WEBVTT - What's in a witches' brew? 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:05.960 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:14.360 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:17.279 My name is Robert Lamb and um Julie Witchy Pooh 0:00:17.280 --> 0:00:21.479 Douglas one of my favorite witches witch which who was 0:00:21.480 --> 0:00:23.720 Witchy Pooch. She was like one of those cartoon witches 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:26.560 and she, you know, she had like the iconic like 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:29.120 green face and the long nose and the mole and 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:32.240 she was always making potions, just kind of like a 0:00:32.400 --> 0:00:35.400 kindly witch. Okay, yeah, well that's good. I like that 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.640 the interpretation. I like that at that variegation of the 0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:41.559 witch we're talking about, which is, of course, because this 0:00:41.640 --> 0:00:43.680 is the week of Halloween, so we thought what better 0:00:43.720 --> 0:00:46.199 time than to roll out a couple of our favorite 0:00:46.240 --> 0:00:49.120 spooky episodes and uh and this one's one of them. 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:51.960 This one deals with you've You've got everything in this story, 0:00:52.600 --> 0:00:58.440 which is psychedelic lubricants, rooms. What more could you want? Right? 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:06.600 So we hope that you enjoy the Halloween je What 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:09.039 do you like to put in your witches? Brute? A 0:01:09.080 --> 0:01:14.399 little a little frog play, rosemary, yeah, rusty garlic, yeah 0:01:14.440 --> 0:01:19.400 of course, um, little crystallized ginger, nice touch. Yeah, I 0:01:19.480 --> 0:01:23.680 highly recommend um scale of dragon to the wolf which 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:26.800 is mummy man, gulf off the raven c salt shark, 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:29.760 root of himlock digged in the dark of course, liver 0:01:29.840 --> 0:01:32.360 of a blaspheming jew if you can get it, uh, 0:01:32.400 --> 0:01:35.200 and goll of goat slips of you. And of course 0:01:35.360 --> 0:01:37.280 you want all the silver in the moon's eclipse. That's 0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:39.520 just an old recipe that I picked up. You're such 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:42.560 a purist, picked up from old will there. But yeah, 0:01:42.560 --> 0:01:44.840 I just get myself from Trader Joe's and you're all 0:01:45.280 --> 0:01:47.560 of the earth the witches. I'll a Trader Joe's is 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:51.000 really good. I mean everything from your scale of dragon 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:54.800 to uh, you know, the eye of Newt and Baboon's blood. Yeah, 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:57.720 they have excellent pepoon's blood. You know this. This is 0:01:57.760 --> 0:01:59.800 what I love about how stuff works is that we 0:01:59.840 --> 0:02:02.280 can discuss these things. We've got our own coven here 0:02:02.880 --> 0:02:07.120 and it really allows us to exchange ideas about witchcraft. 0:02:07.400 --> 0:02:10.480 There's a coven at how stuff works. Yeah, like seriously 0:02:10.560 --> 0:02:12.600 or like literally, there's a covenant how stuff works? Or 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:15.239 are you just talking about we throw ideas into a 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:19.840 call drof? Oh no, yeah, sure, it was just metaphorical yeah, sure, 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:24.680 of course, there's not a real coven. That would be weird. No, no, no, 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:28.440 it's metaphorical. Alright, well really well, I would I would 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:30.960 imagine you're you. You must be meeting in a separate space, because, 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:34.760 as we know from legends and myth and folk tales, 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:38.880 the classic version of the witch, and and by the 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:42.000 classic version of which I'm not craning this in on 0:02:42.000 --> 0:02:45.720 on on Wiccan stuff, like a modern witches, of of 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:47.800 whom I know some of My friend Michelle is a 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:50.200 practicing Wiccan. And to my knowledge, you just don't have 0:02:50.200 --> 0:02:53.560 a cauldron. No, no, Today we're talking about the witches 0:02:53.639 --> 0:02:57.799 that are burned in our memories. And sometimes it's yes, 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:00.639 um who yeah, who have cauldron? Who are meeting in 0:03:00.680 --> 0:03:04.720 the dark, who are plotting against Macbeth, that are casting spells, 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:08.359 that are hanging out with cats that hate Dorothy, that 0:03:08.480 --> 0:03:11.799 hate Dorothy, that are dying underneath the weight of houses 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:14.079 that fall from the sky. Uh. This sort of thing, 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:16.200 the idea of the witch, is pretty fascinating, especially when 0:03:16.240 --> 0:03:19.000 you get past sort of the the the typical Halloween 0:03:19.160 --> 0:03:22.320 idea of just cackling old crones. I mean, you could 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:24.680 we could just talk for a long time about the 0:03:25.520 --> 0:03:28.400 about about what the Witch represents, because as I've discussed before, 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:31.800 I mean, the Witch is basically a monster, the hag, 0:03:31.880 --> 0:03:33.960 the hag, especially if you see the Hag as a 0:03:34.000 --> 0:03:38.240 monster or the ogress, uh, appearing throughout different myth cycles 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:40.440 where uh, and some of this is tied to the 0:03:40.520 --> 0:03:43.880 idea that some sort of cannibalistic, grotesque old woman will 0:03:43.880 --> 0:03:46.280 come and eat your children if they don't behave, or 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:48.720 that if you're not careful, guys, you might be seduced 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:50.840 by what seems like a beautiful woman but turns out 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:54.280 to be a grotesque monster, right then sort of the 0:03:54.320 --> 0:03:57.000 sucky best thing too, exactly exactly. And then when you 0:03:57.120 --> 0:03:58.960 I mean you also in the Witch you have a 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:02.520 situation where it's a woman with power, and of course 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:07.480 that is a very interesting idea throughout a predominantly male 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:10.960 dominated culture where suddenly here, here are women and they 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:12.640 have power. And what does his power mean? Is it 0:04:12.720 --> 0:04:15.600 a threat to male dominance? And uh, I mean, I 0:04:15.680 --> 0:04:19.240 mean make me stop, because well, I was gonna say that. 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:24.159 Erica John has at interesting perspective on this from historical context, 0:04:24.320 --> 0:04:27.600 and she has a book called Witchcraft and some poetry 0:04:27.720 --> 0:04:30.880 and fiction and some historical data in their few spells 0:04:30.880 --> 0:04:34.599 in that I don't know, I hope. So I think 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:36.600 that she actually sort of approached this book in that 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:39.520 manner of like, Wow, could I become a witch myself? 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:43.359 Even though, um, she's someone who I think is grounded 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:45.520 in reality and knows that she wasn't necessarily going to 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:48.480 start flying around. But anyway, Um, she is the author 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:51.279 of fear Flying. That's what she's best known of. As 0:04:51.720 --> 0:04:55.080 in her forward of the book, she says, witchcraft in 0:04:55.120 --> 0:04:58.280 Europe and America is essentially this harkening back to female 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:02.159 divinity within a patriarchal culture. If you insist long enough 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:04.279 that God is the father, a nostalgia for the mother 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:07.880 goddess will be born. If you exclude women from church rights, 0:05:07.920 --> 0:05:10.960 they will practice their magic in the fields and forests, 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.479 in their own kitchens. The point is female power cannot 0:05:13.480 --> 0:05:17.040 be suppressed, It can only be driven underground. So this 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:20.400 is how she places which is really in a historical 0:05:20.520 --> 0:05:23.479 sense of Okay, what's actually happening here when we talk 0:05:23.520 --> 0:05:26.680 about which is when we get away from this idea 0:05:26.720 --> 0:05:31.480 of pointy hats and broomsticks. Even though broomsticks certainly planned 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:33.920 to it as we will find out. Yeah, and it's 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:37.320 interesting that you mentioned the the necessary re emergence of 0:05:37.360 --> 0:05:40.240 the feminine deity because I'm reminded of a series of 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:42.120 essays that I read, and have I known that you 0:05:42.120 --> 0:05:43.479 were going to go in this direction, I would have 0:05:43.520 --> 0:05:45.480 would have brought that book with me off to put 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:48.039 something on the blocks about it. But there's some interesting 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:52.600 material in there about depictions of Jesus Christ in medieval art, 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:55.359 and in some of these depictions, Christ becomes more and 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:58.800 more feminine, and you you actually have have varying in 0:05:58.839 --> 0:06:03.240 some cases outright heretical. And I'm doing quotes with air quotes, 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:06.840 and I finker, is there heretical ideas or sometimes they're 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:11.360 just sort of quasi heretical, where individuals end up worshiping 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:14.080 a more female version of Christ in the same way 0:06:14.080 --> 0:06:17.400 that there are female depictions of the Buddha. Okay, so 0:06:17.440 --> 0:06:20.520 this is sort of a uh an effort to unify 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:24.279 right right and bring both sides to this right, and 0:06:24.320 --> 0:06:27.719 to focus more on feminine aspects in this case of 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:30.720 of Jesus and then to venerate those aspects as opposed 0:06:30.800 --> 0:06:33.920 to just bleeding man God on a tree kind of 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:36.080 a thing. It's a really fascinating accept because you get 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:39.479 into this whole interesting area of the wound of Christ, 0:06:39.960 --> 0:06:43.320 the spear wound, and how this spear wound is also 0:06:43.960 --> 0:06:49.640 kind of like a vagina. I mean, it's sorry, I'm 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:52.760 gonna be strong. That's not a big deal. Yeah, the 0:06:52.800 --> 0:06:55.719 wound is like vagina. Yeah, next time you see an 0:06:55.760 --> 0:06:58.960 image of doubting Thomas, think about that. Um. But moving 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:02.760 on side tangent there, But back to which is um 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:06.320 you were saying? Yeah, Erica doing that, she does. She 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:09.800 does explore the reasons why we have vilified, which is 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:12.080 throughout the ages, and one of the things that she 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:15.640 says really interesting is that women have always been the 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.960 bearers of life right, and we know historically women have 0:07:19.040 --> 0:07:22.640 been repressed on all sorts of different fronts. She also 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:26.200 says that as women gain power, they began to um 0:07:26.960 --> 0:07:30.480 to sort of be tamped down. And if you ascribe 0:07:30.640 --> 0:07:33.840 witchness to someone, or you put power in the light 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:37.840 of negativity, then what you're doing essentially is saying that 0:07:37.920 --> 0:07:42.440 not only is this person a life bringer, a life bear, 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:45.280 which is really powerful, but this person has the ability 0:07:45.320 --> 0:07:51.240 to bring death right through potions, magic, uh general dark shenanigans, 0:07:51.360 --> 0:07:54.280 right yeah, and if they're engaged in food preparation too. 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:57.160 I mean that's food can be the big life giver. 0:07:57.320 --> 0:07:59.520 But if it's if something's wrong with it, that if 0:07:59.520 --> 0:08:03.280 it becomes toxic in some way, shape or form, if 0:08:03.280 --> 0:08:06.880 something goes off, there's some sort of bacterial, uh infection, 0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:10.800 then it's a killer as well. That's right. That's why 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:12.640 you should always be kind to your server. Right. You 0:08:12.680 --> 0:08:14.320 never know what's going on in the kitchen. She might 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:16.320 be a witch. Yep, she might be a witch, or 0:08:16.360 --> 0:08:19.600 he might be right, yeah, a warlock. So it's gonna 0:08:19.600 --> 0:08:21.679 sound flipped to say this, but but all of a sudden, 0:08:21.720 --> 0:08:25.320 you've you've got something like a broom, which is becomes 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:28.480 really important, almost like a very high tech object in 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:30.920 the thirteenth century, right, which is interesting because I think 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:34.200 the broom is something we often discount as that very 0:08:34.280 --> 0:08:37.480 Halloween idea of a witch. Like you've got a you know, 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.000 there's like a kindergartener. Let's put a funny nose on her, 0:08:41.040 --> 0:08:43.400 paying her face screen, give her a broom, and she 0:08:43.440 --> 0:08:46.800 can start collecting candy, right, striped tights. Right there we go. 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:49.920 But I mean it is important to understand that this 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:53.040 really was a prized object at the home. When we 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:55.240 talk about the kitchen and who's preparing your food, we're 0:08:55.240 --> 0:08:57.760 also talking about the person who has you know, usually 0:08:57.760 --> 0:09:02.240 elaborately braided broom, a cauldron, right that may have been 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:06.080 passed down from generation to generation, and these objects start 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:12.479 to really gain importance that they are key feminine cultural artifacts. Yeah. Absolutely, 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:14.679 And so when you start to think about a witch, 0:09:14.760 --> 0:09:17.440 you start to think about brooms. It would make sense 0:09:17.480 --> 0:09:21.720 that somehow they would factor into the image of a witch. 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:25.440 But now you'll look at early typographs of which is 0:09:25.480 --> 0:09:30.240 and you'll often see some depictions of which is uh, 0:09:30.400 --> 0:09:34.480 quite naked on top of a stride, exceedingly naked. And 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:37.679 that's another thing that will Shakespeare. Um, well, no, I 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:39.120 don't know if they were naked, and that there was 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:40.720 any reference to the naked in the text. I'm thinking 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:45.320 of Roman Polanski's version of Matbeth, which is certainly naked, 0:09:45.360 --> 0:09:48.160 which is awesome and uh and has some really naked 0:09:48.200 --> 0:09:52.480 old witches and which I thought worked perfectly. But back 0:09:52.520 --> 0:09:55.439 to these old engravings and woodcuts where you see naked 0:09:55.440 --> 0:09:57.760 women flying around in the middle of the night talking 0:09:57.760 --> 0:10:02.880 with goats, riding goat, um, you know, in engaging with 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:05.240 the devil and in various way shapes and form right 0:10:05.360 --> 0:10:07.280 in terms of there's something to this right where if 0:10:07.320 --> 0:10:09.160 you scratch the surface a little bit, you'll find out 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:13.439 that the broom actually figures pretty prominently and in which 0:10:13.520 --> 0:10:16.920 is work. And let's just back up real quick. Um, yes, 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:19.960 the broom is the ultimate symbol of domesticity, but in 0:10:19.960 --> 0:10:22.400 the hands of which it can become this really potent 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:27.880 symbol of liberation. Right, And the more disenfranchised a person is, 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:30.400 the more that they might turn to magical thinking to 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:33.160 gain some sort of mastery over their situations. So let's 0:10:33.160 --> 0:10:35.760 look at it this way. Um. You know, maybe someone 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:40.679 wasn't necessarily a self proclaimed which, but perhaps they did 0:10:41.000 --> 0:10:43.839 uh dabble back of the day, you know, when we're 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:47.559 talking about this historical which in the thirteenth century in 0:10:47.760 --> 0:10:51.480 ointments because it was important for healing in ritual and 0:10:51.640 --> 0:10:54.320 magical spells, because this was a way to gain some 0:10:54.360 --> 0:10:56.960 sort of control over their lives. Right, But back to 0:10:57.040 --> 0:11:00.920 this broom. Yeah, there's kind of like two arresting ways 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:03.120 of looking at the power of the broom, one which 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:05.439 will discuss even more as of course, the magical thinking 0:11:05.480 --> 0:11:09.000 side of it. And then there's this whole ointment situation ointment, 0:11:10.160 --> 0:11:12.280 which you think is a gross word, but I do. 0:11:12.559 --> 0:11:14.800 And then and now we're about to really sort of 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:19.520 dive into the flying ointment here and talk about something 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:23.080 that's very interesting about the broom in the ointment. You 0:11:23.080 --> 0:11:24.680 want to you want to run with that, Okay, So 0:11:24.720 --> 0:11:26.800 there's this idea that which is they're flying around in 0:11:26.880 --> 0:11:29.640 broomsticks or they're flying around in a chair, but in 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:33.960 many of these tails and accusations, they are rubbing an 0:11:33.960 --> 0:11:39.640 ointment on the broom or chair first, which it's often 0:11:39.679 --> 0:11:41.880 glossed over generally when you it's not a part of 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:46.640 the Halloween costume. Um usually on a jar of ointment, 0:11:46.720 --> 0:11:50.320 excepting the costume. So they're taking this broom they're coating 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:53.440 it with with some sort of mysterious ointment that they've 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:57.360 brewed up, and then they're riding this this broomstick naked 0:11:57.760 --> 0:12:01.640 and just having a wonderful time doing it. So, I mean, 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:04.679 obviously that brings to mind some some various scenarios that 0:12:04.720 --> 0:12:07.000 could be taking place, and there's actually some real um 0:12:07.120 --> 0:12:08.800 some people put some real thought into this, and the 0:12:08.840 --> 0:12:12.560 idea that the ointment is in fact a drug or 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:17.280 has has a pharmaceutical or or or psychedelic properties and 0:12:17.960 --> 0:12:22.079 they are interacting with the ointment on the broom Yeah, 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:24.120 there are some pharmacologists who say, you know what, we 0:12:24.200 --> 0:12:26.160 think that this is actually what was happening, is that 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:31.120 these ointments were being made and applied um through the skin, 0:12:31.400 --> 0:12:36.120 basically applying a crazy pharmaceutical ointment to the genitals with 0:12:36.160 --> 0:12:40.120 a broomstick. Yes, yes, they probably said that on the 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:45.280 side applied gently to broomstick, then ride broomstick genitals first 0:12:45.360 --> 0:12:48.400 and gothic font And this is from the investigation of 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:52.040 Lady Alice Kepler in she was one of the first 0:12:52.080 --> 0:12:55.040 women to be accused of witchcraft in Ireland. We have 0:12:55.160 --> 0:12:58.360 this account quote in rifling the closet of a lady, 0:12:58.400 --> 0:13:01.520 they found a pipe of ointment, wherewith she greased a 0:13:01.640 --> 0:13:06.200 staff upon which she ambled and galloped through thick and thin. Okay, 0:13:06.840 --> 0:13:08.760 these are actual documents that they're pulling some some of 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:11.600 this stuff from, and not that we put tremendous amount 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:15.520 of stock in the prosecutions materials in witchcraft trials. I 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:18.120 mean they're no. Take that with a whole lot of salt. 0:13:18.240 --> 0:13:20.320 But who knows, like the idea that there could be 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:23.280 some shruded truth to this is fascinating. Okay, dig a 0:13:23.320 --> 0:13:25.000 little deeper. And this is from the Journal of the 0:13:25.000 --> 0:13:28.120 American Society of Anesthesiologists and a paper they called the 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:30.960 Legacy of a Tropos the fate who cut the thread 0:13:31.000 --> 0:13:33.560 of Life, which I think is really poetic for for 0:13:33.640 --> 0:13:36.560 a journal um. In the paper they describe a tone 0:13:36.559 --> 0:13:40.600 written by sixteenth century Dutch physician Johan we Are, who 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:43.680 concluded that a plant called henbane was a principal ingredient 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:47.160 in which is through along with deadly nightshade and man drake, 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:50.200 and according to where there were other ointments, but the 0:13:50.280 --> 0:13:52.400 essential ingredients remained the same in all of them, in 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:55.160 all the preparations. When they applied to the upper thighs 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:57.720 or general thills, it was said to induce the sensation 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:01.760 of rising into the air and flying. And by the way, 0:14:01.760 --> 0:14:06.000 by applying this to their skin and rather than taking 0:14:06.000 --> 0:14:09.360 it orallyy it was much more effective because then they 0:14:09.360 --> 0:14:11.960 didn't have to digest this and have obviously the sort 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:15.959 of stomach ailments that would accompany that. Right, So at 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:18.200 some point they figured out that hey, this is this 0:14:18.240 --> 0:14:20.280 is a pretty good way to get high. Well, it 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:23.960 kind of it's similar in a way to the way 0:14:24.200 --> 0:14:30.280 some medications are applied via suppository rather than taken orally. Yeah. 0:14:30.320 --> 0:14:32.720 And one of the dangerous with suppositories if you're taking 0:14:32.760 --> 0:14:35.760 some sort of illicit substances, of course, that you can't 0:14:35.840 --> 0:14:37.600 if you take to take it orally, you can get 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:42.080 you can become ill and vomited back up. But suppository 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:44.720 not so much. Yeah. And the people that were studying 0:14:44.720 --> 0:14:47.520 in these appointments, they weren't necessarily thinking that that which 0:14:47.560 --> 0:14:50.480 is at that time we're applying them and then actually 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:55.080 you know, taking flight. They understood this to have hallucinatory properties. 0:14:55.120 --> 0:14:58.200 Back in the sixteenth century, Francis Bacon even said the 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:02.040 witches themselves are imaginative. Believe oftentimes they do that which 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:05.160 they do, not transforming themselves into other bodies, not by 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:09.360 incantations or ceremonies, but by ointments and anointing themselves all over. 0:15:10.480 --> 0:15:14.120 So they had sort of an inkling there that yes, 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:18.720 they were transcending the experience, but not in physical body, 0:15:19.200 --> 0:15:23.720 not actually where they get together and have transcendental experiences 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:26.840 and not invite them in folk I know. Um. And 0:15:26.920 --> 0:15:29.400 this is interesting to the use of soot, which is 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:33.040 sort of alkaline would have enhanced the passage of organic 0:15:33.040 --> 0:15:36.240 basis because a weak alkaline environment would be sufficient to 0:15:36.280 --> 0:15:38.920 neutralize the positive ironic charge. This is again from that 0:15:39.040 --> 0:15:42.680 um and it's thesiolist journal. Uh. This is an effective 0:15:42.760 --> 0:15:47.160 ethnobotanical technique that may be seen with Peruvian cocoa tours 0:15:47.240 --> 0:15:50.040 who mix in their mouth the cocaine containing leaves with 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:53.440 alkaline centers to enhance uptake. And this is and this 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:56.000 is interesting and a topic will probably go into in 0:15:56.040 --> 0:15:59.240 greater detail in a future podcast. But this is by 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:01.880 far not the only, would not be the only situation 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:07.280 of individuals taking uh, some sort of psychedelic substance as 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:10.920 part of a ritual or or magical practice. Right, and 0:16:10.960 --> 0:16:13.240 you actually don't you have an article on licking frogs 0:16:13.800 --> 0:16:16.160 or am I thinking of something else? I have a pamphlet. 0:16:16.200 --> 0:16:17.480 It was handed to me on a by a guy 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:21.440 in the train, but I've I've been very trepidicious about 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:24.400 trying it out. There's some hallucinatory frogs that if you've looked, 0:16:24.840 --> 0:16:28.200 actually I think it's maybe the the the vom or 0:16:28.240 --> 0:16:31.440 something that they have that people can actually get high. 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:34.760 So obviously, through trial and error, over thousands of thousands 0:16:34.800 --> 0:16:38.600 of years people have figured out different properties and plants 0:16:38.600 --> 0:16:42.080 and animals and manipulated them. So it's not weird that 0:16:42.200 --> 0:16:44.120 someone would come up with an ointment. And it's not 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:48.040 weird that this person, the female and the family would 0:16:48.240 --> 0:16:51.000 um be the person to come up with these ointments, 0:16:51.280 --> 0:16:55.280 are mostly healing right and have a sort of power 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:58.280 in their household, maybe even in their village, as the 0:16:58.320 --> 0:17:01.479 go to person that has all these great little recipes 0:17:01.520 --> 0:17:04.479 that can make you feel a lot better, possibly make 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:08.199 you feel as though you are writing a broom. And 0:17:08.280 --> 0:17:11.240 let's also talk about that broom. I hate to sort 0:17:11.240 --> 0:17:13.840 of bring it up, but again, you know, why not 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:16.280 just apointment? Why have the broom? And I'm just going 0:17:16.320 --> 0:17:19.760 to point out that this perhaps was a a proto 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:27.000 sexual aid, So I'm gonna say old timey sex toy basically, yeah, 0:17:27.240 --> 0:17:28.960 now and uh, And I wonder if too, have like 0:17:29.040 --> 0:17:31.960 a going back vote from the from the side of 0:17:31.960 --> 0:17:35.639 of women, liberated women engaging in a certain activity and 0:17:35.680 --> 0:17:40.760 looking instead at um, really grumpy men deciding to crack 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:43.760 down on this and persecute women. Um. I wonder how 0:17:43.840 --> 0:17:46.159 much with the broom too, there's this idea of you 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:49.479 have defiled. And not only have you defiled yourself and 0:17:49.520 --> 0:17:52.040 your and your faith and all, but you've also defiled 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:56.800 this object which has um sympathetic and not sympathetic, oh yeah, 0:17:56.800 --> 0:18:01.280 sympathetic importance in the household and in the family and 0:18:01.400 --> 0:18:03.840 uh and also is a symbol of the status. And 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:09.520 you've somehow perverted this artifact. Well. Also, as we know, um, 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:14.359 the understanding of female sexuality certainly wasn't that complex or 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:16.639 nuanced back in the day, and some would argue that 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:19.800 today it's still Yeah, we just did the podcast. I've 0:18:19.800 --> 0:18:23.320 been dealt with the female orgasm. Obviously, we still scientists 0:18:23.320 --> 0:18:26.840 are still figuring out exactly what sexually human sexuality and 0:18:27.040 --> 0:18:29.199 female sexuality is all about. Yeah, And so for a 0:18:29.200 --> 0:18:34.280 woman to express sexuality, certainly during uh one period over another, 0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:37.040 depending on what was happening when the thirteenth century is 0:18:37.040 --> 0:18:40.159 opposed to the sixteenth century, Uh, they were certainly um 0:18:40.760 --> 0:18:44.600 iconic images and ideals to live up to. Yeah, I'll 0:18:44.600 --> 0:18:47.280 put it that way, right, So we discussed the ointment 0:18:47.320 --> 0:18:50.200 based importance of flying around on broomsticks and so forth. 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:52.959 But after this break, we're gonna really get into the 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:56.760 idea of magical thinking and how that enforces all these 0:18:56.760 --> 0:19:03.280 things we were talking about. All right, so we're back. Yeah, 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:06.560 we solved the broomstick problem here. Yeah, and I want 0:19:06.600 --> 0:19:08.959 to add one more thing about the broomstick. I couldn't 0:19:08.960 --> 0:19:11.320 help but be reminded of the Bobby the Babba yaga, 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:16.600 you know, the old Russian hag or witch or cannibalistic ogress, uh, 0:19:16.640 --> 0:19:20.520 you know, with the tusks for for teeth. Yeah, she 0:19:20.560 --> 0:19:23.000 also shows up in uh, there's a movie called Jack 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:26.800 Frost which mry sents theater three thousand dead years ago, 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:28.640 and it has the Bobby Yaga in it. So she's 0:19:28.720 --> 0:19:32.200 a really iconic character in Russian myth um. And she's 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:35.000 the witch. And she in addition to living in a 0:19:35.080 --> 0:19:39.159 hut that walks around on hin legs, she also flies 0:19:39.160 --> 0:19:42.320 through the air, sometimes in an iron kettle and sometimes 0:19:42.400 --> 0:19:45.800 in a mortar and pestle, which of course is the 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:49.480 you know, the the device for crushing up various herbs 0:19:49.720 --> 0:19:51.879 and what have you and making them into powders for 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:55.000 use in ointments, for use in uh you know, and 0:19:55.080 --> 0:19:57.480 you go to the pharmacist today and I mean that's 0:19:57.520 --> 0:20:00.920 the symbol of the craft. Yeah, And here are these 0:20:00.960 --> 0:20:04.439 these symbols of domesticity, right, that that are being harnessed 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:09.199 for for powerful goings on with witches, which I think 0:20:09.320 --> 0:20:12.719 is really interesting and really plays into this idea of 0:20:12.800 --> 0:20:15.880 the law of contagion, which is one of the two 0:20:15.960 --> 0:20:19.800 laws of sympathetic magic. Ya. Sympathetic magic is this very 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:22.240 old idea, the idea that if something I think we've 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:25.159 discussed this before. Okay, so I have a rubber dinosaur 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:26.879 in my hand, all right, it's true, and I have 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:30.480 touched this rubber dinosaur, right, and in touching it, I'm 0:20:30.520 --> 0:20:32.560 probably doing nothing more than getting some of my my 0:20:32.640 --> 0:20:36.359 skin oil on it or my fingerprints what have you ink? 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:41.040 From my hands? My hands are really disgusting. But but then, 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:42.480 but then when I when I set it down, the 0:20:42.560 --> 0:20:44.480 taint of my touch, that that will be the extent 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:46.560 of it. The idea of sympathetic magic is so that 0:20:46.600 --> 0:20:49.640 there's a there's an even greater taint that is applied 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:51.879 to this rubber dinosaur, and that that I have somehow 0:20:52.359 --> 0:20:55.560 imbued it with a sense of myself. You've transferred yourself 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:58.080 to this object. Yeah, And we continue to do this 0:20:58.119 --> 0:21:00.080 sort of thing today, I mean, just dealing with my 0:21:00.119 --> 0:21:03.119 own stuff I'm wearing my dad's watch that he died in. 0:21:03.440 --> 0:21:06.760 I'm not a logical believer in sympathetic magic, but I 0:21:06.800 --> 0:21:09.119 am sympathetic towards this object, and I have to a 0:21:09.200 --> 0:21:11.520 certain extent imbuted it with a sense of him on 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:13.159 some level, you know. So, I mean we all do 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:15.480 this kind of thing every day. Yeah, And we talked 0:21:15.520 --> 0:21:17.679 about this a little bit in the Science of Lucky Pants, 0:21:17.720 --> 0:21:20.479 and you know how we ascribe meaning to things, and 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:22.840 we think, if if I do this, or if I 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:26.280 take this, then you know something will happen. Or in 0:21:26.320 --> 0:21:28.639 the case of your father's watch, I mean, that's that 0:21:28.840 --> 0:21:32.200 is for you, a part of him. So it's interesting 0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:36.359 that we're all sort of hardwired to to have this 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:39.159 sort of symbolism in our lives, right, And I should 0:21:39.160 --> 0:21:40.920 mention I explained the watch. I didn't explain why I 0:21:40.920 --> 0:21:43.600 have a rubber dinosaur in my hand. And it's a 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:45.720 like a squeeze toy that I used to keep from 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:49.160 fidgeting too much while recording a podcast. Just to explain that, 0:21:49.320 --> 0:21:51.679 why why I have a rubber dinosaur on my person? 0:21:52.080 --> 0:21:54.600 It's true, he squeezes the heck out of it, and 0:21:54.680 --> 0:21:57.720