Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of
Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
Speaker 1: of these amazing tales right there on display, just waiting
Speaker 1: for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
Speaker 1: For hundreds of years, arguments and feuds were handled one
Speaker 1: of two ways, either with a healthy conversation or with
Speaker 1: a duel. Up until the late eighteenth century, those duels
Speaker 1: were mostly carried out with swords, until guns became the
Speaker 1: weapon of choice. Funny enough, the object of a duel
Speaker 1: wasn't to kill the other person. It was only to
Speaker 1: achieve a sense of justice that honor had been restored
Speaker 1: to the wronged party. Now, a duel was considered an
Speaker 1: appropriate way to seek retribution for a long time. But
Speaker 1: what happened if someone felt that their honor had been
Speaker 1: besmirched in a less serious way? Where did they go
Speaker 1: for satisfaction? Well, if they were a German college student
Speaker 1: in eighteen seventy one, then they had an alternative. According
Speaker 1: to a book from that time, students at Leipsick University
Speaker 1: would challenge each other to a special kind of face off,
Speaker 1: but not one that would leave the other side bleeding
Speaker 1: out from a bullet wound. Rather, they might pass out
Speaker 1: from drinking too much alcohol. They were called beer duels,
Speaker 1: and they were part of a lengthy set of rules
Speaker 1: known as the Beer Code. According to the Code, students
Speaker 1: usually male students, that is, would be split off into
Speaker 1: two groups depending on their drinking abilities. Newcomers were called foxes,
Speaker 1: while experienced drinkers were referred to as beer boys. A
Speaker 1: fox could become a beer boy either by waiting two
Speaker 1: semesters or passing a drinking test. Often, beer boys would
Speaker 1: challenge each other to different drinking related competitions, such as
Speaker 1: who could drink the most beer in a given period
Speaker 1: of time. Anyone who declined the challenge faced ridicule and
Speaker 1: embarrassment and even more drinking. But sometimes things got out
Speaker 1: of hand and one drinker would offend a beer boy.
Speaker 1: They might call them a name, like a sage or
Speaker 1: a beer baby. When that happened, the wronged party would
Speaker 1: challenge the offender to a beer duel. But there were
Speaker 1: no swords or pistols in a beer duel. The only
Speaker 1: weapon allowed was beer. I know you didn't see that
Speaker 1: one coming, did you? And the rules were surprisingly complex.
Speaker 1: Different challenges and responses were often given depending on whether
Speaker 1: the offense had been carried out on purpose or accidentally.
Speaker 1: Sometimes the offended party had to demand a beer duel himself,
Speaker 1: and other times the offender had the option to call
Speaker 1: for a duel either way, though these incidents always ended
Speaker 1: the same way. Everyone drank a lot, and just as
Speaker 1: with an actual duel involving weapons, challengers and challenges had
Speaker 1: to choose their own second or representatives to handle the
Speaker 1: logistics of each confrontation. Umpires maintained order and officiated the
Speaker 1: proceedings as well. Considering these were drunk college students drinking
Speaker 1: the night away, their rules were thorough and impressive. Now,
Speaker 1: beer duels were only one manner of retribution. Beer boys
Speaker 1: had other ways to demand justice for perceived offenses, such
Speaker 1: as the order x plano. This gave any beer boy
Speaker 1: the right to force a fox to drink, usually to
Speaker 1: teach them a lesson for being too arrogant. Refusal to
Speaker 1: drink led to more shame for the fox, and this
Speaker 1: extended beyond the university. According to the rule book, any
Speaker 1: man of a higher semester drinking in a nearby beer
Speaker 1: village had the right to force someone lower to them
Speaker 1: to drink, and if that person refused, the challenger was
Speaker 1: allowed to dump his beer on their head. And finally,
Speaker 1: the university beer code had something called the grand seravis.
Speaker 1: This was reserved for those times when everybody has been
Speaker 1: drinking for a while and they were too far gone
Speaker 1: to see reason. If a beer boy felt insulted by
Speaker 1: someone's remarks late into the evening, the grand seravus was
Speaker 1: the equivalent of sworn testimony in a court of law.
Speaker 1: Only what someone saw or heard during the course of
Speaker 1: the evening could be spoken of in order to put
Speaker 1: the matter to bed for good. The grand Seravus was
Speaker 1: not to be used frivolously. It was the last resort
Speaker 1: to settle any and all disputes, so as to avoid
Speaker 1: further arguments or worse. I suppose it seems the Germans
Speaker 1: have always been serious about their beer. The beer Code
Speaker 1: is perfect evidence of their dedication. To offend a beer
Speaker 1: boy was no joke. Lest you wanted to wind up
Speaker 1: an object of ridicule or find yourself being peeled off
Speaker 1: the floor after passing out from drinking. Perhaps something could
Speaker 1: be learned from their rule book. Maybe we could avoid
Speaker 1: a lot more problems in the world if we shared
Speaker 1: a beer or three together every now and then. And
Speaker 1: to that I say cheers. The sun blazed overhead as
Speaker 1: the crowd gathered in the square, fanning themselves in the
Speaker 1: tropical heat. Their soft murmurs quieted as the man of
Speaker 1: the hour was led to his place on the gallows.
Speaker 1: It was July seventh of seventeen thirty. Before the day
Speaker 1: was out, the pirate Olivier Lavasieur would meet his end.
Speaker 1: As the crowd watched, the wind weathered pirate pulled something
Speaker 1: free from the strap around his neck. It was a
Speaker 1: small locket. Find my treasure, he said in the French,
Speaker 1: hardened by the wind and the waves, And as he
Speaker 1: threw the necklace into the crowd, he shouted his last words.
Speaker 1: Only one may understand it. Olivier Lavasieur's life ended that
Speaker 1: hot summer day on the island of law Reunion, a
Speaker 1: French colony off the coast of Madagascar, but his legend
Speaker 1: was only beginning. Inside the dead man's locket was a
Speaker 1: code that hid the location of one of the greatest
Speaker 1: buried treasures in history, Olivier Lavasieur wasn't always a pirate.
Speaker 1: Born sometime in the late sixteen eighties to a wealthy
Speaker 1: family in northern France, he initially studied to become an
Speaker 1: architect in the early seventeen hundreds, though he set his
Speaker 1: sights instead on a naval career, so when France became
Speaker 1: involved in the War of Spanish Secession, he received permission
Speaker 1: from the king to sail as a privateer, plundering enemy
Speaker 1: ships for the glory of France. By the time the
Speaker 1: war ended in seventeen fourteen, Olivier found that he had
Speaker 1: a taste for murder and mayhem on the high seas,
Speaker 1: so when he was ordered to return to Paris instead,
Speaker 1: he became a pirate, sailing under his own flag. Olivier
Speaker 1: quickly gained a fearsome reputation too. He was known by
Speaker 1: some as the Buzzard for the way that he stripped
Speaker 1: gold from a ship like meat from a carcass. Others
Speaker 1: called him the mouth in honor of the vicious verbal
Speaker 1: lashings that he would give to his victims. He struck
Speaker 1: terror cross the high seas, plundering ships from the Caribbean
Speaker 1: and West Africa, all the way to the Indian Ocean,
Speaker 1: which is where in seventeen twenty one he launched his
Speaker 1: most famous attack. In April of that year, Olivier happened
Speaker 1: upon a Portuguese galleon named Our Lady of the Cape,
Speaker 1: leaving the Indian ports of Goa, ladened with treasures. Our
Speaker 1: Lady had run into a storm, and, fearing that she
Speaker 1: would sink, had dumped any extra weight. In this case,
Speaker 1: that meant all seventy two of her cannons. Olivier and
Speaker 1: her crew captured the ship easily and made off with
Speaker 1: thousands of pounds of treasure. However, their biggest prize was
Speaker 1: a huge cross of solid gold studded with rubies, emeralds,
Speaker 1: and diamonds. The heist was legendary, and Olivier and his
Speaker 1: crew were rich men a thousand times over. The story
Speaker 1: even made its way into Robert Louis Stevenson's novel Treasure Island.
Speaker 1: In seventeen twenty four, the French government offered amnesty to
Speaker 1: any remaining French pirates sailing the seas. All they would
Speaker 1: have to do is give up a large share of
Speaker 1: their riches. Unwilling to part with his fortune, Olivier refused
Speaker 1: amnesty and was hunted for six years. Finally, he was
Speaker 1: caught in Madagascar in seventeen thirty and sentenced to hang,
Speaker 1: and moments before he died, he tossed that necklace to
Speaker 1: the crowd, which contained a cryptogram with seventeen lines. Hidden
Speaker 1: somewhere in the code was the key to his great treasure.
Speaker 1: Over the years, many have tried to decipher Olivier's code.
Speaker 1: It's widely accepted that it's a pigeon cipher where letters
Speaker 1: are replaced with symbols. What's not quite as easy to
Speaker 1: figure out is what exactly the symbols spell out. After
Speaker 1: many attempts over the years, a man named Reginald Cruz
Speaker 1: Wilkins found a new lead in the nineteen forties. Reginald
Speaker 1: believed that since the Night Templars used similar cipher's, Olivier's
Speaker 1: code must have something to do with them. However, he
Speaker 1: also hypothesized that it had something to do with the Freemasons,
Speaker 1: King Solomon, or the twelve Labors of Hercules. Needless to say,
Speaker 1: Reginald died in nineteen seventy seven without ever having cracked
Speaker 1: the code. Even with Reginald's theories It's not clear what
Speaker 1: exactly the cipher points to. It could be a map
Speaker 1: or a riddle, but some believe the whole thing might
Speaker 1: just be a hoax. Olivier Lavasieur was certainly a fabulously
Speaker 1: wealthy pirate, but he died in seventeen thirty The first
Speaker 1: mention of the code he supposedly gave to the crowd
Speaker 1: at his execution wasn't until nineteen thirty four, two hundred
Speaker 1: years after his death. Whether the code is a treasure
Speaker 1: map straight out of Robert Lewis Stevenson or just an
Speaker 1: elaborate hoax, people have dedicated their whole lives to discovering
Speaker 1: the truth. So maybe, just maybe, hiding under the sand
Speaker 1: on some long forgotten island, Olivier's treasure lies waiting. Here's
Speaker 1: hoping after three hundred years, X still marks the spot.
Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership
Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,
Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the
Speaker 1: worldoflore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.