Oh What A Time... - #152 Maps 1 (Part 1)

Episode Date: December 8, 2025

This week we’re here with the first of two episodes on the history of maps! We’ve got 27,000 year old maps carved onto tusks, maps in ancient Egypt and, the big one, the Mappa Mundi.Elsewhere this week, we’re discussing that great underrated invention: the coat. Get ready for a potted history of the humble coat. If you’ve got anything on coats that we’ve missed, you know what to do: [e-mail]! The comedy history podcast that has spent as much time talking about the invention of custard as it has the industrial revolution is here with its first ever live show! Thursday 15th January at the Underbelly Boulevard in London’s Soho. 🎟 Tickets are on sale now: https://underbellyboulevard.com/tickets/oh-what-a-time/On our Patreon you’ll now find:•The full archive of bonus episodes•Brand new bonus episodes each month•OWAT subscriber group chats•Loads of extra perks for supporters of the show•PLUS ad-free episodes earlier than everyone elseJoin us at 👉 patreon.com/ohwhatatimeAnd as a special thank you for joining, use the code CUSTARD for 25% off your first month.You can also follow us on: X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepodAnd Instagram at @ohwhatatimepodAaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice?Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk).Chris, Elis and Tom x Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

O Watertime is now on Patreon. You can get main feed episodes before everyone else, ad free, plus access to our full archive of bonus content, two bonus episodes every month, early access to live show tickets and access to the O Watertime Group chat. Plus if you become an O Watertime All-Timer, myself, Tom and Ellis, will riff on your name to postulate where else in history you might have popped up.

For all your options, you can go to patreon.com forward slash O-Watertime. Hello and welcome to Oh What a Time, the history podcast that asks, was a time before proper winter coats, just awful. When you would head towards winter and you would think, well, this is just going to be hell. I think this all the time. There are two things that make me think this.

Because of my likes and personal life, I am a member of lots of Facebook pages that show pictures of football fans on the way to away games in the 80s. Love it. It's the kind of thing I like. They always, always, always, without fail, look bitterly cold.

And none of them have got proper coats on. And they all look like they're suffering. They're all way thinner than people are nowadays because no one went to the gym and took protein powder and creatine and all that stuff in the 80s. And they've all got shit coats on. And it just looks like doing Rochdale Away

must have been so hard in 1980. Whereas now Rochdale Away is an absolute joy, isn't it? Well, in a nice warm Patagonia coat. That's a very good point. Yeah, no problem. But the other thing is the equivalent you see Arctic explorers using like before the First World War,

like Scott in the Antarctic and stuff. His coat was shit. Yeah. And look how that ended. Yeah. Imagine trying to go, I can't remember whether it was the north or the south pole. Imagine trying to go to one of the poles in a shit coat. Those coats they wear at the North Pole in like 1900

are basically what you would wear now for Rochdale Away. Yeah, yeah. I do the school run in a better coat than Scott of the Antarctic had. How is that? And a pack of huskies. It's half a mile. I agree with you. The 80s were one thing, but I was actually thinking about, think way back, let's say, you know, let's go medieval Britain, when they really didn't have access to any kind of modern sewing techniques, sort of, you know, thick inlaid coats, none of that nonsense. You really just had to face the cold full on. No goose down.

Exactly, yeah. That you'd bought from your local camping shop. Yeah. Nothing made by regatta. You know, now you mention it, when you think back to, like, Tudor times, has anyone got a coat on? No. Did the coat come around in like 1900? When you think about penny farthings in the Victorian era, I can't in my minds I imagine anyone wearing a coat.

Do you know what? The last vestiges of that, the last remaining Tudors are Jordy's. Because, I mean, I can't believe I'm saying this. I hate myself for using this cliche, but I mean, done lots of. of gigs in Newcastle and being a part of the Newcastle night time economy it is actually true I remember going to watch the Swans play I remember going to watch Swansea play

Sunderland and it was horrendous it was awful I remember thinking at half time I'm not sure I can handle this but I've come all this way so what do I do do I just get back in the car

having driven to Sunden for 45 minutes of football And they're all the macums They're in T-shirts Incredible They've basically got anti-freeze Running through their veins Like on a Friday night

Saturday night And on the terraces as well What a culture I'm the sort of person That constantly misjudges the weather Where I will go out Not wearing a thick enough coat I'm now about two minutes from home

I've got the kids with me And it's a real choice To go back and get a coat So I'm basically stuck outside now Not wearing enough clothes That's basically what always happens Like, I'm too optimistic about how many layers I need. It's also annoying either way.

Yeah. Wearing clothes that are too thick and too warm. You're like, well, I'm just going to have to carry this now. Yes. And being cold with nowhere left to go. Very miserable. And then you're like, okay, I think you've had enough. You've had enough for the swings.

But if you've really pushed me twice, exactly. There's nothing worse than one minute into a football game and thinking to yourself, I'm too cold. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you think, I've got two. two more hours of this. Yeah, I actually bought a jumper on the way to North Macedonia away. Because I left the pub but I was walking to the ground and was like,

well, I've completely misjudged this. Macedonia in March, why have I just got a cuckoole on? That was mad. So, yeah, I had to pop into a camping shop to buy a Macedonian jumper. And then, because I got excited, I was too hot and the jumper just ended up on the floor. It was just cock up after cock. That's actually a very good point, El. I think the one thing worse than being cold would be when, this is especially true of London,

where you're wearing a thick coat, you're running late, you just amount make it onto a tube carriage, and it's absolutely packed, and then suddenly you're hotter than the sun, because you've been running from Liverpool Street through bank, and you now couldn't be hotter, and you can't remove your coat. The sweat begins. And then you bump into someone, you know, they give you a hug, and as their hand touches your back,

You audibly squelch And you say, I'm sorry, it's another thing I've misjudged You bump into the X, you still haven't got over For 15 years She hugs you and you squelch Oh yeah, yeah, yeah And she goes, go on then, I'll hug in then Oh yeah, he's squelched again

Like a kitchen sponge That's why I left him, because he's a squelcher Britain's least dry man Britain's biggest squelcher That's why I left you. You're listening to Britain's biggest squelcher here, or music radio, far away. Because you're damp to the touch. I hugged Lee Trundle, my footballing hero yesterday,

and I'd completely misjudge what I should be wearing, and I squelched when Lee touched my back. I thought, not now. Where had you been? I'd been recording something for the Swans prior to the Wrexham game. Okay. And he came to meet me afterwards because we were doing a podcast together, and I'd got excited in the tunnel,

because I'd got to see the players changing rooms. You got all sweaty. I'd kind of be sweaty. He hugged me. I squelched. We looked each other in the eyes. Nothing was said. I just left with my tail between my legs.

He took out his phone. He deleted your number in front of you. And that was that. So there you go. I think what's our conclusion? Is our conclusion then that people in the past would have been fine with it because they were harder? Or is our conclusion that it would have been horrible

but they had no choice around it? What do we think is the answer there? They were definitely hard. I think that's it. Definitely harder. Yeah. Do you want, I've actually got in front of me a brief history of the coat. Oh, nice.

Okay, great. So the coat apparently wasn't knocking around much until like the 1500s, but 1,400s to 1400, medieval Britain. The cloak was big. Yes. The cloak. That was the precursor to the coat. They hadn't figured out the arms yet. They'd worked it out with other items of clothes.

that they couldn't work out and move it across to the cloak. When I worked at an advertising agency a few years ago, a man came in to a meeting and he was wearing a cape. Okay. And he took the cape off

and he sat down. And we attempted to have a meeting. I can't remember what we talked about because all I could think about was like... This is when you were working the Daily Planet, wasn't it? It's wearing red... underpants. You can't wear a cape.

You can't wear a cape. A cape. Yeah. He had a gold buckle on the front. What was his vibe? You could imagine. He worked for a fashion house. So I think it was part of the job was you had to make quite the statement. Yeah, of course. But sometimes, as that day proved, you can make too much of a statement.

And what were you wearing? What was your statement? That's wearing. Velcro, positive and negative on each. side of my body. Cassette, sell a tape to my cheeks. Do you know there was a job? We might have talked about this before in the Globe Theatre, made famous by Shakespeare, of course.

I think actually he might have backed the building of the globe. That might be wrong. Get in contact if I am wrong. But there was a job called the cloak where a man would walk around the audience wearing a cloak and you could pay to urinate his feet. So he would wrap the cloak around you because there were no toilet facilities. Like a portable your eye by? Yeah, exactly.

He would wrap the cloak around. you like a shower curtain and then you would urinate his feet and you would pay him tuppence or whatever and off you would go Newcastle fans were complaining the other day because they were made to stay in the away end at Marseille

after the game had ended and the toilets had blocked or something or there was a leak and they were standing in urine what they were basically having courtesy of the French police was 16th century Shakespeare experience so you're going to watch

Romeo and Juliet live it's a lot of piss on your fucking shoes I don't know why you're experiencing history I don't know why those Newcastle fans are complaining so much yeah but you know if you're at the Globe

and you're stood an extra stranger and they summon over that guy yes that's such a good point I'm getting what I'm getting out of here yeah the one you want to worry about Chris is when they summon the guy over he whaps the cloak around them and then he lowers himself down a little bit

and the top of their head is not coming out over the top of the cloak you know that is no longer a year in situation there's not a play I would find gripping enough to piss into someone's cloak for can you imagine as well like the stench of that coat oh yeah the stench of the cult the stench of the theatre I mean my clothes in the 90s used to stink from facts

like people smoking in pubs this I suppose the choice is, Elle, to we or not to we. You having that? That's not bad, is it? He just never stops. I wish he stopped. Back to the history of the coat. We're now in the 1500s.

Oh, we're still going, okay, fine. 1,500s to 1600s in Britain, the first true coat appears because of tailoring improvement so they can do actual sleeves and shape the bodies and all that. But the coat really takes off the industrial revolution due to technology mechanised, textile mills, Cheap mass-produced wool, standardised sizing begins, huge urban workforce, daily commuting, colder, polluted cities, practical warmth was needed. And there you go, the foundations were laid for Rochstead away centuries later. That's really interesting. That is very quickly becoming quite a grubby coat, isn't it?

If it's your everyday coat in a very smoky city. Oh, can you imagine? Yeah. In the middle of the Industrial Revolution. I had a cream jacket about 10 years ago. In the Industrial Revolution. No, no, no, no, but just leaning on tube trains, it would just get dirty. Oh, man, yeah.

Was that your Harrington? I did have a Harrington. It wasn't that one, actually. It was another one. Okay, yeah, yeah. The Harrington seemed to cope with the dirt a little bit better. Cream is not a sustainable colour for modern city living, I think, especially with children. It's just not.

On the tube, forget it. It's fine for a photo shoot as long as it's straight out with a packet. That's the only set of circumstances. So, Chris, is that at the end of the coat history? Basically, yes. case we can move on to what the actual history is in today's show today's episode is i'm excited to say another listener suggestion from one of our top tier patron subscribers this is one of the great benefits to signing up and becoming a know what a time full timer you can suggest episode ideas

and once a month minimum we will do one of them and today's suggestion has come from yvonne jackson is on the subject of maps which i think is a super superb idea. So much so that we've actually prepared two episodes on this. Not to go out sequentially, but this is the first episode on Maps. There is so much in that as a subject area. So thank you very much, Yvonne. But you would agree, guys, that signing up and becoming a patron, Oh, What a Time, full-timer, is well worth it. Do you want to explain why? Oh, the O-Chatter Time, the group chat for O-Water Time listeners, plus two bonus episodes every month, pre-sell tickets to live shows. We'll talk about that in a minute.

and ad-free listening as well. The benefits are incredible. I love the ad-free listening. Who needs ads in their life? It's just such a smooth listening experience. I love it. And you know, the great thing as well is you get the full archive of bonus content as well.

Bonus episodes we've been doing for years and years, tens and tens of episodes you've never heard, all to be enjoyed at patreon.com forward slash oh, what a time. But that's not the only thing to get excited about Is it, Tom? It's not, because we have a live show. Isn't that right, Ellis? Look at the hook at this, just knocking it around.

It's like ticky-tack. It's like Kevin Kagan and Tony Blair doing headlers. Where's the live show, Elle? We're going to pass you to death. The live show is at the Underbelly Boulevard, and it is on January the 15th. And to get those tickets, you can go to ohwatha time.com. I've got big plans for the live show.

Have you all? I've just bought some new trousers, and I'm getting baggy about the second. Like, I'm going to look like proper, like Henry the 8th backy trousers for the live show. MC Hammer. Oh, yeah, yeah, big time. That's the fashion. It looks ridiculous.

People hate it, but that's fashion top. Do you know, Ellis, remarkably, from his other podcast live shows, get messages about the quality of his trousers. That is true. Well, you get messages from audience members saying, we love the show, but that's not really why I'm DMing you. I just want to know about where you got your trousers from. I'm, I'm, how can I say this?

and remain humble. I'm probably the best trouser wearer in audio. Who were the rivals? Oh, very good question. Andy Goldstein, Jake Humphrey. Yeah, the host of trouser pod. Trauser pod. I'd be an absolute shoe-in for trouser pod.

Absolutely. You wouldn't be a shoe-in. They don't want to talk about that. No interest in that. And excitedly on the live show, you're actually going to strip your trousers off and pop them on Jeremy Bentham for all of eternity on. time. Is Jeremy Benton wearing car hat? Yes, he is. He's wearing car hat. He's more into the YMC

service work scene actually, Tom. For God's saying. So genuinely, we are really looking forward to the show. If you want to grab tickets, you can now. Where can you get click it from, Chris? You can click in this episode description. We can go to oh what a time.com. There we are. Right. Let's get cracking with a little bit of correspondence and then we'll get into the wonderful world of maps. Does that sound good? Oh, yeah. Yes. So, you sent us some correspondence, have you? Well, let's take a look at you then. This is a very short email, but it caught my eye, so I'm going to read it out,

because I thought it was a really interesting question. This is an email from Stephen Alterson, who says, Hello, lads, I've got a very quick question for you. When was the last time anybody ever built a castle? and who for and where I love the show Stephen O who's from Berwick-Pon-Twee, Northumberland where we have lots of them I actually know this

Do you? Yeah, Izzy, my wife, is doing a podcast with Dan Skinner who people might know from Shooting Stars used to play the car, why he still does play the Carderangelo because they're all friends and they're doing this podcast for GWR where they're going they're visiting places that are on the GWR network Love it.

And they went to Castle Drogo, which is apparently the last castle to be built in the UK. So I'm just going to Wikipedia that. Yeah, it's the last castle built in England. Castle Drogo is a country house and mixed revivalist castle near Drew Staten. I'm not sure if I've pronounced that properly, I'm afraid. People of Devon. It is in Devon. Constructed between 1911 and 1930 is the last castle built in England.

And you look at it, and it does look exactly like a castle. And it's basically, it's the same age as my house. It's amazing. That's exactly right. I'm just sending a picture around to the group now. What's interesting about it, it's sort of seemingly sandstone, I would guess, looking at it. But it is a castle, but it's got that sort of flat, pristine, modern look that you obviously don't get to see with normal castle because they're all ancient. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is what their castles would have looked like when they first were built way back when. Isn't that amazing?

Yeah, I mean, it looks like a castle from a cartoon, but it was finished in 1930. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, there are people alive who remember. Castle Drogo not being finished, which is incredible. There would have been people who lived nearby seeing it go up going, they can't. That's not really what the neighbours are building. They said it was a side return. Is that really what they're...

I mean, I know they're like old things. But come on. Do you remember there was a news story a few years ago where a guy basically built a mock castle and hid it behind hay bales? Do you remember that? No. And then the council found out he didn't have planning permission. He just had to knock it down.

but he built essentially a sham castle behind loads of hay bales on his farm because it's just something he wanted to do and the council turned up and went there's definitely something behind that and indeed there was it was a fake castle hidden behind there so there you go so that's that's an answer for you that's the early 20th century so that's 1930 castle drogo is the last castle in england by the renowned architect edward luteons there you are hope that answers your question well it does answer your question Because Castel Coch, which had been a castle, I think, the Normans built a castle on that site in the 11th century.

But then it was rebuilt as part of the Gothic revival in the 19th century. It was the Marquis of boot, did it? Amazing. So I would have put money on Castel Coch being one of the last ones, but no, Drogo 20th century. Can I contribute an outside, just throw this in there, see if you agree this is a castle? They say every man's home is his castle. Yeah. And Bobby George, the darts player from the 80s, built his own house.

Did he? And I'm pretty sure it's either in the shape of a dart or the shape of a dart board. And it's called George Hall. How can you have a house in the shape of a dartboard? As in flat front bird's eye view, it looks like it's like it's round. As opposed to it's just a big disc that he tries. I need to. It's called George Hall.

You need to find this out. We can't be so vague as to know it's either the shape of a. dart or a dart walk. They're so different. Bobby George, George Hall. If it's George Hall, I'm guessing dart. I'm looking at the aerial view of it, and it looks nothing like a dart or a dart. It's just house-shaped. It's, yeah, it is a house-shaped house.

Okay, I think we can agree that's the most underwhelming finish to a story ever told. I have corrected myself. If you're that free and easy with facts, all your stories should be incredible. because you can literally go anywhere with them. What is it? It's in the shape of something. You need to let it go, Chris. Maybe he's got a dartboard in his house that was paid for by...

Well, he can. I can see that he has. His dance winning. Is there anything more desperate, Ellis, in the sentence, it's in the shape of something. As he scrabbles around on the internet to try and justify the fact he's brought this up in the first place. It's in the shape of something, Your Honor.

I'd argue it's in the shape of a. Travel 20, maybe. Oh, yeah? Okay. Yeah, really? I didn't really. I'm so sorry for slamming you, Chris. Can I get on my hands and knees to the listener?

If you've got any facts about George Hall, Bobby George's home, which he built himself. Yeah. Please send them in for our new feature, Bobby George George, George Hall facts. To supplement my knowledge. I will never, ever, ever build my own house. No.

We've already got one. No, but like those people who are like, oh, it's just going to be perfect, just how I want it. No, just buy a house that you're 70% happy with and put up with it, for God's sake. Please. Have you ever seen that episode of Grand Designs where they run out of money? I think that happens quite a lot, doesn't it? Exactly. That's my point.

It's almost impossible, I would say, unless you're Bobby George. Grand Designs, what always happens is about 70% in there's a problem with the windows. It's always the windows. So the windows are delayed. They've ordered some weird windows from France to fit this mad shape they've cut into the side of their house. And then the windows don't arrive on time. Or if they do, they don't fit. It's always the windows.

The one I'll never forget. It was an Australian guy. And he wanted his house to jut out into the sea, like a sort of pier. Okay, yeah. So it was massive. So a wing of a house who was going to jut out into the seas. Obviously, that had to be on, you know, pillars to keep it up. Yeah.

And he wanted the pillars to be sort of in. paste in this kind of wood, right? But the wood was very rare. And when it was chopped and I had to be dried out for like a really long time, like a year or two years. Right. So he goes to the timber yard to buy it. And they're like, sorry, mate, it's got to be dried out for two years.

And this was cut down about six months ago. So can you wait? And he goes, no, I'd like it now, please. It's only been dried out for six months. It takes two years. I'd like it now, please. It'll crack No, I'd like it now

It'll definitely crack You need another 18 months Can you wait? No, I'd like it now please Anyway, he buys it He builds it They go back a year later They say

Oh, the pillars The wood The wood cracked The guy was right I think Yes, it's cracked And it's cost to be thousands of dollars

Yeah, I'll apologise Come on, man You were given all the information I'm imagining He got them home then you got the hair dryer out. When I'm running late and I've got wet socks, I need to desperately trying to get them dry enough to leave the house.

He was doing all sorts of stuff to dry this wood, though. And they were like, you just got to leave it to dry out. Can I, could I put it in a kiln? No, you can't put it in. No, that'll burn. Right, but I do want it now. It's going to crack. I'm going to ignore you, actually, and that'll be, thank you very much.

I think that's partly because of the pressure. There are cameras. Oh, of course. You've invited a TV show and you don't want to look like an idiot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you promise them this will be done in a year. Yeah. So that word's going in whether you like it or not.

Just quickly before we did that little chat about ground designs gave me some time to find some source material for the point that I'm about to make. I've actually discovered an article. This is from the Harwich and Manning Tree Standard on the 28th of March 2013. And the headline just happens to be, get your apologies ready. Bobby Dazzler's DART shaped mansion on the market. Okay? Are you ready? Start thinking about how you're going to apologise to me.

I'll continue under the article. Arrow's ace Bobby George is hoping he is right on target by trying to flog his self-built mansion for $3.5 million. The Darts legend and wife Marie say they have decided to put their home, George Hall, in Ardley, on the market because they're getting too old to manage it. And they hope a businessman may have a shot at converting the 18-bedroom dart-shaped pad into a conference centre of residential home.

The couple have lived at the quirky mansion, which includes, Get this, Tom, a Chinese takeaway, pub and a bar since they built it in 1995. Are you kidding? Why would you need 18 bedrooms? It was just you and your wife. Also, the bedroom at the very end is going to be tiny if it's dark shaped. The bedroom at the tip is going to be not fit for a field house.

That's where the bath was. It's where the bathroom was in the tip of the dart. You want to be in the throwing end. I'd try to shower in the tip. The master bedroom's got to be in the shaft of the dart, isn't it? I wouldn't want 18 bedrooms, even if I could afford 18 bedrooms. I found other articles from Bobby George's going, I overdid it. Was that 18 bedrooms?

Was the garden dartboard shape? Because that would make sense. If the point was in the middle of the garden, like you've got a bullseye and then it's a circular garden around it, That's quite a nice little touch. I'm just saying if he wants to repurchase in the house and add that, then maybe you could do that. That is a good idea. Thank you very much.

There you go. I've got the picture of overhead of George Hall. And I know that people say it's dart-shaped. But look at the article I've just shared, says it's dark-shaped. I've heard it was dark-shaped. I'm looking at it. I can't figure out how this is dark-shaped.

I mean, how would you describe that, boys? I've just sent it to you. just a bit sort of bit like a travelodge you'd find near a motorway. Yeah, that's that, do you know what, Tom is absolutely spot on. If you showed me that picture, I would just assume it was a travel lodge. Yeah. Or maybe a golfing resort. I certainly wouldn't think, oh, that's a dark shaped house.

This is a Bobby George's house. Yeah, absolutely. Well, there we go, Chris. Bobby.jorge's email address is bobby.orgia.orgate.com. How do you know that? Because it's on his Twitter bio. Well, there you go. Well, that's what we can get our questions answered.

We can get in contact with him now. Yeah, why do we email the man himself? Exactly. Okay, great. If there's anything you want to contact the show about, be it historical, be it Bobby Jewel-related. Here's how you're getting contact with the show. All right, you horrible luck, here's how you can stay in touch with the show.

You can email us at hello at oh what a time.com And you can follow us on Instagram and Twitter at oh, what a time, pod. Now clear off. Okay, shall we now crack in some actual history? As we mentioned, this is a listener-suggested show. on the subject of maps, and I think this should be a really fun one. What are you guys going to be talking about? I'm going to be talking about maps in ancient Mesopotamia.

Oh, I'm going to be talking about the Map of Mundi, which I still need at school. And I'm going to kick things off by taking us back to some of the first maps ever created. And this blew my mind how long ago this was. I was not sort of ready for this. To set the scene, okay, it's 1965, and a farmer is busy, working to expand his cellar at home some 85 miles south of Kiev in Mesrick, okay, this is the name of the place

in the Ukraine. In the Ukraine, exactly. When suddenly he unearthed something, okay, and it is the lower jawbone of a woolly mammoth. And unsurprisingly, when he relays his information to archaeologists, there's a response is, okay, we probably need to give this area a bit of attention, okay, because it's quite interesting. And so a comprehensive dig is started And very soon, even more incredible objects are found

There's a woolly mammoth tusk Followed by a drum Which is made from a mammoth skull And evidence of at least four prehistoric dwellings My question here is If you're the guy who's looking to complete his cellar Is part of you quite annoyed you've found this stuff And now you've had to delay everything to two years

For an archaeological dig Or are you excited? What's your feeling if your cell is still not done? Wow, are you thinking stuff? Is there money in this? Yeah, I suppose that is what it is, isn't it? Yeah. And could I end up with a much plusher cellar, a man cave by the end of this?

A dart shipped cellar. Literally a man cave. Yeah, exactly. So of all of these items, the tusk was the most important. As once it had been cleaned, scholars discovered that it had been elaborately carved just as the skull was painted with dots and lines of red ochre. And what's more, they concluded that these carvings were information akin to a modern map. Okay, so on the tusk, they could discern fields, a river, and several dwellings belonging to people. And most incredibly of all, this tusk was reckoned to be nearly, get this, 15,000 years old.

Okay. Making this one of the oldest maps ever found. So on this tusk, there's pictures of fields, a river, all these things in the local geography, and it's 15,000 years old. What are your thoughts on that? I didn't know they were making maps. I mean, that's sort of pre-agricultural revolution, isn't it? Absolutely. I mean, I've got to be honest, how accurate is it?

Is my phone better? Your phone is better, admittedly. However, the tusk doesn't run out of batteries. Good point. It doesn't get too hot in this summer. Exactly, yeah, completely. And it's probably less addictive. It fits in your pocket.

The tusk doesn't have social media on it. Oh, God, yeah. Which is sort of emotionally draining. I can't Snapchat on a test. Can you? Exactly. But this tusk, okay, is nothing compared to a similar discovery made in Pavlov in what is now the Czech Republic a few years earlier in 1962.

Again, this was a mammoth tusk on which was carved, what seemed to be, again, field, a river and human settlements. But this tusk was even older. This tusk was 27,000 years old. Wow. I mean, imagine the feeling of finding something of that age and beauty. It's incredible. It's so old.

that you just wouldn't believe it would be that old? If I found a 27,000-year-old Tusk, I'd think this is a child's toy that's probably a year-old at best. And you'd immediately been it. I'd be so scared of dropping it or breaking it. The stress of handling it would be enormous. Yeah, absolutely.

I do find it amazing, though, like cave paintings, all these sort of things. Just looking at something. If you go to the British Museum, for example, And there's the ancient Egypt exhibition is a perfect example. These paintings that still have the shape and the colour. But when you imagine the person sat there those thousands of years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And the time and care. All these things that sort of link us to them, the parallels, these needs to document where we're from and to create. These are sort of consistent things. Yeah, yeah, the creative impulse. Exactly, yeah. They have always existed and will always exist until AI. came along and destroyed it all.

Who were the podcasters of ancient Egypt? Exactly. Someone in 27,000 years' time finds this episode on a USB key. Yeah. I was like, wow, it's a window into the past. Were these the three great geniuses of 2025? And also, why did they put it on a USB?

Didn't that go out about 15 years prior to the recording of oh what a time? Why don't you just save it to the cloud? And why are Ellis' trousers only just coming into fashion now? Oh, what a memory's thing? He was so many tens of thousands of years ahead of his time. So, Elle, you mentioned the idea of how accurate it was. And that's actually quite an interesting question, because when people discovered these pieces,

no one really knew what to make of it. Some thought they were a map. Others thought, you know, because it showed the types of things that are around rather than being particularly exact like a map would be, maybe it could be art. It was only with the discovery in Ukraine a few years, years later, the archaeologists recognize the congruence between these two items. And if the Pavlov

Tusk was a map, then that suggests that humans have used similar styles of visual representation of their surroundings for longer than they've used written communication. And it is, of course, those simple ideas of fields, rivers, and houses that continue to form the basis of modern maps. You can see that these things still remain true. So the question is, how many habits do we still share with prehistoric people. I mean, prehistoric mapping did not just take in things that were close by. Dot maps were found in caves in southern France and northern Spain. These date back to between 14,500 and 12,000 BCE, and they bear a remarkable resemblance

to the constellations as seen at the sky at night. So they have made maps of the sky as they saw it at night. And once again, what I love about this is that cohesion. to the whole span of human existence. That same night sky that we see now is what they would have documented. I love that. That's pretty special, isn't it?

It is. Although we do all sound like stoners, the more we talk about this. But this is one of my favourite things about the ancient world. These kinds of compositions. You're listening to Oh, what a blunt. El, Chris and I pass around. I love it in the ancient world, like in ancient China.

They know, they can, because of like comets being cited, they can figure out the exact day in these ancient manuscripts that they saw that comment and it's like April the 12th, like 100 AD. They know exactly when it was. I love that about history. Yeah, it's better Cahili's comets on to be a tapestry, isn't it? Is it? Yeah, pretty cool.

There you go. But to answer your question, could they actually work? work as maps. Well, clearly they were not designed for navigation because they don't tell the distance between one location and another, let alone suggest a route. But what they did do is illustrate a sort of sense of community, a sense of belonging, of being part of a local area, which may be what the first idea of a map was for. That was the initial purpose of a map to show where you lived. And since these early discoveries, many more have been made, adding to our understanding of the ways in which prehistoric humans try to make

sense of their world. A particularly intriguing discovery, not least because it echoes the mammoth tusks of Europe. It's something called a cyclone. Have you heard of this? It's a tapered cylindrical stone which is found in Australia. The cyclone is an ancient artefact. Several of these have been discovered belonging to the Aboriginal peoples of Australia, although the name is not indigenous. It was invented by Robert Etheridge, who was a British paleontologist who came originally from Cheltenham, if you're interested, and used this phrase in a research paper he published in 1916. And the precise purpose of a cyclone is also a matter of speculation amongst archaeologists. They may have been tools for communication, maybe a religious ritual, or to guide travellers through a local area, or indeed all three in different locations.

One cyclon was discovered at Fawes Bridge, which is in the remote northern New South Wales in 1970. That's about 500 miles northwest of Sydney. And it shows a series of lines and intersections, apparently deliberate carvings, of what. And it was only when archaeologists compared the cyclons marking with the maps of local areas that they realised quite what a remarkable discovery they'd made. It's amazing this. Allowing for soil erosion and movement and realignment of nearby water courses, this cyclone turned out to be a map. It's impossible to date precisely, but it's given a plausible date of around 20,000 years BCE. Just mind-blowing, isn't it? And what the cyclone shows or appears to show, since environmental

changes and weathering kind of makes it a definite agreement slightly tricky is the meeting point of local watercourses, the Warrego River, the Colgoa River, with what we now known as the Darling River, and most interestingly, probable fording points where travellers could more easily cross from one bank of a river to another. So that was a map showing how you could traverse the terrain, how you could cross the rivers and where the rivers were. Isn't that amazing? 20,000 years ago that there are maps or it's likely their map's been created

showing travellers how they could move around the area. It's more amazing we've still got them. Yes. Because you'd think that all that stuff would just be lost to the suns of time but to still have that. And obviously now for it to be

looked after and preserved and we're studying it. Yeah. I love that. I think that's amazing. The maps that we have now, incidentally, that show us around particularly local areas that I just want to bring up

because I think they're the worst thing on Earth are the huge maps in Westfield or any massive shopping centre which is a massive touch screen but of course the touch quality doesn't work anymore so you just have to ram it really hard

with your finger as it refuses to accept you're trying to press B and find out where boots is and you're like hang on is there more than 1 JD Sports in here because that doesn't make any sense at all But Dunkin' Dornets is over there. This is, what's happening here? It's so true.

Even when they give you the information, it's impossible to read what direction you should be going on and what floor you're on as well. Oh, my God. If anyone listening owns a Westfield, can you just do me a quick favour? Can you just call the floor something normal instead of basement, lower ground?

Ground, one, two. Why do I never know what any of these floors mean when I can see them with my own eyes? Oh, oh, food court, food plants. on a different floor to everything else. What's going on? And can you also make it clear that it is a touch stream? Because what I had about two years ago

is I went up to what I thought was a touchscreen but was just an advertising hoarding, showing videos, and just pressed it for about 30 seconds while some teenagers looked at me and laughed. And I realised that this is never going to give me the information because it's just a TV screen. It's not doing anything. Like when little kids were used to iPads and answer phones

and stuff trying to scroll coffee tables and books. Exactly. I was one of them. But what's interesting, okay, about all of these examples so far is that the maps have been carved onto three-dimensional objects. However, another prehistoric discovery, a cave complex, Noazi Sir Ecole, which is south of Paris, raised a tantalizing prospect

that humans may have also developed their own three-dimensional maps. This, I love this. This is so great, and I wish they still existed today. There, scientists found carvings which seem to map, the local rivers and streams and local water rays and how they ran from high ground to low where it might gather, where it began, all with accompanying earth mounds

to represent the undulating terrain. So it's a map laid out and they've built up the earth, the show where the hills were, where the water would have ran down. In effect, it's like a model of the immediate environment. Like a model railway kind of thing. Yeah, yeah. Of the immediate environment in which the makers lived,

a miniature version of their world and remarkably the model could also be filled with water to fully replicate inside the cave the world that could be seen and traversed outside so you'd fill it with water and it would show you how the water moved around the area that you lived in how the rivers and how the streams operated

so you could understand it how great is that and that was made it's reckoned some 13,000 years ago does make you wonder though the person doing that what should they be doing Yeah That is a plush job

To be fair In the community You're going to come and hunt with us No I'm making a 3D map With Mounds of Earth Right We haven't eaten for a couple of days You're definitely going to stick

With the map Yeah I think I probably am actually I don't really think Hunter Gatherers Had time for hobbies Yeah It's just as a sort of tribe We're really struggling here mate

Yeah But the map The Sabretooth tigers Are really doing us a mischief this bloody map you see once I've started I've got to finish a project okay okay well we've talked on the show a lot about jobs

from history you'd like I think this has to be one doesn't it oh the 3D map make up absolutely making little hills out of mud yeah the water flows around it so this is 12000 or around 11000 BCE which is younger than the Tusk or cyclones but it's still operated with the same principle

which are the urge to say we live here it's amazing to me that these existed so long ago that mind-boggling amount of time, 20,000 years ago that this was happening, that people were etching the terrain onto tusks or whatever happens to be to show where they lived

and to feel part of the world around them. It's incredible, isn't it? Yeah, I had no idea they were that old. Well, there we go. That was part one. Thank you, Tom. Part two comes tomorrow, unless you want to join

the O Watertime patron. You can be a part-timer, an all-timer, a full-timer. For all your options, which will include, in every instance, getting tomorrow's episode today, you can go to patreon.com forward slash oh, what a time. Otherwise, we'll see it tomorrow. Bye.

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