WEBVTT - SYMHC Classics: Three Hellhounds 0:00:02.440 --> 0:00:06.680 Happy Saturday after we name dropped the Rugaroo and are 0:00:06.720 --> 0:00:09.760 behind the scenes for our Werewolf of Bedburg episode. We 0:00:09.880 --> 0:00:13.079 are replaying our episode on Hellhounds, which is where the 0:00:13.160 --> 0:00:16.919 Rugaroo made a past appearance on the show. This originally 0:00:16.920 --> 0:00:20.000 came out on October twenty eighth, twenty twenty and if 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:22.360 you're listening to this episode on the day we publish it, 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:25.600 or even the day after, the rugaroofest that we mentioned 0:00:25.640 --> 0:00:28.280 at the end is going on right now. If that 0:00:28.360 --> 0:00:31.000 sounds fun and interesting. The place to get more information 0:00:31.240 --> 0:00:35.280 is still at Rugaroofest dot org. Who wouldn't want to 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:39.000 be in the New Orleans and Homa, Louisiana area right now, 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:45.960 but hopefully you'll check it out. Enjoy. Welcome to Stuff 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:55.840 You Missed in History Class, a production of iHeartRadio. Hello, 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:58.800 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Frye and I'm 0:00:58.800 --> 0:01:05.240 Tracy V. Wilson. Crazy. It's almost Halloween. I know it's 0:01:05.240 --> 0:01:07.800 the best week of the year, so this seems like 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:10.560 a really good time to talk about sort of a 0:01:10.640 --> 0:01:13.800 version of something that I think we've been tiptoeing around 0:01:13.800 --> 0:01:17.800 for a while, which is dogs, specifically demon dogs. I 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.520 swear I do want to do a domestication of dogs 0:01:20.520 --> 0:01:22.640 episode at some point, but there's a lot and they're 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:26.920 constantly finding new things, so I keep getting scared off. Yeah, 0:01:26.959 --> 0:01:30.240 and a weird coincidence. This morning, I tweeted something about 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:35.039 how basically needing to do an episode about something lighter, 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:37.440 even though my episodes lately have been pretty fun, just 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:39.720 because there's a lot of stress and chaos happening in 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:42.840 the world right now, and somebody replied that maybe we 0:01:42.880 --> 0:01:44.840 could do a history of puppies, and I'm like, this 0:01:44.959 --> 0:01:49.040 is almost that kind of and right, I want to 0:01:49.040 --> 0:01:51.360 acknowledge it. For some people, dogs are just scary. Not 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:54.800 everybody likes dogs, but there's a reason for that, right. 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:56.880 This is a fear that has been part of many 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:01.160 cultures for centuries, including dog from the nether World, which 0:02:01.200 --> 0:02:03.360 go all the way back to the three headed Cerberus 0:02:03.360 --> 0:02:06.000 who guarded the gates of the underworld in Greek mythology. 0:02:06.520 --> 0:02:08.720 But today, as we inch closer to Halloween, I thought 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:11.200 it would be fun to talk about three of the many, 0:02:11.240 --> 0:02:15.359 many supernatural canines and hell hounds that have lengthy histories 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:18.200 in our collective storytelling. And the first two of these 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:21.880 are very closely related. They're both based in England, and 0:02:21.960 --> 0:02:24.440 really the second of them makes up the bulk of 0:02:24.440 --> 0:02:28.359 the episode. Now the last one is a North American creature, 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:31.240 and it's just incredibly charming and fun. In my opinion, 0:02:31.919 --> 0:02:34.720 it's a little bit thematically different than the other two, 0:02:34.760 --> 0:02:36.760 but I thought it would be a good upbeat place 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:40.480 to land, particularly, you know, these are fraught times. It's 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:43.919 been a rough year. I love Halloween and creepiness and 0:02:44.000 --> 0:02:46.640 being scared as much as anyone, but gosh, it's also 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:49.160 great to laugh if we can, so we'll try for 0:02:49.200 --> 0:02:51.880 a little bit of that. And there are of course 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:55.760 loads more demon dog myths throughout the world, so odds 0:02:55.760 --> 0:02:57.840 are really really good that this is the start of 0:02:57.880 --> 0:03:01.360 a perhaps a Halloween series, and next Halloween will do 0:03:01.440 --> 0:03:05.200 more and perhaps more geographically and culturally varied. I have 0:03:05.280 --> 0:03:07.600 a list started already for that. But if you have 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:09.639 stuff you want to send us, you can do it. 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:12.360 But right now we're going to talk about some hell hounds. 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:15.880 Sounds like a potential Halloween version of Crampus and Friends, 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:20.200 which has been a winter holiday staple. That is kind 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:24.880 of the thinking nice. So first up is the bar 0:03:24.919 --> 0:03:29.560 gest the dog that is part of Northern England's folklore 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:34.680 tradition and is normally associated with Yorkshire, sometimes described as 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:38.080 a goblin or a ghost, and I wanted to mention 0:03:38.200 --> 0:03:41.080 the bar Guest in part because of an interesting coincidence 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:44.000 that happened recently on the show. So I was already 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:47.720 working on this episode for a while, and when I 0:03:47.760 --> 0:03:50.360 started working on our recent bram Stoker episode, I had 0:03:50.400 --> 0:03:53.160 already been kind of doing prelium work on this, and 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:55.760 then unexpectedly the bar Guest showed up while I was 0:03:55.840 --> 0:03:59.640 doing bram Stoker research. In that episode, we mentioned that 0:03:59.680 --> 0:04:02.400 a ship that had run aground near Whidby had served 0:04:02.400 --> 0:04:05.480 as the inspiration for the ship that transported Dracula from 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:08.760 Transylvania to London. And one of the details which we 0:04:08.880 --> 0:04:11.760 mentioned that was shared by locals with bram Stoker when 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:14.480 he was doing his research was that a black dog 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:17.279 had emerged from the hold of directship and run off, 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:20.159 and that dog was believed by some people in the 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:23.160 community to have been the bar guest. So the bar 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:26.400 Guest is described as a huge dog and its teeth 0:04:26.480 --> 0:04:30.080 are large and prominent. There are a couple of things 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:33.200 that set him apart from another so called hell hound 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:35.799 that we are about to talk about. The bar guest 0:04:35.920 --> 0:04:39.119 is not always described as being black. Sometimes he's gray. 0:04:39.279 --> 0:04:42.760 But beyond that, this dog sometimes is described as a 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:47.279 shape shifter, including sometimes appearing headless. If you see a 0:04:47.360 --> 0:04:49.920 bar guest, that means you are going to die soon. 0:04:50.440 --> 0:04:53.080 If you only catch a glimpse of it, your death 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:57.080 might take a little longer to arrive. Yeah, I feel 0:04:57.080 --> 0:05:00.560 like this would create a whole community of people that 0:05:00.680 --> 0:05:04.120 hear dog noise and clamp their eyes shut. But in 0:05:04.200 --> 0:05:06.720 terms of the written record, a lot of the more 0:05:06.760 --> 0:05:10.279 persistent qualities of the bar guest story and its legend 0:05:10.680 --> 0:05:13.400 seemed to come from the book Notes on the Folklore 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:16.400 of the Northern Counties of England and the Borders. That 0:05:16.480 --> 0:05:19.479 book was written by William Henderson in eighteen seventy nine, 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:23.120 and in this collection of folk tales that he kind 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:26.160 of gathered oral recollection from people and wrote it down, 0:05:26.720 --> 0:05:29.839 Henderson shares more details about the bar guest as a 0:05:29.880 --> 0:05:33.080 harbinger of death. So he writes, quote on the death 0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:36.320 of any person of local importance in the neighborhood, the 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:40.039 creature would come forth a large black dog with flaming 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:43.919 eyes as big as saucers, followed by all the dogs 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:47.600 of the place, howling and barking. If anyone came its way, 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:50.000 the bar guest would strike out with its paw and 0:05:50.080 --> 0:05:53.280 inflict on man or beast a wound which would never heal. 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:58.400 My informant, a Yorkshire gentleman lately deceased, said he perfectly 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:01.480 remembered the terror experienced when he was a child at 0:06:01.520 --> 0:06:05.640 beholding this procession before the death of a certain Squire 0:06:06.000 --> 0:06:10.320 Wade of new Grange. Henderson also put in writing some 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:13.599 details about the bar guests shape shifting that have persisted, 0:06:13.680 --> 0:06:17.840 writing quote, A friend informs me that glasen Zykes, near Darlington, 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:21.120 is haunted by a bar guest, which assumes at will 0:06:21.240 --> 0:06:24.239 the form of a headless man who disappears in flame, 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:29.400 a headless lady, a white cat, rabbit or dog, or 0:06:29.480 --> 0:06:33.560 a black dog. So many things. The bar guests can 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:38.320 be whatever it wants. The bar guest legend is popular 0:06:38.400 --> 0:06:40.800 enough that you might have bumped into it before if 0:06:40.839 --> 0:06:43.920 you've read Roald Dalls the Witches, or played the Witch 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:47.800 or video game or Forgotten Realms or Dungeons and Dragons, 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:51.240 or engaged with any number of other entertainment options you 0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:55.120 might have crossed paths with mentions of it. Yeah, I 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:57.080 think it comes up in the Lord of the Rings 0:06:57.120 --> 0:06:59.920 game online. The bar guest is everywhere part of it. 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:02.359 It's because it's just a fun word to say. But 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:04.560 the bar guest is also hardly the only hell dog 0:07:04.640 --> 0:07:07.760 of Great Britain. There have been many, many names for 0:07:07.960 --> 0:07:12.560 very similar beings. So there's the capaldweight, trash striker or 0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:16.320 shriker you'll sometimes see. There's the Welsh counanon and the 0:07:16.360 --> 0:07:20.520 Isle of Man's mouta d'Or. But perhaps the most famous 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:23.120 alternate to the bar guest name is the iteration of 0:07:23.120 --> 0:07:24.840 this English hell hound that we are going to talk 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:28.120 about next, and who actually started this episode because I 0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:33.080 love saying this name black shuck. Yes. So. In fifteen 0:07:33.120 --> 0:07:36.840 seventy seven, Abraham Fleming wrote an account of an event 0:07:37.000 --> 0:07:40.120 at the parish church in a town near Norwich that 0:07:40.680 --> 0:07:43.720 created a version of this English legend that still persists 0:07:43.800 --> 0:07:48.400 until today. That account was titled and just Buckle Up 0:07:48.520 --> 0:07:51.680 because it is one of the one of those one 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:53.720 of the titles we love so much. The title was 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:58.600 a strange and terrible wonder wrought very late in the 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:01.760 parish church of bon Game, a town of no great 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:05.320 distance from the city of Norwich, namely the fourth of 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:09.880 this August, in year of our Lord, fifteen seventy seven, 0:08:10.000 --> 0:08:13.920 in a great tempest of violent rain, lightning and thunder, 0:08:14.360 --> 0:08:18.240 the like whereof hath been seldom seen, with the appearance 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:22.520 of an horrible shaped things sensibly perceived of the people 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:26.320 then and there assembled drawn into a plain method according 0:08:26.360 --> 0:08:32.040 to the written copy by Abraham Fleming, in addition to 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:36.480 the length art, just all the delightful spellings that are 0:08:36.559 --> 0:08:39.520 coming on. I even cleaned that up a little bit 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:41.800 to make it easier. We've taught. We did our whole 0:08:41.800 --> 0:08:45.720 episode about you know, grammar and spelling and how things evolve. 0:08:45.880 --> 0:08:51.720 And this is a case where Fleming had his own flourish, 0:08:52.280 --> 0:08:56.520 particularly when it came to vowels. There's actually some comparative 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.800 writing in other pieces where people are trying to f 0:09:00.080 --> 0:09:02.079 you're out if it's Fleming and they start talking about 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:04.720 he kind of does that same weird spelling here. This 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:08.760 might be the same right here, because those things were 0:09:08.800 --> 0:09:12.360 not codified yet. So this pamphlet with that incredibly long 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:15.640 name actually tells the tale of two appearances of a 0:09:15.720 --> 0:09:18.840 large black dog The first is at Saint Mary's Church 0:09:18.840 --> 0:09:21.920 in Bongay on a day during services when there was 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:25.320 an intense thunderstorm, and in the pamphlet it is written 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:28.480 that the quote whole church was so darkened yeay, with 0:09:28.520 --> 0:09:32.720 such palpable darkness that one person could not perceive another. 0:09:33.400 --> 0:09:36.920 Then during this storm their quote appeared in a most 0:09:36.960 --> 0:09:41.200 horrible similitude and likeness, a dog of a black color. 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:45.160 This dog, according to Fleming's story, was so terrifying that 0:09:45.240 --> 0:09:49.080 it made the parishioners think that Doomsday had arrived. The 0:09:49.120 --> 0:09:51.720 dog ran between two people who were praying and wrung 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:54.640 both of their necks, but killed them while they were praying. 0:09:55.240 --> 0:09:59.240 The dog also bit another man, leaving scorch marks. That 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:03.120 man survived. The steeple of the church was struck by lightning, 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:07.400 and the mysterious dog disappeared, leaving behind only claw marks 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:09.960 in the pavers and the door of the church. But 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:13.120 this was, as we mentioned, only one church that experienced 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:17.400 a terrifying canine visit that day. The dog also appeared 0:10:17.440 --> 0:10:20.800 at Holy Trinity Church about seven miles away in a 0:10:20.840 --> 0:10:25.600 town called Blitheburg. Fleming described it this way, quote the 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:29.080 like thing entered in the same shape and similitude, where 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:33.040 placing himself on a main bulk or beam, whereon sometime 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:37.400 the rude did stand. Suddenly he gave a swing down 0:10:37.440 --> 0:10:40.640 through the church, and there also, as before, slew two 0:10:40.880 --> 0:10:44.360 men and a lad, and burned the hand of another 0:10:44.400 --> 0:10:46.880 person that was among the rest of the company, of 0:10:46.920 --> 0:10:52.480 whom divers were blasted. This mischief thus wrought, he flew 0:10:52.600 --> 0:10:56.359 with wonderful force to not little fear of the assembly 0:10:56.559 --> 0:11:00.800 out of the church in a hideous and hellish likeness. Yeah. 0:11:00.840 --> 0:11:04.720 So in both cases, giant, terrifying black dog arrives, kills 0:11:04.760 --> 0:11:08.440 a couple of people, injures some others, and vanishes. And 0:11:08.480 --> 0:11:10.360 we're going to talk about the way that this story 0:11:10.400 --> 0:11:12.439 took on a life of its own in just a moment. 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:14.800 But first we will pause and have a sponsor break. 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:27.400 Fleming's write up about the fiendish dog who attacked the 0:11:27.480 --> 0:11:30.240 churches is the start of a century's long tradition of 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:33.959 stories about that dog, who was eventually named black Shuck 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:36.000 as the story was passed down. We'll talk about the 0:11:36.040 --> 0:11:38.160 first time that name appears in writing in a moment. 0:11:38.880 --> 0:11:41.200 When Fleming wrote this account, he was an editor and 0:11:41.280 --> 0:11:45.000 publisher who went on to become an ordained minister. And 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:47.240 this document, which has come to be known sort of 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:50.480 casually as the Wonder Pamphlet, is just as much a 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:53.280 sermon as it is a report of a dog attack. 0:11:53.679 --> 0:11:57.439 It includes passages early on in it about this whole 0:11:57.480 --> 0:12:01.320 thing being a warning not to stray from fate. He wrote, quote, 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:05.199 God warneth by signs from heaven, by fiery appearances from 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:09.280 the air, by wonders wrought on earth, strange and unusual. 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:12.600 There is also language in the pamphlet about how man 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:15.959 has engaged in all manner of ungodly behaviors, and then 0:12:15.960 --> 0:12:19.200 it tells these dog stories, and then it concludes with 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:22.640 a prayer. So this appears to be a scenario where 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:27.080 Fleming is reporting these events based on news that someone 0:12:27.080 --> 0:12:29.640 else had relayed to him for when there's no way 0:12:29.679 --> 0:12:32.760 he could have been in both of those churches where 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:36.360 the appearances happened one after the other for another. His 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:39.920 first printing of the Wonder Pamphlet, and the detail of 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.680 the church door being marked by the beast's clause was 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:46.800 attributed to the wrong location, and he corrected it later 0:12:46.840 --> 0:12:51.600 on in subsequent printings. Because Fleming later became a minister. 0:12:51.800 --> 0:12:54.160 It seems that when people have referenced his work, there's 0:12:54.200 --> 0:12:58.280 been some timeline confusion, and they characterized the writer as 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:01.000 a clergyman who was working at one of these churches 0:13:01.040 --> 0:13:04.120 where it allegedly happened. He was not a clergyman at 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:07.679 all yet at the time, definitely not one working at 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:11.120 one of these churches. No, he was a publishing man 0:13:11.160 --> 0:13:15.200 living in London. What did happen though, was that this 0:13:15.320 --> 0:13:19.880 pamphlet was put into circulation very soon after the thunderstorm 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:22.320 of August fourth, fifteen seventy seven, which was a real 0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:26.200 thunderstorm that's documented. I mean, it was a very popular pamphlet. 0:13:26.280 --> 0:13:28.640 It seems a lot of people believed those stories in 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:32.479 it about the dog attacks, and while still working in publishing, 0:13:32.520 --> 0:13:35.840 so before he became ordained, Fleming had the second part 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:39.480 of this story published in the Holland Shed Chronicles, with 0:13:39.640 --> 0:13:42.520 one notable exception which we'll talk about in just a moment, 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:46.720 so for context. Holland Shed's Chronicles was a large collaborative 0:13:46.800 --> 0:13:49.800 history of the British Isles that was initiated as a 0:13:49.840 --> 0:13:53.120 project by printer Rayner Wolf in the late fifteen forties. 0:13:53.600 --> 0:13:57.199 The multi volume work was first published in fifteen seventy seven. 0:13:57.600 --> 0:14:00.800 Then in fifteen eighty seven a much and an update 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:04.200 was published under the stewardship of Abraham Fleming. So even 0:14:04.240 --> 0:14:07.960 a decade after this first writing, Fleming was still writing 0:14:08.000 --> 0:14:11.920 about that thunderstorm. Additionally, by this point Fleming had plenty 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:15.120 of clout he was considered an expert on that particular storm. 0:14:15.679 --> 0:14:19.880 Hollandshed's Chronicles was considered an important source of historical information, 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:22.960 and it was famously used as a source by writers 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:26.520 like Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare. So you might think 0:14:26.600 --> 0:14:29.480 that the inclusion of the black dog story in this 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:32.400 chronicle is really going to cement it as sort of 0:14:32.400 --> 0:14:35.760 settled history at the time, But in fact there is 0:14:35.920 --> 0:14:39.400 no mention of the dog in this account. So this 0:14:39.480 --> 0:14:43.640 is the version as it appears in Hollandshed's On Sunday, 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:45.960 the fourth of August, between the hours of nine and 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:49.200 ten o'clock in the forenoon, whilst the minister was reading 0:14:49.280 --> 0:14:52.480 of the Second Lesson in the parish church of Blithsburg, 0:14:52.560 --> 0:14:55.560 a town in Suffolk, a strange and terrible tempest of 0:14:55.640 --> 0:14:59.000 lightning and thunder strike through the wall of the same 0:14:59.120 --> 0:15:02.600 church into the around a yard deep, drove down all 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:06.280 the people on that side above twenty persons, then renting 0:15:06.320 --> 0:15:08.920 the wall up to the vestra, cleft the door, and 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:12.720 returning to the steeple, rent the timber, break the chimes, 0:15:12.800 --> 0:15:16.120 and fled toward Bongay, a town six miles off. The 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:19.080 people that were stricken down were found groveling more than 0:15:19.120 --> 0:15:22.160 half an hour after, whereof one man more than forty 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:25.320 years and a boy of fifteen years were found stark dead. 0:15:25.560 --> 0:15:29.200 The other were scorched. The same or like flash of 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.280 lightning and cracks of thunder that rent the parish church 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:35.760 of Bongay, nine miles from Norwich, rung as under the 0:15:35.760 --> 0:15:38.640 wires and wheels of the clocks, and slew two men 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:41.240 which sat in the belfry when the other were at 0:15:41.240 --> 0:15:45.360 the procession of suffrages, and scorched another which hardly escaped. 0:15:45.920 --> 0:15:49.600 So it's interesting that the deaths and injuries are mentioned here, 0:15:50.120 --> 0:15:53.360 but they're attributed simply to lightning strikes and not the 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.840 sudden appearance of a hellish dog. And there are records 0:15:56.840 --> 0:16:00.520 that indicate that those deaths and injuries did in fact happen. 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:03.880 I mean, it's totally within the realm of possibility that 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:06.960 if lightning strikes the steeple of a church, people inside 0:16:07.000 --> 0:16:11.280 may be killed, but there's just no reference at all 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:15.280 to a dog causing them, So maybe the decision was 0:16:15.280 --> 0:16:18.720 made to remove that flourish of the Hellish canine In 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:22.800 later years, and again going to the church records, there 0:16:22.920 --> 0:16:25.480 is a mention that there was a payment made to 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:29.920 a professional dog whipper named John Hines quote for whipping 0:16:30.000 --> 0:16:33.160 dogs out of the church at prayer time on the 0:16:33.240 --> 0:16:36.240 day of the storm. This was actually a profession. People 0:16:36.240 --> 0:16:38.840 would bring their dogs and sometimes the dogs would get unruly, 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:41.440 and they would keep professional dog whippers on hand. This 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:43.760 sounds horrible and I don't like it, but they would 0:16:43.800 --> 0:16:45.440 get the dogs out of the church so that the 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:48.920 proceedings could go on. So it's possible that the original 0:16:48.920 --> 0:16:52.680 write up of the story, again probably relayed to Fleming 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:56.640 by someone else not witnessed by him, conflated some events, 0:16:56.880 --> 0:16:59.160 that there was an unruly dog in the church that 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:03.040 had to be forcibly removed, and that separately lightning strikes 0:17:03.120 --> 0:17:07.119 killed several people and injured others. Despite that change in 0:17:07.160 --> 0:17:09.879 the later version of the story that Fleming edited the 0:17:10.000 --> 0:17:13.120 legend of the Suffolk appearances of the dog, which might 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:16.800 have been a demon, was established, and that story persisted. 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:19.479 So to be clear, this was certainly not the first 0:17:19.560 --> 0:17:22.960 account in England of a terrifying black dog that was 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:26.800 characterized as supernatural. Dating back to some time between the 0:17:26.840 --> 0:17:30.760 eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Anglo Saxon Chronicle included the 0:17:30.800 --> 0:17:34.760 sighting by multiple witnesses of a pack of black dogs 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:39.680 quote with eyes like saucers and horrible running through the woods. 0:17:40.240 --> 0:17:42.880 In this case, the dogs weren't alone, but they appeared 0:17:42.920 --> 0:17:46.840 to be on a hunt that was led by mysterious men. Yes, 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:50.919 that's another version of the story, these wild hunts. So 0:17:51.000 --> 0:17:54.040 the name black shuck first appeared in the eighteen hundreds, 0:17:54.160 --> 0:17:56.520 and then it seems to have been applied retroactively to 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:59.199 a lot of these stories. It first came up in 0:17:59.240 --> 0:18:02.080 writing by Red and E. S. Taylor in eighteen fifty, 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:05.119 and he wrote about it in the periodical Notes and Queries, 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:10.000 Quote this phantom. I have heard many persons in East 0:18:10.000 --> 0:18:14.040 Norfolk and even Cambridgeshire described as having seen a black, 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:18.479 shaggy dog with fiery eyes and of immense size, and 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:22.760 who visits churchyards at midnight. One witness nearly fainted away 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:25.480 at seeing it, and on bringing his neighbors to see 0:18:25.520 --> 0:18:27.840 the place where he saw it, he found a large 0:18:27.880 --> 0:18:33.200 spot as if gunpowder had been exploded. There. A laine 0:18:33.320 --> 0:18:36.800 in the parish of Overstrand is said is called after 0:18:36.880 --> 0:18:40.240 him Shuck's Lane. The name appears to be a corruption 0:18:40.440 --> 0:18:44.119 of shag as Shucky is the Norfolk dialect for shaggy. 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:47.560 Is not this a vestige of the German dog fiend? 0:18:47.960 --> 0:18:51.280 The other frequently cited mention of black Shuck is one 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:54.280 that was written in nineteen oh one, and this time 0:18:54.359 --> 0:18:57.280 the legend kind of gets another upgrade this go around, 0:18:57.280 --> 0:19:00.520 in the form of black Shuck's appearance being important of death. 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:03.800 Our guest had been associated with as a death porton, 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:05.719 but this is where black Shuck kind of comes in 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:10.639 with that same association. This was written by William Dutt 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:13.639 in a book that was titled Highways and Byways in 0:19:13.720 --> 0:19:16.640 East Anglia. And this is kind of a lengthy excerpt, 0:19:16.680 --> 0:19:18.480 so because I want to include all of the ways 0:19:18.520 --> 0:19:21.359 that he kind of solidifies this legend. So Tracy and 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:23.280 I are going to take turns with it. So it 0:19:23.400 --> 0:19:26.359 starts quote, if this were a stormy night instead of 0:19:26.359 --> 0:19:29.520 a stormy day, the old fisherfolk of the coast would 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:31.919 say it were just the time for black Shuck to 0:19:31.920 --> 0:19:35.120 be abroad, for he revels in the roaring of the waves, 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:38.360 and loves to raise his awful voice above the howling 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:41.240 of the gale. He takes the form of a huge 0:19:41.280 --> 0:19:46.520 black dog and prowls along dark lanes and lonesome field footpaths, 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:50.159 where although his howling makes the hearers blood run cold, 0:19:50.480 --> 0:19:54.040 his footfalls make no sound. That's such a great turn 0:19:54.080 --> 0:19:58.800 of phrase. This passage goes on. You may know him 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:01.880 at once, should you see him by his fiery eye. 0:20:02.280 --> 0:20:05.199 He has but one, and that, like the cyclops, is 0:20:05.200 --> 0:20:08.160 in the middle of his head. But such an encounter 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:11.000 might bring you the worst of luck. It is said 0:20:11.040 --> 0:20:13.200 that to meet him is to be warned that your 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:15.840 death will occur before the end of the year. So 0:20:15.920 --> 0:20:19.080 this ends quote. So you will do well to shut 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:21.800 your eyes if you hear him howling. Shut them, even 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:24.560 if you are uncertain whether it is the dog fiend 0:20:24.640 --> 0:20:27.159 or the voice of the wind you hear. Should you 0:20:27.240 --> 0:20:30.440 never set eyes on our norfolk snarl yaw, you may 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:34.800 perhaps doubt his existence, And like other learned folks tell 0:20:34.880 --> 0:20:38.359 us that his story is nothing but the old Scandinavian 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:41.439 myth of the black Hound of Odin, brought to us 0:20:41.480 --> 0:20:44.199 by the Vikings who long ago settled down on the 0:20:44.240 --> 0:20:48.240 Norfolk coast. Scoffers at black Shuck there have been in plenty, 0:20:48.359 --> 0:20:50.760 but now and again one of them has come home 0:20:50.920 --> 0:20:54.360 late on a dark stormy night, with terror written large 0:20:54.400 --> 0:20:57.400 on his ashen face, and after that night he has 0:20:57.480 --> 0:21:02.040 scoffed no more. Such a good little write up. As 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:04.960 the years have gone on, things have kind of reached 0:21:04.960 --> 0:21:06.760 a point, or at this point, you could go to 0:21:06.840 --> 0:21:09.720 any number of towns and communities in England and find 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:13.760 an assortment of location specific sightings of black Shuck that 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:16.520 are part of local lore. Just kind of scrolling around 0:21:16.560 --> 0:21:19.480 through the Internet, I found so many that are, like, yes, 0:21:19.640 --> 0:21:22.359 black Shuck visits this one bridge in our town, every 0:21:22.600 --> 0:21:25.439 you know, fortnite or whatever, Like every town seems to 0:21:25.480 --> 0:21:28.040 have some variation of it. Coming up, we will talk 0:21:28.080 --> 0:21:31.600 about some modern developments of the black Shuck legend, but 0:21:31.680 --> 0:21:33.680 first we will hear from some of the sponsors that 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:45.160 keep Stuffy missed in history class going. There are, as 0:21:45.160 --> 0:21:48.240 we mentioned before the break, some interesting modern events in 0:21:48.280 --> 0:21:51.240 the Black Shuck story, including one that started in twenty 0:21:51.280 --> 0:21:55.399 fourteen with the announcement of an archaeological find. Now this 0:21:55.520 --> 0:21:58.320 news broke via the UK paper The Daily Mail, which 0:21:58.359 --> 0:22:02.080 is known to publish some less carefully vetted stories. On 0:22:02.119 --> 0:22:05.159 May fifteenth, twenty fourteen, it ran a story with the 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:09.399 headline is this the skeleton of legendary devil dog black Shuck, 0:22:09.440 --> 0:22:14.359 who terrorized sixteenth century East Anglia. Folklore tells of seven 0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:19.080 foot hellhound with flaming eyes. I was curious and I 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:21.159 went to see if we had talked about this in 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:26.440 the twenty fourteen edition of Unearthed. We had not, probably 0:22:26.480 --> 0:22:31.280 because I don't source Unearthed from the Daily Mail. I 0:22:31.400 --> 0:22:33.240 checked as well, and I was I had the exact 0:22:33.280 --> 0:22:35.560 same thought process. It's like this would never show up 0:22:35.560 --> 0:22:39.480 in Tracy's notes. So this story leads the reader to 0:22:39.520 --> 0:22:43.359 the possibility that this archaeology team may have found the 0:22:43.400 --> 0:22:48.440 remains of this legendary hellhound. It includes the following text quote. 0:22:48.600 --> 0:22:51.360 It was discovered a few miles from two churches where 0:22:51.440 --> 0:22:55.040 black Shuck is said to have killed worshippers during an 0:22:55.080 --> 0:22:59.119 almighty thunderstorm in August fifteen, seventy seven. What's more, it 0:22:59.160 --> 0:23:02.200 appears to have been in a shallow grave at precisely 0:23:02.240 --> 0:23:04.640 the same time as Shuck is said to have been 0:23:04.760 --> 0:23:08.679 on the loose, primarily around Suffolk and the East Anglia region. 0:23:09.680 --> 0:23:12.480 This article then goes on to mention that testing of 0:23:12.520 --> 0:23:15.119