Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion advised. Hi,
Speaker 1: this is Danis Schwartz and this is the seventy five
Speaker 1: episode of Noble Blood to celebrate this monumental anniversary. I
Speaker 1: am so excited to be joined by the incredible historian
Speaker 1: Dan Jones, the author of I think a dozen books.
Speaker 1: His latest Power and Thrones, A New History of the
Speaker 1: Middle Ages, is basically just the most readable, interesting book
Speaker 1: about the entire thousand year period of the Middle Ages,
Speaker 1: Like if you have ever had any like questions or
Speaker 1: misunderstandings about what actually constitutes the Middle Ages and what's
Speaker 1: important about it and what isn't dance book is just phenomenal.
Speaker 1: And his first novel, Essex Dogs, which is about a
Speaker 1: platoon of soldiers during the Hundred Years War, comes out
Speaker 1: later this year. You should absolutely look it up. I've
Speaker 1: read a chapter. It's just phenomenal. I'm basically star struck
Speaker 1: that he's here. Dan, Welcome, Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: being here. Oh I'm star struck as well. So conversation
Speaker 1: is going to be stilted for listeners who maybe recognize
Speaker 1: your voice. You are also on the number of Netflix programs.
Speaker 1: Do you want to numerate which ones to those are? Well,
Speaker 1: there's a series called Secrets of Great British Castles. We
Speaker 1: made two series of it, seasons of it, I guess
Speaker 1: you'd call it back in sixteen, and they were great.
Speaker 1: Each episode I'd go to a castle and tell some
Speaker 1: stories and wander around and like look like quite sort
Speaker 1: of earnest at times and other times jocular and like
Speaker 1: wave my hands in the TV presented style, and do
Speaker 1: you know what. It was like super fun to make,
Speaker 1: and they've lived on Netflix for some years now and
Speaker 1: I believe like forty territories so in really improbable places,
Speaker 1: I'm like the castle guy. We're going to be going
Speaker 1: into depth talking about the Middle Ages and Nate of
Speaker 1: the Crusade. But tell us a bit about your background.
Speaker 1: How did you become a historian? Well, I had a
Speaker 1: really good history teacher in school. And that sounds kind
Speaker 1: of banal, I guess, but it tends to be make
Speaker 1: or break. I think history is a subject where charismatic
Speaker 1: teachers can get someone interested in history for life, and
Speaker 1: the opposite is also true. For no reason other than
Speaker 1: I liked my history teacher and did okay in history
Speaker 1: at school. I went to study history at Cambridge and
Speaker 1: then specialized in the Middle Ages there. And I would
Speaker 1: love to say that I had had this like burning
Speaker 1: desire to be a medievalist, but really the day I
Speaker 1: had to fill in my form detailing this isn't June.
Speaker 1: That's how old I am. I bet you weren't born then,
Speaker 1: just barely, just barely, okay, so well you were saying
Speaker 1: sort of goo goo gaga. I was filling in a
Speaker 1: form that said what I wanted to study when I
Speaker 1: went to Cambridge was Cambridge give you enormous freedom to
Speaker 1: study what you want within the history history tribos, which
Speaker 1: is great. And I didn't take it very seriously, which
Speaker 1: is sort of the story of my life. On the
Speaker 1: way and I asked my teacher, Hey, what should I study?
Speaker 1: And you want to add medieval and yeah, that will do.
Speaker 1: So I take the box. And then some months later
Speaker 1: October I went to university and I was presented with
Speaker 1: like a bunch of medieval history to study. But I
Speaker 1: studied under Helen Caster, who is one of the greatest
Speaker 1: She's the o g really, and so she taught me
Speaker 1: pretty much everything I know about the Middle Ages, and
Speaker 1: she was such as again, you know, the story is
Speaker 1: of phenomenal teachers. I was taught by her. I was
Speaker 1: talked to right by David Starkey, Juday historian, and those
Speaker 1: two people were highly influential. Helen on getting me hooked
Speaker 1: on the Middle Ages and David on just teaching me
Speaker 1: how to write the joy of narrative writing and of
Speaker 1: argumentative essay writing and a public performance. So that that
Speaker 1: was kind of my background. And then I did a
Speaker 1: lot of journalism, and I read a newspaper column after
Speaker 1: university for ten years, and I suppose that journalistic style
Speaker 1: fed somewhat into the narrative history writing style I've developed.
Speaker 1: And once I started writing books, I started getting TV
Speaker 1: work as well. And here I am, you're looking at it,
Speaker 1: listening to it. There is when you're starting a new book,
Speaker 1: now that you're eleven or twelve in, as you said,
Speaker 1: what's your process like when you have an idea and
Speaker 1: then what's your research process? Like? How long does it
Speaker 1: take you? I guess I've got like a pool of
Speaker 1: ideas at any one time that I know one of
Speaker 1: them is going to develop, And I'm usually relatively certain
Speaker 1: about what I'm gonna be doing for the next two
Speaker 1: or three books. Well that's the way it is now anyway.
Speaker 1: The very first the sort of primordial pool of idea
Speaker 1: forming is just like thoughts kind of ambiently buzzing around
Speaker 1: my head as I go about my day to day business,
Speaker 1: usually while I'm working on something else, and then the
Speaker 1: time will come when I've actually got to start writing
Speaker 1: a book. I tend to write a book a year,
Speaker 1: not a big book every year, but I tend to
Speaker 1: have a big book one year and then a different
Speaker 1: project the next year, and I alternate like that. So
Speaker 1: I'm extremely architectural as a writer. So the first phase
Speaker 1: of any book work that I do involves no sitting
Speaker 1: at my laptop typing at all, not really very much reading,
Speaker 1: just a lot of thinking around the subject and trying
Speaker 1: to build a framework of how I would envisage your book.
Speaker 1: So Powers and Thrones, which is my most recent nonfiction book,
Speaker 1: while the subject matter was a history of the Middle
Speaker 1: Ages and so in all I really had by way
Speaker 1: of a brief from my publisher was we start with
Speaker 1: a sack of rown four ten and go to the
Speaker 1: sack of room seven, and then it's like fill your boots. So, okay,
Speaker 1: I've got two bookends for that's I think it, Well,
Speaker 1: how do we create this thematically? Then I approached that idea.
Speaker 1: I thought, what's what's important in the history of the
Speaker 1: Middle Ages that will talk to a twenty one century audience,
Speaker 1: because of course these history is the business of communicating
Speaker 1: across the years. So I came up with some a
Speaker 1: list of five themes I thought were Germaine, both to
Speaker 1: the subject matter around to the audience, And then I
Speaker 1: started like breaking it down. I have weird and it's
Speaker 1: fairly arbitrary numerical obsessions. So with Powers and Thrones, I
Speaker 1: was absolutely certain it had to be sixteen chapters, four
Speaker 1: parts of four. I mean, there's a real reason why.
Speaker 1: I just decided. At some point when I was doing Creasing, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it probably makes you could okay, you could
Speaker 1: rationalize it, you could post rationalize it, but I can't
Speaker 1: tell you that that's how it feels. At the time
Speaker 1: when I was doing Crusaders, I was like, this book
Speaker 1: is twenty seven chapters, three lots of nine. I don't
Speaker 1: know why. I just felt the story felt like you
Speaker 1: get a feel for it after a while. You just
Speaker 1: feel you know what the shape of the story is.
Speaker 1: You can chuck all of that out the window. When
Speaker 1: it comes to fiction, I've just written, as you kindly
Speaker 1: pointed out, a novel, and that that was a completely
Speaker 1: different matter. You're much more adapted that, so I should
Speaker 1: ask you the questions. Really, No, absolutely not. I feel
Speaker 1: like I'm already learning. I have no idea how many
Speaker 1: chapters my nextbook is going to be. I'm so behind.
Speaker 1: Are you gonna be writing fictional nonfiction both? I have
Speaker 1: both in the can right now. I have no idea
Speaker 1: how many chapters either, as this is maybe why I'm struggling. Well,
Speaker 1: do you know what? A few years ago I had
Speaker 1: dinner with George R. R. Martin right, who created a
Speaker 1: Game of Thrones, and George and I while I interviewed
Speaker 1: him in front of a big audience, and then we
Speaker 1: had dinner afterwards, and George said something that really stuck
Speaker 1: in my mind. He said, there's two types of writer.
Speaker 1: He said, You've got architects and gardeners. And you said,
Speaker 1: the architect plans that everything very meticulously and then starts
Speaker 1: to build. And I thought, that's the type of writer, right,
Speaker 1: And it's true nonfiction. That is the type of writer
Speaker 1: I am. And he said, the gardener just plants seed
Speaker 1: and lets it grow. Now he spoke much more favorably
Speaker 1: about the gardener. So that's the type of writer he is.
Speaker 1: And I thought I could never be that writer. Okay,
Speaker 1: So when I sat down to at Essex Dogs, which
Speaker 1: is the novel later this year, I was like, well,
Speaker 1: here comes an architect writing and writing a novel. I
Speaker 1: found a plan the hell out of this. And I
Speaker 1: sat and I planned, and I tried to like have
Speaker 1: it all in its shapes and forms for us started
Speaker 1: and I sat there and for the first time in
Speaker 1: my life, I looked at a blank page and I thought,
Speaker 1: I don't know what to do with this. And I
Speaker 1: realized that the thing to do, and this is everyone's
Speaker 1: process is completely different. So just may resonate with you.
Speaker 1: We may resonate with your listeners. It may not. You
Speaker 1: may think what a load of nonsense. But my process
Speaker 1: now is to do some yoga and then to just
Speaker 1: sort of lie about with my feet on that sofa
Speaker 1: that like in the back of my office, to just
Speaker 1: sort of lie there. I want. Sorry. There was like
Speaker 1: this jay Z trailer for one of his albums once
Speaker 1: it was from Mgmacarter, Holy Grail. There's a bit of
Speaker 1: jay Z in the studio. Okay, yeah, there's There's always
Speaker 1: gonna be medieval and he's he talks a little bit
Speaker 1: in that video to Rick Rubin, the legendary rock and
Speaker 1: sometime hip hop producer, and Rick Rubin in that video
Speaker 1: is the comfious looking man I've ever seen. He's just
Speaker 1: lying stroking his big long beard on a sofa while
Speaker 1: all the other producers were kind of uptightens in there.
Speaker 1: Rick Rubens just like back like this, and so I
Speaker 1: gotta I call it the Rick Rubin pose. I've got
Speaker 1: to get into before him in any position to write fiction,
Speaker 1: and wants them in the Rubin pose, and you're like
Speaker 1: almost half asleep, like in communion with your dream state.
Speaker 1: Then and only then am I ready to write It
Speaker 1: looks it's completely different. I like to do a lot
Speaker 1: of brainstorming in bed horizontal before I go to sleep,
Speaker 1: where I'll like turn off the light and it'll be
Speaker 1: like ten o'clock and my fiancee will think I'm like
Speaker 1: going to bed. He'll be like, okay, well you're asleep,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I'm not asleep, I'm working. It's all
Speaker 1: part of the process. Sometimes you just need to let
Speaker 1: the ideas come. You've got to be in that state
Speaker 1: and it's about you know, sound this is gonna sound
Speaker 1: super woo. But I really think there's a different mental frequency,
Speaker 1: maybe even a different party of brain at play writing
Speaker 1: fiction and nonfiction, which is weird because the trick I've
Speaker 1: always tried to pull in nonfiction is to make it
Speaker 1: feel like fiction. But that said, a lot of what
Speaker 1: I've drawn on in writing nonfiction does not come from novels.
Speaker 1: That comes from screenwriting. Its school screenwriting technique that sits
Speaker 1: under my history books, so that that's very structural. I'm
Speaker 1: interested in George R. Martin, particularly because he seems very
Speaker 1: inspired by history. Do you know for a fact if
Speaker 1: he's read Or of the Roses. I don't think he had.
Speaker 1: So I did a thing for the season five DVD
Speaker 1: of Thrones which was like the real history. It's like,
Speaker 1: it's a pretty good documentary. Actually, there's me and Kelly
Speaker 1: to Resent, a couple other historians and George and the
Speaker 1: HBO people. When I went to New York to shoot
Speaker 1: that were like, George is just your greatest fan. Dan
Speaker 1: in Santa Fe He's got your books on his desk,
Speaker 1: and I really believe that at the time, and then
Speaker 1: in retrospect I think they were just flattering me. Well, look,
Speaker 1: he was writing about Game of Thrones when I wasn't
Speaker 1: far off Google Baby, so I was a long way
Speaker 1: from having written Wards of the Roses at that point.
Speaker 1: Well back to the Middle Ages, I admit it's a period.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's such an intimidating period, one that I
Speaker 1: never really felt like I've gotten a handle on. To
Speaker 1: listeners who maybe don't know what actually constitutes the Middle Ages,
Speaker 1: and why is it called the Dark Ages, I would argue,
Speaker 1: and I think you would argue incorrectly. Maybe the best
Speaker 1: place to go to answer that is sixteenth century, which
Speaker 1: is the end of Middle Ages, and that's sort of
Speaker 1: where we first start hearing the term the Middle Age,
Speaker 1: if not the Middle Ages. So in fifteen sixty three,
Speaker 1: I think maybe four, John Fox, the great Protestants writer,
Speaker 1: write his Book of Martyrs, Acts and Monuments. It's it's
Speaker 1: most problem more propertyle It's called Fox's Book of Martists,
Speaker 1: and it's a it's a it's an ecclesiastical history, basically
Speaker 1: leaning into the subject of martyrdom, and particularly of the
Speaker 1: Protestant Martyrst. Fox, in the course of vacts of Monuments,
Speaker 1: tries to like salami slice up history, and he says,
Speaker 1: it's not salami sce beIN. It's really big chunks. He says,
Speaker 1: there's three ages in history. He says, there's the primitive age,
Speaker 1: by which he means if really pagan Rome and everything
Speaker 1: proceeding and in Christian Nicolesia scal terms, that's sort of
Speaker 1: poor old persecuted Christians be hiding from Romans and catacombs.
Speaker 1: And Fox says, and there's our present age, you know,
Speaker 1: just as we think of our sols now as being
Speaker 1: differentiated by being alive or you know, we are quite
Speaker 1: quite modern. So Fox thought about his own time in
Speaker 1: the fifteen sixties and he said that, well, between these
Speaker 1: two bits, that's the terribly enlightened post Reformation sixteenth century
Speaker 1: and the pagan classical world. There's like the Middle Age,
Speaker 1: he says, the Middle Age, and it's like it's just
Speaker 1: this sort of lump in the middle. Now. Of course,
Speaker 1: if we define that as I have slightly more tightly
Speaker 1: as being saccarone four ten Sacar seven, we're still talking
Speaker 1: about eleven hundred some years. That's a big chunk of
Speaker 1: recorded human history. And why is it then to the
Speaker 1: Dark Ages? Usually it's the early Middle Ages that defines
Speaker 1: the Dark Ages, so everything up to about from the
Speaker 1: five hundred through nine hundred, with some very very slight
Speaker 1: justification in that the written record tends to be much much,
Speaker 1: much much patchier in Western Europe, certainly at that time.
Speaker 1: There is a sense, if you read the history again
Speaker 1: of Western Europe, that there's a retreat in the Christian
Speaker 1: world from the scientific and learning of the ancient world,
Speaker 1: and that seems, you know, anti progressive to many people.
Speaker 1: And there's just a sort of sense that it's already
Speaker 1: difficult and far away, and no one wants to have
Speaker 1: very much to do it. It's gross, I mean, why
Speaker 1: would you how would you like get dirty in the
Speaker 1: Middle Ages, which can be pretty intimidating and weird when
Speaker 1: far pretty of bits of history to look at, you know,
Speaker 1: the sort of glories of Republican Rome or the great
Speaker 1: scientific advances brackets minus dreadful imperialism of the nineteenth century.
Speaker 1: You know, these things are probably more attractive to most
Speaker 1: sane people. They were terribly unattractive to me as subjects
Speaker 1: to study when I was growing up. I don't really
Speaker 1: know why that's mad. That's mad. Well, let's flip it around.
Speaker 1: Say what's attractive about the Middle Ages? The Middle Ages
Speaker 1: is inherently and although this is I'm just saying this
Speaker 1: to be look at it through the prism of the
Speaker 1: Victorian Age, which created this reputation. It is sort of
Speaker 1: inherently romantic. I mean, I realized all the problems with
Speaker 1: statements are not stupid. But be that as it may.
Speaker 1: We do happen to live after the nineteenth century, and
Speaker 1: we are still stuck with many of the preconceptions of
Speaker 1: the nineteenth century. In our general worldview, the Middle Ages
Speaker 1: does seem romantic, or it seems ramantic to a child
Speaker 1: who wants to study things. It's got nights, and it's
Speaker 1: got princesses, and he's sort castles, and it's got daring
Speaker 1: do and everyone goes about a horse. Tell me that's
Speaker 1: not a world that it seems like on the surface
Speaker 1: of things attractive to you. Perfect segue, because I would
Speaker 1: love to talk to you about the historical basis of
Speaker 1: our Thurian legend. I feel like I was one of
Speaker 1: those children who grew up in you know, Chicago, reading
Speaker 1: our Thurian legend and thinking like, oh, this is this
Speaker 1: is magical, this is purely fictitious. These are fairy tales.
Speaker 1: And of course you get older and you discovered that
Speaker 1: there's been, you know, historical figures who have been proposed
Speaker 1: as the real king Arthur probably didn't look like we
Speaker 1: imagine in story books. Yeah, I think there are certain
Speaker 1: figures from the Middle Ages. Arthur is one of them,
Speaker 1: Robin Hood is another. They're kind of perfect bridges were
Speaker 1: getting people into the Middle Age because there's there's a
Speaker 1: huge volume of fiction about them, which has in itself
Speaker 1: a nearly a thousand year history in the case of
Speaker 1: Arthur at any rate, and there is the tantalizing prospect
Speaker 1: that some of this might actually be true. Now I
Speaker 1: have read so you don't have to the many, many
Speaker 1: books which go looking for a real historical basis for
Speaker 1: King Arthur, for Merlin, for at Lancelot, for person, for
Speaker 1: whatever whatever, the Camelot. And you know, it doesn't take
Speaker 1: very long immersed in that early medieval literature, earnest as
Speaker 1: it is to say, well, it's very clear what's going on.
Speaker 1: There is nobody in history who meaningfully resembles the Arthur
Speaker 1: we know from a fiction. So really, what are we
Speaker 1: looking for? Well, are we looking for a person whose
Speaker 1: example was the original basis for the very first Arthurian stories?
Speaker 1: And I've concluded I think over the years even that
Speaker 1: is really a sort of misapprehension of the problem. These
Speaker 1: stories were not created by and large in the twelfth century,
Speaker 1: from you know, creating dat onwards it's like saying, well, no, wait,
Speaker 1: who was the real iron Man? Who was this real
Speaker 1: spider man you speak of? Like, well, you know, you
Speaker 1: haven't really understood that what's going on here? The primary
Speaker 1: purpose of storytelling was not to elaborate on the real
Speaker 1: deeds of a known historical figure. That was just to
Speaker 1: kind of tell a story. It gets a kind of
Speaker 1: asked backwards to go looking for the real Arthur. However,
Speaker 1: like I said that, the initial prospect that there might
Speaker 1: be a real, real King Arthur was this a real
Speaker 1: person is sexy enough to get people into the Middle Ages.
Speaker 1: The same for Robin. It the same for Robin. I
Speaker 1: suppose The question is when did the fictional accounts begin.
Speaker 1: That's that's a much more interesting and better question, because
Speaker 1: the fiction that the real kind of the cradle of
Speaker 1: our thuryana if you like twelve early twelfth cent true
Speaker 1: creating to Perceval of wolf Bach Perceval, is it flourishing
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Monmouth to an extent in the history of the
Speaker 1: Kings of Britain. I have to already interrupt and say,
Speaker 1: I'm already furious and how well you pronounced those French names,
Speaker 1: because as any listener to this podcast knows, it's absolutely
Speaker 1: impossible to me, and here you come in just effortlessly
Speaker 1: dropping all of those French names, teaching listeners that it
Speaker 1: is possible. Well, I've been I have been in Morocco,
Speaker 1: in France for the last two weeks. I mean, my friends,
Speaker 1: is pretty horrible. Like if if you'd see me in
Speaker 1: France struggling my I to negotiate buying an umbrella in
Speaker 1: a shop in m Bois the other day, and it
Speaker 1: was a very torturous conversation. I went through trying to
Speaker 1: buy this umbrella and a pair of nail clippers, may
Speaker 1: I add, and there was a problem with the card machine,
Speaker 1: and I got to like, I got so far with
Speaker 1: this conversation, like hacking my way in French, and then
Speaker 1: just like I was just hit my limit, and I
Speaker 1: was like, excuse me, belivionly, and she went, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm American. And I was like dumbfound and I thought,
Speaker 1: was my friend really so good that I tricked? You know,
Speaker 1: you were just being weirdly polite for an American. And anyway,
Speaker 1: put all that aside, Let's go back to the early
Speaker 1: twelfth century. This is the cradle of Artherian and what's
Speaker 1: the context for all of these stories Suddenly like flourishing
Speaker 1: and becoming you know, used the analogy already, but like
Speaker 1: the Marvel movies of the day, at this end, this
Speaker 1: this sort of open world where stories can be retold
Speaker 1: and characters and pitched up in each other stories and
Speaker 1: all that. It's it's the high point of sort of
Speaker 1: nightly chivalry in a way, the concept of the night,
Speaker 1: that is, the heavy cavalry, the warrior on mounted on horseback,
Speaker 1: armed with sword and lance, that had sort of come
Speaker 1: into European military and political society from the early tenth century.
Speaker 1: By the mid eleventh century, if we think, you know,
Speaker 1: we're talking about ten sixty six Norman invasion of England,
Speaker 1: the even then, nights are still it's still a work
Speaker 1: in progress if you can, if you can think of
Speaker 1: the bear tapestry, the horse mounted warriors, they're still have
Speaker 1: spears in their hands rather than couch lances, which is
Speaker 1: the sort of you know, the essence of nightly combat.
Speaker 1: So it takes a long time for firstly, what is
Speaker 1: the essence of a night on horseback as as a
Speaker 1: military entity, that take that takes a while to develop
Speaker 1: technologically and strategically. What takes even longer to develop is
Speaker 1: this kind of cast mentality and common social code among
Speaker 1: those warriors, which we call knighthood, a set of principles
Speaker 1: and beliefs and code of conduct and worldviews and if
Speaker 1: even if we want to be pretentious and memes, that
Speaker 1: takes a little bit longer to develop. But by the
Speaker 1: early twelfth century, you know, the aftermath of the First
Speaker 1: Crusade really even this sort of you know, the Second
Speaker 1: Crusades coming around. The way knights are in business and
Speaker 1: knighthood has really become bound into noble culture and our
Speaker 1: aristocratic culture in Western Europe. And part of the consequence
Speaker 1: of a cast mentality, or part of what reliable historical
Speaker 1: features of the cast mentality or a group in a
Speaker 1: group culture of that sort is that you start to
Speaker 1: have origin stories. You start to have fables of knighthood
Speaker 1: and these imaginary deeds and nights from a past that's
Speaker 1: just over the horizon. You know, we can't quite grasp
Speaker 1: who these people really were, but we know they lived
Speaker 1: in a great time when the land was populated by
Speaker 1: giants and scary beasts, and they did heroic deeds, and
Speaker 1: we the nights and today should tri and emulate them.
Speaker 1: So that's what's going on in the early twelfth century.
Speaker 1: Knighthood's on a roll, and along with it come these
Speaker 1: these wonderful stories. Well, and and once that's established, once
Speaker 1: nighthood has its own literature, really interesting things start to happen.
Speaker 1: So people grow up listening to primarily listening to these,
Speaker 1: you know, these stories of Arthur and the Knights, the
Speaker 1: round table and chivalry. A good example be William Marshall,
Speaker 1: who you probably talked about before. We can talk about
Speaker 1: in some more detail if you want. Men like this
Speaker 1: grow up hearing these stories, then start to try to
Speaker 1: absorb these ideas within the ar theory and legends into
Speaker 1: their own behavior, and almost the tropes of fiction start
Speaker 1: to inform the realities of warfare and then William Marshall's case,
Speaker 1: the deeds of these real people are then written up.
Speaker 1: So you have this sort of popular eat itself thing
Speaker 1: going on where not to just becomes such a self
Speaker 1: referential phenomenon. That's that's full of stories being told of
Speaker 1: generation to generation and people growing up feeling that they
Speaker 1: are both existing in the real world and existing in
Speaker 1: this kind of old turnate fantasy reality that goes along
Speaker 1: with the profession Who is William Marshall? What is the
Speaker 1: cliff notes version of that story? So William Marshall, by
Speaker 1: his own estimation or certainly the estimation of his sons
Speaker 1: and friends who commissioned his biography The History of William
Speaker 1: Marshall in the early thirteenth century of nineteen as a
Speaker 1: massively long old French verse account of the Marshal life
Speaker 1: idealized somewhat. But Marshall was a man of the late
Speaker 1: twelfth and early thirteenth century who was one of the
Speaker 1: younger sons of a night called John Marshall, who was
Speaker 1: fighting in the eleven thirties in the anarchy between Stephen
Speaker 1: and Matilda, the English Civil war for the throne between
Speaker 1: rival descendants of King Henry the first both grandchildren. William
Speaker 1: the Conqueror and Marshall was five years old during that war,
Speaker 1: and his first encounter with warfare, according to this story
Speaker 1: of William Marshall, was his father was holding a castle
Speaker 1: against King Stephen, one of the belligerents in the anarchy
Speaker 1: in that civil war. And King Stephen had hold of
Speaker 1: young William because he was being held as a sort
Speaker 1: of hostage for honorable behavior. And Steven's men put young
Speaker 1: William in the bucket of a trebor share, you know,
Speaker 1: one of those giant siege catapults, and said, oh right, John,
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna hurd your kid at this castle
Speaker 1: wall and his prospects of not being you know, ketch
Speaker 1: up after we finished our slight um paraphrase, and John
Speaker 1: Marshall said, do what you please. I've got loads of kids.
Speaker 1: May This is a classic story we see from tale telling.
Speaker 1: But what does young William Marshall do. Well, he's so
Speaker 1: naive and kind of charming. He charms King Stephen and
Speaker 1: makes him laugh, which is dearly a key skill in life,
Speaker 1: which I know you possess. So he charms King Stephen
Speaker 1: to such an extent that Stephen goes Oh no, we can't.
Speaker 1: We can't reduce this poor childhood catch up. Let's let
Speaker 1: him hang around with me for a bit. And that's
Speaker 1: the start of young William Marshall's career in royal service,
Speaker 1: and he goes on to be raised as a knight
Speaker 1: at the family of one of the Marshall of the
Speaker 1: friends of one of the Marshall family in France. He
Speaker 1: then enters the service of the Plantation as the early Plantations,
Speaker 1: so at various times in his career he writes in
Speaker 1: tournaments with Henry the Young King, that's the eldest son
Speaker 1: and peustive successor of Henry the Second, the first Plantation
Speaker 1: the King. He serves Henry the Young King, he serves
Speaker 1: Henry the Second, he serves Eleanor of Aquitaine. He serves
Speaker 1: Richard the Lionheart, he serves King John, and eventually Sir
Speaker 1: John's son, Henry the Third. He is the man who's
Speaker 1: sort of responsible for saving the Plantagenet crown so that
Speaker 1: Henry the Third can wear it when King John's at
Speaker 1: war with both the French and his own parents. So
Speaker 1: Marshall's career is a really really good way to look
Speaker 1: at the first two to three generations of the Plantagenets,
Speaker 1: and the history of William Marshall is one of our
Speaker 1: most entertaining and important sources for that time. You know,
Speaker 1: we're talking here temporarily between the eleven fifties and the
Speaker 1: twelve tens. Marshall's biography is brilliant because he's such a
Speaker 1: charismatic and entertaining character. You know, his central moral precept
Speaker 1: is loyalty, and loyalty is what his entire story over
Speaker 1: these tens of thousands of old French verses supposed to
Speaker 1: supposed to make us meditate upon. He gets in all
Speaker 1: sorts of entertaining scrapes. He's you know, he is a
Speaker 1: very very talented knight, you know, and and typical of
Speaker 1: Nights in many ways. As a young man, as I said,
Speaker 1: he's right on the tournament circuit, and you know, being
Speaker 1: on a tournament team and being a well known tournament
Speaker 1: it was a very good way to make money, connections
Speaker 1: and prestige in the world in which those values were
Speaker 1: highly regarded by polities in general. So Marshall's very tuned
Speaker 1: to tournament. He's just he's got the ability to get
Speaker 1: on with people, and he's he has a great military
Speaker 1: skill set at a time when the business of politics
Speaker 1: is largely goes on crusade, on Third Crusade, or that
Speaker 1: that weirdly is not really mentioned, actually doesn't go in
Speaker 1: the Third Crusade. I'm sorry. He goes to the Holy
Speaker 1: Land around the time of the Third Crusade, probably not
Speaker 1: on the Third Crusade, but that's that's a weird little
Speaker 1: sort of gap in his history. And anyway, you know,
Speaker 1: so look, we get to see all the plantagants through
Speaker 1: Marshall's eyes, and then his biography has already said is
Speaker 1: written up in It's not our theory arena, but it's
Speaker 1: a sort of new version of our theory ana. It's
Speaker 1: like saying, hey, here's another epic, sort of romantic poem
Speaker 1: about the deeds of the night. Only guess what this
Speaker 1: one is absolutely true. I mean, it's fantastic read. You know,
Speaker 1: when you mentioned that the jousting sort of circuit of
Speaker 1: that time in your book, you sort of trace the
Speaker 1: history of jousting up until the festival joustings of like
Speaker 1: you know, King Henry the Eighth, which I think modern
Speaker 1: people most often associated like that's what jousting is. It's
Speaker 1: sort of like just for fun. It's sort of celebratory.
Speaker 1: What were those early jousting circuits, like, you know a
Speaker 1: few hundred years before that. So when we say jousting,
Speaker 1: that's immediately going to bring to mind your listeners. I'm
Speaker 1: sure Heath Ledger in a Night's Tale, right, like you know,
Speaker 1: we will rock you. And they're in the lists and
Speaker 1: they sort of they ride at each other and then
Speaker 1: bash the lances into shields and someone falls off or doesn't. Okay, century,
Speaker 1: absolutely that's tournaments. It's fighting in front of an audience.
Speaker 1: It's a bit like m m A or boxing today.
Speaker 1: It's just organized violence and quite a contained environment with
Speaker 1: some sense of an ethical code and some Unless you're
Speaker 1: Henry the Second of France, right, yes, well all bets
Speaker 1: are off at that point. I mean all bets are
Speaker 1: off in France in general. Go way back to where
Speaker 1: we're talking about William and Marshall in the twelfth century.
Speaker 1: Tournaments look absolutely nothing like that, and quite many times,
Speaker 1: at many times and in many places they're actually a
Speaker 1: legalist that are so dangerous. The tournament at that point
Speaker 1: is conducted over a very large open space which could
Speaker 1: stretch dozens of miles in either direction. Maybe even scores
Speaker 1: of miles in another direction. Teams turn up and the
Speaker 1: name of the game is, over the course of several days,
Speaker 1: to ride one another down, not kill one another, you know,
Speaker 1: that's that was very bad form. But to fight at
Speaker 1: about eight percent capacity and capture one another. And once
Speaker 1: once you've captured somebody, then they would have to buy
Speaker 1: back from you their liberty, their horses, and their armor,
Speaker 1: which were the three things which were the most important
Speaker 1: to a night. And they could be quite violent, quite rough.
Speaker 1: They obviously attracted large crowds of hangers on, ranging from
Speaker 1: well to do support as well wishes and spectators through
Speaker 1: to you know, the hangers on that were always accompanied
Speaker 1: any festivities or festivals sort of dealers and spieves and
Speaker 1: drunkards and thieves and the usual crowd the people you
Speaker 1: find me hanging out with. If I guess, what's the
Speaker 1: sport itself? Like, I guess you've got to be quite
Speaker 1: rich to take part in it. So it's a little
Speaker 1: bit like Formula one motor racing, but with the casual
Speaker 1: violence of mixed martial arts. Yes, of rugby or American football.
Speaker 1: You know you need horsemanships. It's a bit like polo
Speaker 1: I suppose that the horsemanship plus wealth makes a little
Speaker 1: bit like the polo circuit, but with the with the
Speaker 1: violence and danger of Formula one and rugby, it must
Speaker 1: have been great fun. I think, enormous fun. And if
Speaker 1: you've got involved in this, you know, if you can
Speaker 1: get a start, if you get on a team and
Speaker 1: you're any good, you could really make quite a lot
Speaker 1: of money because you could capture people, you own money
Speaker 1: ransoming the gear back, or you could lose your shirt
Speaker 1: as well. This happens to William Marshall. You know, he's
Speaker 1: early on in his tournament career, gets a bit cocky,
Speaker 1: and then he's captured and he loses pretty much everything.
Speaker 1: And at that point you're relying on your team sponsor
Speaker 1: or captain. You know, it's element of Aquitaine or Henry
Speaker 1: the Young King to bail you out or you're in
Speaker 1: bother and Marshall at various times ends up a prisoner
Speaker 1: for quite a while. There's a great story in his
Speaker 1: biography where he's a prisoner and he's been injured in
Speaker 1: one of these tournaments. You think he's had I think
Speaker 1: he's had a lanced through his leg and he's got
Speaker 1: a very painful wound in his leg and it's sort
Speaker 1: of bandages stuffed in it and it's dressed. He's got
Speaker 1: to be really careful because it's a serious round and
Speaker 1: he's being sort of taken around servery borying by whoever's
Speaker 1: captured him. I can't remember it. And one night the
Speaker 1: people have captured him having this competition of who can
Speaker 1: throw this giant stone, the furthest it's very good, it's
Speaker 1: good boys stuff. There was an HBO they had to
Speaker 1: entertain themselves somehow exactly. You know, if we get Netflix
Speaker 1: and Chill has chuck a massive stone and Chill or not,
Speaker 1: and so they're chucking a massive stone about and Marshall
Speaker 1: he can't like he's he just can't sit there and watch.
Speaker 1: It's like, come on, guys, give me a go. But
Speaker 1: I don't think you want to go. I don't think
Speaker 1: you want to play at this. Give me a passed
Speaker 1: me to stone, really passed me to stone. So he
Speaker 1: gets the stone, of course, because he has to win.
Speaker 1: Just laughs. He throws it so hard that all the
Speaker 1: stitches and the badges bast out of his leg and
Speaker 1: he's worse off afterwards. In the other one's before but
Speaker 1: that's that's told us a relatively comical story in the
Speaker 1: history of William Marshall, which is like his desire, his
Speaker 1: nightly prowess occasionally got the better of him. Pride. Pride
Speaker 1: comes before a burst leg as they say, Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what they say. One other thing I'm interested in speaking
Speaker 1: to you about, obviously because you're the expert on English
Speaker 1: and British castles, the idea of the evil castle, When
Speaker 1: does that really come about? I think we're picturing like,
Speaker 1: you know, cartoon castle of like the stone turrets and
Speaker 1: archers through the slits. I think I know what you're
Speaker 1: talking about, you know, like think about the cartoon castle,
Speaker 1: which surely even if King Arth there was you know,
Speaker 1: quote unquote real that wouldn't have existed in the fifth century.
Speaker 1: But when do we get the classic stone castle. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: the story of the castles, story of of several important
Speaker 1: phases of evolution. So beginning really around the turn of
Speaker 1: the first millennium tenth century, I suppose you start to see,
Speaker 1: particularly with the Normans, a lot of the drivers of
Speaker 1: a lot of medieval history that is still familiar to
Speaker 1: us today often tend to be the Norman's. This group
Speaker 1: of sort of Viking descended Francified roughnecks from Normandy, which
Speaker 1: is a little bit to the west of Paris center
Speaker 1: on Room in modern France. The Normans are great castle builders,
Speaker 1: and during the tenth eleventh century you start to see
Speaker 1: it a typical Norman castle, which would be a well
Speaker 1: called a motte and bailey castle. So you're going to
Speaker 1: have a keep, which is a sort of stronghold, usually
Speaker 1: built on a sort of artificial or natural hill, and
Speaker 1: then round it an enclosure with other wooden palisades or
Speaker 1: you know, even stone walls in some instances, and within
Speaker 1: that's the bailey. So that's that's the sort of basic
Speaker 1: form of a castle, and it serves pretty well. For example,
Speaker 1: during the Norman invasion, after the Norman invasion of England
Speaker 1: ten sixty six, William the conqueror comes over and builds
Speaker 1: castles absolutely everywhere, and of this sort. You know, you
Speaker 1: throw them up pretty quick. What are they fought? Well,
Speaker 1: they're really garrison's. This is where Norman knights are stationed
Speaker 1: and they have a sort of a radial circle of
Speaker 1: a day's ride. That castle can then control the land
Speaker 1: around it because you can send knights out from it
Speaker 1: to wherever you choose. But the heyday of the castle
Speaker 1: of the sort that you're talking about is somewhat later.
Speaker 1: So in British terms, probably the greatest castle builder is
Speaker 1: Edward the first, Edward Longshanks in the Hammer of the Scots.
Speaker 1: So Edwards is king at the turn of the twelve
Speaker 1: into the thirteenth century. He is a crusader, his son
Speaker 1: of the not enormously successful Henry the third and therefore
Speaker 1: a grandson of bad King John, very very talented military
Speaker 1: general commander, and carries out in the British Isles a
Speaker 1: sort of an Arthurian inspired attempt to conquer Wales and
Speaker 1: Scotland and add them formally and permanently to the Kingdom
Speaker 1: of England. Prior to end of the First Reign, the
Speaker 1: main focus of sort of territorial expansion or a trenchment
Speaker 1: or defense from England had been France had been to
Speaker 1: the so holding on to Gascony, but also trying to
Speaker 1: get back the bits that we lost by King John
Speaker 1: Njou main terrain normally whatever whatever, all that's sort of
Speaker 1: finished fired with the Austrain. England still has Gascony, which
Speaker 1: is in southwest around who centered around the city of Bordeaux.
Speaker 1: But really the job of conquering anymore of France by
Speaker 1: that stage is just too expensive and too difficult. So
Speaker 1: Edwards starts to i mean somewhat inspired by the legends
Speaker 1: of Arthur, who'd be the king of the Britons and
Speaker 1: not the English, starts to look to conquer into Wales,
Speaker 1: in Scotland and in Wales, launch this enormous series of campaigns,
Speaker 1: particularly to Northern Wales, Snowdonia, which is the very mountainous
Speaker 1: bit of of North rest world, typically the heartlands of
Speaker 1: the native Welsh kings, extremely inhospitable to reign, very difficult
Speaker 1: to conquer, but Edward decides conquers twelve seventies, twelve eighties,
Speaker 1: twelve nineties. Edwards sends in enormous armies with enormous cause
Speaker 1: of engineers to cut these super highways into northern Wales,
Speaker 1: conquer the land, to get rid of the native princes
Speaker 1: and kings, and builds these vast, vast stone castles at
Speaker 1: unbelievable expense into the mountain sides of North Wales. One
Speaker 1: of the most famous one we featured on Secrets of
Speaker 1: British Castles is Carnavon, which is right up in the
Speaker 1: northwest tip of Wales, just across the Meni straight from
Speaker 1: Anglesea which is the big island of Norlands to the
Speaker 1: Northwest Worlds, and Carnarvon Castle is still an incredible, incredible
Speaker 1: place to visit. Lots of these places were never quite finished,
Speaker 1: but they were all were almost all the architectural brain
Speaker 1: child or an engineering brainchild of a castle builder called
Speaker 1: Master James of St George, who was just, I mean
Speaker 1: the greatest castle builder of his day. And they look
Speaker 1: nothing like a Norman castle. They are these sort of
Speaker 1: often two sets of concentric walls. In the case of Carnarvon,
Speaker 1: these walls are built in alternating horizontal bands of stone,
Speaker 1: which is supposed to resemble the wall Constantinople. You've got
Speaker 1: palatial apartments. You've got these very very large inner whether
Speaker 1: they're not courtyards, I suppose they call them bailey's where
Speaker 1: hundreds of people could congregate. They often have small towns
Speaker 1: erected around them, you know, new towns built to host
Speaker 1: a population to supply the needs of garrison the castle.
Speaker 1: They're the fairy tale castles and they're built all over
Speaker 1: North Wales during the time of Edward the First, and
Speaker 1: the expenses truly, truly, truly phenomenal. They don't actually serve
Speaker 1: for a very long time as effective military outposts because
Speaker 1: the conquest of Wales is sort of but you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's almost completed underhead with the first. I mean,
Speaker 1: there are further conflicts in the fifteenth century Henry fourth
Speaker 1: Fester to find Wales, but but really the job is
Speaker 1: sort of done. And the castles I think quite quickly
Speaker 1: asked from having a primarily a military function to primarily
Speaker 1: an intimidatory function. They're sitting there as a sort of
Speaker 1: a deliberately painful reminder of the might of the English crown,
Speaker 1: and they are symbols of conquest. These days they will
Speaker 1: be torn down and thrown in the sea because they
Speaker 1: will be triggering and they would be very offensive. In fact,
Speaker 1: that that might well happen. So I'm sure somebody will
Speaker 1: come along and well else soon and so these are
Speaker 1: terrible symbols of colonialism, or we need to chuck them
Speaker 1: all in the sea. But in terms of intimidation, the
Speaker 1: Tower of London, I mean, maybe the most famous castle
Speaker 1: in England would have obviously served the same purpose when
Speaker 1: William the Conqueror comes in builds this massive castle in
Speaker 1: the middle of London. Yeah, that's right, I mean the
Speaker 1: White Tower. The original bit of the Tower of London
Speaker 1: very much was designed to overall Londoners. But again, well
Speaker 1: maybe it's a slightly different story with the Tower of
Speaker 1: London because it's soon there's not much need for a
Speaker 1: generation after William the Conquered. There's really not much need
Speaker 1: to have a castle in London to overall the Londoners.
Speaker 1: I mean that the relationship between London and the Crown
Speaker 1: is only occasionally one of a military antagonism in the
Speaker 1: rest of the English Middle Ages. The tar of London
Speaker 1: is a great example of a castle that that quickly
Speaker 1: passes to have a sort of more palatial administrative role.
Speaker 1: With the first of the Royal mint, they're making coins
Speaker 1: in the Tara, London becomes a prison, it becomes a menagerie.
Speaker 1: You know, this is where under Henry the Third, I
Speaker 1: think you have a polar bear that swims in the
Speaker 1: Thames every day that's kept in the Tower of London,
Speaker 1: has a little leash that goes out and catches its
Speaker 1: fish in the Thames, And there are at various times,
Speaker 1: elephants and lions. It's only under the first Duke of
Speaker 1: Wellington nineteenth century that that London zoo moves out of
Speaker 1: the Tower of London, so it forms it's a very
Speaker 1: it's a it's a very odd castle to Tara London.
Speaker 1: It's a wonderful one and rightly the most famous. But
Speaker 1: if you think about it's in its fifteen sixteenth century history,
Speaker 1: what's it most famous as being used for. It's a prison.
Speaker 1: It's where the printers in the tower go. It's where
Speaker 1: you've done an episode, and that it's where Anne Berlin
Speaker 1: is acuted. That becomes it's it's more important function. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think people probably associated with the Tutors more than
Speaker 1: William the Conqueror. Now, yeah, I think so. I think so.
Speaker 1: I mean, but all of the like all of these
Speaker 1: castles there are there are certain points in history where
Speaker 1: castles are very important for different reasons. If we look
Speaker 1: at the eleventh century, the Normal Conquest, ten sixties, through
Speaker 1: a couple of generations, Yes, castles are there for polonizing
Speaker 1: and subduing the English and their projection of Norman power
Speaker 1: from the other side of the English Channel into England itself.
Speaker 1: And then you have this period in the you're talking
Speaker 1: about in the thirteenth century were underhead with the first
Speaker 1: there's this kind of revival of castle building, mainly on
Speaker 1: the places that the English trying to conquer within Britain.
Speaker 1: And then in the Tudor era we start to see
Speaker 1: castles perform a different function again. You know, they are
Speaker 1: there their palaces, their administrative, their prisons. And then the
Speaker 1: sort of final great throw of castle use in England
Speaker 1: is in the Civil War in the seventeenth century, after
Speaker 1: which that's why many of the castles in England are
Speaker 1: in ruins, because they were slighted by Cromwell's side in
Speaker 1: the Civil War, so they couldn't be used as royal
Speaker 1: fortifications thereafter, and that's why so many castles in englanduties
Speaker 1: rather clamorous ruins in the same way that so many
Speaker 1: or what we can see if so many monasteries in
Speaker 1: England are these haunting Gothic ruins, thank because they were
Speaker 1: left that way deliberately after the Reformation under Henry the
Speaker 1: eight There are very few castles which don't just become
Speaker 1: sort of private, stately homes or just ruins after the
Speaker 1: seventeenth century. But there's one very interesting exception, which is
Speaker 1: Dover Castle on the south coast, and that still had
Speaker 1: a military function in the Second World War. It was
Speaker 1: where if you've seen the film dun Kirk with Mark
Speaker 1: Ryland's very nobly sort of chugging chugging across the channel
Speaker 1: in his little ship, that the command center for dun
Speaker 1: Kirk was Dover Castle. In fact, if you visit over
Speaker 1: Castle when you're in England, you can go down and
Speaker 1: then it has a military or a quasi military function
Speaker 1: after that, because there are nuclear bunkers underneath cliffs underneath
Speaker 1: Dover Castle which were intended and may god still be
Speaker 1: intended for use as regional command center for the southeast
Speaker 1: of England in the event of World War three, fought
Speaker 1: with nuclear weapons. It's pretty weird done that, but that
Speaker 1: that's a very unusual guy. It's kind of one of
Speaker 1: my favorite castles in a way because it's so unusual
Speaker 1: that it retains a serious purpose for a thousand years almost.
Speaker 1: I remember when I was, you know, much younger, the
Speaker 1: first time I went to Edinburgh, went to Edinburgh Castle.
Speaker 1: I was so astonished because up until that point my
Speaker 1: understanding of castles was like Disney Neu Schwinstein castles, you know,
Speaker 1: the fairy tale castles that are sort of the castle
Speaker 1: equivalent of the Arthurian legends. And the Edinburgh Castle, which
Speaker 1: is very much like a small town and feels like
Speaker 1: a military garrison. Yeah, got it. I mean Edinburgh Castle
Speaker 1: is one of the most wonderful places in the whole
Speaker 1: of the whole the UK. And I don't need to
Speaker 1: man explain in Edinburgh to you. He's written a novel
Speaker 1: set at in a very brilliant one. By the way,
Speaker 1: that that too is quite unusual in that part of
Speaker 1: its function as a royal palace is still to have
Speaker 1: this ceremonial military thing and with the tattoo and with
Speaker 1: the bag of the gun, And that's part of its charm,
Speaker 1: I suppose. But part of its charm is also, like
Speaker 1: so many of the best castles, it's the glamor of
Speaker 1: its location, you know, on that craggy volcanic precipice, I suppose,
Speaker 1: overlooking one of the most beautiful cities in northern Europe.
Speaker 1: It's almost unbelievably charming, isn't it a wonderful place? Well,
Speaker 1: I feel like I've kept here for a long time.
Speaker 1: But before I let you go the Middle Age. The
Speaker 1: Middle Ages, which spans a thousand years, is sort of
Speaker 1: an intimidating chunk I think for amateurs to look at.
Speaker 1: Is there a specific period that you think is your favorite? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, like with my children, I have a different
Speaker 1: favorite depending on which day you asked me. But I'm
Speaker 1: back into the fourteenth century at the moment, which was
Speaker 1: kind of where I begun. My first book was about
Speaker 1: the Peasants Revolt tht eighty one, and the Peasant Rot
Speaker 1: eighty one is a sort of almost like a culminating
Speaker 1: events was what we now call a populist rebellion or
Speaker 1: rising that comes near the end of a century where
Speaker 1: there's been famine followed by animal moraine, followed by the
Speaker 1: Black Death, pandemic, pestilence, followed by war, the Hundred Years War,
Speaker 1: and then you get to the populist rebellion. And so
Speaker 1: the fourteen centuries where I started, and it's where I've
Speaker 1: gone back to. So that the novel Essex Dogs you
Speaker 1: mentioned is set in thirty six towards the beginning of
Speaker 1: the Hundred Years War. And you know, for one reason
Speaker 1: or another, I've just been I've been on a fourteenth century. Tip.
Speaker 1: You know, it's not that cheerful at time. You know,
Speaker 1: you don't go into the fourteenth centuryship a good time,
Speaker 1: but but it is incredibly dramatic, and you see in
Speaker 1: the fourteenth century really what feels like apocalypse coming. But
Speaker 1: you also see the beginnings of you know, literature in
Speaker 1: the vernacular traditions that we recognize today, you know, Chaucer
Speaker 1: or Pacaccio, these sort of father like figures of the
Speaker 1: vernacular literature that became adopted by nation states. It's all
Speaker 1: there in the fourteenth century and the very very early
Speaker 1: stirrings of the Renaissance, the early stirrings of religious protests
Speaker 1: that will coalesce in the Reformation. It's it's the beginning
Speaker 1: of the end of the Middle Ages, and it's a
Speaker 1: time where for a lot of well a lot of people,
Speaker 1: it was the end of days. But it's the closest century,
Speaker 1: maybe barring the early twentieth century, that you've ever had
Speaker 1: too genuine apocalypse. That's interesting. Well, with that, I think
Speaker 1: that's an optimist take place to leave us. Dan, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for taking the time out. Everyone you
Speaker 1: should absolutely read one, two to three of all of
Speaker 1: Dan eleven or twelve books. Before the interview, I asked
Speaker 1: him how many books he had written and he wasn't
Speaker 1: sure there was another one. Thank you, Dana, it was
Speaker 1: so much fun talking to you and everyone preorder his
Speaker 1: novel Essex Dogs if you're interested in that romantic world
Speaker 1: of the fourteenth century. He's a brilliant writer. And remember
Speaker 1: this is the episode and starting now, Noble Blood is
Speaker 1: going weekly, so look for an episode every single Tuesday
Speaker 1: on your podcast app. Dan. Thank you so much, thanks
Speaker 1: and congratulations. Noble Blood is a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky. Noble Blood
Speaker 1: is hosted by me Danish Sports. Additional writing and researching
Speaker 1: done by Hannah Johnston, hannah's Wick, Mura Hayward, Nie Sender,
Speaker 1: and Laurie Goodman. The show is produced by Rema al Kali,
Speaker 1: with supervising producer Josh Faine and executive producers Aaron Manky,
Speaker 1: Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from I
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