WEBVTT - The Monstrefact: The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog

0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:05.600
<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of

0:00:05.640 --> 0:00:10.160
<v Speaker 1>My Heart Radio. Hi, my name is Robert Lamb. And

0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:13.440
<v Speaker 1>this is the Monster Fact, a short form series from

0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:16.240
<v Speaker 1>Stuff to Blow Your Mind focusing on our mythical creatures,

0:00:16.640 --> 0:00:25.639
<v Speaker 1>ideas and monsters in time. The cave of Carbonac is

0:00:25.680 --> 0:00:30.720
<v Speaker 1>a loathsome sight, for outside the dark aperture lay scattered

0:00:30.800 --> 0:00:34.000
<v Speaker 1>the bones of fifty or more warriors, and here we

0:00:34.120 --> 0:00:41.000
<v Speaker 1>are told death awaits us, all with nasty, big pointed teeth. Yes,

0:00:41.080 --> 0:00:45.920
<v Speaker 1>this is the famous killer rabbit from the film Monty

0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:50.960
<v Speaker 1>Python and the Holy Grail, and the audience indeed gets

0:00:51.000 --> 0:00:54.640
<v Speaker 1>to watch on as the otherwise normal looking white rabbit

0:00:54.720 --> 0:00:58.480
<v Speaker 1>commences to slaughter medieval nights right and left, until the

0:00:58.600 --> 0:01:01.400
<v Speaker 1>Nights of the Round Table do finally defeat the creature

0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:05.280
<v Speaker 1>with the aid of the legendary holly hand grenade of Antigoch.

0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:08.200
<v Speaker 1>It's a wonderfully absurd scene, and of course, the obvious

0:01:08.240 --> 0:01:11.040
<v Speaker 1>reason for the absurdity is that rabbits of the natural

0:01:11.080 --> 0:01:14.880
<v Speaker 1>world are generally noted for their bashfulness in the wild

0:01:15.160 --> 0:01:19.000
<v Speaker 1>and their docile nature in domesticated settings. This seems to

0:01:19.040 --> 0:01:21.840
<v Speaker 1>be true of all extant rabbits and hairs of the

0:01:21.880 --> 0:01:27.000
<v Speaker 1>family Leopori day and even such prehistoric examples as neurologist Rex,

0:01:27.280 --> 0:01:29.760
<v Speaker 1>which would have been about six times the size of

0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:33.640
<v Speaker 1>a living rabbit, were largely herbivores. Though to be sure,

0:01:33.840 --> 0:01:36.520
<v Speaker 1>rabbits are capable of eating their own young, and there

0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:40.800
<v Speaker 1>are also anecdotal reports of rabbits scavenging meat in the wild.

0:01:41.600 --> 0:01:43.959
<v Speaker 1>So the mere idea of a killer rabbit is of

0:01:44.000 --> 0:01:47.520
<v Speaker 1>course again inherently absurd, whether we're talking about the killer

0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:52.160
<v Speaker 1>rabbit of Carbana or the giant rampaging rabbits of VY

0:01:52.200 --> 0:01:55.320
<v Speaker 1>two's Night of the Lepis. Though I suppose I'm willing

0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:58.480
<v Speaker 1>to give giant rabbits in a largely barren environment the

0:01:58.480 --> 0:02:02.440
<v Speaker 1>benefit of the doubt. Still, the idea is inherently silly,

0:02:02.560 --> 0:02:06.040
<v Speaker 1>so silly that the notion of a killer rabbit continues

0:02:06.080 --> 0:02:10.240
<v Speaker 1>to resonate in varying areas of discourse. Just as one

0:02:10.320 --> 0:02:12.880
<v Speaker 1>quick example, and again this one is from the nineteen seventies,

0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:15.880
<v Speaker 1>in which there is a fair amount of killer rabbit excitement. Obviously,

0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:20.000
<v Speaker 1>uh as Gary Bettel wrote in a nine paper in

0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:23.960
<v Speaker 1>the New Scholasticism, quote to find a carnivorous rabbit would

0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:27.480
<v Speaker 1>indeed so upset our system of knowledge that we might have,

0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.480
<v Speaker 1>that we might hesitate to classify the newfound entity as

0:02:31.520 --> 0:02:34.120
<v Speaker 1>a rabbit. But the idea of a killer rabbit is

0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:37.200
<v Speaker 1>not just a comedic obsession of the seventies. No, the

0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:41.040
<v Speaker 1>idea actually goes back hundreds of years. At least. The

0:02:41.080 --> 0:02:44.520
<v Speaker 1>facade of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France features an

0:02:44.560 --> 0:02:48.040
<v Speaker 1>image of a night fleeing from a rabbit, an image

0:02:48.080 --> 0:02:52.720
<v Speaker 1>that reportedly inspired the Python filmmakers. Such a fearsome rabbit

0:02:52.760 --> 0:02:56.119
<v Speaker 1>also pops up in the medieval literary cycle of Reynard

0:02:56.200 --> 0:03:00.640
<v Speaker 1>the Fox, again as an absurdity, an example of extreme cowardens,

0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:04.320
<v Speaker 1>and as pointed out on the British Libraries Excellent Medieval

0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:09.200
<v Speaker 1>Manuscripts blog, the motif of illustrated fearsome rabbits in medieval

0:03:09.280 --> 0:03:13.119
<v Speaker 1>manuscripts dates back to at least the eleven seventies. When

0:03:13.120 --> 0:03:18.200
<v Speaker 1>we see a rabbit threatening a night in the Arnstein Passional,

0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:22.440
<v Speaker 1>such rabbits typically pop up and decorated initials and marginalia,

0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:27.559
<v Speaker 1>so not central illustrations, but illustrated flourishes that often celebrated

0:03:27.600 --> 0:03:32.000
<v Speaker 1>absurd notions of the world turned on its head later

0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:36.040
<v Speaker 1>centuries also gave us more manuscript illustrations of rabbit mischief.

0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:40.840
<v Speaker 1>The smith Field Decreetles of the thirteen forties includes images

0:03:40.880 --> 0:03:44.360
<v Speaker 1>of man size rabbits shooting a hunter with a bow

0:03:44.360 --> 0:03:46.800
<v Speaker 1>and arrow, and then later we see another man sized

0:03:46.880 --> 0:03:50.400
<v Speaker 1>rabbit assisting in the judgment and summary execution of the hunter.

0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:54.000
<v Speaker 1>The final image shows one of the rabbits beheading the

0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:56.960
<v Speaker 1>hunter with a great sword. So clearly this is all

0:03:56.960 --> 0:03:59.520
<v Speaker 1>in good fun and this is just one example, but

0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:03.840
<v Speaker 1>I high recommend you check out that blog post Medieval

0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:09.040
<v Speaker 1>killer Rabbits when Bunnies Strike Back for more examples. Clearly,

0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:12.119
<v Speaker 1>the oxymoronic power of the killer rabbit has stood out

0:04:12.120 --> 0:04:15.080
<v Speaker 1>to us for some time and it will continue to

0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:18.479
<v Speaker 1>resonate with us as the cute threat, the thing that

0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:23.240
<v Speaker 1>couldn't possibly rise up and eat us, bite our head off,

0:04:23.720 --> 0:04:27.240
<v Speaker 1>or sentenced us to death by beheading. Tune in for

0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:30.279
<v Speaker 1>additional episodes of the Monster Fact each week. As always,

0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:32.520
<v Speaker 1>you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow

0:04:32.560 --> 0:04:42.960
<v Speaker 1>your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is

0:04:43.000 --> 0:04:45.600
<v Speaker 1>a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for

0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:48.720
<v Speaker 1>my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

0:04:48.760 --> 0:04:50.560
<v Speaker 1>or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,