. Throughout many of Poe's short stories, characters are placed in stifling, claustrophobic settings that add to the overall feeling of panic and fear. In some, such as Ligeia and The Fall of the House of Usher, most of the action occurs in one room or one house, closing off the characters to any outside influence. The Pit and the Pendulum takes this idea a step further, imprisoning the narrator in a dungeon. Poe highlights this theme in The Cask of Amontillado, in which the murderous narrator literally encloses his victim in a tomb. In The Masque of the Red Death, the castle is completely cut off from any means of entrance or exit.