WEBVTT - Sacred Daggers, Part 1 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:06.000 Is this a dagger which I see before me, the 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:11.080 handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch THEE. I 0:00:11.160 --> 0:00:14.000 have THEE not, And yet I see THEE. Still art 0:00:14.040 --> 0:00:17.479 thou not fatal visions sensible to feeling, as to sight, 0:00:18.120 --> 0:00:20.800 or art Thou but a dagger of the mind, a 0:00:20.840 --> 0:00:24.520 false creation proceeding from the heat of rests brain. I 0:00:24.600 --> 0:00:27.400 see THEE yet in form as palpable as this which 0:00:27.440 --> 0:00:30.479 now I draw Thou, marshalst me the way that I 0:00:30.640 --> 0:00:34.120 was going, and such an instrument I was to use. 0:00:41.479 --> 0:00:45.279 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:51.080 --> 0:00:53.200 Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:53.360 --> 0:00:55.960 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:59.160 In today's episode and likely a follow up episode, I 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:03.320 believe to be discussing daggers, but not just your common 0:01:03.440 --> 0:01:05.880 everyday daggers and dirks like I know you know most 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:08.000 of you are carrying around. But no, we're gonna be 0:01:08.080 --> 0:01:12.120 busting out some awesome plus two and plus three daggers 0:01:12.160 --> 0:01:19.200 with all sorts of sacred, sacrificial, historically or culturally significant connotations. 0:01:19.680 --> 0:01:22.399 As is often the case with these multi part explorations, 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:25.960 We're just gonna kind of open the dagger drawer here. 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:28.640 We're going to pull some out and see what we learn, 0:01:28.760 --> 0:01:32.480 see what we discover. Not entirely sure what all the 0:01:32.480 --> 0:01:35.680 connections are necessarily gonna be, but I think we're gonna 0:01:35.680 --> 0:01:38.640 have some interesting artifacts to discuss here. 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:41.760 Were you inspired to do this topic because of recent 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:43.479 events in your D and D campaign? 0:01:44.080 --> 0:01:46.000 I mean, there are always cool daggers in D and 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:49.040 D campaign, so I certainly reflected on that a fair amount, 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:52.040 but no real recent things that I can think of. 0:01:52.760 --> 0:01:55.200 I think my current character doesn't even use a dagger. 0:01:55.200 --> 0:01:58.320 I mean she probably has one, like your character, unless 0:01:58.360 --> 0:02:01.760 they just are not allowed to have sharp objects. Probably 0:02:01.800 --> 0:02:04.240 has a dagger, or you'll have the opportunity to pick 0:02:04.240 --> 0:02:05.160 one up here there. 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:07.600 Yeah, at this point, I forget how many cult daggers 0:02:07.600 --> 0:02:10.600 we've stashed into our bag of holding. We got a 0:02:10.600 --> 0:02:11.360 bunch in there. 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:12.919 Yeah, I just keep throwing them in. 0:02:13.840 --> 0:02:15.679 Yeah. No, the shopkeepers want to buy them. 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:20.400 Yeah, the return rate you don't get much back on those, 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:22.440 the cultest daggers. I mean, I guess they've been used 0:02:22.440 --> 0:02:24.880 a lot. They're a little bit dull, yeah, you know, 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:29.200 a little bit cursed from their usage. But in that 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:31.560 we kind of get into something we will be discussing, 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:34.040 and that is like, the dagger does seem to have 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:38.440 a special place sometimes in our hearts, sometimes literally in 0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:42.200 our hearts, I guess. But the dagger itself is of 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:46.440 course a human weapon invention that goes way back in 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:50.359 our development of tools. Our ancestors, of course took up 0:02:50.520 --> 0:02:53.600 various nature facts, you know, found objects, and some of 0:02:53.639 --> 0:02:55.519 these might have taken on the form of a dagger, 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:57.760 you know, some sort of a talent or two, and 0:02:57.800 --> 0:03:00.960 eventually they went on to create full fledged artifacts, so 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:05.640 short stabbing weapons crafted from say flint, ivory or bone, 0:03:05.800 --> 0:03:08.360 along with some other material to sort of bind things 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:11.040 together to make it, you know, more than just one 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:15.080 found implement, but multiple implements brought together into a proper artifact. 0:03:15.440 --> 0:03:17.680 I was just trying to think, is there a formal 0:03:17.760 --> 0:03:20.760 dividing line between the concept of a knife and the 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:24.360 concept of a dagger. I can say my usage, which 0:03:24.400 --> 0:03:26.799 is that I would think of a knife as a 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:30.600 all purpose utility tool, whereas a dagger is a weapon. 0:03:30.720 --> 0:03:32.240 It's something made for violence. 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:36.120 Yeah, I mean it does, it gets it gets a 0:03:36.120 --> 0:03:39.520 little subjective at times, for sure. I was reading a 0:03:39.520 --> 0:03:43.560 bit about this because you know, on one hand, you'll 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:47.119 have plenty of examples throughout history where someone had a 0:03:47.200 --> 0:03:51.960 blade that certainly had a utility function. This would be 0:03:52.000 --> 0:03:54.920 your knife for you know, cutting through bits of rope 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:59.360 or perhaps vegetation, maybe you use it in butchery. But 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:02.640 then it might also be a weapon that not only 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:05.680 can be used as a weapon, because certainly any knife 0:04:05.720 --> 0:04:08.760 can be used as a weapon against say other humans 0:04:08.880 --> 0:04:12.520 or you know, hostile organisms of one sort or the other. 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:16.839 But then also sometimes you have you have weapons like this, 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:19.920 You have blades that kind of a dual purpose like this, 0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:22.880 this is your working blade, but if me be it's 0:04:22.880 --> 0:04:24.080 also your stab in blade. 0:04:24.320 --> 0:04:27.160 Huh, and maybe you're eating blade too, exactly. 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:30.920 Yeah, So you know it's going to vary culturally and individually. 0:04:31.520 --> 0:04:34.920 It's going to depend on the exact size of the weapon. 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:39.279 It is worth noting that while the origins of the 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:42.479 dagger are essentially like vanish into prehistory, you know, to 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:45.200 the extent that we can even know these things, it 0:04:45.279 --> 0:04:48.320 does seem to predate the sword, but is not as 0:04:48.320 --> 0:04:53.320 old as the spear. And I think this makes a 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:56.640 lot more sense when we sort of get into how 0:04:56.680 --> 0:04:59.839 we divide up some of these weapons. I turn to 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:04.520 book I frequently reference, and that is Brian Fagan's The 0:05:04.520 --> 0:05:07.880 Seventy Great Inventions of the Ancient World, and there's a 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:10.520 chapter in there dealing with spears and swords and so 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:13.440 forth that I've probably referenced in the past that he 0:05:13.480 --> 0:05:17.600 wrote with Thomas Hewlett, and they point out that scholars 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:20.400 tend to decide what is a dagger, a dirk or 0:05:20.440 --> 0:05:24.680 a sword based purely on blade length, though this method 0:05:24.680 --> 0:05:27.240 in and of itself doesn't consider the method by which 0:05:27.279 --> 0:05:30.200 the blade would have been used. So it's just kind 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:32.800 of like, all right, is it how long is it? 0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:34.719 Is it shorter than a sword? Well, that looks like 0:05:34.760 --> 0:05:37.200 a dirk. Oh, it's shorter than a dirk. It's a dagger. 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:41.000 And that's about, you know, as nuance as they get, 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:45.120 you know, leave the other details, I guess, for more 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:49.919 detailed examination of the artifact. But in broad strokes, if 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.599 you will, that the spear, of course keeps an adversary 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:55.479 at a distance, and at a considerable distance if you 0:05:55.520 --> 0:05:58.880 get into, you know, examples of throwing the spear one 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:01.159 way or another, which we've discussed in the show before, 0:06:02.000 --> 0:06:05.000 but then if the enemy's closer, while the sword allows 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:08.640 for a close quarters combat but still keeps the adversary 0:06:08.760 --> 0:06:11.320 at a modest distance and also allows for a fair 0:06:11.360 --> 0:06:15.320 amount of force, but then when we come in even tighter, well, 0:06:15.360 --> 0:06:18.040 then we get into dirk range and then dagger range, 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:22.359 and the weapon becomes increasingly close combat, you know, risky. 0:06:23.480 --> 0:06:26.839 And also, while all hand weapons are an extension of 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:30.120 the human body, you know, factored into the mind's body schema, 0:06:30.240 --> 0:06:33.160 the dagger is just about as intimate a weapon as 0:06:33.200 --> 0:06:36.719 you can get. You know that with a dagger, death 0:06:36.760 --> 0:06:40.839 and bloodshed are close, like they are, like it's I 0:06:40.839 --> 0:06:45.080 think it's ultimately one of the things that's so hypnotizing 0:06:45.120 --> 0:06:49.760 and ticing and like symbolically potent about the dagger is that, like, 0:06:50.040 --> 0:06:52.520 to get closer you'd be dealing with, like with a 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:55.000 weapon you'd be dealing with like brass knuckles or something, right, 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:59.640 something that's essentially just parts of the human body slightly augmented, 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:03.520 but in terms of a weapon that one bears and 0:07:03.600 --> 0:07:05.960 again updates the body schema and kind of makes it 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:08.320 a part of you, Like, the dagger is the most 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:09.320 intimate of weapons. 0:07:09.920 --> 0:07:12.080 I think about that in the context of what often 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:16.040 happened in combat between knights wearing plate armor. So if 0:07:16.080 --> 0:07:18.920 you're both wearing plate armor, it's going to be difficult 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:21.080 to hurt each other with a sword and doing cuts 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.440 and thrusts that just bounce off the plate. So often 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:27.320 the way these duels or fights on the battlefield would 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.600 go would be that you would initially trade blows with longer, 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:33.600 heavier weapons at a distance, maybe like a pole arm. 0:07:34.160 --> 0:07:36.440 You probably also have a mace with you, and the 0:07:36.480 --> 0:07:39.040 goal would be to knock your opponent down on the 0:07:39.080 --> 0:07:41.600 ground or to tire them out and injure them with 0:07:41.800 --> 0:07:46.720 blunt force, and then usually into the fight by grappling 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:49.840 with them and trying to get a killing stroke, by 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:52.000 getting up close and using a short blade like a 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:54.760 Rondell dagger to try to stab in between the plates 0:07:54.760 --> 0:07:56.880 of the armor or through the face plate. 0:07:57.600 --> 0:08:00.880 Yeah, and that's where it gets really, it gets really 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:05.720 I get really squeamish thinking about it. Yeah, and yeah, 0:08:05.760 --> 0:08:07.360 I mean it would seem this is of course going 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:11.440 to vary greatly by you know, individual and culture and 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:16.000 proximity to these various martial arts, if you will, But 0:08:17.400 --> 0:08:21.840 it feels less of a like a dignified art form 0:08:21.880 --> 0:08:24.400 of battle, and it becomes more just about like personal 0:08:24.520 --> 0:08:25.800 murder and death at that point. 0:08:26.160 --> 0:08:29.760 Yeah, some of the pretty illusions of heroic warfare kind 0:08:29.760 --> 0:08:31.480 of fade away when you get that close and you 0:08:31.560 --> 0:08:32.480 see what's really going on. 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:36.839 Yeah, and that makes it such an interesting focal point 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:40.840 I think for so many authors and artists throughout time, Like, 0:08:40.880 --> 0:08:44.160 there's something about a knife fight that is frightening and 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:47.320 also tantalizing. So, you know, it should come as no 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:50.359 surprise that the Dagger was a frequent point of contemplation 0:08:50.559 --> 0:08:56.080 for author Jorae Luis Borges. Alongside things like mirrors and labyrinths. 0:08:56.160 --> 0:09:00.200 You know, knife fighters pop up again and again his 0:09:00.280 --> 0:09:05.840 short stories, including nineteen sixty nine's The Encounter, which I 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:08.320 think has also I think it was published in The 0:09:08.320 --> 0:09:10.440 New Yorker under a different title back in the day, 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:13.040 but in the collection I have it is listed as 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:17.480 The Encounter, and it deals with a violent encounter between 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:21.920 a pair of knife fighters or ku chi euros and 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:25.400 the author. In the narrator anyway, it comes to believe 0:09:25.640 --> 0:09:28.439 that it was not the two men who fought each 0:09:28.480 --> 0:09:32.920 other ultimately, but the two antique dueling daggers that they wielded. 0:09:34.160 --> 0:09:38.320 So it's dagger versus dagger with some human pilots tacked on. 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:43.360 Yeah, I'm gonna read from Borges and translation here it 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:46.520 was the weapons, not the men, that fought. And then 0:09:46.640 --> 0:09:50.080 later this passage they had sought each other for a 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:53.520 long time, down the long roads of the province, and 0:09:53.559 --> 0:09:56.320 at last they had found each other. By that time, 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:59.880 their gauchos were dust in the blades of those knives. 0:10:00.000 --> 0:10:04.600 They're slept and lurked a human grudge. Things last longer 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:07.720 than men. Who can say whether the story ends here, 0:10:08.120 --> 0:10:10.400 Who can say that they will never meet again? 0:10:10.960 --> 0:10:13.520 Well, by that logic, the bones of the men could 0:10:13.640 --> 0:10:14.720 meet again somehow. 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:19.520 Well, yes, but yeah, something but I like it. Yeah yeah, 0:10:19.559 --> 0:10:22.000 something like this could be said of any weapon, or 0:10:22.000 --> 0:10:25.800 any antique weapon especially, but yeah, the dagger, especially via 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:30.760 its closeness, it's intimacy. You know, it seems especially apt 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:32.760 for this kind of reading. You know, perhaps it's just 0:10:32.800 --> 0:10:35.400 so close to our own bodies and our own wills 0:10:35.480 --> 0:10:37.720 it becomes like a focal point of our most violent 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:41.640 designs and desires that it becomes something more. 0:10:42.400 --> 0:10:43.960 Oh yeah, yeah, And I don't think we have to 0:10:44.000 --> 0:10:47.880 speculate about the symbolic importance of the dagger. I mean, 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:50.960 we can literally just see that a huge number of 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:56.040 the daggers produced and preserved throughout history are things that, 0:10:56.480 --> 0:10:59.360 as far as we can tell, might never have actually 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:02.280 been used, you know, might never have been used for violence. 0:11:02.360 --> 0:11:05.559 They were symbols, They were decorations. They were something that 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:09.040 people held and kept on their body to look a 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:10.760 certain way and to mean something. 0:11:11.160 --> 0:11:13.800 Yeah, whether they were actually used in any kind of 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:18.440 a particular ritual of use or ritual without use, you know, 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:21.319 like what was it used to cut open a you know, 0:11:21.360 --> 0:11:23.240 an animal in some sort of a practice, or was 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:26.320 it just sort of presented or was it more what 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:28.480 we might think of as decoration like in some cases 0:11:28.520 --> 0:11:33.559 We don't know, But yeah, the dagger takes on this 0:11:34.720 --> 0:11:38.880 important symbolic place in various cultures throughout time. 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:41.000 In fact, I would not say this is not just 0:11:41.040 --> 0:11:44.480 true of daggers. I would extend this to weapons in 0:11:44.559 --> 0:11:48.720 all times and places as used by humans. Clearly, I 0:11:48.720 --> 0:11:51.520 mean obviously they are in many cases actually used for 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:56.120 violence or defense. But that's not the only reason people 0:11:56.160 --> 0:11:58.680 get them. You know, people don't just have weapons because 0:11:58.679 --> 0:12:01.560 they will literally actually have to use them at some point. 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:03.800 A lot of it's about how they make people feel, 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:05.920 how you feel when you have a weapon. It's like 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:08.800 a psychological self management issue. 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:11.840 Yeah, yeah, there's something to be said too, how we 0:12:11.920 --> 0:12:14.680 even end up buying weapons that, first of all, have 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:18.400 no conceivable real life purpose. We're not planning to use them, 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:23.320 either for a utilitarian purpose or even or even in battle, 0:12:23.320 --> 0:12:26.400 like people will buy things like cling on battle accents 0:12:26.480 --> 0:12:26.880 or whatnot. 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:29.120 You know, this is my Samurai sword. 0:12:29.200 --> 0:12:32.400 Yeah, yeah, yeah, And you know, and again it may 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:34.480 be tied to an actual culture, it may be tied 0:12:34.520 --> 0:12:37.200 to a misrepresentation of a culture or something from a 0:12:37.240 --> 0:12:41.200 science fiction fantasy show. But yeah, it still takes on 0:12:41.240 --> 0:12:43.600 this important meaning. And there's something about holding it in 0:12:43.600 --> 0:12:47.440 our hands. By the way, the knives in that Borgz story, 0:12:47.679 --> 0:12:52.400 he describes them a fair link for a short story. 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:55.360 So I looked up some images of what these things 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:59.439 actually looked like, and I have a picture here for you, Joe. Apparently, 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:04.600 the two eyes that the Gauchos would use around the 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:07.559 time that the story is taking place consisted of two 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:11.600 different sorts of blades. There was the facan this would 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:17.920 like a short and it almost looks like a bayonet. 0:13:16.679 --> 0:13:19.680 Kind of long, almost dirk like, you know, I would 0:13:19.760 --> 0:13:21.760 almost think of this as a short sword. 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:24.680 Yeah, it really does look almost like a short sword. 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:27.800 It has like a either a U or an S 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:31.160 shaped crossguard on it. And then there was another blade 0:13:31.200 --> 0:13:34.199 called the Dagga, which was which had like a really 0:13:34.240 --> 0:13:36.840 short guard, so no S or U shapes, and it 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:41.800 was apparently double edged. And the Facan especially was a 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:45.000 blade that was both something that they would use for 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:48.000 work and also if they were to engage in a 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:51.120 knife fight, this would be their blade. All right, Well, 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:56.199 let's get into our dagger selections for this episode. We 0:13:56.559 --> 0:14:00.199 came up with a whole list of possible choices sort 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:02.920 of like get things started. And I have to admit 0:14:03.920 --> 0:14:07.880 this first one that I picked my selection here has 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:12.640 everything to do with fantasy and RPGs because it sounds 0:14:12.720 --> 0:14:14.760 like something from a fantasy or RP. It sounds like 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:16.760 it could be the name of a Dungeons and Dragons 0:14:16.840 --> 0:14:21.120 adventure module. Well, let's hear it, and that is the 0:14:21.240 --> 0:14:25.320 rock Crystal dagger of the Ivory Lady. So many questions, right, 0:14:26.640 --> 0:14:29.520 is it made of rock crystal? Who's the Ivory Lady? 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:31.640 What's her deal? Why does she have this blade or 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:32.680 why does she want this blade? 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:35.480 And so forth? What's the quest? Yeah, of the Ivory Lady. 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:38.280 It makes me think like our Lady of Perpetual Knife. 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:43.160 Yes, so yeah, let's start with the lady in question here, 0:14:43.240 --> 0:14:46.280 So not to be confused with the Ivory Bengal Lady, 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:50.960 which I was momentarily sidetracked by, because this is also 0:14:51.240 --> 0:14:56.040 a fascinating sounding historical tidbit. The Ivory Bengal Lady is 0:14:56.080 --> 0:15:00.680 a fourth century CE skeleton found in North Yorkshire, England 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:05.560 and apparently of North African origin, so not her different lady. 0:15:05.880 --> 0:15:08.360 The Ivory Lady in question here that we'll be discussing 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:12.600 was found in southwestern Spain, near Seville and adjacent to 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:18.000 the Tolos de Montellierio gravesite. The lady in question first 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:19.920 believed to be a man till I believe a twenty 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:23.600 twenty one analysis proved otherwise, was a woman of some importance, 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:27.040 if not leadership, during the Iberian Copper Age. This would 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:30.840 have been between thirty two hundred and twenty two hundred BCE. 0:15:32.000 --> 0:15:34.200 The main source I was looking at here for this 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:39.640 is Amologen and peptide analysis reveal female leadership in copper age, Iberia. 0:15:40.040 --> 0:15:44.080 And this was by census Penna at all. This was 0:15:44.080 --> 0:15:47.840 published in Scientific Reports. It's a really interesting article that 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:49.160 of course does a good job it just sort of 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:52.960 laying out what was found, what we know about the 0:15:53.000 --> 0:15:56.080 body of the Ivory Lady, and what it signifies. But 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.720 also they make this case that she was evidently like 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:03.760 a eating social figure at the time, so perhaps a 0:16:04.040 --> 0:16:09.080 highly ranking priestess, and not only like a highly ranking priestess, 0:16:09.160 --> 0:16:13.200 but like perhaps the highly ranking priestess of her time, 0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:16.840 someone who would have commanded a great deal of power 0:16:16.920 --> 0:16:21.120 and authority among her people, and in doing so like 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:27.520 retained that aura after death, like for generations. So the 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:31.360 Ivory Lady in question here was buried with an African 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:37.000 elephant's tusk. Again this is in an Iberian Spain, an 0:16:37.000 --> 0:16:42.120 ivory comb, an ostrocheg shell, a flint dagger inlaid with amber, 0:16:42.800 --> 0:16:46.360 which in and of itself is a pretty fascinating sounding dagger, 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:49.160 but also a crystal dagger, which I'll come back to. 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:53.040 She also had a large ceramic plate bearing trace elements 0:16:53.080 --> 0:16:57.200 of wine and cannabis, and some of these items seem 0:16:57.240 --> 0:17:00.200 to have been buried with her, while others include the 0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:04.879 crystal dagger, were left as offering some time after her death. 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:07.520 Its thought that the crystal dagger was placed maybe some 0:17:07.600 --> 0:17:09.160 eighty years after her death. 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:09.919 Oh wow. 0:17:10.200 --> 0:17:12.919 Yeah, you can find images of this dagger online if 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:18.040 you look for ivory lady, crystal dagger, that sort of thing. 0:17:18.720 --> 0:17:21.400 I included an image here for your Joe though, and 0:17:21.080 --> 0:17:24.960 you can see the blade and the reconstructed hilt here. 0:17:25.480 --> 0:17:29.399 So it was composed of rock crystal and had an 0:17:29.480 --> 0:17:33.480 ivory handle. The ivory, as with the other examples of ivory, 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:36.560 would have been imported, and it was decorated with some 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:43.199 ninety different decorative beads made of mother of pearl. The 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:48.240 rock crystal itself. This is a transparent, colorless variety of quartz, 0:17:48.280 --> 0:17:51.160 so it's essentially a quartz dagger. But I think rock crystal, 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:53.960 of course, is just going to sound a little more exciting. 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:57.680 But still it does very much look like crystal. 0:17:57.760 --> 0:17:57.840 Like. 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:00.960 You can imagine this thing perhaps being held up to 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:04.320 the light, be it fire light or sunlight, and it 0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:06.720 being quite an evocative site. 0:18:06.720 --> 0:18:11.479 Casting rainbows everywhere. Yeah, I mean perhaps wow. Yeah, So 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:13.760 I'm trying to tell just looking at the picture if 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:16.280 I'm seeing this correctly, So you said it is transparent 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:18.879 or translucent, this is a blade that you can see 0:18:18.920 --> 0:18:20.280 through to some extent. 0:18:20.400 --> 0:18:23.440 To some extent, yeah, one gets the impression that would 0:18:23.440 --> 0:18:24.720 have done interesting things. 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:26.520 With the light. Yeah. 0:18:26.720 --> 0:18:29.840 And so clearly this is a rather different beast than 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:34.000 the working and fighting blades we were talking about earlier, Like, 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:39.359 this is clearly an item of prestige, of symbolic importance, 0:18:39.920 --> 0:18:43.320 and it was finally crafted. So it's a combination of 0:18:43.440 --> 0:18:48.120 rare materials, imported materials, and also just a high level 0:18:48.119 --> 0:18:50.960 of craftsmanship, especially when it comes to the working of 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:54.080 the rock crystal, which I'm to understand would have been 0:18:54.800 --> 0:18:59.280 extra labor intensive and also maybe not as ideal for 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:02.480 actual use if you were intending to stab a bunch 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:04.640 of people with it or use it for some sort 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.159 of you know, day to day sort of purpose. So 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.639 it was something that would have signified class and or power. 0:19:11.840 --> 0:19:14.880 In this paper, they also include an illustration of what 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:18.359 they think the lady, the Ivory Lady might have looked 0:19:18.440 --> 0:19:21.200 like in life. I included this for you here as well, Joe, 0:19:21.200 --> 0:19:25.119 and you can see her seated in a position of authority, 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:29.879 and you'll notice that they've depicted her with like red 0:19:29.920 --> 0:19:34.240 pigment over part of her torso. And this is actually 0:19:34.359 --> 0:19:37.760 really key and quite interesting. This would be due to 0:19:38.119 --> 0:19:40.680 the red and the red ranges from like a bright 0:19:40.760 --> 0:19:45.600 scarlet to a brick red form of mercury sulfide. This 0:19:45.640 --> 0:19:48.480 is cinnabar, and this has been used in various places 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:52.720 around the world for pigmentation and everything from art and 0:19:52.840 --> 0:19:56.919 clothing to cosmetics and body adornment, and it's also been 0:19:56.960 --> 0:20:00.800 used in various traditional medicines as well. But again it 0:20:00.840 --> 0:20:05.280 is mercury so far, so it is quite toxic. 0:20:05.359 --> 0:20:07.560 And we were not recommending it. 0:20:07.760 --> 0:20:09.880 Yes, ye, do not decide that you want to go 0:20:10.920 --> 0:20:14.160 upgrade your look with cinebar. Now it is toxic. And 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:20.000 we know that she used cinnebar because she had quote 0:20:20.040 --> 0:20:24.840 striking strikingly high levels of mercury in the bones and 0:20:24.880 --> 0:20:29.399 these revealed intense anti mortem exposure to cinebar, So she 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:32.680 would have she would have been using cinnabar on a 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:35.560 level that she wouldn't have just picked up through just 0:20:35.640 --> 0:20:39.320 sort of like casual usage, like she had privileged access 0:20:39.359 --> 0:20:42.959 to this stuff. So this would again, as with her 0:20:43.000 --> 0:20:46.960 association with wine and cannabis. The argument here is that 0:20:47.000 --> 0:20:50.600 she probably had some sort of priestly role in the society. 0:20:51.720 --> 0:20:53.639 Now I mentioned already that this grave side is in 0:20:53.640 --> 0:20:59.960 close proximity to another grave site, that Tolos de Monteluerio site, 0:21:00.240 --> 0:21:04.680 and there are other women buried there as well, and 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:09.400 they also have high levels of mercury due to cinebar 0:21:10.720 --> 0:21:13.680 and these were seemingly buried, according to the paper, two 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:17.760 or three generations later. And so the assumption here is 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:20.240 this they would have been buried close to her grave 0:21:20.920 --> 0:21:23.000 in an attempt to sort of connect them to her, 0:21:23.280 --> 0:21:25.840 or because they were you know, they were part of 0:21:26.000 --> 0:21:30.159 a lineage that was connected to her. And the authors 0:21:30.160 --> 0:21:32.960 of the paper make an argument for a powerful priestess 0:21:33.000 --> 0:21:37.320 class in this coppy age Iberian culture. One of the 0:21:37.760 --> 0:21:41.960 later buried females had an extra toe on each foot, incidentally, 0:21:42.000 --> 0:21:45.239 which they point out would have possibly been interpreted as 0:21:45.280 --> 0:21:48.080 a signifier of her special class and powers. 0:21:48.359 --> 0:21:48.919 Interesting. 0:21:49.400 --> 0:21:52.399 Yeah, So again, the argument here is that she was 0:21:52.720 --> 0:21:55.720 an important person, and perhaps more than that, perhaps the 0:21:55.760 --> 0:22:01.040 most important person in her society at the time. And 0:22:01.119 --> 0:22:05.639 so this is not necessarily to say that The argument 0:22:05.720 --> 0:22:08.800 then therefore is that Copper Age Iberian people were part 0:22:08.800 --> 0:22:12.320 of a matriarchal society, though some might make that case, 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:14.440 but I believe based on the reading here, like the 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:18.520 main argument they're making is that previously it's kind of 0:22:18.560 --> 0:22:22.200 like the default assumption was, oh, they were a patriarchal society, 0:22:22.440 --> 0:22:24.400 and we can kind of see that in the idea 0:22:24.440 --> 0:22:27.040 that when we first discovered the Ivory Lady, we thought 0:22:27.080 --> 0:22:29.919 she was the Ivory Man, and then we came to 0:22:29.960 --> 0:22:34.840 realize that error later on with additional analysis, and so 0:22:34.960 --> 0:22:38.040 the idea here would be that women, and especially the 0:22:38.040 --> 0:22:40.879 Ivory woman, enjoyed a great deal of power in a 0:22:40.920 --> 0:22:44.480 society that was socially and politically more complex than we 0:22:44.520 --> 0:22:47.880 previously thought, or more complex than we previously gave them 0:22:47.880 --> 0:22:48.359 credit for. 0:22:49.480 --> 0:22:49.680 Now. 0:22:49.840 --> 0:22:53.040 Sadly, when it comes to the exact significance of the 0:22:53.119 --> 0:22:57.480 rock Crystal Dagger, you know, we just have to speculate again. 0:22:57.720 --> 0:23:02.440