A Geek History of Time - Episode 316 - White Wolf V Witches Be Crazy

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

We were saying that we were going to get into the movies. Yeah, and I'm only going to get into a few of them because there were way too goddamn many for me to really be interested in telling you this clone version or this clone version in the early studio system. It's a good metric to know in a story arc. Where should I be? Oh, there's Beast. I should step over here. At some point, I'm going to have to sit down with you

and force you, like pump you full of coffee and be like, no, okay, look. And are swiftly and brutally put down by the Minutemen who use bayonets to get their point across. Well done there. I'm good Damian, and I'm also glad that I got your name right this time. I apologize for that one TikTok video. Men of this generation wound up serving

the whole lot of them as a percentage of the population because of the war, because of a whole lot of other stuff. Oh yeah. And actually in his case, it was pre war. But but, you know, I was joking. Did he seriously join the American Navy? He did. Fuck. This is a Geek History of Time. Where we connect nerdery to the real world.

My name is Ed Blaylock. I'm a world history teacher at the middle school level here in Northern California. And I've mentioned before that I'm working toward my master's degree right now and in the class I'm taking right now I got my first opportunity to perform peer review our rough drafts for our major papers which are research proposals, because this is a research methods course that I'm taking. So we're all coming up with a research proposal, and we're doing peer review. Each of us has been assigned

two of our classmates to do a peer review on. And earlier this week I opened up the first paper that I was going to do a peer review on and I realized that this was going to be a lot more demanding than I thought Largely because There I didn't know where to start The the classmate the first classmate whose paper I was working on I don't think is a native English speaker and there were several places where you know, that's that's neither here nor there really but there were several places where like leaving out an article like, like a V or a, you know,

that kind of had enough of a diff like could, could potentially change the meaning of what they were trying to say that I couldn't always tell what argument they were trying to make. If that makes sense. And, um, I also definitely got the feeling that they were scrambling to try to understand like what we were supposed to be doing in the rough draft. And there was an awful lot of circular language, like different phrases that mean the same thing being repeated a couple of times in a paragraph You know the whole it's the poison for Cuzco

Yes, Cuzco is poison the poison specifically designed for Cuzco that was like oh man and and Yeah, so our professor had said, you know do the positive, you know critique then positive model and I was like, okay. Well, let's find some good things here And I also had a little bit of a problem with that because like that's not the way I was taught Trying to stretch those muscles to to get better at doing that. So yeah, that's what I've been working on this week. How about you?

Well, I'm Demian Harmony. I am a US history teacher up here in Northern California at the high school level. And actually, I had a friend of mine drop off a book for me the other day, specifically so I could read it obviously but it pertains to some research that I'm doing he left me a note he shot me a message rather and he said delivered I did as you would assume mutter god damn it to myself as I read your yard sign. It has its intended effect.

I like it. Yes. I like it. Yeah, but her dammit as I read your yard sign. So yeah. Cool. Well, let's see when last we talked we were up to our armpits in werewolves. Yes, which is an uncomfortable and rather dangerous set of circumstances to be in depends on the conditioner you use but okay Yeah, I'm fair

Yeah, but so this week we're gonna be talking about wizards Okay, rather we're rather we're gonna be talking about mages Or rather we're gonna be we're gonna be talking about a lot of the things Okay. Well, let me let me so we've talked about vampires. Yes, and Vampires are essentially made by other vampires. It is a yes orally contracted disease Yeah, yeah

You know technically you could call it that yeah werewolves are just born that way right there was no you make other werewolves Yeah in in the world of darkness like can't repeat is not a curse. It is inborn condition You are a werewolf. Yes congenital. Okay. Yes So now we're doing mages, which I assume, um, can be learned. Kind of. Okay. So we're going to get into kind of a blue lives matter kind of episode. All right. It's the Tony Stark approach to, um, well, you had, you had gamma radiation, you had mutants, and now we've got high tech. Like, well, kind of like it's, it's people who could put it down if they wanted and

and wouldn't have to register. OK, yes. And no, it's a little more nuanced or a little more it is simultaneously more complicated and less complicated than that. It yeah, but but for that discussion, we'll have to start out talking about because this is the way I'm doing these episodes is we're gonna have to Talk about like wizards and and magic in lore Okay, sure and just like with vampires and just like with werewolves Like I could do a whole Four episode series on oh, hey and ladies and gentlemen, this is magic and how magic is, you know

Developed in the lore and everything over time and as a matter of fact magic could be one that like we could do a sub series on because it's it's It's such a universal human kind of concept like wherever you have been people there has been some kind of tradition of Magic, right? Just if somebody understands barometric pressure, they're a warlock, you know? Like, if someone counts past 10, they're a wizard. Yeah, like it's like, what magic powers do you have? What sorcery is this?

I have an almanac. It's a spell book. Like. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. book like Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah and and Like in a way. I'm kind of gonna gonna touch on that a little bit, okay anyway

We'll get to it so so magic mm-hmm is a powerful idea, okay? It's a universal idea In the in the West particularly which is what I'm gonna what I'm gonna focus on. Mm-hmm the word magic along with the words Magus Magi and mage Takes its root from the Persian word Magu Which in turn comes from the proto indo-persian Meg or Mag which means capable or to be able. So it's about ability. Ability to create.

Ability to create. Ability to manipulate. Or manipulate, yeah. Ability to change. Magicians of all kinds, from shaman to witches to the wizards of legend, all share the ability to make the impossible happen Okay. Now just real quick. Yeah Magus Latin. So my wheelhouse

Comes from Magos Greek So which which is borrowed from Right, which yes Absolutely. I'm not saying Greek is the origin. I'm just saying that the Greek word Magos literally means Persian wise men or Persian priest of the wise men like Which which is where yeah in a in a in a Catholic addition to this whole thing When we talk about the three wise men the term that is often used is the magi, the gifts of the magi.

They were, in fact, in scripture, Zoroastrian scholars. Right. Because they saw the star. Yeah, who in their studies saw the star and showed up. Now, here's a question I've always wanted to actually ask you. And this seems like as good a place as any Yeah, you just did the cross. I did it seems like as good a place Then is the star that they were following to Bethlehem was that the Morningstar? No, okay. That is a different reference. That is a different reference. Yes. Okay, the Morningstar is is a reference to something evil and Tastes like sausage, but isn't sausage.

Oh, oh, oh, nicely done. Thank you. It took that one. I had that one. That one had to sit on the griddle for a minute before I figured it out. So I didn't mean to hit you with such a hot topic. Yeah, nice. Not even mad, oddly enough.

No. So, so the more, the, the, the thing about, and man that's, this is a whole other, other discussion, but the, the TLDR version is yes, the morning star is a completely separate astronomical thing. Okay. And the negative connotation that is associated with it naturally is that the astronomical thing And The negative connotation that is associated with it now Is an artifact of

the development of Meaning in scripture over time Okay, so when when when when the first references to the morning star were written down Mm-hmm. It was not as Malevolent a reference as it is right because it started as just a single puppet and and Judy and they were just talking at a morning TV show And Judy and they were just talking at a morning TV show Nice and then it got worse and worse. Yeah, and started selling fake meat got it

Yeah, so, okay Okay, but it is interesting that the the three kings the three kings, you know And they're following not the Morningstar. No, the the I'm flailing here Star of Bethlehem. There you go. So they're they're following not the Morning Star, I'm flailing here. The Star of Bethlehem. There you go. So they're following that. They're looking at stars. They're looking at astronomy. And like you said, there's Zoroastrians.

And I mean, that's where we get our zodiac from. And that's how you know that a Taurus is always gonna be that way and whereas Yeah, a Scorpio would totally not bring that energy and then like, you know Bonobo rising but a chimpanzee setting and I I never paid much attention I'd really I'd really rather have a bonobo in the any rising position Chimp in a rising position. Yes, well because a bonobo in any rising position In a rising position. Yeah, well cuz a bonobo in a rising position my leg is gonna get soapy But I'm not gonna get my my body ripped apart. So yes, I can clean one thing

It's gonna get a good lather yeah Talk about it, but shampoo an elephant Jesus We're a buffalo. Oh god. No So Our ideas our concepts yeah of magic as we treat it as we understand it As the trope all the tropes that we get sure around it in our cultural context right all of these meetings gathering Yeah, yeah, yeah are tied to concepts formulated and by formulated I mean like written down for the first time

in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE so the so the five and four hundreds BC sure and Greek writers scholars people who wrote about this stuff Spoke of goetia and it's either goetia or goetia. I think it's spelled. It's pronounced goetia Yeah, it would make sense See you can't do French ever to save your life and now I'm trying to deal with Greek and no I actually just took Wolf a gang von Goethe's name. Okay, and just transpose it into there. I'm totally Okay. Yeah Yeah, but you know what yeah could very well for all I know could fucking be sure sure

So anyway Greek writers spoke of Gio E. Tia. I'm gonna say it's goisha Practices that they labeled as dangerous and abnormal and these were these were practices that were coming out of Religious or mystical semi religious practices out of Babylon and Persia and and places farther east so there is this foreign Attachment to it like you know the stuff we do when when one of our priests you know Kills a chicken and and checks its innards. That's like you know that's that's what you do. That's normal

Yeah, but like over here. You know this stuff they're doing is that's that's That's dangerous, right? Yeah and so Real quick the the word that you're referring to in Greek. There's a word that means juggler. That's go at you cause so Performance yeah skilled in witchcraft as well So I just I just love that like You know the witchcraft blah blah blah and juggling like, you know, just it reminds me of those dancing priests

Yeah, you know, they're the priests of war and it's soul train like it's I'd love that There's there's so much room for them to do both things. Yeah. I mentioned I mentioned to my students this year about the dancing priests of Mars when I talked about Rome and and most of the kids were you know unmoved but there were a

few of them were like wait a minute. Dancing priests. I said yeah. Yeah. It's it. It's exactly as silly as it sounds. Yeah. To us. Yeah. But but to the Romans it was critically important

Yes, like so this was serious business the the root word for for all of this Is go it go a 10 go a tame go a tone all these things that have that there's words like One of them is whaler which I absolutely love because Bob Marley and the whalers, but also people who cast spells, people who bewitch, people who do sorcery, people who like, like there's so much that's just tied to that concept, like that is a root word. Yeah. So yeah, a true primal kind of root word Yeah, but and interestingly because I had a suspicion that oh, okay. The Greeks are doing this That means they're gonna associate it with geometry None of these words have to do with any kind of mathematics. They all have to do with speaking things

into existence not Axiomatic shit at most you've got juggling which I guess you could get to a triangle from there But let's be real like I'm stretching But like it's just it's just kind of interesting because I as soon as you said oh in this century in this issue It's like oh, I bet Galen is gonna come into this no No, this has nothing to do with math Which is fascinating to me because the Persians were all about the math and the astrology and the astronomy Were so mathematical. Oh, yeah. Well because that's that's how you

Describe the mathematics is how you describe those observations like there's no There's no there's no other meaningful way to that's true express that other than math, right? so so when when they when they Wrote down the idea of goetia and had all of these other words that they put they you know built essentially to to build around it The the ideas that they were they were putting forth was that that this is the summoning and binding of daemons Mm-hmm or spirits in the sense that it doesn't quite yet have the

Christian connotation of demon like a spirit out of hell or anything right that but these are Supernatural beings these are spirit beings that do frequently kind of have it does carry a sinister tint to it For the is this their version of the fey? Oh, could we crossbreed family? It's it's a little bit. I would say it's a little bit more like the Arabic idea of gin Okay, okay, cuz I did my next guess was are we talking main ads are we talking niads are we but those don't seem to be as mischievous as what

you're talking about yeah yeah yeah like their currency seems to be tinged with like fucking you up yeah yeah yeah there's there's there's this definite idea that you know if you know the proper way to do it you can you know summon them and bind them But you better be on your toes because they're gonna try to stab you in the back sure okay, you know and So you would you would these these practitioners would suppose they were from Boston Really yeah, Philly Philly Faye Philly Faye Got a whole bunch of fucking batteries here fucking son of a bitch yeah That's why they're attacking Santa

Because he's that's competition. Oh my god. He wasn't attacked by Philadelphia sports fans He was attacked by the Philly Faye there you go. Yeah, okay Okay, so You're not gonna get through a sentence tonight. I'm gonna have a hard time with us tonight, but that's okay. It's what we do so necromancy enchantment divination and and astrology and and I have divination in there even though necromancy could be used in order to have divination in there, even though necromancy could be used in order to divine things. And astrology was all about divination. But like when I say divination separately, I'm talking

about oracles and, you know, prophecy out of nowhere and that kind of stuff. Right. When I, when I have it separately from the other categories of forbidden practice That's kind of what I mean sure and and all of those ideas fell under this idea of go at yet This is this is this Sinister, you know forbidden you really shouldn't be doing this stuff kind of right, right? and So you mentioned Galen a minute ago and you were like, yeah, I'm gonna we're gonna hear about Galen, right? You know And we're not gonna hear about Galen, but you are gonna hear about Pythagoras

Okay because Pythagoras had a reputation as a magician Sources attribute to him sure multiple Fantastical feats including being seen in two cities many miles apart at the same time Okay Being greeted aloud by a river saying hail Pythagoras Okay, and

Correctly predicting that a man believed to be dead would arrive on board a ship coming into the harbor Like having knowledge that like he shouldn't have right right, okay? You know everybody else everybody else is like yeah, no dudes dead. We've heard dudes dead, but there's is like no He's aboard that ship and everybody's like what have you been like have you been have you been right hitting the henbane again? Like what the right and nope there the dude is right Okay, so none of these things are what I would have classified as dumb people thinking math was magic No, right, but

Remember that he is of course known to us. Yes in a modern world He's known to us as being a natural philosopher and a mathematician like math was his thing yeah and you know figuring out angles and you know volume and like all of all of the stuff that that he codified yeah right and so there is this connection between him being immensely learned and that learnedness having a magical or divine component like he knows secrets of the universe he is somehow you know his level of knowledge has earned him this this place of respect not only from other people but from the elements themselves a river Speaking to greet him, right?

Right and that kind of truck with the spirits and him knowing how to be in two places at the same time You know there's this bleed over that phrasing, you know between yeah that phrasing is hilarious to me though Him knowing how to do it not him having the ability The abilities out there. We just don't know it. He figured it out. Like there's just something There's a verbal quirk there that I did. Yeah You know and and it's and it's it is connected to the idea of him being so learn it. Mm-hmm and so the Romans Like they do with so much other shit. They perpetuated Greek ideas about magic

they you know, of course pick it up and ran with it and and they believed in all kinds of hexes and counter curses so much and oh my fucking Like they had they had laws on the books against I want to say that the word was venetarium Are you talking like the evil eye? Well killing through magic. Oh, okay. I Haven't written down somewhere in my notes here Vinny Venetarium Which was also on

On the legal codes the death penalty you would face the the death penalty for causing death via magic through vanitarium. But vanitarium apparently, according to the sources I looked up, also was a word that could mean poisoning. Yeah, because it's tied to wine ultimately. Oh. Yeah. Vane. Yeah, okay. Right. Right. Well, how are you spelling it?

Because I once my pronunciation might actually be helpful Well, I want to say because I don't have the word in front of me But what I remember from from typing it down is I want to say it's V E N E T a r i um when a tarium Although the after the when a tarium although the after the when a The the tarium part might be something I'm misremembering and I'm trying to find it Well, yeah, our eom is like a storage for a thing. So like that makes sense like a solar eom is a son But but like that makes some sense like it is stored there

But what you're the way you're spelling it is tied to the word for blue, which I find interesting, because if you go back a little bit, it might be tied to the word for veins. Oh, what is it? It's not tarium, it's not tarium, I got it wrong. Whene ficium.

Oh, ficium, okay, yeah. Which is related to faciat, making or doing. oh, okay. Yeah, which is Yeah, okay, yeah making right doing right. Yeah, okay, so when a feek you or when a feeky ah would be how you describe Cersei Yeah spoiler alert yeah, cool, which also included words like a Female poisoner not a male poisoner. That's a different word. Whenenum is the word for poison. But yeah, it's not tied to the word for wine at all

that I know of because ven is very different. Wena or wene is also a word for veins. So, yeah, you get into some interesting stuff there. Yeah, so yeah We need feaky when a feaky or a we need no not feaky when a feaker she was a when a feaker It was one of those words. Yeah when they feed them But anyway, okay so and during an epidemic in Rome in 331 BC

There were 170 women killed as witches Make sense by the Romans accused of when a fecum And then during the third century in in imperial Rome of the common era So this is now you know several, several centuries later, both female and male magical practitioners were burned at the stake as punishment for malevolent magic under the Lex Cornelia. Okay. So, so that's from Cornelius, right? So Lex is feminine. So anything that is from Cornelius would be Lex Cornelia. Okay, that makes sense. Okay

so in the Romans again they believed in in all of these, you know curses and and Plenty the elder One of the favorite things that I found out while I was well I was looking all this up Pl planning, the elder, uh, has this passage where he talks about all of this practice and he specifically talks about practices out of,

out of Egypt and Mesopotamia and the Persians and like all of these foreigners. Right. And there's this, there's all of this, like, you know, all of that Oriental weird non-Roman shit kind of, kind of, you know, the, the the the the Other ring is really intense of talking about this stuff And and he says, you know, it's it basically he says it's it's all it's it's it's False false stuff being practiced by con men Basically is kind of right as like anybody anybody who says they can do this They're full of shit, but it's not a bad idea to carry an amulet just to keep it all off of you anyway mm-hmm

The Romans were like okay, so there is a There is a lead sheet that has been unearthed that had scratched into it because it's lead right yeah But I love that it's a lead sheet scratched into it basically a love charm that a boy puts on a girl Okay, and it's let her burn and freeze in her love for me Let her love only me let her want to see me more than any other Let her want me more than she wants food more than she wants her family mirror that she wants her father or father her mother or all this stuff Let her burn only for me and it's it's a love charm and it's okay when I had my students translate it because grammatically There's some cool stuff happening that helps them to really drive home a certain concept. Hmm

But when the students are reading it, they're like, this is some problematic shit harmony. I'm like, yeah This is some problematic shit, Harmony. I'm like, yeah, it was. You know? Yeah, I love the fact that your students called that out, because they're like, what the fuck? We're not merely translating words here. What the fuck? And I think it was unearthed in Morocco or Tunisia.

OK. But you know, Rome had turned into a big lake um but yeah like there's uh god i remember somewhere in my translations there's some sort of discussion of um keeping back the evil eye and if any woman gives you the evil eye here's how you can bounce it back at our kind of thing. Oh, yeah. Yeah, what I what I found was you know that it was absolutely common practice for for Romans in the Republic in the Empire, you know throughout Roman history to wear amulets that would yes have have You know blanket counter counter curse stuff. Yes to ward off wards to keep off the yi

And the evil eyes this is this fascinating kind of concept when we talk about magic at all Because it's Like it's it's hard to pin down where it came from because it is like it is now universal across the Mediterranean and then from the Mediterranean into Ireland oh yeah well yeah you know it spread everywhere and this idea of the very idea of malevolent attention Yeah, and it is this recurring theme the Romans always saw it as like tie again tied back to an older woman Mm-hmm. It's that you know the mother matron Crone thing. It's like yeah We can't impregnate her we shouldn't trust her

She's no longer capable of bearing children right She's automatically suspect as a woman. Yeah. Yeah. And, and I, there's, there's, I'm going to a little bit go into the, you know, gendered nature of all of this later on. I don't have as much time to go into it as if I was going to be, you know, really totally a hundred focused on this, but it is a point that has to kind of be brought up. So, magical practice, like we've already kind of said, was frequently associated, like throughout Western history, it has been orientalized. Right. You said by Pliny the Elder in Rome. Yeah, Pliny did it in Rome, and everybody's done it since then. His nephew, remember, was the one who was persecuting the Christians as a whacked out

superstition. As a whacked out oriental cult. Exactly. He's like, these fucking Easterners, man, why'd you send me to Bithynia? This is some bullshit. I had to torture these fuckers. Thank God they have a checklist of 10 things they can never do so I could just go down the list and ask them. But I mean, what do you want me to do? And Trajan's like, calm down, bro.

Everybody dabbled in Christianity when they were in college. It's all right. It's cause you're trying to bang a deaconess. It's cool. Like, it's okay, man. Yeah. It's like, are they hurting anybody? Yeah. It's just like, you know, but like plight both Pliny's apparently are just like man Is it is it is it coming out of the east? Well, right automatically fucking suspect My god they were marats, um Or no We're bar rats. Um, or no, we're anyway, make, make Rome mergers. Oh, make room great again. Make room great again.

God damn foreigners. Yeah, that's the problem with Rome. All these foreigners. Yeah, that's, that's what your problem is there right? Yeah, you know You know well You know like I don't as if they if they literally and they literally mean this as long as they learn Latin and they like Act like Romans. They're fucking Romans. It's all these guys that are bringing this alien religion shit in here They didn't even need to learn Latin to be honest. It was pay your taxes Yeah, speak what you want the guy in charge. He didn't even need to learn Latin to be honest. It was pay your taxes

Yeah, speak what you want. Um the guy in charge he'll translate. It's good Like whatever hell our emperor mostly speaks greek. Anyway, have you seen his beard like we're good like It's yeah, you know, they did not give a shit So god, it'd be nice to go back to that. Like, you know, as a step, not as an end, but as a problematic first step, that would be, that would be great. So, um, and, and this other ring, uh, like the Romans attributed magical practices to the Egyptians, the Babylonians,

the Persians. And then as the empire went on, and those whacked out Christians that Pliny the Younger had such a problem with, as they moved into the position of social supremacy, magic was the label applied by the church to any kind of non-Christian religious practice. Okay. So if you were, you know, one of the Garamani of whatever tribe living out in your part of the empire, praying to the trees, that was magic. Druids were magic. Oh, yeah.

All of that shit were magic. Oh, yeah, all of that shit was magic and and that other ring was intensified and What what I love about this period of this of this trope development Is that this is a time period where we have? development is That this is a time period where we have all

kinds of Saints going out and doing all kinds of stuff like this is this is the period where we have so many hagiographies to choose from Wasn't there a saint who like literally chopped up a holy tree with a hatchet? Oh, it's oh, it's even better than that and I wish I could remember which saint it was I want to say it was Benedict. Oh I wish it was I don't know it might have been Whoever the saint was he went out into the countryside someplace, you know out in the Empire And he said to the locals and he went up to locals and he said, you know my god the god of Christ is Is more powerful than your god and I can prove to locals and he said, you know, my God, the God of Christ is, is more powerful than your God. And I can prove it.

And they said, yeah, how's that Boniface? Yes. Yes. It was close. Yeah. And it wasn't just that he cut the tree down, right? It was that he got them to cut the tree down. Right. He said, you can stake me down on the ground yeah and and if if you try if you're if you cut your tree down to fall on me my god will protect me right and the miracle was that the tree started to fall on him and then stopped and fell the other direction and he won because he got the stupid pagans to cut down their sacred tree Dedicated to Thor by the way. Oh Really? Yeah, I'd forgotten that detail. That's a good one. Yeah

So so he simultaneously manages to have a miracle Mm-hmm, and I'm gonna get into the the the nuance of that here in a second manages to have a miracle overcome the pagans, and show how stupid the pagans are all at the same time. So it's like a threefer in the hagiography there. That's called being a one flight ace. Pretty much. It's a one move, three It's a one move three miracles like yeah

You're automatically canonized. Yeah, so so Boniface is probably the most I'm gonna say unintentionally comedic example sure but multiple Saints lives involve stories of Saints were people who became Saints overcoming supernatural opposition from pagan magicians Usually through the miraculous intervention of God You know you could go back to Jesus and you've got Simon. Don't you? Yes. I'm actually Sorry Simon. No, no, that's fine. Simon Magus. Yeah is the is the very first example of this

Simon Magus. Yeah is the is the very first example of this Simon Magus became a Christian after seeing the miracles that were being done by the disciples And he he said yes. No, this is this I you know, yeah, I'll get baptized whatever you want to do There's a great racket. This is great And he went to him and said so now, you how do you do the how do you do the tricks? I'll pay you I want I want to go buy them from you business. Yeah, I want to buy them from you I'm gonna go into business for myself You know And they and like you know of course they they you know cast them out

Gtfo and the thing and and that that story is Theologically really important right and it's also very illustrative for our ideas of wizards Because Simon Magus was a magician Simon Magus was a guy who who did things he knew Secrets to make things happen. He understood barometric pressure He could camp past 12 He knew how to hide objects in the sleeves his robe He knew sleight of hand like He knew sleight of hand like yeah, oh

I'd like to say like oh god I I wish I could go back with all the knowledge I have I could run that book But you don't have to be that smart right now to be you don't even have to be functionally literate to convince like 79 million people of something like yeah, sadly. Yeah, don't and it's not even magic It's the dumbest kind of magic now Watch me punch the rabbit. That's in the hat. Yeah Tough guy. Yeah Okay, so Simon the magician so Simon Simon Magus, yeah What wanted to buy the secret to do miracles from from the apostles the disciples and they told him

All right. No fuck off there. There is no there is no trick and and the difference that is Not only theologically important for those of us who are who are believers, but also that is important for illustrating our concept of magic is that the miracles that Christ performed, the miracles especially that were performed by Peter and the other and the other apostles after Christ's death were Acts the act was performed by God

Okay with the apostle acting as the conduit or the deliverer of God's power the source is always Divine the source is always God sounds like they are a wand in a way odd yeah in a way, okay, and in a in in the actions of a magician the magician is Exerting their will the the the magician is guilty of the sin of pride. They write are imposing their will on God's creation and like there's there's

various and sundry kinds of places in scripture both in Christian and Hebrew scripture where You know specifically this is not something you do Because this is you know, it's vainglory. It is testing the Lord your God it is, you know, it's vainglory, it is testing the Lord your God, it is, you know, a thousand different things all at once are bad, right? And so anybody who is a saint, anybody who is performing a miracle is not the source of the power. They are not the source of the event. They are the catalyst, perhaps you might say. You know, and it is again, always the divine that that fuels it

magicians do things either through their own mastery of some kind of knowledge Mm-hmm or by having a compact or having bound some kind of supernatural spirit

a compact or having bound some kind of supernatural spirit to Make it happen for them either way there's some level of Knowledge that man was not supposed to have But it might it might be esoteric knowledge of the nature of the world or it might be You know supernatural contract law but but but either way you know that's that's the root of that power and you know this this brings us to the Middle Ages or first I need to I need to kind

of point out that again Mosaic law the Old Testament and then in a new testament both prohibited specifically prohibited practices related to Goetia describing them as vainglorious trying to force God's hand but people still clung to magical practices right in the same way that people in northern europe kept leaving offerings out for the fairies sure people still kept amulets around to ward off the evil eye you know grandmothers and grandfathers still taught you know the the chants and the and the little spells to, you know, keep away the bad stuff to their children, their grandchildren.

Right. And these practices stuck around. And this now brings us to the Middle Ages and the further othering of magic. Christians who by this time had already been saying anybody who's doing anything pagan, that's a form of magic They accused muslims and jews of magical practice Because like you had said before Like there's some orientalism there because this is western medieval europe, but also there is oh, they're better at medicine than us

uh, so Yeah, there's a wonderful book that talks about that. And math. Yeah, and math. Kiss the Arabs. Okay. But then also on top of that, there's the, no, no, no, no, when we convert bread into flesh, it's holy. It's a miracle. But when they do it, it's cannibalism. Like, you know, it's blood libel. Yeah, yeah. It's, you know, it's, it's, it's, yeah, it's that othering. It's that they're not like us. And even though they do the exact same thing, worship the exact same God and just use different words for it, well, they're clearly not us. Yeah. Yeah yeah And so, you know your mention of blood libel You know the killing the killing of a christian child as part of that was obviously some kind of magical sacrificial ritual

Right like the adrenochrome. Yeah. Oh jesus christ yes because Nothing ever changes all of this has happened before and all of this will happen again Nothing ever changes all of this has happened before and this will happen again Heretical groups later on in Europe groups like the Hussites kind of proto-protestants similarly got accused of magical heretical kinds of practices the Cathars and the

And the Templars both get accused of similar. Yes the Cathars There's there's a a kind of a witch hunt that yeah There's a whole heresy that they've got our heresy. Yeah now what's what's The Cathar heresy is an interesting case for a variety of reasons like Theologically what's interesting about the Cathars is the Cathars engaged in the heresy of Albigensianism and there that one of their core ideas was that either there was an evil god along with

God the father So so they're there basically they said The devil isn't merely a fallen angel. He's anti-god Right or Depending on which albigency and heretic you want to talk to it's that God has two natures one of them in Ellen one of them evil either way It's it's to it's that God has two natures one of them in Elton one of them evil either way It's it's a it's a dramatic like universe

Reshaping kind of kind of idea right in the theology right and that that led to Supernatural the TV show one one yes eventually but I mean that's God and his sister like in a lot of ways there's the little shit and all that yeah oh yeah yeah and then there is more immediately there were albigensians and Cathars basically believed that the material world was ruled by the evil one of the two right that because I around yeah because Around there's suffering there's pain. There's like all of this was what was the real heresy or they did this Yeah, yeah making making the look around at everything just vaguely gesturing. Yeah

This sucks. Yeah, that was the heresy And and they're they Chandler banged Any more obvious Yeah, yeah perfect But their their Practices their their religious practices were centered ultimately on this denial of the material world that was, you know, a major, it really was in a and, and a very significant and a very, uh, uh, utterly paradigm shifting kind of difference in view of the universe.

Right. And their, and their practices took on this mystical bent because of that, right. Which then, which then made it really easy for any noble whose, whose peasants started flirting with catharism to go like um devil worship like yeah, I need some papal support here Yeah, I need I need a whole bunch of of heavy duty hitters with sharp metal objects I need them right now and I need them to be granted permission to kill whoever they got to kill and get into heaven doing it

Right, you know, um and the Templars the Templars are again another fascinating case for a very different reason because they they became over time over a couple of centuries they became this very powerful very influential very wealthy group Like an individual Templar was penniless. We've talked about this a little bit talking about monasticism Yeah, individual Templar was penniless, but the order was really wealthy right and and You know Philip wanted that number one And didn't want to pay back

Payback what he owes number two or possibly number one also wanted that number two and Because they were a warrior brotherhood They're dangerous to order everywhere. Well yeah. Yeah. I mean that's, that's, yeah. When you, when you have a non-state attached military organization with its own recruitment methods, its own motivation, its own financing, like, yeah, no, that is, that is threatening

to the order of everything for sure right but on a on a Spiritual or religious practice level which is where I was going with it. That's that's an amazing point But where where I was thinking of it is Throughout human history anytime you have a warrior cult whether it's them or the Dammit the Mithraic cults of right, you know Roman army. Yeah You know, they have their own kind of spiritual needs mm-hmm and their own kind of spiritual thing and so their initiation rituals and their own kind of spiritual thing. And so their initiation rituals and their particular

ways of, you know, performing the mass, performing vigils, performing whatever are going to become divergent. And that again, just like with the Catholic and their mysticism is going to make them an easy, an easy target. They got accused of spitting on the cross and ritual denial of Christ as part of their initiation rituals, which they were like, no, we don't do that. We are dedicated. We're the poor knights of the temple.

Do you see our t-shirts? Do you see what we're wearing? Yeah. There were stories of worship of a mummified head. That's what it was. Yeah. Within there. Yeah.

And one of the things is there may have been a mummified head that they may have had these practices, but what that may have actually been was they may have believed it was the head of John the Baptist. Right. Which would have had its own kind of, you know, yeah, it's not like, yeah, it's not like the Catholic church at that time was, um, and iconic. Yeah. It's like, yeah, I was trying to find the word like they collected plenty of parts like,

yeah. And, and scattered them everywhere it is still it is still actually church practice when when a new church particularly a cathedral for new cathedrals going up but but even regular parish churches will often have a relic of some kind under the altar really yes I I had not realized this till I was going through our CIA and I was like wait a minute Hold on you mean to tell me there's somebody's bone or a fragment of somebody's bone under our altar Wow, is it like KitKat where you just break off a finger and Hand it to your friends a hole Need to go to confession for that.

There's... You know that KitKats are measured by fingers? No. Yeah, they're called fingers. Each one of those is a finger, which I love because horses are measured by hands, which means there is a KitKat to horse conversion.

I like that. That's funny. Okay, that's cool So there there is a whole Jingle for you. Give me a break Break me off a piece of that and then just like fill in that the Saints name Yeah Anthony whatever. Yeah, so that Anthony. Yeah Three syllables works best of that Clement third Clement three. Yeah

So so anyway, you know this this is this is still a thing sure, you know it's much less much less prominent, but it is still a thing and How do they I'm sorry, I have to ask how do they choose who gets what? That I have no idea about I do not know the I hope there's a lottery works I hope there's like one of those big old tumblers and it's got the plastic things and in it is the bones And it's you know, pretty sure that's not it. I mean That would as as a as a george carlin inspired skit that would be amazing. Oh my god. It have father guido sarducci It's just oh, yeah, you're's been so long

But because then the name would be in there and you just read it and you hold it up like yeah It's way less harmful than the draft. That's a really nice. It's a knuckle bone That's a good one right there That's a good one right there That's a lot. That's a lot of better. Hey, you know what it could be worse It could just be a finger. We got a lot of fingernails in here This is at least it's actually a bone You know, it has a little bit a little bit of heft. It's a kind of dried out Oh It's a little bit of heft. It's a kind of dried out. I wish I could illustrate things. Oh my god.

Yeah, okay, so so so Jesus hey All the all the really big major old cathedrals have his relics that right Yeah, oh, yeah. Yeah, like I remember that nobody news getting into that stuff I think Philip got a phylactery that held a thorn from the crown. Oh, no. No, no Cross Notre Dame So many fragments of the cross. all over everywhere it would remake thesis ship

probably could Know the actual it was the crown it wasn't a thorn from the actual the crown No, but I'm saying that like Philip had a phylactery of just a thorn like yes. Yeah Yeah, he there was like one of his personal things he's right had yeah, yes But Notre Dame had the crown yeah Has okay? Yes When the fire being worried? Yes, when when when the cathedral caught fire that was that was one of the things that that

The the diocese was was very careful to make sure was clear to everybody, you know, immediately after the situation had been contained was all of the relics are safe, you know, because there's it's Notre Dame. So yeah, a lot of them. But yeah. So and so the Templars got accused of like, you know, worshipping this mummified head, which the shading of it and the way it was portrayed meant that it was idolatry and possibly like anti-god, you know, demonic entity that was somehow involved. Right. And so all of this, you can, you can go down the list of these of these accusations against the Templars and they line up Almost entirely beat for beat

With later witch trial accusations. Oh, yeah, like this is this is the template for Later on that's where we get the word template. No, i'm kidding. I'm kidding Um, it'd be interesting if it was it would be funny Yeah, yeah, You know, interestingly enough, there's a group in England called the Lawlords that basically accused the Catholics of this kind of stuff. Like they were like proto-proddies. Yeah.

And they were like, y'all are just like, this transubstantiation shit is going too far. It's Consumption not not trans can stems and it's just like yeah Like so it's just it reminds me you're a fascinating movement. Yeah, they are and they wrote shit down in English So it's actually translatable for Americans but But what fascinates me is like they strike me as the kind of sports fan that I am or used to be at least Anybody who is more of a sports man than me is a lunatic

Anybody who's less than a sports fan of me is just not a real fan. They're just yeah Yeah, only I know the golden mean yeah, and the Lollards always struck me as that they're like no It changes But you could taste the body Like it doesn't change all the way that's dumb, but consomestatiation That's what we're all about. Yeah, I think they had like 12 confessions and I don't remember what they were. Oh, yeah Yeah, Lollardism. Wycliffe John was on their team from the Fugees.

John Wycliffe is now spinning in his grave at a rate fast enough to power a small town. But yeah, the Lollards are closely tied to the leveler movement also because there's there's a big you know a big part of what they were upset about was the Wealth and and concentration of wealth of the church. Mm-hmm and you know and and Things they really got themselves. They really got themselves into big trouble when they started you know talking about When when Adam plowed and Eve span who then was the gentleman right the plowman's tail or something like that Yeah, yeah, and and and their call for you know radical

And and and their call for you know radical Redistribution of wealth was what finally was like, okay. No, we can't have this anymore We're gonna suppress the shit out of these guys Well, and there was also a layer of like all things women are bad Yeah, there was a weird misogyny which again They were doing to the Catholics what the church had done to the Templars like yeah, just yeah Mm-hmm. It's like how you like that. It's like we're an institution fuck off fuck all the way off. Yeah We're not just an institution. We're the Right, right, like I don't think you understand who you're fucking with but you're going to find out. Yeah. Yeah, and they did

so So all of this You know magic Is is now at this point not merely othered But it is is tied to Demon demon worship the in the direct influence or involvement of the devil, you know, and, and, and by this time, it is, it is a, it is a sinister thing. It is a, it is, you know, not to be trusted, but at the same time, nevertheless, folk practices still continued.

People still kept performing herbal medicine. People still wore or carried or made amulets, spells to ward off the fairies. They'd throw salt over their shoulder. They'd knock on wood. All the common superstitions that we know of are essentially magical thinking yes You know they practiced various forms of quote-unquote white magic it's it's during this time period that we see that the the beginning of the Hard delineation between protective or white magic and

harmful or dark or destructive black magic right and so People are still doing all of this stuff But but there's always this fear and suspicion that that all of it was at its source You know demonic it was it was coming from you know supernatural forces are just not to be trusted and it's all You know the work of the great enemy somehow right right even the good stuff is actually bad Even the good stuff is actually not really good. Yeah, yeah, and So in this in this kind of time period we have

More Personages like Pythagoras who we know you know is a historical figure. Mm-hmm. We have other figures who come down to us as having connections to being magicians and And the first one that I want to talk about is Roger Bacon Not Francis Bacon not Francis Bacon Roger Francis Bacon is later Roger Bacon Was a friar he was he was a churchman

He was a natural philosopher. Sorry we have fans who would be mad if I didn't There was a friar named bacon Yes, okay there there you guys are yeah, okay. Yeah, go on yeah So yeah, yeah, I know it had to be done Yeah It's a state law It was a natural philosopher and early scientist and like Pythagoras His reputation for wisdom and learnedness

Led to his legend including wizardly aspects In the early modern period he was said to have created an enchanted head That was empowered to speak and could perform prophecy He was accredited with having sorcerous knowledge and the ability to see faraway scenes through a viewing basin You know he could go wave Yeah, yeah He you know in various and sundry other things he could he could You know

Summon spirits speak to the dead all of this kind of stuff, huh? To the dead all of this kind of stuff uh-huh Now notably his legend is largely an innocuous one despite his great sorcerous knowledge He was said to have managed to trick the devil and get into heaven Despite knowing these things oh Because he was a fiddle man of God Yeah, now in actual fact as far as we can tell from contemporary sources Bacon was definitely a polymath. He was a passionate scholar, right? He dabbled in alchemy like

Everybody did well and I must say alchemy back then was there were divine aspects to it. The, the desire to change led to gold was the illogical or, or at least was, yeah, it was theological in that if you could turn a base metal into the shiny one, the uncorruptible, right? The perfect metals, you could, like you, you could make a human soul worthy of yeah yeah, it was it was it was a spiritual exercise as much as it was a Physical one yeah, yeah, yeah and Aside from that

He's not actually known for certain to have actually dabbled in any kind of occultism. But his legend went on to include all of these things just because he was a mathematician and an astronomer and, you know, early scientist in all of the ways that he was. Now Bacon did not dabble in any occultism, but John D Really actually did John D lived a couple of centuries later 1527 to 1608 or 1609 and He was the court astrologer the Queen Elizabeth the first

That's right. Okay. Yeah, yes, and he was a spy important Yes, well he's credited with having been how much he actually was a spy like he he went into he left her court and went Into Europe right whether he was actually acting as her agent like you know popular culture has said you know He was acting as her spy and all of the stuff like Maybe right we know obviously if he really was a spy He wasn't gonna do anything to leave behind any evidence of it, right? Sure, so and and just cuz he was doesn't mean he didn't do other things as well Yeah, and she had others and and and yeah on top of that

By the way, if you go to marvel 1602 you read that Dr. Strange is essentially that character He is john d In marvel 1602 where where he's advising elizabeth before she dies and he's trying to help her to understand how to deal with This this victor von doom fellow out This this Victor von doom fellow out East someplace in the Holy Roman Empire. Yeah, nice One more reason why I actually need to sit down and read Marvel 1602

Yes, like I've looked at it and and I've seen I've read a couple of Artists of it. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Yeah. Yeah, so so D Was as a student at Trinity College He created stage illusions for a for a theatrical performance, right? That he said led to the beginnings of his reputation as a magician. Mm-hmm And he was charged with treason During the reign of Queen Mary Elizabeth's's sister, remember? Well, everybody was, but yeah. Well, yeah. But he drew up a horoscope of Her Majesty Mary and the Princess Elizabeth. Right.

And like in that particular time, there was very little you could do about the two of them at the same time that would not somehow be politically charged. Right. Right. Right. Now he was eventually exonerated. Right. And he had taken Catholic religious orders. But when Elizabeth took the throne, he became a Protestant. Like you do. It's Elizabeth. Elizabeth you know and wound up taking up residence in her court becoming her court astrologer right and he wrote a hermetic and and Christian Kabbalistic text in 1564 Monas hieroglyphica okay that received great attention and where where Roger Bacon had wizardry attributed to him

It's really clear D genuinely thought himself a magician and a holder of esoteric knowledge, right? Well again, he also Differed with people when it came to transubstantiation like that that was a big deal to people. And he actually, huge big deal. One of the things that he did was he proved that transubstantiation was real, proved. I'm using finger quotes, believers will know that it was real

and that I'm going to hell. But he proved that it was real because he proved you could do it using any edible substance So instead of just the wafers or the bread he used ground up walnut shells And that's where we get the term D's nuts I am I am simultaneously impressed and so I Am I am simultaneously impressed and so oh man, oh incandescent

You know the thing is you have you have reached farther for less good. Oh, yes It's somehow somehow Shortness of the path you had to follow for that one. Just makes me more angry. Led me right. Just like I had a ring in my nose. I swear. Yeah, God, you were all in on that. You really were. Was a son of a bitch.

Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah. Did that right in your face. You really. All right. So yeah, no, so he wrote a monas hieroglyphica, which is about Angela's mom using emojis. That one oddly doesn't make me angry. Because you know, who's the boss?

That's right. Yeah. So, so he changed the chant to a oh oh a Several in in the context that I'm talking about when I say that it's a hermetic Christian capitalistic text Hermetic in this context means pertaining or related to esoteric knowledge attributed to Hermes Tramegistus. Oh Okay, so it, so dates back to, you know, the Greeks and the Greeks attributed to the Egyptians, like it's not like you do. Yeah. Yeah. And then Kabbalistic in this sense can refer refers to Christian and adoption and adaptation of the Jewish mystical traditions of the Kabbalah.

Right. And, and there's, there's Christian Kabbalah, there's obviously, you know, Jewish Kabbalah and the hermetics have their own Kabbalistic tradition or their own interpretation of it. That's separate from both of those. And, and those Kabbalistic, and and those Kabbalistic all of those Kabbalistic Kabbalistic traditions show up at various places in Rosicrucian spiritual theosophic practice okay those are the guys that were helping Indiana Jones at the end of last crusade but almost chopped him up in the beginning of last yeah well yeah they're yeah yeah I got it actually I'm gonna look up

whether they were actually Rosicrucian but yeah they're they're related certainly so now I've been I've been the last couple of people I've talked about are historical right I've right you, um, or historical, right? I've, right. You know, these, these are people who we know we have records. This, this guy actually existed. Right. And whether they actually were or believed themselves to be magicians or not is,

is the part of this that is legendary. Sure. Where I'm going from here is now talking about actual legendary figures to kind of look at how this archetype of the wizard is developing a moinen comes to us out of the Finnish and Karelian folklore he is the main character of the Kalevala which is the Finnish national epic and now dates get kind of fuzzy here because the earliest parts of the oral tradition that are involved in the Kaliwala could be as much as 3000 years old. This is going a long way back. But like so much European folklore, it was collected and edited and codified and written down in the 19th century

Okay, and so there are lots of stories out of the Kalevala that we can look at and we can go Yeah, this is this is old. This is like older older than iron in Europe old, right? Right, right and and there are other parts of it that we look at and we go. This is a 19th century nationalistic introduction You know and yeah, I could see there's there's it's like Oh Nazi excavators found five rings Let's do the Olympics this way now. Yeah Yeah, and and so so these these different elements are kind of interleaved with each other mm-hmm so picking different bits out can be kind of hard but

Vina Moinen is a demigod according to Some some parts of this tradition. He's the son of the goddess Ilmatar and the first man. And he appears in the Kali-Vala as an old man, still vital and still strong and still a warrior but white hair very long beard and his age is an indication of his ancientness and his power he is not enfeebled by his age okay if that makes sense no it does it does yeah and So he is he is semi divine Mm-hmm, and he is associated very strongly with songs poetry and chants

Stute ch and ts not like randomness. Oh, okay. Okay, so so language. Yeah the singing Okay, so by the way the word word for song in Latin, I believe is Carmen. Okay. And there's also another word, but the word Carmen can also mean magical spell. Okay. Yes. If I recall correctly. Yeah. Yeah. It's a charm. It's a prayer. It's an incantation Um, it could also be a formula Uh, but it could also be the speakings of an oracle Like it's all those things is is that the root from whence we get the word charm? Carmen very likely because the latin c

I believe in italian turns to a cha sound right? Chess array like that would make sense. Yeah, so yeah, and that's where you get, you know, Carmina Barana Carmina is the plural of Carmen. Okay. So yeah, this makes sense. Mm-hmm. We're gonna see a lot of that by the way Language has turned into a four-episode thing on the mage Jesus yeah, like oh, did you know this? Yeah Yeah, so so all of when we see Vyna Moinen work magic all of his magic is rooted in language cool Speaking the names of things Can conjure can control can change them

Okay, right a verbal a verbal evil eye Kind of yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and he is a shape-shifter and an elementalist It also goes back to face shit toe right don't tell him your name. Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. Yeah and So there are a couple of there are a couple of different places in the Kalei Vala where we see this but the the most I say the most instructive is he gets into a Wizards duel we we would look at it as modern consumers of media. We would look at it as a Wizards duel cool

He gets into a Wiz's duel with Yoko Hainen. And Yoko Hainen is a young man, but is magically powerful and is descended from, I want to say he's the son of Lohi, the Kind of Baba Yaga ask Crone figure who is the goddess of winter and and evil? Okay, and so via the Moin and yoga Hainen are at odds over Which one of them is gonna get the girl? basically

and they get into this duel and uh, which one of them is going to get the girl basically. And they get into this duel and there is shape shifting involved and there is, you know, one of them, you know, speaking, speaking a thing and having the thing happen. And ultimately Vyna Moinen, um, just breaks out in, in a chant that causes the earth itself to rise up and surround and then swallow Yokohinan, pull him down under the snow and under the ice and entomb him. And the part of the overtone part of the part of the emotional loading of this is that Vyna Moinen has this power over the elements because of the charisma and the level of respect that he gets from his, his level

of charisma and, and just the fact that even the elements of the earth, you know, bow to him. And so this is, this is a very primal kind of magic. it is linguistic in its nature and it is the creation of a time when bards and wizards were the same thing because you and I see this as as we're reading it or watching a visual interpretation of it sure we see it as a wizards duel to the Karelian Finns proto Finns who? Sang the story it was a duel between poets oh Wow Okay, so it's so interesting to me that like okay the belief in the supernatural was way higher back then, the belief in gods and

the god was way higher back then and yet when they're faced with a very clear like, oh, these are magician wizard guys fighting, they're like, look at the poets fight Yeah, you know like their explanation is, or their focus is much more on the part that everybody can do instead of on the part that nobody can do. Like the fantastical part, not a focus. The poetry on the other hand, that's the foot, like just wow. Yeah. Well, you know, in a, in a society at a technology level where there are no recorded media. Right. And all of the stories, everything, everything is orally transmitted. Anybody who

remembers and can, uh, can evoke. Right. The stories and evoke poetry. My ancestors, like it's, it, you know, you have power over me cause youoke poetry my ancestors like it You know you have power over me because you can name my ancestors. Mm-hmm There's okay, so you go back to the druids for just a second as long before Claudius slaughtered them all Caesar's talking about them and he says they they do not allow written letters now now Greek allow written letters. Now, Greek figures were used, Greek letters were used amongst the Celts and all the people that he invaded

and took over for all kinds of things, but the Druids specifically, in order to become a Druid, you had to basically go to Druid college and you had to memorize for more than 20 years. And if you fucked up even once in your recitation you were put to death. Yeah. So there's so much value placed on that amongst them and these are the ones who were doing the Wicker Man and all this kind of shit according to Caesar. According to Caesar. But like one of the things that they could do to you if you

didn't do right according to Celtic society was they could deny you access to sacrifice. Yes. You know, and shit like that. So it's just like it's, and again, it's they remembered the poems. They remembered 20 years worth of, you know and yeah, and in many of those groups the Irish I know among them Yeah becoming a bard Was a like a a an

Adjunct of being a druid like right you you ran in the same circles like the the training you got was different But you had the same status. Yeah, yeah and Yeah, and speaking of bards Wasn't there a thing about if you if you wrote a poem that made people laugh at a king as a bard you could be liable If people killed that king like there was some sort of weird fucking thing like there wasn't a law No, it wasn't you were liable. It was if the king somebody could come to you and say The king is becoming a tyrant or the king is getting old and weak or whatever I need you to write a satire. That's what it was. Yeah, and you as the bard would say

I That's what it was. Yeah, and you as the bard would say Hmm I understand what you're saying, but no, I don't think it's time. Yeah or Okay. Yeah, it's time as a bard I'm not just gonna write one even if I think he's fucking up But if somebody comes to me and says he's fucking up. He's gotta go. All right. It's not just me, right? And when you wrote the satire and made him the object of ridicule, that's what it was. Yeah He would have to step down. Yeah So you you could you could literally destroy this man's whole career You basically you were the verbal equivalent to a vision board

You pretty much you were a vision bard. Yeah. Oh, yeah. There you go. Not even mad So the the next figure I want to talk about is a bard. He's a Welsh bard named with him Okay, yeah, and no vowels. Yeah Well to at the end Why in the middle but yeah good Ian? He appears in the fourth branch of the Mabinotian which is the the essentially You could call it the Welsh national epic, but it's not really epic in the same way

And like with the vine a moinen this is very much This is this is an especially pronounced part of the northern European Zit geist about magic it's rooted in language Okay, and Gwilyan is explicitly called out as a bard and a poet And he is the nephew of math math onwy, who is also a powerful magician. And the relationship between him and his uncle is an important part of his whole legend. This is a very distinctly Celtic cultural undertones here of like

cultural undertones here of like the relationship between a young man and his mother's brother, you know as his as his mentor figure and all that kind of stuff and William himself is the uncle of the Welsh hero Lou full full name Lou law guffas and so how to how to describe the beginning of the story because it's involved so William nominates his sister Ariane Rod to to be a cup bearer a servant for math and one of the one of the Requirements for the job is she has to be a virgin

Okay Well as she shows up to do the job Through magical circumstances it becomes clear. She actually isn't one she is embarrassed. She's she's sent away and Lou this baby this baby boy is is born. You know basically leaps out of her body And she you know just flees and abandons the baby and Gwydion picks picks the boy up and carries him inside and looks after him and a Month two months whatever the time period is afterward Gwydion takes the baby to arianrod Mm-hmm and says you need to give the boy a name

Or no, yeah, he says you need to give the boy a name. She says I'm not gonna name him Okay, I Will not I will not do it and he will have no name from anyone But me because it was the mother who gave a child their name So William raised the boy until he was about six years old No name no name no name. Oh child has no name until about the age of six and then arianrod is

down in the in the town below her her castle because she's no woman and a cobbler a noble woman and a cobbler, a shoemaker, and his very young apprentice are there. And a bird alights on a building or on the spar of a ship, different versions of the story have different things. And the bird, one way or another, the bird is causing causing a distraction causing a problem

okay, and so the little boy picks up a rock and Flings it from a very long distance and strikes the bird in a very specific spot on its leg to drive it away without without Killing it okay. Yeah, and arian rod says the fair-haired boy has a strong sure hand Fair-haired boy is a strong sure hand. Okay, and poof the shoemaker and little boy turn into Gwydion and The child who and Gwydion looks at his sister and says very well the boy's name shall be swift sure hand Luthor Giffis

Okay, so ha ha you named him Okay, and he on run says oh that's so similar to like Hulin being given dueling gases Yes, yeah, well, well is Celtic. Yeah Yeah, yeah, and so then says all right fine fine. Fuck you. Okay. He has a name, but I'm never going to give him arms, so he's he's weapons. There's a statue There's a statue of a guy on a horse. Yes. Oh, okay. All right. Yeah Yeah, so she says I'm never gonna give him I'm never gonna hand him weapons and For a young nobleman his mother was the one who handed him his weapons, so he's never he's never gonna have noble status He's gonna be a peasant all his life

William says all right Cool fine, whatever It goes away. Mm-hmm Several years later Okay a Two bards show up in arianrhod's castle and as they are performing An army appears in the distance. Mm-hmm and arianrhod servants, all of our menfolk are away, we need somebody to fight these guys off. Bards are powerful stout men. And somehow the older bard winds up getting armed by one of the servants

and Arianrhod hands weapons to the younger one. And as soon as she finishes buckling on his sword belt poof the army disappears And it's with Ian and Lou right Ian says ha ha ha gotcha and Finally arian harrod says fine For the ink and you again. Yeah I He I I place a gaus on it at this point point it's not even I'm not gonna give him She just says I place a gas on him. He is never going to marry a mortal woman. Oh, I was close. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah and

so Gwydion and his uncle then make the woman blow the wed who becomes make the woman blow the web who becomes Lou's wife and winds up betraying him and there's a whole legend about that sure so William is again a bard Poet his language is is a part of everything He does the words like naming giving Lou a name is the very first part of this whole story

you know so that's that has that centrality right and There's shape-shifting. There's illusions. There's The use of trickery yeah, there's massive contrivances. Yeah, huge contrivances, right and So so we have all of these all of these elements in this in this story, right? So now possibly the most famous all of these all of these elements in this in this story right so now possibly the most famous legend non non-modern archetype of a wizard we come to his Merlin right before the late 20th century he was the most famous wizard in the English-speaking world and probably in the French and German speaking

worlds as well. Uh, according to his legend, he's born of a mortal woman in an incubus. Um, so he's half demonic. Uh, he's gifted with prophecy. Uh, the ability, the ability is related to enchantment and shape shifting again. He in, in his role in the story, he uses magic to allow Uther to seduce a grain and she gives birth to Arthur.

Right. He then for reasons nobody else understands for his own cryptic, you know, I know the future kind of reasons he spirits Arthur away and arranges when Uther dies, cryptic, you know, I know the future kind of reasons he spirits Arthur away and arranges when when Uther dies he is the one who sets up the sword in the stone. Right. And then when Arthur pulls the sword out of the stone reveals himself to be the true heir to the Crown of England, in the original stories there's modern interpretations of Arthur have

conflated the sword in the stone with X caliber which which initially its name was caliber in in the Celtic But in the in the very earliest tales Merlin Points Arthur to the lady of the lake and Excalibur Okay. Yeah, she hands him that right? Yes, and And there's a bit where

Merlin says to Arthur, you know, which do you value more the sword or its or its sheath or its scabbard and Arthur looks at him like what are you dumb the sword? I mean like look at it like you know whatever and and Merlin says to him see this is the folly of youth as Long as you wear that scabbard no sword can cut you And you know there's that whole moment which then becomes important when another wizard or rather wizard dress Steals the scabbard and makes him vulnerable well, and isn't that his own half-sister. Yes More drain no Morgana Yes more depending on the on the right Morgan or Morgana Lafay, right?

and she's the half-sister because his She's half-sister and cousin right? the half-sister because his She's half-sister and cousin right because his dad got it on with his own sister. No no his dad his dad seduced Yagraine you grain right wound up remarrying It's it's a it's a okay, okay, but it's his half-sister Through mom winds up Arthur then winds up

Sleeping with another one of his half-sisters and she that's what that's that's what I'm conflating. So yeah, so so he Arthur is half-sister with Morgan Le Fay and more gauze. That's what yeah Orkney He winds up getting tricked into sleeping with more gauze Mm-hmm and more gauze gives birth to Mordred there, okay, yeah, and more gauze is also the mother of Gavin Gareth and Gaharis

Gavin being the Scottish Welsh, whatever you want to call it pronunciation of Gawain Okay, and so they are his cousins and Morgred is his son Right his family tree is Borked because magic so And and now that I'm talking about that I've been sticking to male figures Uh-huh because there's a distinct tonal difference in folklore between depictions of male sorcerers and female spellcasters. And so there were themes of femininity and even outright gender swapping attached to magic when used by men. Um, like, uh, I haven't, I haven't talked about Norse traditions really at all up to this point, right? But Odin was said to be a practitioner and actually a master of a form of magic

called Sather, which was exclusively a female art. Oh, in, in real life, if a man was caught practicing S say there he would be put to death Interesting because in because of at least two myths, uh, thor and loki end up swapping genders with women Oh, yeah, no, yeah, there's there's there's this really weird to us, um set of ideas that, uh, the, the, the Norse had back then about gender and

gender roles. And like in those occasions when Loki and Thor, uh, you know, in Thor's case, you know, essentially winds up dressing up in drag to, to fool giants, you know, Loki actually becomes female, like it turns into a mayor, like how much of that was somehow some kind of recognition of, of, you know, fluidity of gender, how much of it was, this is incredibly trans-aggressive and we're doing this as an example. We don't know what the emotional loading was

for those stories. We know that they told those stories and we know that Thor was a hyper-masculine figure. He was, we know that Odin was a hyper-masculine figure, you know, and Loki was chaos, you know, and so him, him being so literally gender fluid, um, could to them have been an indication of, no, this is, he is a being of primal

chaos. He is neither one nor the other. He's, you know, everything all at once, kind of, you know, right. Yeah. You know, he's all in nothing all at once. Yeah. And, and you know, we, we have our own ideas about all of these things and we look at those stories and you know without because there's no other documentation and because all of those stories were written down in the 15th century you know after after you know pagan practice in in in Norse society right gone away almost entirely You know, we don't we don't know what the spiritual and emotional

Meaning of that was to them, right? But it had to be something important you know or it could have been like like It could have been pure whimsy, too Yes, it entirely could have been you know, hey it could have been pure whimsy too Yes, it entirely could have been you know it could have been the the spider ham version of their myths You know

Yeah, you know Yeah, I kind of lead in the direction with with Thor's story in particular the way that's written seems to be you know Played for comedy so it kind of right like right well, and it's an inversion played for comedy Absolutely because I mean it's not like they didn't have like hyper masculinity, I don't know how distinctive their gender roles were but like it seems like the women could handle the fucking men, you know, but like You know there clearly was a But like there clearly was a okay the boys are off doing their thing Jesus

We can finally get some shit done kind of vibe going on yeah, um, and so this could absolutely be a way of like softening the men through this like inversion of of you know their Most masculine type, you know, it just it feels very draggy in terms of like Yeah, the the comedy entertainment comedy, exactly, exactly. So yeah. I don't know. I think that our loading of our own values on gender,

especially in a charged time when it comes to gender, I'm a little wary of it. And also, I just love the idea of Norsemen Absolutely like oh this day of the year we all wear pigtails Yeah You know fuck if Thor could do it is you know yeah, cuz if Thor could do it we can do it Yeah, it's oven midday. You know it's so yeah Yeah Yeah, it's of in midday, you know, it's so yeah Yeah

So but either way, yes, so but women women as as casters is different than men as casters Because then it's learned and it's like you are you are the elite Whereas it seems like women as casters. There is a more whereas it seems like women as casters, there is a more... Well, there are women in legend who are casters, and then there is practice of folk magic, and they're similar, but they're notably different at the same time.

And so, when women in lore are sorceresses, to add a more, call it elite or class kind of attached kind of word rather than witch, when women are in lore as sorceresses Their magic was by its nature subversive Mm-hmm. I mean it was always somewhat subversive, but it's more so And and so you know the first kind of example that I have is Cassandra Now she's the daughter of Priam right she starts she she she's a priestess of Apollo and She's cursed Mm-hmm, and her curses she has the gift of true prophecy. She can see the future

Right knows what is going to happen. She's but she's cursed with mansplaining. Yeah Yes, yes, no and but but no gas lighting actually gas lighting Yeah, no one no one will believe her right because she had the audacity to refuse Apollo right Like let's let's let's talk a little bit about you know Patriarchy right here and Apollo being the god of divination Yeah, like he's like, oh, yeah, I'll give this to you. But yeah. Yeah now I would point out No one would believe her which I really wish I still love this idea

I really wish I still love this idea. Yeah that when all the the children of pream got Divided up and they did as slaves and sent back I wish they would have put her with Odysseus's ship because he would have gotten back in 10 days Oh, yeah, he would have gotten gotten home right away. Yeah. Yeah, because I'm I'm whatever I am nobody Yeah, and nobody will believe her Yeah, I know the future. Yeah, I know the future but if I tell you Nobody nobody will believe me and he's like, okay, we're gonna go there. Yeah, we're gonna we're gonna avoid this island entirely guys Um, yeah, there's a whirlpool over here Poseidon is pissed. I get why she just told me I killed her nephew. I get it I'm sorry

So we're gonna we're gonna actually pick up the boat and walk it across this island and avoid that thing entirely We'll be home in two days. Yeah Look at he split. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm home I'm home in a matter of weeks rather than to write. Hey, I'm looking to hold my little boy He's 10 now instead of like he's got beard hair like Yeah, he's a fucking adult. Yeah, yeah, so you know and and now Cassandra doesn't Do anything? Magical, but she's an important

Archetype yeah, absolutely of a serious and a prophetess. Yeah So the next next name on my list is Circe hmm You already know oh do I ever yeah, oh she hogged all the magic Nice. Thank you again. Not not only not even mad actually impressed. I like that. That's a pun I wrote so many years ago. I'm sure So she's a daughter of Helios, yes, so again we have this idea of connection to the Sun. Yeah She's highly knowledgeable in herbal or and potions. Yes

She is she she did rather enchant or in source cell or transformed her enemies Whoever they were at various times now. She's most famous of course for turning Odysseus's men into swine. Yes And then turning them back after Odysseus agreed to stay with her for a year so it depends on the story because some say that he he goes to knock on her door because Ileanaus comes back I think it was Ileanaus yeah might have been I might be mixing up my second in commands to legendary men yeah um but yeah actually I think I am because that's a nice guy But anyway, the dude comes back. Um, and oh, this is like well fuck I'll go fix this then and he's like

Oh, no, don't don't go. We don't want to lose you. He's like, nah, I gotta get my men back He goes to knock on the door and right as he does mercury shows up because mercury is the god of magic Right and mercury says on the door and right as he does Mercury shows up because Mercury's the god of magic. And Mercury says, hey, you do this, she's going to hit you with her golden wand, turn you into a pig. So take these herbs and then when she hits you with the golden wand, it won't work. So counter charm, he gives him a counter charm and says, you, you know eat eat this do this whatever. Um, it's it might be the first, uh, like um way of defeating doping

uh, but Nice take these peds but they you know, they can't show up on a test Uh, he takes the golden wand from her and then he holds a knife to her or a sword to her depending on your You read of it and says you fucking turn my men back And she's like of course I will daddy and Then he said I would I would pay money

cashy money See somebody do that as a skit right right here because oh My god, that's too perfect. Yeah. Yeah. So, so he stays with her for a year. Um, depending on, again, depending on the source, uh, winds up fathering two sons with her, um, which like in a year, damn but again magic she's you know, the Sun God whatever so And then according to another story She is responsible for turning Scylla into a monster. Oh

The greatest the the the minor sea god glaucus Right came to her saying hey There's this there's this babe Silla Right that I want to that I want to I want to get with can you brew me a love potion? Sure, and yeah you know Circe looked at glaucus and was like I don't know I kind of want you for myself like how you doing daddy Right and glaucus was like no no no no it's I only got eyes for Scylla. She's she's gorge

Mm-hmm and so Circe said all right sure I'll brew your potion Mm-hmm and Gave it to him and said okay pour this into the pool where she bathes And she comes out monstrous Yeah, and she she hounds sprung sprung out of her thighs and she became the man-eating monster that we know from right

the the Odyssey right and so She supposedly also turned the Italian thing Italian king Hikers into a woodpecker For turning her down. Okay, Picus probably Picus. Yeah anyway, so You know, let's see we have jealousy Motivating her to do evil right we have female figure utilizing magic for

seduction purposes and or vengeance It's all potion and herb based right okay, just keep these things in mind. Yeah. Yeah So now next is media things in mind. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so now next is media. Jesus Christ. Oh, oh man. Oh, she's a special kind of like there, there's so many fun skits that can come from her. Like when we get to the, uh, the father and the cauldron, let me set the stage for you. Okay. Yeah. Okay, so tell us so Madea was a priestess of Hecate right?

Hecate the goddess goddess goddess of magic right goddess of protection from magic. Yeah Double major that way yeah kind of is goddess of the crossroads goddess of drugs mm-hmm and goddess of the moon Now Medea aided Jason right tasks that he had to perform to obtain the golden fleece yes But she fell in love with him through the Intervention of either Aphrodite or Eros placed a spell on her to make her fall in love with him and so she was like oh my god you're incredible I love you I will totally help you but you have to marry me okay there's there's a few so

real quick because we talked about potions she tells him to she she goes into the the foothills and grabs herbs and Creates a potion for him an ointment and tells him to smear it on himself and on his weapons after the Light so that he can wrestle the bulls Yes, yes, the fire-breathing oxen that he has to use to yeah to then plow the fields So she has him smearing shit on himself so again ointments The nature magic that kind of stuff okay

so so yes She then also knows that her dad's gonna be pissed cuz there's no fucking way anybody could have done that without the help of god Damn it, Madea And so go to your room young lady right like and so in some in some she escapes with Jason She's like I helped you you got to help me and he's like cool and she's like and I'm also bringing my brother He's like it's a boat. It's fine. Let's go because the The word for the type of wood that was used for the the Argo yeah what is

Robor which could mean oak which makes a lot of sense yeah it could also mean cork which I love because it makes it unsinkable and it also means like I need to write a note for myself where am I gonna keep it oh yeah you know also You know Also makes it awfully fragile I would not want to try to build a ship out of that I'm just thinking buoyancy like you know put an needle anywhere on it. You know where north is shit, you know But okay, so then she's on the boat with him or were you gonna talk about this part or no Next thing I have is the hydras teeth. So okay. Okay. Oh God, I don't so she she knows she has she has an understanding that the hydras teeth are gonna create warriors

Okay, so I always knew them as dragons teeth, but yes, okay So I will I will hold my powder dry until after you've gotten the myrmidons and stuff. Okay. Yeah, okay So she she is aware that you know when when you when you plant these these in the ground They're gonna come up as warriors. They're gonna try to kill you because you know again my dad hates your ass Right and she tells him okay So when they do that throw a rock into the middle of them, and they'll fight each other over the rock Yeah, so like I'm gonna. I'm gonna. I'm gonna hand you what you need to know to not get killed, okay? Which which again goes back to?

Spellcasters of whatever kind is being knowledgeable about lore and understanding yes these things So so she tells him how to defeat the Mermodons. Yes, and then the next one I have is the sleep potion for the dragon before we get to the sleep potion. Yeah, okay So she begs him to leave she takes her brother of Ciretus with her and he takes her and they go and then It's a boat. It's fine. Yeah. That's the phrase that we got a ship. Cool.

Let's go. Yeah, it's not gonna load us down. I don't have time to quibble. Let's come on. Come on now. But here's where it gets good. Her dad is giving chase. Yeah.

And they're getting so fucking close because they're in essentially the equivalent of a battleship like it's a Dream or whatever the fuck okay? They're a Spears throw away, and she realizes See now I've always had a theory that she only knew One trick and this is it or two tricks, okay? one is smearing shit and the other is this and so So

She knows potions. Yeah, and then she murders her brother and dismembers him and drops them behind the boat and drops them behind the boat because she knows that her dad will stop at every body part to pick it up to collect his whole body to give him proper burial. What a ruthless bitch. It's so much funnier. Holy shit. So like wow. Yeah so it works. Of course it works. Yeah, right Cheapity. Oh God, it's just And I just so I picture she's like Jason. Don't worry. I got this get to the prow of your boat and guide your man He's like, yeah, no problem. And she's like just keep your eyes forward. Don't worry. And never mind the screaming.

What? No, nothing. Go, go. Nothing, nothing, go, go. And then, you know, all right, they're slowing down. And you just hear, oh my God. You're like just people freaking out. And I always have Jason as not being all that bright, to be honest.

Yeah, well. Or being Nick Fury, one of the two. Like there's no in between. There's no in between there's no in between yeah, but But yeah, so she murders her brother's her own brother. Yeah Wow See what I'm what I'm reading Okay, go ahead what I'm what I'm reading into that is

You know Eros or or Aphrodite or whoever, you know, and source-held her to be in love with Jason, right? Right. So like, she's like, OK, you know, we've got to take my brother because my father's going to kill my brother. Well, they're running away. And it's either Jason or my brother. And I've been made, in anime terms,

yandere enough about Jason that like I'm sorry bro But you got to die right cuz Jason and I'm just I'm just seeing you know the crazy guys Yes, I must kill the queen yeah, yeah, yeah But yeah, so that means that absurdus Played his parts well in in members only wake Played his parts well in an members only wake That is so wrong so wrong

So because Jason's going to find the Golden Fleece which is like the ultimate MacGuffin although in in ducktales It turns out it helps put dragons to sleep Interesting you should say that mm-hmm because in order to get the fleece the last magical task that yes, because you know Dismembring a corpse of a family member is is certainly fitting into an idiom, but it's not exactly sorceress, right? So her her final Sorceress act that I that I'm gonna mention here is that she creates a sleep potion real quick

I'm gonna grab that baton and run with it after you finish this then because Jesus Christ Grab that baton and run with it after you finish this then because Jesus Christ She creates a sleep potion to allow Jason to sneak past the dragon guarding the fleece right right so like sheep She is the walking easy button Yes for for the whole quest she right she's the maiden maiden guide Right for the whole thing that that is her narrative role and she does whatever she needs to do in order to fulfill it. So now what else have you got?

Now remember, she knows two tricks. She knows potions and she knows chopping up bodies. So they get back to where Jason was originally exiled from. Yes. Okay, and he's got the golden fleece, here it is, right? And the guy's like, oh fuck, and I promised I'd give up my kingdom. And then he convinces Jason, he says, look, Jace, I didn't expect you to be back so soon.

You know, this is yours by right, but honestly look at me, bro I am so old like I'm gonna die and if you just let me rule it'll be easier for everyone and Jason's like All right. Cool. No problem, man. Like that's that's cool. Um Madea is not having it and she's like, oh hell no hell no and so she Goes to that Kings daughters three of them and says hey your dad's hella old right and they're like, yeah and she's like wouldn't you like him to live forever or at least be young again and they're like

That would be good. Yeah, she's like, no, go, go kill a ram. Go kill an old ram and bring it to me and I will show you the magic needed. And so they go kill a ram, an old ram and they bring it back to her and she chops it up into pieces because these are the only two tricks she knows. And she's combining them and she puts the ram into a giant cauldron and Says magic words and sprinkles herbs over it and stuff like that. So potion plus dismemberment, right? And then the ram jumps right out and it's a young ram again

And so yeah, and so she's like, you know and the daughter's like, oh so they go and kill their father and they chop him up and they, they put them in and she, she sprinkles herbs, but they're not the same herbs. So she makes, yeah, turns dad into stew and changes his name. Um, but, um, and the daughters are all sitting there for a long time waiting and they start discussing what's different.

Well, it's it's a human. It's different, you know, and it's and then eventually they realize what they've done. Medea and Jason get chased out of town because you don't fucking do that. And then, as I recall, Jason then meets Glauque. Okay, so before we get to Glauque, Medea, her ambition, her madness and all this. I just want to see the scene of the three daughters being so happy and just, oh god, dad's gonna, any minute now, any minute now, any and pretty soon they fall quiet and one of them starts to say, any minute, shut up.

Uh, and then... And then there's just a really long uncomfortable silence as dad is boiling and bubbling and... and one of them finally... Did... did we kill our... no, no, no, no. It's different. It's complex. It's a human. It's not a ram. It's different. No, no, shut up. You don't- you always worry. We saw it work and just- That whole evening.

Play it- play it like a whole- like a whole- like that's the whole episode. That's the whole episode. Yeah. Like- like Veep. That- that kind of of that kind of vibe. Yeah, just oh my god So then okay, so then he meets gla okay falls in love with her and he's like, yeah And see this is why I was surprised where you said they got married because as I recall they fucked they had two kids But they didn't get married ever. No. No, she she wanted him to marry her. Oh, okay. Okay, and he found no I never said he married her Okay, gotcha. Gotcha. So yeah, he me he he meets glauque falls in love with her. He tells medea. Hey, um I'm gonna marry her now. So thanks for everything but i'm out

And she's like, uh, uh, so now she only knows two things Um, so she kills her children Yeah, yep So now she only knows two things. Um, so she kills her children. Yeah. Yep And then kills okay by using a potion inside of This beautiful garment and glauke puts it on and emulates Yeah, and then medias like well, I gotta get the fuck out of here Uh, and she goes to she prays to helios and says yo, um,

I need a ride. And he sends her a chariot, which has, I think two dragons connected to it. And she lands in Athens and like lives fine there. Jason moves on with his life and he's sitting under the shadow of the Argo. Um, one of the very few heroes to have survived long enough and Then a stiff wind blows up and catches one of the sails and pulls the Argo and it crashes down on him and splats him Yeah, which like I remember reading The Argonauts and I'm like Wow, did I miss page like what the hey what yeah hell yeah

I mean on some levels like wow his work killed him right like his his legend killed him But on the others I just I picture him on like you remember those those like beach chairs that we had in the 80s Yeah, you know where they knew and it was white and it was all playing back on one of those reclining deck deck and then just Benches a block squid shifts under the sand and you know And you know and then roll credits like it would be like Bambi versus Godzilla like yeah, you know yeah, but anyway yeah, Madea insanity Potions yes and dismemberment and murder yeah Yeah Yeah

Yeah, and and now in fairness. Oh, this is only had two tricks as well Well one hide under the belly of something large Yes, and whether it's actual sheep or or or a wooden horse that you have to build like if you can't find nature ones Then build one but that's it store-bought It's fine. Yeah. Yeah But yeah in lying. Yeah lying is the other yeah. Yeah, very true. He's very good at it Or he's the only one that thinks to do it like it's

Again if you understand barometric pressure you you could be king like I can calculate the hypotenuse of a right triangle that makes me a god to you people right What idiot could have been yeah, yeah So all right Now the last I'm gonna talk about before we bring this episode to a club. That is a very good idea. Yeah is Morgan Lafay, okay Again as an idea of the of the feminine archetype that we're we're seeing develop, right? Yeah

Yeah, now we already talked about the fact she's Arthur's maternal half-sister Because you know that family tree is just completely fucked right And in many of the tales she is an apprentice to Merlin Right she learns from him and yours implied or depending on the source not even implied but outright stated to be a on the source not even implied but outright stated to be a Sexual relationship between the two of them, right? It depends on how sexless you want him to be. Yeah, and depending on the source it might be

Nimue and It might be Morgan Who enchants him and seals him up inside a cave Merlin that is okay, okay? Which is how he he? Makes his exit from the stories and is not there to counsel Arthur Right to to help him avoid making the dumb jock golden retriever mistakes that he that he makes Effective death of a mentor if not the death of a mentor right yeah, yeah And in the very earliest stories she has a benevolent role she is because you know she's his older half

sister right and her learning and her connection to fairy and all of these things have her in a in a role of you know being being helpful being benevolent you know kind of looking out for Arthur being a guardian but she evolved over the course of the development of the legends she evolves into an antagonist and she consistently shows up using illusions and trickery to deceive trap foil Arthur and his nights like a night goes out on a quest and Some magical hinky shit happens. It's her like it's it's it's her or

You know most of the time it's her In the story of going in the green night There are some versions of that story where the Green Knight got his powers from Morgan Right in order to be a test for the Knights of the Roundtable There's interestingly you know when we talk about the way that Medea killed Glaucia Glaucia yeah, okay There's a story from one of the Arthurian cycles Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for the Queen for Guinevere Offering this this sumptuous gorgeous cloak. Mm-hmm. Okay, and

I don't remember who it is. I don't remember if this is before Merlin is is locked up or not, but somebody goes How about you have her? Show us what it'll look like on someone You know, we see this with Hercules too. I think this is how Hercules dies is his wife is too stupid to To do that Yeah, yeah, and then he builds his own funeral pyre while he's burning like it's yeah It's it is long and drawn out. It's yeah And so anyway, you know Arthur Arthur basically tells the messenger, you know, put it on she puts it on and you know

Catches fire, right? and In another one of the stories it is Morgan Le Fay Morgan Le Fay seduces some other night into ambushing Arthur And then she uses magic to steal the scabbard to Excalibur. Sure. And you know, fling it into a lake where it can't be recovered.

And she just consistently is seducing Knights and nobles into working against Arthur. And there is a very significant, uh, sexual component to her. Yeah, I was going to say it's a lot more duplicitous and sexual than it is any kind of magic. Yes. Well, it kind of kind of comes back to the words being. Yeah, poison or seducer magic. Yeah.

And so she she uses illusions. She uses magical spells she crafts these things And she is always credited as being a sorceress But her motivation and her mechanism of doing things has this much more sexualized kind of right uh Component to it right and when you think about who these stories are being told to that kind of makes sense because this is this is You know the vulgate cycle being told to

french and english nobles and you know I was gonna say I thought it was a French story to begin with Yeah, and and they're and they're their Stories are going to revolve around these kinds of things, you know and and the nature of their ideas about Feminine roles and morality and female sexuality and all of that stuff have oh sure have have developed I don't want to say evolved because of the the overtones

But they've developed you know from where they were with the ancient Greeks to what they were in medieval France and So what we see here in the Western Canon is this definite dichotomy male will workers Manipulate language and change their own shape. They have these duals where they change shape and do these things Female will workers operate through herb lore potions and poisons and they are generally seen as antagonists To heroes whether whether we're talking about Morgan Le Fay who's always one or we're talking about media Who's like I help you I help you I help you and now fuck you Right, you know and her methods even though fuck you lay me. Yeah

Even though her her Motivation throughout most of the story is to aid him her methods are you know dismemberment right and My god, what the fuck did you do? You know And so in a similar way Mm-hmm in the real world

fears of witchcraft Quick real quick um the okay, so Morgan, okay, so the male is, they change themselves, they do the learned stuff, the force of will, that kind of stuff. Female magic, duplicity, herbs, much more tied to nature on some levels,

and also change you. Not themselves. It's not the same thing. It's not the same thing. It's not the same thing. much more tied to nature on on and on some levels and also Change you Not themselves. That's the inflict change exactly now. Sometimes they do it with a sharp knife Sometimes they do it Mechanical yeah

Very personal right sometimes they'll do it with an oink mint But either way, you know, they're about changing you, not changing themselves. I think that's okay. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so yeah. And so, you know, what we see in Europe, in the culture of Europe associated with this stuff is Most of the number one remember that in the Middle Ages and into the early modern period in Europe Church authority Was universally male authority. Yes Okay, women women could become the abbess of a nunnery, but they're still going to have to answer to the bishop. And a woman's never going to be a bishop. A woman's never going to be in front of a congregation, right? The priest is always male. The conduit for the

miracle, unless we're talking about the saint's life of a nun, which is a thing But the everyday miracle of transubstantiation coming right to that is right as a male figure. Yes You know and and so that that Connection to the divine that connection to the supernatural is very masculinized yeah a Female connection to the supernatural is the old woman who lives in a hut out on the edge of the village Yes, who can help you with an abortion who can put together a love potion for you to you know get a husband

Who can't you know who who can help you with fertility can help you with fertility yeah you know but also by the way if you make her mad she can make your cows sick and kill your children and poison the well and right and and and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and,

and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, is where I'm gonna I'm gonna pull the curtain. Yeah. For us this evening. So what's your takeaway right now? Um, geez, that unless a game system deliberately sets out to to diversify, to include more people, to deliver more equity, to deliver more accessibility in its lore, it will be trapped

in this old medieval way of thinking. I'm not even gonna say this Roman way of thinking because like that would be a step forward. I think Even in the christian church in rome like pliny complained that like yeah They had two fucking women in charge in this one spot because yep that hadn't been codified yet, right? so Unless a gaming company like hires, I don't even think sensitivity writers, but like historians who have actually done the goddamn work as, although I think sensitivity writers absolutely would help, or consultants,

yeah, but historians who actually know their job and historians who actually recognize the history and and listens to them you're going to essentially recreate the misogyny of Of the period that you're trying to emulate Yeah, even if you don't mean to it reminds me back in like episode 20 something where we talked about level nine fighters And we realized that Gary Gygax was still speaking from a frontier mindset about native peoples Yes

You know, yeah. Yeah, so very much. Yeah, so I I I worry that a 1990s Edgy Type of Role-playing game is not going to succeed at that. It's not well Yeah, we'll get into it. Yeah, well we can we can talk about it. So so yeah, no, that's that's I Appreciate very much that takeaway. That's that's yeah. Yeah, so Well, cool. I can't wait to hear the next one. Um

What are you? Recommending for people to consume I'm looking for it right now consume I'm looking for it right now Darn it, and I've forgotten the title son of a bitch It's all that time yeah, sorry Jonathan strange the novel Jonathan strange and mr.. Norrell by Susanna Clark

I can remember mr.. Norrell, but for whatever reason I can't remember Jonathan strange Which you'd think that'd be the easy one because you know strange lizard with the last name strange like yeah so anyway By Susanna Clark it is a doorstopper of a book. It's a huge novel, but it is an alternate history That takes place in England during the Napoleonic Wars and in this England Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell are responsible for bringing back magic into England okay and it has the the author has footnotes throughout the entire book that refer to earlier works in the same universe and refer to

the centuries-long history of magic, you know before the Romans and then you know into the Middle Ages and the last you know known real Romans and then, you know, into the middle ages and the last, you know, known real practitioner of magic in England was the Raven King. And like, there's this whole universe. That's cool. That's been built as the background for this story. And it is a comedy of manners. And it's a, it's a story about, about friendship and about wonderment and like it's an amazing amazing book and so I very strongly recommend it when we're when we're talking about the Concept of the paradigm as it were of wizards. Mm-hmm. This is a really amazing book that I think Opens some new ground and and manages to play with tropes in a really wonderful way cool

So Jonathan strange and mr.. Norrell okay by Susanna Clark. What about you? I'm actually gonna recommend Billie Jean King's autobiography all in Okay, she was the tennis star who at the tender age of I think 29 so not I mean she's been at it for a while She beat the the male chauvinist former number one guy who was I think like 55 at the time who was like Yeah, women will always be inferior And so even even out of retirement, I'm gonna beat the top woman and she beat him.

But it's her autobiography because her journey, that was just one step in it. And speaking of that equity that I was talking about, speaking of hearing women's voices on these sands of things and also just that That you kept coming back to that dichotomy, you know that light versus dark that you know The wizard versus the the witch, you know, like even those two words like yeah so Yeah, so Billie Jean King's autobiography all in that's what I'm recommending. Yeah

Where cuz cuz I know you're a shadow on the war work and they find us We collectively can be found on our website at wubba wubba wubba dot geek history time comm Our archive is there find anything that catches your interest and listen to it and then bounce around as your as your whims take you into it and then bounce around as your as your whims take you. We can also be found on the Amazon podcast app, the Apple podcast app and on Spotify. Wherever it is that you have found us, please take the time to subscribe and give us the five star review that you know we deserve. And where can you be found, sir? Well, you can find me and capital punishment at the Sacramento Comedy Spot on I

Really doubt that this is gonna release before May 2nd, but if you do get to us before May 2nd Go and check out Sacramento Comedy Spot The capital punishment at 9 p.m. If this is after May 2nd and anyway punishment at 9 p.m. If this is after May 2nd, anyway, go on June 6th and July 11th and August 1st. Check out Capital Punishment. $15 tickets. We have merch. There's all kinds of good stuff. Buttons, shirts, stickers, you know, for your 15 Stanley cups. But you absolutely should get down there and watch us spin that wheel because, oh my God,

it's just, it's a great show. You should really do it. And if you can't get down there, then you definitely should watch it online. Go to saccomedyspot.com and find the, pull on the calendars and buy the ticket there. So All right. Well, uh For a geek history of time. I'm Damian Harmony and I'm Ed Blaylock and until next time keep rolling 20s