Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society - Shag, Marry, Kill: Roman Emperor Edition

Episode Date: August 29, 2025

Which would be better for a fling, which would you not touch with a barge pole, and which is marriage material? There's only one way to find out.This episode was edited by Tim Arstall and produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer was Charlotte Long.Please vote for us for Listeners' Choice at the British Podcast Awards! Follow this link - https://www.britishpodcastawards.com/voting - and don’t forget to confirm the email. Thank you!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. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Do you want even more shocking and scandalous history? Like why the ancient Greek statues had such small manhoods? Or what went on behind closed doors in the Georgian era? We'll sign up to History Hit, where you can see me discover the scandalous side of history, as well as hundreds of hours of original documentaries, plus new releases every week, covering everything from prehistoric Scotland to the Treaty of Versailles.

Sign up to join me in locations around the world and explore the past. Just visit history hit.com forward slash subscribe. Hello, my lovely betwixters. It's me, Kate Lister. This is betwixters sheets. I am me and you are you. But before we can go any further together, I do have to give you the fair do's warning

because if you keep listening and you get upset, well, fair do's that one was on you. And here it is. This is an adult podcast, Poked by Adults, other adults about adulty things in an adult way covering a range of adult subjects and you just be an adult too. Oh, I think we've all had enough of that by now.

Let's get on with it. Welcome to the streets of ancient Rome, where I am going full millennial TV presenter and plucking three emperors, and letting today's guests decide whether they would shag, marry or kill them. I know, I know, it's savage and it devalues humanity, but oddly enough, that is something the Roman world in the early 2000s had very much in common. Plus, you have to admit it's quite satisfying to take the power away from these bloodthirsty, eager maniac emperors for once, albeit a good couple of thousand years later than we'd like.

It's going to be quite the job convinced them all to come back to the story. with me though, so bear with me and I will see you there. What do you have a funny man? Oh, money, of course. You're supposed to rise when an adult speaks to you. I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing it. Yes, social courtesy does make a difference. Goodness, I feel so done. Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie.

Hello and welcome back to Betwixte's History of Sex Scandal in Society with me, Kate Lester. Roman emperors probably didn't have to face that much criticism and rejection. Well, I mean, they did, but not to their faces. I think that's probably fair to say. Because if you were going to do that, you would end upon the pointy end of a sharp sword pretty damn quickly. Luckily, we are thousands of years hence, and so we can ridicule and reject them all we want.

Hurrah! And joining us today to assess whether she would shag, marry, or avoid three Roman emperors we have chosen is the amazingly fun and fantastic historian and author Emma Sourner. Southern. But before we head back to the Roman world, once more, I do have to ask you if you would possibly just give us a cheeky vote for the British Podcast Awards Listeners Choice Award. I know we've asked you a billion times, but think of it this way. The sooner you vote, the sooner will win it, and then sooner we might never have to ask you this again.

All right, goblets and togas at the ready betwixters, let's do this. Well, hello, and welcome back to betwixta sheet. It's only Emma. Southern, how are you doing? I'm very well, thank you. I'm delighted to be back as always. Well, thank you very much for coming back. And because you are very kind of come back, we've decided that we're going to play a game this time around. We're going to play Shag Marry Kill in ancient Rome.

I have had to have this sort of explained to me a little bit because I wasn't familiar with the original TV. I was aware of it. I don't think I ever watched the show. Did you watch the show? It was a snogmarry of void. That's the very thing. In case there are other people out there like me going,

I'm not quite sure what's happening here. Could you explain what that program was, please? So Snog Mariamoid was one of those kind of horrifying millennial TV shows where a TV presenter would grab women who they considered to be either wearing too much makeup or to be not natural enough. It's sounding Roman already. That sounds quite Roman.

So too much makeup or like coloured hair, piercings, that kind of thing, like anything. And then they would put them in a computer called Pod and then get members of the public to rate whether they would snog, marry or avoid them. And then they would give them a makeover, which was like fully early 2000. Like they'd make their hair brown or blonde

and then put on more quote unquote natural makeup and a peplum. And then they would put them back in there and then the members of the public. By members of the public, I mean men they grabbed off of the street of like Bristol or whatever. would then say, oh yeah, yeah, I'd check her. This is peak millennial, awful shaming TV, isn't it?

All of those ones that were just about making people feel awful and about judging them. Ten years younger, that was another one, get some woman and make a stand in the street and get everybody to guess how old she is. Brilliant. Well done everyone. Yeah, so it was exactly that. It was absolutely fixated on the idea of natural beauty, which involved like just the right amount of makeup, just the right amount of hair extensions and natural colour.

and anything outside of like fairly defined lines were considered to be avoidable. Whenever I watch those kind of programmes, I'm always like, you've taken someone that's clearly into goth makeup and heavy piercings and dreadlocks and all the rest of it. And what they've done is they've not tried to like tone that look down a little bit, but still lean into it. They'd go a complete 180 and try and make a look like a member of the Walton family or something. Yeah, yeah, they absolutely would.

And then they put them in like a nice floral dress. and then men would say, yeah, I'd take her home to my mom. In another 100 years, people will study that. They'll study us. But we are here to talk about the ancient Romans as per usual. They liked a natural beauty look as well, and they were also very judgmental around women. They were very judgmental.

But we're going to judge men. Yeah, we're going to judge men. We're going to judge Roman emperor. Well, actually, Emma is, I'm going to give her some Roman emperors, and then she's going to decide if she wants to shagmary or kill them. We thought that we'd up the ante a little. bit. Yeah.

From what you've told me before, most of them should be killed, actually. So I'm not sure how well that this is actually going to go. Yeah, it's a struggle to imagine that any of them should have been allowed out. And even the ones that are kind of quote, unquote, good tend to be really annoying. So you still wouldn't want them around, I don't think. I will say that my tastes, because we're having to go 90% on personality, although one of them is purely looks-based. The ones that I think most people think are good are the ones that I would.

would least like to hang out with. Okay. Okay. Interesting. Yeah. Before we get into it, it's fair to say that the Romans were pretty judgmental group of people, would you agree? Did they play their own version? I feel like they probably did, yes. Except they would do it in verse, probably. They would compose a poem about it and everyone would think it was wonderful. Okay, so first up, so I've run around the streets of ancient Rome and I found this guy Commodus and I'm bringing him to you to say Shag, Mary, Kill.

First of all, who was Commodus? And let's talk about his pro points. Do you mean Commodus or Caracalla? Because I have very different feelings about those two. I mean the one from Gladiator. Well, Commodus is in Gladiator 1 and Carrikella is in Gladiator 2. So that doesn't narrow it down. Oh, no.

Gladiator 1. Wachian Phoenix. Yes, Wacking Phoenix. Carrikella is the one I fancy. What do you find attractive about Caracalla? Who on earth was he? So Caracella is the son of Septimius Severus and Julia Domna. So he has a Syrian mother and a Libyan father.

Really his major pro point is that he's hot as hell. Really? How do we know this? So all of his statues are of him and he's got curly hair and a curly beard and the grumpiest face you ever saw. and he just looks very brooding. Smouldering. He smoulders, yes. He smolders, he's a smolder. And he's always kind of looking down and away with a little kind of pouty lips.

He's very handsome. Hang on, hang on, my producer has just sent me. Not a portrait. Oh, yes. Right. That is a smolder, isn't it? That's very pouty. I think I've said this before, but I was deeply upset by what they did to my boy in Gladiator 2,

where they made him kind of tiny, and incredibly pale and syphilitic and with a pet monkey, when he is very large. And he's Libyan-Syrian, so he is definitely dark. He's beardy and he's smoldry. Like, he's very handsome. How do you know he's big? Partly because he looks big in his pictures.

And secondly, because the main thing that he liked was being with the army. So he spends a lot of time on the front lines. He has no time for Rome particularly, has no interest in politics. He loves two things, one of which is his mum, and the other one is running around on the front lines of the army with his male friends. Okay. Okay. So was he an emperor? He's an emperor, yes.

He's co-emperor with his brother for a while. And then kind of downpoint, he does kill his brother. Oh, we were doing so well. Quite brutally. The problem with Carrikeller, I would say, if you put him in a pod and we're like, would you like to shag marry or avoid this man, very handsome. if you spoke to him for probably more than two minutes, very poor personality. Oh dear. Apart from the murder stuff, why did you say that?

He also had his wife killed. Oh, oh dear. Which wasn't great. Was there grounds for this and she'd been like kicking kittens to death or anything? No, but he just didn't. I have an entirely unprovable, unproven and suppose head canon theory that he was gay. Well, when you said he loved his mum, I was like, mom. Okay. And the only thing that he likes doing is being intense with men on the front lines

of the other. He's very good looking. He's got a good mustache and a beard. He's smoldery. He regularly talks to his mum and he likes being intense with men. Wherever he travels, he takes his mom with him and he got rid of his wife largely, it seems, because he didn't really like having a wife. He accuses her randomly of treason and then has her executed. So, like, personality, Otherwise, if you were to try and shag him, he would probably have you killed. Oh, so that's a drawback, isn't it? It is a drawback. Which is a shame.

But he is, by some significant margin, the hottest of the emperors. Was he renowned as being hot at the time? You know what? They actually never really talk about how hot emperors are. Because it's only ever men writing about them. So this is literally you looking at the statues? Yeah, it is. It's incredibly subjective and it is entirely me.

You know, he does some minor terrorising of people. Is it bad within the scale of other Romans? Compared to like a comidus who tries to like rename Rome after himself. Yeah. Or like a Nero or a Calicula, he's not that bad. Not that bad. The bar's low, but not that bad. I mean, the bar's not great. He's quite popular.

Elagabalus, who is not the next emperor but the emperor after that, manages to come to power because his grandmother, convinces everybody that he was Caracella's illegitimate son. And everyone was like, we quite liked him. Okay. So he's not unpopular. I think largely because he doesn't spend a lot of time in Rome. He also likes a snazzy little cloak.

Carrekella is not his name. Carrekella is his nickname that he gets because he goes to Britain on campaign and he discovers that Britons wear this snazny little cropped cloak with a hood. Oh. Oh. It just kind of covers the shoulders and comes down to the elbow and he's got a little hood. Sheiky. And he is so taken with it that he just takes to wearing it all the time.

This is a lovely, lovely gay... Was he Italian? No, he wasn't Italian. No, he's not born in Rome. He's born in Gaul, actually, but he is... A lovely French gay man. He's Rome. Yeah.

Where it's Syrian on his mother's side, Libyan on his father's side, Roman ruler, who is stabbed to death on the Persian border in the end. How long does Carolella last? Because none of them lasted very long. Oh, no, he gets like 20 years maybe, 50. Quite a long time. Oh, okay. So very good-looking.

Largely because of his mom, who's great. Like, she holds everything together. Yeah. Loves his mum. Loves his mum. Snappy dresser. Yeah. And managed to hang on to power for quite a long time.

Yeah. On the downside. Does not seem to be interested in women at all. And when he did interact with women, he did tend to murder them. It is quite a drawback that. It is a drawback. You have to take that into consideration. And I think if you try to put him in a pod, he would murder you.

Right, damn it. Okay, all right, okay. So we're going to come back to him. I'm going to ask you at the end, because I've got three, and then we can sort them out. Okay, so Kara Keller, he can go over here. Another option I have for you here is this rather fabulous specimen going by the name of Otho.

Otho is Emperor for a very short period of time. Not one of the most famous ones. Even when I saw the name, I was like, who? Who the hell's that? I am an Otho fan girl. Tell us who he is. Emperor for three months. Ah.

In the year of the four months. That's like work experience, empering. Kind of, yeah. He's like an intern. But I think he is also not enormously, the reputation that he has is one of being a bit of a party boy until he becomes emperor. So he is mostly famous before he becomes emperor

because he is friends with the Emperor Nero and Nero persuades him to marry a woman called Popaya because Nero wants to have an affair with her but he can't hang out with her because he's already married so he can't just have like a random single woman hanging around at his dinner parties that would look suspicious. So he persuades Otho to marry Poppea so that he can then bring her to the dinner parties basically

and then Nero can go off and shag her. I've got a picture here. I've just been sent... Oh, hello. Right. Oh, he's gone full cock out in this statue. Oh, yes, yeah. That's a statement. There are some very rude ones of Otho from the Middle Ages, so that one's a polite one. Why are they having rude statues of him?

Did he have a reputation as being a rude emperor? He has a reputation as being a bit of a luxurious emperor. Or before he is emperor, he's a luxury. So he has this kind of stain of being friends with Nero. He has a stain of marrying Popeia, who he then fell in love with Paupeia, and so basically tried to stop Nero from having sex with her. So Nero exiled his wife, married Popeia, and sent Otho to be governor of Lusitania of Portugal. But Otho was married to Pompeia? Yes.

Nero forcibly divorces them, marries Poppaea himself, and then sends Otho away, basically. Then Nero is overthrown. And Otho, who never really got over the stealing of his wife, joins in, supports the first claimant to the throne Galba. And then when it turns out that Galba is a prick and just very poor at being Emperor, he overthrows Galba. And he overthrows Galba with effectively a great personality. Wow. Okay. So tell me about his personality. So he is notorious for arriving in Rome and just being a friend to everybody. Like he will do favours for people. He is just charming.

at parties. Depending on whether the source is friendly to him or not, they will either say that he tried to ingratiate himself or they'll be like, what a great lad. Like, he just turned up and was a delight to everybody. And he overthrows Galba with about 17 soldiers because they all hate him so much that nobody will support him. And then becomes emperor and everyone is like, yeah, we seem fine with this. And then his three months as emperor are mostly spent in a civil war because there is another person who is trying to invade Rome. But he is just quite nice. He's just good at being an emperor.

Why did he only last three months then? So this is my absolute, once you get to the end of this sentence, is going to sound deranged. But there's my favourite thing about him. The whole period he's in this civil war. Vitellius in Germany had risen up against Galba and then continues against Otho.

He just doesn't back down. And they fight three battles, which Otho wins, two and then loses one. After the third one, he says, you know what, I don't want to be emperor enough to waste any more lives on this.

I think that civil war is repellent. If this is going to be a real war and these battles are going to continue, then I refuse to be the cause of any more Roman lives lost and he killed himself. Oh, I didn't see that come in.

Yep. Do we know that he did this and he wasn't just bumped off and then, you know, nice stories were said about him. And we have quite a lot of details. So Suetonius' father fought for Otho. So he has like first-hand account of it. All of the sources say this.

And even the ones that are quite hostile to him and who were like, he was really luxurious and he spent too much money. But you know what? His death was great. And he kind of redeemed himself in death because he just says, I don't want this enough. I don't want any more people dying for me. Okay.

A slightly selfless Roman emperor then? Yeah. Got to be unusual. And there's this one other point in his very brief reign where there's kind of a miscommunication amongst the soldiers and they invade a dinner party that he's having with some senators. And no one's really sure why they're there and he doesn't know if they're there to overthrow him

or if they're there to kill the senators and everyone is very afraid. And he manages to just completely diffuse the situation. He just stands up and is like, moves all the senators to safety so they know he's not trying to kill them, talk to the troops and he's like, thank you so much for coming to protect me.

But everything is fine. And, you know, because you've helped me out, I'm going to give you a reward. Everybody go home and everybody just goes home and like nobody dies and nobody's injured. How did they come to kill him? Well, kind of unclear. They were either coming to kill him or coming to make him fight somewhere else. But it's kind of unclear what they actually wanted. But he just is like, looks at all these armed men who have just literally 20 minutes ago killed another emperor and is like,

Yeah, and just deals with it. I'll be back with Emma after this short break. All right, okay, so you're talking me around. Otho, positives, very good-looking, not shy of getting his cock out, if the statues are to be believed, seems to have what we would now consider to be quite a strong moral compass. He doesn't want people to die. He doesn't want people to kill people needlessly

to the point where he actually does himself in. He seems like quite loyal to Pompeia in the fact that it pissed him off, So you've got some loyalty there. Well, he loved her and then he is like, yeah, I would like to stay married to her and Nero's like, but he never tries to overthrow Nero. I think of him as like a Prince Hal from the Henry V, Shakespeare plays, whereby he's a playboy when he is a single man and he has no responsibilities. There's all these stories about him having like pipes that pump perfume into his dining room, which is considered to be disgusting. But as soon as he's given any responsibility, he like really rises to the occasion and becomes like a good guy. Oh, well, let's talk downsides then, because you can't be Emperor of Rome and not have one or two downsides.

He hung out with Nero. That's... He spends a lot of time with Nero, and he does have all of these stories from his youth of him being a bit of a prick. So apparently when he was a teenager, he used to run around Rome and find homeless people and beat them up for fun. Not great. That's not great. That's, it's quite difficult to defend that, Otho. It is difficult to defend that one.

and he does marry Poppea so that Nero can have an affair with her. Also not great. Yeah. And he seems to have a nice time in Nero's court, which is honestly not a brilliant thing to say about someone. Like Nero's court is kind of a nightmare. Like any association with this man at all is enough to damage. It's not great.

It's really, really not great. But any association at all can damage him. Was it kind of like that with the Nero thing of just like, you knew him, you hung out with him, that's a bad thing? And you were close friends with him and you did things, know, you obviously helped him out with some of the things that he was doing and he was doing weird shit. Like, they were doing deeply weird sex in there.

That's not ideal. And a lot of people, the reason that people are kind of wary of him is this idea that he might, if he had lasted longer, like, tipped over into Caligula kind of spending, like, just spunking all of the empire's money on building himself, like, fancy boats. Oh, okay. But he didn't last long enough to find out. It's not sounding great for, you know, somebody to... So, okay, so quite reckless with money then.

Possibly. Although he governs Lusitania very well and doesn't do anything bad there at all. So for 10 years. Was he good in battle or did he lose quite a lot of stuff? He's not amazing in battle, but he has good commanders. All right, so quite a mixed bag here. Yeah.

On to our third choice. It's none other than Marcus Aurelius. Yes. So Marcus Aurelius, when that thing was going around about the Roman Empire and men always think about the Roman Empire, I would say he was like the second person that came up in the TikToks, where you said. Really? Who do you think about, like when you're talking about? Because his meditations are so popular with a certain type of man. Oh, right. Okay. Tell us who Marcus Aurelius is and then he can tell us what his meditations were meditating. So Marx-Morales is the last of the five good emperors in the second century. He has the last one of the emperors who were chosen because they were good guys, who seemed capable of running an empire.

And he oversees some really big wars in Germany and some fairly big persecutions of Christians. But he is mostly remembered now because he wrote, they're actually his private diaries, but they were published in the Middle Ages. and are now sold as like a foundational text of soicism. They're basically like affirmations that he writes to himself. That's a flex, isn't it? Like if your private diary that was never supposed to be published actually became the foundation for a philosophical movement,

if they found my private diaries, it's just the ramblings of a lunatic. It's just I ate too much ice cream, I'm angry at my neighbours, I want to do this, I want more chocolate. It's nothing sensible in there. Well, his ones are like, when I wake up in the morning, I will not be bothered anymore by people who annoy me. I will not be annoyed by people asking me questions. I will stop worrying about the things I cannot change

and I will only worry about me. And they read, like, there's a really great, Danny Lavery has a version of them where they're basically written like New Year's resolutions. Like this year, I'm not going to let the haters get me down just because they're jealous of me. Oh, so yeah, it is like affirmations. Okay.

Yeah. Hang on. Yeah. picture of him. Thank you very much, producer, Stu. He's got a good beard. Who are we dealing with here? Oh, that is a good beard. Yes. He has, I don't know how accurate these statues ever were,

but he certainly has quite a thoughtful, wistful look on his face there. Yes. And that is very much his vibe. Like, he basically got really into philosophy as a teenager, like into stoic philosophy specifically. Hit me with it. And what is stoic philosophy? The worst philosophy, as far as I'm concerned.

Stoic philosophy basically argues that. rationality is the peak of morality, that a man should aim to be rational at all times of rational thought, and therefore should use rationality to control one's emotions and should separate oneself from the things that one can't control and not be emotionally affected by it. You should say, that is happening over there, and I am centred and pure.

And it has a lot of ideas about freedom as well, whereby freedom is not being in the control of anyone or anything. And that is the ideal form for a man. So you should be able to tamp down all of your wants and desires and every decision you make should be made on a rational, logical level. You can see why it's very popular with a certain type of man. Is this idea that emotions are girly and men are. are logical and sensible because we don't count anger as an emotion. Yeah. Did he apply this successfully in his own life, Michael Sirillia?

Did he manage to be chill and calm and unemotional throughout his entire life? No, I'll tell you my favourite thing about him. One of my favourite things to tell men who really like him about is the letters that he wrote to another teacher of his in which he repeatedly talks about how in love with him he is. And it's like, dear Fronto, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you. And Fronto is like, dear Marcus, thank you so much for your lesson. Me and my wife have been having a lovely holiday. I'm not even really exaggerating.

They literally are like, dear Fronto. If anyone asks me who I love, I will say you. You are the love of my life. Nothing you can say will ever make me love you less. And then Fronto's replies literally are like, I hope you're resting. Thanks for dropping by. Yeah. This is kind of before he's the emperor, but when he's still the heir to the emperors.

So he can't say like, what the fuck. But he's still, he is very much like a normal human being. So he has a lot of big feelings. Well, I mean, there's an argument to be made that if you need to fill your diary every single day with, I will not lose my shit today, that you might be losing your shit on a regular basis. And that's what the meditations are. They are basically like, it would be a lot better if I wasn't irritated by all the people that irritate me.

I do identify with that quite strongly though. Like I can get on board with someone writing that in their diary, which I'm going to really try not to lose my shit with people. people today. And he goes through these phases of being very like performative, I suppose, with his, like, he sleeps on the floor for a while and his mom has to persuade him to stop being a bit of a dick about it. And it's like, you were the heir to the emperor. Could you get in a bed? Why was he doing that? Because a philosopher was supposed to be frugal and like having too many things meant that you were beholden to too many things and therefore you were not free. He didn't stop having any things. He was just choosing not to sleep in his bed for a while.

Was he gay, do you think? I know, I know, don't write his letters. We can't speculate about these things, but we can actually, because it's good fun. Well, he has loads of children with his wife. Bisexual king, perhaps. I think a bisexual king. He seems to like his wife. All of the kind of writers generally like him because he murders almost nobody.

Except Germans, he murders loads of Germans. That's not. Like, you can go to Rome and you can see Marcus Aurelius's column, which is just in the middle of a random. square and what that is is just pictures of Marcus Aurelius murdering Germans for about 30 foot. See, that's not very chill, Marcus Aurelius. It's extremely unchall, but I'm sure he did it rationally. Yes, for rational and sensible reasons.

Yeah, empire building reasons. Was he a good emperor? He's a good emperor if you're a senator, yes. Like, depending on what you think a good emperor is, he's not a very fun emperor. Well, the Stoics were just very sensible, weren't they? that was their gig. I have a feeling that his idea of a good time was to invite people over to talk about Stoic philosophy

and the grammar. I've met so many of those when I was a student hanging out in holes, some twat with a guitar who's going to invite everyone over to start talking about Nietzsche or something. Yeah, he's read a lot, he's read his epictetus, he's read as Seneca, he's got a lot of philosopher friends

and he just really would like to talk to you about rationality and providence. Pluses then. Pluses. He's very thoughtful, quite obviously. He must be quite clever to be coming up with this stuff. He's dedicated to his one thing that he's really into. And he probably won't kill you. That is a plus in this particular period. Loved his wife, would you say? Yeah, seems to have got on with her fine. It doesn't seem to have had a huge amount of interest in her. Then she stays where a woman is supposed to be, so that's fine. Downsides, he does fuck up the good thing that the Romans had going on for that century

because he does make his son emperor and that's how we get comidus who is a nightmare man. Right, okay. Which is very unrational. If he had been properly rational, then he would have said, you know what, like the past five emperors we've had, they were chosen in young adulthood or adulthood because they had demonstrated that they had the qualities required to be a good emperor.

And when previously we have allowed people who were just born, into the monarchy to be emperor, they went terribly wrong. So maybe I should pick somebody who had demonstrated that they have the qualities. And instead he was like, my horrible son. Yeah. He's demonstrated nothing but poor judgment for the past 20 years of his life. So I've decided that's the guy for me. That's the one. I'm going to leave all of this vast power to this guy. So his forward planning was not brilliant. But it's introspection, tip top. introspection, willing to work on himself and he does seem to have got his curly hair routine down

if the statues are anything to be believed. And a thoughtful little face. I'll be back with Emma after this short break. All right, so that was Marcus Aurelius. So I think that it is time that I'm going to force you to choose here. So we have got Caracalla, Otho, Marcus Aurelius, Shag, Mary, Kill, and justify your choice. I mean, they're tough ones.

I'm going to shag Carrekella because I think it would be worth it to die. Even though he'd kill you. He would definitely kill me, but he's so hot. Okay, yep, okay. He's the good-looking one. The other option is Otho, who would, you know, would probably have some weird stuff to show you. But he would have some things you'd never even heard of. Yeah.

So we're going to shag Caracalla despite the threat to life. I think it would be worth it, yeah. All right. Yeah. Yeah, I can respect that choice. All right. And he's the only one that when I see him in a museum, I'm always like, my boy.

My handsome, handsome boy. Yeah. He's my handsome handsome boy. I can't defend anything else about him, but I do fancy. You're just having to throw down for a night and then he's going to kill you afterwards. Exactly. You don't need to defend anything here. I'll go out on a high.

Yeah. Oh, so I think I would marry. Ooh, I wasn't what I thought you were going to say there. Go on. One, I don't think you'd ever get bored in bed. No, no. God knows what he'd learn. in that court, but he stayed there for a long time.

Tricks up his toga that lad. Exactly. And I think he has got a self-sacrificing air to him that I appreciate and he's very rich and he likes giving presents and I like all those things. Nice. And he's only going to last three months and then he can be a wealthy

widow. Exactly. And you know, they say that he governed Lucitania like perfectly and was a great accountant and I really hate doing my taxes so I reckon he can do that. Yes. Okay. Yes. I respect this choice. Well, that by default then means that Marcus Aurelius is getting bunked on the head. Unfortunately, I would rather die than hang out with Marcus Aurelius,

lest he started talking to me about stericism. Is it just that? That he's dull. He looks so boring. He looks like he would start crying at any given moment and then feel bad about it and then cry more. I feel like he any time. Sensitive poetic type. Yeah.

The worst. Does this mean that nice guys finish last though? because he's not as flash as the others. I mean, a bit, yeah, probably. I mean, he's pretty flashed. Like, he's just a bit. It's just dull. He's just going to ramble on about stoicism.

It's just going to be like hanging out with a men's right podcaster. Yeah, basically. Like, he's going to start talking to me about emotional control and God. Fuck it. No, no, absolutely. Yeah, out. And he doesn't look like he was great in bed. He doesn't look like he was a great to hang out with.

He's not going to go to any parties. The books he reads are boring. I don't want to sleep on the floor either. I don't want to sleep on the floor. He's not ever going to go to a horror film with me. He's going to tell me that he thinks it's morally impure or base or something to... No. I have no patience for stoicism at all.

I just consider it to be irritating in every possible way. I think this sounds like a very rational decision. So I actually think that Marcus Reelis would respect this choice. I think he would. I think if I could talk him into it and then explain to him that it was outside of his control and therefore he shouldn't be bothered by it. I only worry about the things you can control. You can't be upset because that's an irrational emotion.

So detach yourself from it. And now we're going to put you in a bag and throw you off this cliff. Yeah, I'm just going to pop you in a guillotine. That's fine. Done. Emma, thank you so much for playing Shag-Marry Kill. I think that you've made some strong choices here. Thank you.

I think they're idiosyncratic and only partially defensible. If people want to know more about it, you and your work, where can they find you? You might get letters after this one. Oh, I might. People are going to write to me about stoicism. Please. If you want to, I suppose, you can go to emma southern.com,

or you can find me at History is Sexy, where I do my own podcast. Fabulous. Thank you so much for joining us. You've been marvellous. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening. Thank you so much to Emma for joining me. And if you'd like us to explore a subject or maybe you just wanted to say hello,

then you can email us at betwixt at historyhit.com. Coming up, we have got more in our little mini-series on History's worst-ever fuckboys coming your way and we'll be starting with Charles II. So, starting strong. This podcast was edited by Tim Arstall and produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer was Charlotte Long. Join me again, Betwixt the Sheets History of Sex Scandal and Society, a podcast by History Hit.