Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society - Medieval Europe's Biggest Sex Scandal

Episode Date: July 31, 2026

This is the wild story of a 12th century French philosopher, Abelard, who fell in love with his student, Heloise.There are a lot of problematic issues going on. Not least their age gap, the resulting power dynamic, and, oh yes—Abelard was castrated.So why does this love story endure?Joining Kate today is the fantastic Dr Eleanor Janega, historian, author and co-host of our sister podcast Gone Medieval.Voting is now open for the Listener's Choice Award at this year's Podcast Awards. Click here to place your vote! Thank you! https://www.britishpodcastawards.com/votingThis episode was edited by Natasha Hughes. The producer was Sophie Gee. The senior producer was Freddy Chick.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.Betwixt the Sheets: History of Sex, Scandal & Society is a History Hit podcast.Voting is now open for the Listener's Choice Award at this year's Podcast Awards. Click here to place your vote! Thank you! https://www.britishpodcastawards.com/voting Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Oh, betwixters. Butwistee, twi, twixty, twixters. Last year, you really pulled it out the bag for us. The bag, pockets, wherever you are storing the it, you pulled it out from there. We won the Listeners' Choice Awards at the British Podcast Awards last year. Do you remember that? Do you remember that? I certainly remember that. And I mostly remember that because none of us thought that that was ever, ever, ever going to actually happen. And it did. And it was so fabulous because that, award came from you guys, but it also helped more people find us and it helped boost the show,

and it just gave us top bragging rights around history hit. But what goes around, comes around, and the nominations are open once again, and now I'm feeling the pressure because it's ours to lose, isn't it? So we are hoping upon hope that you might just help us do this again. So if you have ever smirked, giggled, or even, God forbid, learnt something whilst listening to Betwixt the Sheets, then you can vote for us for the Listeners Choice Awards at this year's British Podcast Awards. It'll take 30 seconds of your entire life at the most. Just follow the link in the show notes, search for Betwixt and vote. And please remember to click on the confirmation email that will come through afterwards.

Otherwise, it won't count. And who knows, maybe we could do it again. Maybe we could be a double winner. Wouldn't that be something? Right, I'll be the show. Hello, my lovely Betwixters. It's me, Kate Lister. to Betwixt the Sheets. Hello, how fabulous it is to see you once again. You little historical

pervert. Yeah, I know. I know what you really are. I know why you're here. It's why I'm here as well. But before we can go any further together, I do have to tell you, this is an adult podcast book. My adults, other adults, about adulty things in an adult way, covering a range of all to bricks, new being an adult too. Do you feel safer? I certainly feel safer. Right, let's crack on. Well, we are in a convent as it happens, and so far nobody on the Betwicks team has burst into flames, which is all for the good. Now the women in here seem so calm and so serene in their situations, quietly praying,

doing a little bit of sewing. But what's that sound that I can hear? That is a quill really going at it. That is Eloise, and she is writing again. What is she writing? Things that nuns should not be writing. She says, even during the celebration of the mass, when our prayers should be purer,

lewd visions of those pleasures take such whole. upon my unhappy soul, I should be groaning over the sins I've committed, but I can only sigh for what I've lost. Eloise. Eloise, if I had pills, I would clutch them. I'm not sure that you should be thinking about that in church. Well, hello, and welcome back to Petwix the Sheets, the history of sex scandal and society with me, Kate Lester. In the 12th century, a 40-year-old Catholic professor has an affair with his student. That is not good. That is not good. But he did pay a terrible price for doing so. So how has that rather gruesome story gone down as one of the greatest love stories in history? Well, today I'm joined by the one and only Dr. Eleni Yarniger

to talk about Eloise and Abelard, twin flames whose loves burn their lives to the ground, ending up in a monastery and in a nunnery, respectively. Are you ready to do? to do it. Let's do this. Well, hello, Eleanor Yanniga. Thank you so much for dropping by our new studio. How the hell are you? Oh, I'm great. I am considering moving in here because the aircon is quite good in it.

The aircon is fabulous. And the decor is pretty damn good as well. I like my banana. Yeah, that is pretty good. Yeah, damn, all right. But we're not here to talk about bananas. We are here to talk about, well, slightly talk about bananas. Hey-oh.

Hey-o. We're here to talk about one of the greatest love stories ever, or at least that's often how it's pitched. The Victorians went nuts for this, didn't they? Eloise and Abelard. Oh, man, two of the best to ever do it. Do you think? Okay, listen. At least Eloise, all right.

Peter Abelard is a complex guy, but Eloise is like one of my favorite people. Okay, I'll tread gently. Because she is so smart. Like she's an absolute genius. And also she's a weird little guy, which is kind of like what my favorite thing for a medieval person to be is. Because she's really stubborn and she wants things a particular way. She is genuinely an iconoclast in that she pushes back against expectations of the period. I mean, slightly for a trash man.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. But like a girl can like a trash man as a treat implicit a wife. I don't think he's going to come up very well from this one. Okay, yeah. I used to say that a good way to think about Peter Abelard is that he's kind of like the Kanye West of the medieval period. Oh, no.

He was going on social media and being anti-Semitic. Yeah, well, no. See, that was before. Oh, okay. I like to pretend in my head that Kanye West died in a car crash, right? And I'm just like, we just don't pretend now. But, you know, it used to be with things like, you know, when he would like jump on stage. and be like, oh, but Beyonce made the best music video of all the time, where it was like,

well, you're not wrong, but you're just a dick? Yes. And that's the way that you need to think about Peter Abelard. He's usually not wrong, but he's kind of a dick. He is being a prick about it. But he's being a prick. And so, like, this is incredibly important. So, like, here we go.

Let's set the scene. Yeah, please do. Introduce our cast of characters. Who are Eloise and Avalard? We're in the 12th century Renaissance, babe. Okay. Okay. Like, it's all happening.

It's all happening. We are inventing the university girl, which is like a fantastic thing to do. We are into philosophy. Like, you know, we need to understand that like theologians and philosophers at this point in time, they're like the rock stars of the medieval period. And it's kind of like how we treat like astrophysicists now. You know how like everybody knows who Neil deGrasse Tyson is, you know, stuff like that where we're like, wow, big, big cool ideas. That's what theologians are like. So. 12th century Renaissance. Where are we, by the way? Paris. Oh, nice. Decoeur, you know. So here we are. And this is where we have the second university ever founded.

So the first university in Europe is founded in Bologna as a result of students kind of banding together. And they're saying we want a university. Second one is founded in Paris as a result of the church who's like, ooh. We want one too. We want one too. Like we want one that we have a little bit more control over. And so a university then doesn't look like a. university now in that it's more of a concept right it's like you have a bunch of teachers there

and you work in different churches and key to this is that everyone who is attending university or who teaches in a university is a cleric you have to be a member of the church oh that's a twist yeah so in order to do this you can't just be like a guy off the street you have to be like a member of the order right okay and and they are teaching two things so the first one if you want to take your equivalent of a BA, you are learning and teaching the trivium. And that's grammar, logic, and rhetoric. Okay. So it's a very limited curriculum. Yeah. So basically what it means is you're doing the classics. So grammar is like you're going to learn Latin, we're all good. Right. You know, logic, you're going to learn philosophy. So you're going to be studying Aristotle. You're

going to be studying Plato. You're going to be studying a lot of Cicero. And then rhetoric, they scream at each other. Oh, that's an interesting addition. Okay, like a debate, club. Yeah. And so it's all just debate, debate, debate. Right. And then if, once you finish that, you move on to the quadrivium. And that is music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy. I'm falling down already. I'm terrible at math. Listen, at least it's like you would figure it out. Okay. I promise. And then if you do that, then you're a doctor. Fantastic. And that's where the term doctor is. You and I both know, people with PhDs are the real doctors. We only started calling medical professionals doctors in the 19th century because we were being nice to them because they felt a little left out.

Okay. And so Peter Abelard is one of these guys, right? Right. The thing about Peter Abelard also is he's noted, you know, the bit about the arguing with each other. I'm not joking. Peter Abelard will find out where you are giving a lecture and he'll come in and he'll be like, you're an idiot kid.

It's not me like that at all. No. Like everybody look at me. It's me. Peter Abelard. And he kicks the doors in and he brings all his students in there like, break it off, Peter. let him know. He's got like seven hype men with him at all time. He's the original. It's not a question. It's more of a comment. Yeah. And he will come in and yell. And like by his own admission, he writes this down in his autobiography. Okay. Is he proud of this? He's super proud of it. He's like, it was so cool when I did this. And you're like, Peter. Anyway, so foreshadowing. Right. Okay. He then at a point in time decides, hey-ho, that he decides that he wants to have like a love affair. Just decide. He decides this. He writes this. He writes.

this out. So he writes this autobiography, which is called the Historia Calamitatum or like the history of my calamities, right? Oh, Peter. Right. Okay. It's really funny. I mean, that's something's happened, hasn't it? The end of your life. Your autobiography is called the history of my calamities. I mean, like, he's so self-serving. But anyway, he was straight up to sides. I want to find a chick to bang. So he's a virgin at this point? Probably. Yeah, because he's supposed to be because he's like a member of the church. Oh, oh, yes, of course. Right? He's a member of the church. Right? He's a member of the church that is so important. He's not supposed to be banging chicks. I forgot that bitch. Yes, you did say. And he then decides that he is going to find someone to

sleep with. And his mind settles on Eloise of Montreal. Okay. All right. Eloise, we don't exactly know how old she is. She's maybe like 16, possibly like 18. But she has a reputation in Paris because she is incredibly smart and apparently a drop-dead gorgeous babe. Who is she? Apart from being smart and drop-dead gorgeous. So she is from a noble family in Montreal, but she is under the care of her uncle in Paris because she is like, crumb to la creme. They're like, this girl is going to be a shining star. We are going to get her a really, really good marriage and we're going to educate her right up. Right. So she's with her uncle to, receive the best education that one can and kind of like debut onto the scene and make an excellent

marriage for herself because that's what happens for noble young ladies in in the medieval period. So here we go. Her uncle is like, well, we've got to find a good tutor for her. And Peter Avaldard is like, hello. Oh no. And it's intentional. Oh. Oh, I'm going often. Yeah. It's not great. It's not great. So he says that he's like he introduces himself and says, heard you're looking for. a tutor and everyone agrees I am the best around. And Eloise's uncle is like, yeah, I heard that that is true. So in he goes, he's a priest. What could go wrong? So much, right? So in the go. And pretty much immediately, the love affair starts. Okay. And so here's the thing. As we would say in check, to your problem with Titsky, right? Like, it's a very problematic thing. In that, you know,

Abelard, he's probably around 37 at the time. We don't exactly, it's one of these things in the medieval period. We don't know how old Eloise is. But he is older and she's younger. And she is younger. And also, like, obviously there is the fact that he is literally her teacher. And he's a priest. So it's like, come on.

And he's her teacher. And she's supposed to be like getting ready for the marriage market and he knows that. And he knows that. As crappy as that system is, that's the deal. Yeah. She's going to be married off. Yeah. And in he comes.

And he comes, right? And they know it, they know this is bad, right? Now, the way Eloise writes about this, Eloise is like, yeah, I really loved him. Everything was fantastic, blah, blah, blah. But still, you know, it is difficult for us to get our heads around now. Let's just say that. And they know that it's bad. Abilard writes about this. And he says, you know, we are supposed to be, we are supposed to be like reading and learning. but he'll say, my, our hands strayed more from the parchment and onto each other. And this is like a really visceral thing to say, you know, because like the parchment, the books that they're made out of are made of animal skin. And so it's like that that's like quite a sexy thing to write.

Oh, because they're not like, they're not touching that skin. They're touching this skin. You know, and basically he's like, we were doing it always. Like a banging morning till night. And there's also like this weird kink thing that they do too where it's like in order to not raise suspicion. He hits her in front of other people a lot. But they both write about it.

I have read that, actually. He used to beat her, yes. Yeah, and they write about it. And it's quite like, oh, but it's like the blows that felt as soft as any kisses and things like that. And it is really like, listen, I'm not here to kinkshame. I bet that didn't raise any suspicion. And it's weird, though, because it's like teachers did hit kids.

Not like that, I don't think. Yeah, not like that. Hopefully. But at the time, it is like one of those things where it's just sort of like understood that they do be hidden, which is sort of like, okay, okay, question mark. You know, Victorians do it too. It's only until very recently that we stopped hitting children. But also, didn't you say that like she's like 16, 18?

She's got a child. She's a complete haughty and he's given her a spanking. Yeah, I mean, like, who even did it? And everyone was like, well, he is a firm disciplinarian. They're like, wow. He's so professional. He's really serious about mathematics in Peter Apple. So, like, this is all well and good.

Like, this is, I mean, in theory, apparently everyone is like, this is fine. I don't see any problems with this at all. No, no problems here at all. Until Eloise falls pregnant. Shit, well, that was inevitable, wasn't it, I guess. I'll be back with Eleanor after this short break. Now, the thing that would happen ordinarily in the circumstances, is okay well you need to get married.

Yeah. Eloise says no. Really interesting. Eloise says no. Why? Because if they get married, he has to stop working at the university. Oh, Eloise.

Because if they get married, then it's like he's got no career because he has to be a member of the clergy in order to do his little shouty-shouty thing. Did he offer to marry her? He did. So it's out now. The affair's out.

The affair's out. And he's like, look, I guess. I'll marry her or whatever. Yeah, fair enough. You found a sound. I don't know what they thought was going to happen. But, you know, there it is. And he says, okay, yeah, I'll do it.

But Eloise says no. But Eloise's uncle didn't really get the memo on this one. What's the uncle's name, by the way? Fullbert. So, oh, great. Bring it back. I've never met a Falbert. Yeah, name your child, Fulbert.

No, that's. Yeah, like, I don't know. Maybe get away with Bert for short. Right. Well, yeah, Bertie, when he's a little. a kid. That'd be kind of cute. Yeah. Okay. Well, Fullbert, I don't know how he's feeling about his niece being

knocked up and unmarried. So he's pretty upset, you know, and like, obviously because here's his ward. He was trying to do everything right for her. He has this very specific thing that he was attempting to do. Her education is clearly suffering. A hundred percent. And she's been like scurried off the minute they found out she was pregnant.

They're like, you are off to hang out in a nunnery while we figure out what is going on. And so she's saying no. And Abelard is like, come on, girl. Like, we're going to have to figure something out about this. So he's trying to marry her then. He's sort of trying to marry her. She's saying, no, no, no.

Folbert doesn't understand this. Because of your career. And then Fulbert gets a bit annoyed with everything that's going on. And Fulbert, real medieval moment. Fulbert orders that Abalard be castrated. Oh, dear. Oh, dear, dear, dear. Just straight in there.

Pach. Orders, who, you know, he's just one of the matter. Oh, he's just ordinary, your ordinary gang of guys who will castrate your niece's boyfriend. Oh, those guys. Yeah, you know, he's hired goons. Hired goons. So he's got these hired goons. And so I love this sort of the history of Calabitonum because they basically like bust into Ablard's apartment in the middle of the night.

Straight off with that dick. Yeat the dick. Dick's out the window. I don't know what they did with the dick. Okay. But dick is gone. Right. R.P.

Do we, like, not to get too graphic, but like, what are we talking here? Because castration can mean like a few things. It's like everything gone or is it just? I know at least the D is gone. I don't know if they leave him with the balls. Right. Shaffed out of here. Okay.

Okay. It's just, it's just. Ten doll time. And they like do, you know, a pretty good job at this too. It's like, again, these hired goons really know how to castrated. I guess it didn't like bleed out. Yeah. Well, so it's like they got it all torsioned off.

It's all fine. Right. But so, so. Oh, wow, they really know what they were doing. And they want him to survive, right? It's like, this is, this is supposed to intentionally be like this humiliation. And so, so Abelard's got no D now. Why did Fulbert do this?

Well, 100%. It's like making a statement about what he's done, right? It's like, oh, you go around knocking girls up, is it? So he thought that Peter Abelad wasn't going to marry. Yeah, Elviz. Oh, okay, okay. And so he, like, a hard day disgrace. He feels.

as though Abelard is the one dragging his feet. Whereas in the letters that Eloise is writing, which has survived us, we understand that it's actually Eloise who's dragging her feet. Okay. And listen, it kind of doesn't matter as far as Fulber is concerned because he's like... You brought shame upon our house.

Yeah, like you should have sorted this out by now. Like a control Eloise a little better too, I think, which is like, interesting. So D is gone. Oh, dear. Abelage writes in the Historia calamiton. according to him, people are just like out in the streets of Paris rending their garden and they're weeping, they're like,

I'm a lords dick, why? I loved it so much. We all loved it. Oh, oh, why. Have you heard the most tragic news? Are you sitting down? I know, and apparently no one is laughing. Oh, right.

Like, at all. Anyway, so. And we're definitely not laughing about it. That, I mean, like, all joking inside, that is a really brutal. crime. Yeah, yeah. And like, here's the thing about it, though, is it's like, so now you know that he, everybody knows he's castrated. And so he's like this kind of imperfect man. Like, castration is a form of punishment that can be meted out, usually in more legal senses. But like, also, let's be clear, it's the Middle Ages. There's no such thing as the cops. Right. Right. Like, there's no police.

Apparently, there's the castration goons. There is the castration goons if you're wealthy. Because like this is a thing is that the higher echelons of society can sort of do what they want. Yeah. And ordinarily in situations like this, you know, some light reciprocity might be expected, but because Abelard is clearly in the wrong and he's a member of the church, what's the church going to do? The most the church could do in response is perhaps excommunicate you, but they're not going to be able to do that because he did knock Eloise up. He did do that. Right. So there's sort of like nothing you can do almost.

And also what this does is this humiliation, this blemishing that he has as a result of the castration means he also can no longer participate in the public life of the university. Why? Because everybody knows he don't got a dick. But that's, I've worked at a university. That's not on the admissions criteria. It is then, right? It's like you can't be out in public. And you can't be teaching kids, right?

It's like, so in the first place. I would have thought having no penis is an ideal criteria for teaching children in the church. No, because you should be overcoming what your penis tells you to do. It shouldn't be that you're in this place because you have been castrated so you no longer have these urges. You're not overcoming a damn thing. Is it as well that like in some cultures I've seen that there is quite a lot of stigma around being a unit? Yeah. It's a weird, like it's a weird thing to be.

Absolutely. Because, you know, there is so much importance placed on men's genitalia. On masculinity. And like a conception of like verbility and a conception of, you know, even for medieval people in theory, some kind of level of stoicism is implied by this. So, you know, the ideal man is a member of the church who's overcome sexual urges and they only kind of experience this masculine fortitude and logic which makes them able to resist sexual urges. So in this case, he's not overcoming anything, right? Like he's just been placed in this particular thing. So he's kind of like a woman.

So you can't put him in front of students any longer because of this very particular humiliation. So it's not just about, you know, the fact that you can't possibly be a danger anymore. But it's like this is a ritual humiliation. What else might you suffer castration for in the middle age? Like how common was this? And I don't mean like the castration goons. I mean like actual like legal apparatus. Like, why might you be castrated?

Well, you might be castrated in situations like this. It is something that would be quite common if you are a member of the nobility and you attack or you have sex with another member of the nobility. And basically, if you get girls in trouble like this, they will castrate you. Because the thing that that also stops you from doing is making another marriage. Right? So it's odd for it to happen for a member of the clergy because ordinarily being a part of the church that would protect you, but also being a part of the church, usually you don't do this. Or if you do it, you know, there's lots of members of the clergy who are having sex with women, but it's not like women who are this high up in the scale, right?

So if you were a nobleman and you knocked up a noble woman and you refused to marry her, it is quite, well, it's not super common, but it is on the cards that you might be castrated because what that does is saying, okay, well, who are you going to marry now? Yeah, okay. So it's out because marriage is specifically for procreation. Yeah. Yeah. All right.

So the castration goons got him and apparently people are crying in the streets. They're so sad. Don't believe. So sad. I'm not sure about that. But like when does the news get back to Eloise? Who is apparently knocked up and in a convent? Like so yeah, she is in the convent.

She's knocked up. She gives birth to their, get ready for what they name their son. Okay. Because it's like it's very, I love this because it is in. incredibly like celebrity names now. They name their son Astrolabe. Which is... For those, not in the know.

An Astrolabe is like a star chart that or like compass that like shows you a map of the night sky. Well, that's quite sweet. But unfortunately, that does sound like Astrolabia, doesn't it? I mean, listen, if she was a girl, it's a beautiful name for a girl. Oh, is it a boy? It's a boy. Okay, okay. It's a boy.

So Astrolabe is born. And she's like, okay, well, I'm just going to stay a nun. Like, here I am. She calls it, right? She's just like, I'm going to stay right in here. Meanwhile, Abelard is shuffled off to a monastery. He's still unpleasant in the monastery. Even more so now, I would imagine.

Even more so now. And they have this long exchange of letters back and forth. It's really interesting because since he's still personally unpleasant, like, he alleges that at a point in time, like, his fellow monks attempt to poison him. He has to be moved out of one monastery into another. And eventually he and Eloise set up a monastery and nunnery together that is a... I didn't know that. Yeah, it's dedicated to the Holy Spirit. And they kind of set up their own.

And she is the abbess, which means that she controls, like, the community of nuns working. there. And they do end up kind of working together again. But we have before that happens, this incredible exchange of love letters back and forth. And it's incredibly interesting because Elie's like, baby, remember all that hot sex we had. I remember when we were doing it. It was so great. Oh, man, I miss it so much. And he's like a girl I do not have a penis. Oh, no. It's really funny because she's still quite hot and heavy for him. And he's like, but they can help you. with that love, sorry. But they're still kind of like really obviously in love.

Oh, they are. So it's like they do, they do still really kind of like right back and forth to each other. So I mean like say what she will. They're really dedicated to this. They did actually love one another. Yeah, which is, I mean, I'm like, Eloise, I want so much better for you. But she's this absolutely brilliant woman. You know, she's.

And she's the abbess. And she's the abbess, which you don't get to unless you're very, very clever. So very clearly she's also kind of like, well, I kind of got the best of both worlds because she gets to have this life of the mind, which she wouldn't necessarily have if she had become just a wife and mother. It's very difficult to negotiate that sort of academic freedom, that ability to write things down. And I mean, there's so much more that Peter Abelard gets into. He's accused of heresy by St. Bernard of Clervaux, one of my most hated people. from the Middle Ages. Why?

Basically, he writes a really complex theology of the Trinity. And St. Bernard of Clairot also just doesn't like Peter Abilard very much because Peter Abelard is personally unpleasant. Yes. And so Peter Abelard is like, come debate me, bro. Come debate me about the nature of the Trinity. I never said anything heretical. And Peter Ablard is like, come on, we're going to have this big debate.

St. Bernard is just like, no. Because he knows he'll lose. Because he knows he'll lose. Yeah. Because Peter Abelard, whatever you want to say about him, like he is a bit of a wrong one. He is a ridiculous perv. He's also really, really smart. I know the type.

And it's, and like, annoyingly, he's right. I've read these things now. Like, a lot of them are ordered to be burnt, but some of them have survived. And it's true that heresy is whatever the church says is heresy. But I'm like, babe, I don't see what's heretical about this. And what's heretical about this is actually that he's much smart. martyr than St. Bernard. He's just doing it better. Yeah, he's just doing it better. And St. Bernard, for whatever reason, is just kind of like the church cops, which don't really exist. But

basically, if he doesn't like you, he will see to it that you're declared a heretic, like, one of the worst to ever do it. But he did leave us some nice dogs. He did, we, I love the dogs. I love the dogs. I love the dogs. So it's like, it's impossible to say what's good or bad, because those dogs are really cute. If that's his legacy, he's being an absolute arseman. all heresy, but very nice dogs. Yep. Hold that thought. We're going to be back with Eleanor after this short break.

Well, here's the thing. So here we get through this really difficult life, and, you know, Eloise is kind of constantly talking to Avald. Is she happy? It's like such an iconic love star. I mean, I know the Victorians went nuts for it and there's like paintings and everything. I think well, maybe you can tell me. I think a lot of it

comes from their love letters that were rediscovered and republished. And they are I mean, there is a lot of spice in there, you'd have to say. If, like, you were talking about it on, like, you know, smut talk, you'd give it, like, five or six of the little red chilies, wouldn't you? Yeah, I mean, like, spice is high, yeah. But they're very passionate as well as this isn't just, like, throw down stuff.

Like, they really, she really loves him. She really loves him. And I do think, I mean, the way Peter Abelard writes about her as well, as, like, you know, at first he's like, oh, yeah, I was just, like, into it because she was, like, hot and clever. But she was so hot and clever. Yeah. I mean, he is devoted. to her. And it's one of these very difficult things because clearly there is this passion. There is

a really enduring love, which is very interesting. And actually, if you sort of left them alone, like if these structures of what constitutes a necessary marriage, if what is the prerequisites for being a university lecturer didn't exist, they could have just had a nice little relationship. You know, Eloise was genuinely like, yeah, babe, I want you to be able to work. I'll have our kid. We'll figure it out. Who cares? Right.

And now that would be possible. They kind of do maintain a relationship. They do maintain a relationship. Until death. Until death. I mean, for obvious reasons, they can't have any shenanigans. He doesn't seem particularly up for that. I guess we can understand why as well.

But they have like an intellectual love affair for the rest of them. God damn right they do. And like, I'm sorry for me as a nerd. Like that's incredibly romantic. Yeah, right? Like, I mean, the spice is going to fade, right? The spice will fade, but, you know, when you have someone that you can really talk about intellectual things at a high level with, you know, that's why I'm so in love with you. Oh, thank you.

That's why, you know, we're besties, right? I will never call the castration goons on you. Thank you. It would be really difficult. to do that too. They're going to get there and be like, girl, what is this? What happens to Astrolabia? So Asrolabia is, he is raised by Eloise's family and he goes on to just have like a normal noble life. Oh, good for them. So, you know, he, he is raised very well. Does have a relationship in particular with his mother, but basically her family takes care of him, which is kind of traditional. Okay. And they sort of do so well at a church level.

that everyone does kind of agree. Like, maybe we shouldn't have done the thing. Maybe we should, yeah, like maybe it's not that embarrassing kind of thing. Did Fulbert, was there ever any record of him going, oh, damn, sorry, I hadn't realized. No, he's all like, yeah, the penis deserved to die and I hope it rots in hell. That's kind of like Fullber's thing. Yeah, exactly. No regrets.

Don't, don't apologize. Yeah, like don't back down, double down. Yeah, exactly. Never complain, don't explain. And so he just kind of like a goes through it. But, you know, it's to a point where everyone agrees enough that perhaps these two were in love. And perhaps the structures of the time were such that, like, they end up buried together in a perilous chay cemetery. Yeah, you can go see them.

They're buried together. Yeah, like, because I'm a nerd. Like, I've gone to go see the grave and, like, leave flowers. I didn't realize that. I thought, like, the love story was, like, they were in love. They're definitely in love. Then the castration goons were called and all kind of wrong. But, like, they were in love for the rest of their lives and were buried together.

Yeah. Oh, wow. Now, see, I'm quite a cynical old hag, but that is romantic. I mean, unfortunately, it's like, I'm just like, dog, I hate to hand it to them, but. That is. And it's one of these things right, because we can do whatever we want. We can say, I have some problems with this. Obviously, I don't love hitting on your student. No. And I think that's bad. And you ought not do it. I agree. But on the other hand, who am I to say to Eloise, who is like, this man is the love of my life. I'm maintaining a long. lasting relationship with him. And she maintains that until the day she dies. There's no revelation moment of like, hang on a minute. No, no. And in fact, one of the things that she really says is like, this is one of the only men who is my intellectual equal. This is like one of the only men that I can actually talk to about things. And one of the only men who does really respect my intellect? Who dies first? He dies first. He is quite a bit older. Oh, yeah, of course. Of course. So he dies first. And everyone is like, thank God for that. But she's in pieces.

She's in bits. Yeah. But she's still got the dynarie to run, et cetera, et cetera. Okay. So, and they are considered, especially, like, in France, they're kind of, like, national heroes, which is why they're in Perlachet now, you know. So they're moved there eventually. They were...

Well, the bones were moved a few times, don't they? Yeah, because, so at first, they're out, they're out at their little school together, which is where they're buried initially. And then they get moved around because, like, well, in the first place, the church is still taking a dim view. Peter Abelard, you know, they don't want anyone, they don't want anyone, like getting, getting ideas above Avalard's station. But eventually they are moved to Perilche because everyone kind of agrees.

Just let them have it. You know? Yeah. Like, it's not fair, right? Like, to a certain extent, it isn't fair. And granted, another thing that isn't fair is that I'm sure that medieval history is littered with love affairs like this, you know, people who were desperately. in love and they couldn't be together for whatever reason.

Castration goons. Yeah, castration goons. The requirements of an education, the requirement and get married to someone else. Exactly. And so this is one of the only times we really get to see how actual love affairs work, right? Because they're both literate, because they were both important. So we keep their letters. You know, so we get to see this real agonizing romantic relationship. It is. It is. It's sad. I mean, like, listen, I'm here giggling about Abilard getting castrated, but it's kind of not nice to my girl who didn't really want that. No, that was, that's definitely unfair for her. She didn't, she didn't deserve that. And they were both brilliant. Like,

I've read some of Abelard's writing. I wrote about it in my latest book, Flick, The Story of Female Pleasure, when he writes about he's trying to like basically understand the nature of women and he's trying to answer the question of like why are women more weak willed than men and he comes, it's really the gymnastics

he goes through and he comes with the idea that women are weaker so God can love them more because they have to try even harder to be nice, to behave themselves. Yeah, and it's a, it is this an ongoing idea that you get from the middle ages of the fact that when women are good,

they're better than men are. So it's like, you know, like the Virgin Mary is this exemplum of this, where it's like that's the best possible thing a human can be. However, they have more to overcome in order to get to that. So, you know, we'll now talk about like the Freudian virgin horror complex thing. You know, not his term, not mine. But, you know, there is a similar thing in the Middle Ages, which it's like the Virgin Mary or Eve.

Yeah. Right. And Eve is clearly weakwilled. she's very easy to be tempted by the serpent, which is why there's that picture on the cover of my book. Fabulous book. The ones in future sex, right? Fabulous, yes.

Because you've got the Virgin Mary on one head and you've got Eve on the other. And it's like which way Western woman, right? Like are you going to be easily tempted specifically by sexuality? Or are you going to be able to rise above this and just become a nice mommy, right? And so this is the thing that happens to Eloise is she falls down the traditional route. That what people are expecting you to do in the middle ages when you're a woman, they're expecting you even if you're super intelligent to cave into the pleasures of the flesh. Because that's what women are.

Women inhabit this much more, I suppose, sensual kind of body. They are more earthly. They are more corporeal, which is seen as bad. And what's interesting about that is despite of all like Peter Abelard's writings and he's writing to Eloise about like, you know, I'm paraphrase. now, but just be a good nun. That's kind of what I'm going to say. It's like, Jesus, knock it off. Knock it off with a sexy time. Stop it, woman, stop it. But she doesn't. And that's what I love about her letters is like, the woman is living in a nunnery. Her partner has been like, they took it and they went. Like, she's paid a huge prize for this. And even though he's writing to her going,

I really can't help you with what you're after, her letters are so passionate. She's owning this, like sexuality. And it's such, like you said, an insight, a rare infight. into some lives of medieval women. We just don't get to see it. That despite all of that rhetoric about behave yourself, she's still there. In one of her letters, she's saying, call me a whore, basically. I'm paraphrasing again, but that's what she writes. Yeah, there's a bit that she writes in where she talks about how sometimes during mass her

thoughts stray to how they used to have sex. And sometimes the movements of her body betray her thoughts. So she's sitting there in mass giving it that. I love that for her. It's so good. Have you ever seen being John Malkovich? Yes. Okay, so, you know, he's doing a puppet show at the beginning,

and it's like really quite horny, and a guy comes up to him in the street and punches him. That's Avalard and Eloise. It's really good. It's really good. I used to show it to my students in class. I'd be like, check this out. They're like, a girl, what is this?

So as a final question, then, why do you think that this love story is endured? Because there are many, many, many, many love stories It's a really interesting one. There's a lot of tragedy in it. But why did this one catch people's imagination? Because another way of looking at it is like mucky tutor diddled his student and the uncle found out and did for him.

End a story. I think that it is down to the fact that these two were incredible intellect. Yeah. If all you heard was gross guy from the church, bang in the niece, dick off. You'd be like, huh, amazing story. But we get to hear from them. This is one of the few cases from the Middle Ages where you really get to hear from these people. Source survival doesn't usually work this way.

But the reason the source survival kicked in is because even at the time, with all the sordidness around it, everyone is like, yeah, they do seem quite clever. Yeah, and they do seem to quite like each other as well. Yeah, and so these are privileged documents that are saved because they're like, whoof, actually, this stuff is, you know, there are. Yeah, Eloise is doing sexy talk. And she's like, anyway, about. to meditations on what I consider. And so she has this

really incredible way of writing where she'll be like, horny, horny, horny, the smartest thing you've ever read in your life. Yeah. And so everybody saves that. And as a result, we get this really top drawer intellectualism, but it makes them these whole people. You know, they are not two-dimensional

individuals. We really get to hear what they think. Flaws in all, right? Like Peter Abelard is a deeply, deeply flawed man, but he's interesting. He is interesting. And it's really interesting to read his work. And they're involved in such dramatic things. So it tells us a lot about how medieval people actually are.

They're not just these, you know, ideas, brief sketches of a person who, you know, they're all just God-fearing and attempting to do the right thing. You know, they are difficult individuals who have a lot of motivations. And it just tells us this story that is so. incredibly compelling. And that's why I'm obsessed with them. We should all be obsessed with Abelard and Eloise. I mean, really, you can go pick up. There's like a penguin version of it. It's like, you know, the love letters of Abelard and Eloise. It's got the Historia Colomottaught him at the beginning. And they're intensely romantic. There's nothing else you can say about it. You're like, I'm sorry. These people are in love. And they will put any kind of you-wup text to shame, quite frankly.

It's true. Like, that's what we've deteriorated to by the time we get to 2026. is just you up. Oh, it's so depressing. And Avaldard is like, I will never be up again. We've been over this. Oh, you have been marvelous. Thank you so much once again. And if the lovely people want to know more about you, where can they find you? Oh, come on over to Gone Medieval, where I am talking about medieval stuff as per usual.

You can check out my book, The Once in Future Sex, where indeed I do discuss Applard and Eloise and such things as women being intensely horny in the Middle Ages. And yeah, you know, we're really. We're doing it or a thing. We're throwing it down. What about social media? Can the nice people find you there? Yeah, they absolutely can.

You can find me on Instagram at Dr. Eleanor Yonaga, and I am on blueskyy. Dot app at Going Medieval. Well, fabulous. And I'm sure that I'll see you around these parts some time very soon. You'll be lucky if you can get me out of here, baby. Thank you for listening. And thank you so much to Eleanor for joining us. And if you like what you heard, don't forget to like with you and follow along whatever

it is that you get your podcasts. And if you wanted us to explore a subject or if you just wanted to say, then you can email us at betwixt at history hit.com. This podcast was edited by Natasha Hughes and produced by Sophie G. The senior producer was Freddie Chick. Join me again, Betwixta Sheets, The History of Sex, Scandal and Society, a podcast by History Hit.

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