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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to

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Speaker 1: the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much

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Speaker 1: for tuning in. Let's hear from the man, the myth

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Speaker 1: legend super producer, mister Max Williams.

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Speaker 2: Max, and there was Max Max Max Max Max.

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Speaker 1: I am Ben Bullen. You are Noel Brown and this

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Speaker 1: is ah. This is a fun one for us because

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Speaker 1: I think in over the years we've both been fascinated

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Speaker 1: with this weird idea, this very particular kind of book.

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Speaker 3: Well, shout out to Stuff you Missed in History Class,

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Speaker 3: a show that I long was the producer for when

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Speaker 3: I first started at how Stuff Works back in the day,

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Speaker 3: and they were the first ones that ever mentioned the

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Speaker 3: Voyage manuscript and this codek Seraphonia and things like the

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Speaker 3: anti Kisthera mechanism. You know a lot of these sort

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Speaker 3: of like is it isn't it real?

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Speaker 2: Kind of things you know.

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Speaker 3: Throughout history that are is it an elaborate prank? Was

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Speaker 3: it just drummed up by some really creative individual and

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Speaker 3: then thrown out there into the world for people to

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Speaker 3: figure it out for themselves.

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Speaker 2: We're gonna talk about all of those things today.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is something that we've always found fascinating and strange.

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Speaker 1: As you said, Nola, a number of shows. The best

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Speaker 1: way to start with this is just books. Books are

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Speaker 1: so cool. If you think about it, they're like a

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Speaker 1: kind of time machine. They're almost like necromancy because a

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Speaker 1: dead author is speaking directly to you. If you could

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Speaker 1: understand a book, you're traveling into a distant place and time.

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Speaker 1: And I think, honestly, I was talking about this with

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Speaker 1: our friends at Daily Seitgeist. I think hearing an audiobook

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Speaker 1: is just as valid as reading one. I think it's

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Speaker 1: the same thing.

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Speaker 3: Well, I think some people just have different modalities of

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Speaker 3: learning and absorbing information that work for them. Like our

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Speaker 3: dear friend of the show, Lauren Vogelbaum, says, audio just

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Speaker 3: does not grab them. When I say grab, I don't

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Speaker 3: mean like, oh that this isn't like interesting. It literally

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Speaker 3: doesn't retain that. She doesn't retain the information. It doesn't connect,

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Speaker 3: whereas me, I listen to almost all of my research,

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Speaker 3: you know, whether it be I like to do YouTube.

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Speaker 3: I have this app called Speechify where you can copy

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Speaker 3: and paste text or type text and it'll kind of

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Speaker 3: read it to you. That way, I can like go

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Speaker 3: through it five or six times while I'm also kind

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Speaker 3: of reading other stuff, and I just find it to

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Speaker 3: be a really good bang for the bucks. So while

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Speaker 3: I have not physically read a book, and I'm not

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Speaker 3: going to lie a couple of years, I consume so

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Speaker 3: much text in literature, probably more than I ever have

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Speaker 3: in my life.

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Speaker 1: And this is the This is all well and good, folks,

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Speaker 1: as long as you can understand what's being said. I

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Speaker 1: think that's a good point about modalities. This is where

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Speaker 1: we get to the ridiculous history for today. It turns

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Speaker 1: out there are some books you literally cannot read, and

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Speaker 1: that is by design.

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Speaker 2: This is where we uh.

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Speaker 1: This is where we introduce something you had just mentioned

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Speaker 1: the Kodex. Is Sarah Finanius or am I saying that correctly?

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Speaker 2: It's weird copy of it? Sarah Sarah Fininan.

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Speaker 3: Oh my god, I've kind of got an anus there

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Speaker 3: at the end. Sarah Faninianus, Yes, there we go that

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Speaker 3: literally try to pronounce Sarah Phineus too, And I think

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Speaker 3: I've been saying it wrong for lo these many years.

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Speaker 3: I think with this book especially, we have a little

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Speaker 3: bit of latitude.

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Speaker 2: I think it would appreciate us. Yeah, it's like it.

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Speaker 3: Because when you say books you can't read, we're not

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Speaker 3: talking because they've been banned or they've been taken out

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Speaker 3: of the spot, you know, right, No, it is because

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Speaker 3: by design they are incomprehensible.

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Speaker 1: The name of the codex literally translates to Seraphini's book.

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Speaker 1: It's named after the really interesting author, Luigi Serafini. All right,

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Speaker 1: it is a really recent book. It was published in

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighty one.

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Speaker 2: He got a copy here.

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Speaker 1: It is an encyclopedia about a world that doesn't exist.

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Speaker 1: You can find it on archive dot org if you

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Speaker 1: want to read an electronic version. But it's just it's

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Speaker 1: neat and it looks like an actual dictionary or encyclopedia.

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Speaker 1: It has a consistent script. The author, Luigi Seraphina, he

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Speaker 1: drew everything, he made up the alphabet, He wrote the

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Speaker 1: whole thing, if you could call it writing. It took

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Speaker 1: him years to complete the project, and it is it

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Speaker 1: appears completely nonsensical.

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Speaker 2: I'll tell you. It reminds me a lot.

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Speaker 3: If there are any gamers out there, I need to get

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Speaker 3: back into it. But I started to kind of diping

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Speaker 3: my toe in a game called No Man's Sky. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 3: that has this world, these worlds you kind of you know,

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Speaker 3: it's basically like a you could call it an RPG,

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Speaker 3: but it's a little light on the you know, the

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Speaker 3: story aspects of it. It's more about just interacting with

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Speaker 3: the world and kind of like mining for materials and

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Speaker 3: even that, it's it's a very meditative and beautiful and

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Speaker 3: Brian you know esque ambient music. But there are all

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Speaker 3: of these plants and animals and and all kinds of

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Speaker 3: other things that exist within this, like you know, biome

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Speaker 3: of the game that very much have similar vibes to

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Speaker 3: the type of imagery found in the Codex. And also

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Speaker 3: there are alien languages that you have to scan and

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Speaker 3: kind of like interpret and all of this stuff. And

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Speaker 3: I just love this level of world building, and I

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Speaker 3: know that we all do. But I think what Luigi

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Speaker 3: has accomplished here as an artist and designer is obviously

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Speaker 3: so good that it freaked some people out a little bit.

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Speaker 3: And then this has been in among discussions around like

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Speaker 3: lost homes or the lost worlds like Atlantis or something

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Speaker 3: like that, you know exactly.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and this mystery is completely created on purpose by Luigi.

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Speaker 1: He is not trying to pull the wool over anybody's eyes.

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Speaker 1: He strikes me actually is a really cool kind of

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Speaker 1: counterculture dude.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: He was born in Rome, Italy, in nineteen forty nine.

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Speaker 1: He's still alive today. And one thing that I think

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Speaker 1: cracks this dude up is you'll still find conspiratorial allegations

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Speaker 1: about the codex, and then he'll in any interview he'll say,

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Speaker 1: you know, I'm here, you can just ask me. I'm

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Speaker 1: not like, you know, some secretive Illuminati skull and bones

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Speaker 1: type guy.

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Speaker 3: He's kind of very hippie. I'm sure you found this

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Speaker 3: as well, Ben, But there's a real cool interview on

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Speaker 3: Wired Yes with him. And again, when you look at

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Speaker 3: the thing, it just feels like this sort of weirdly

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Speaker 3: sacred almost kind of text that's like not It's like

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Speaker 3: you're looking at something you're not supposed to be looking at,

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Speaker 3: you know, right, And to have the creator of this

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Speaker 3: like answering questions on a blog just feels very strange

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Speaker 3: and wonderful.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he's he.

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Speaker 1: Seems like a delightful guy. He does a lot of

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Speaker 1: other stuff. He's one of those you know, we all

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Speaker 1: have friends like this, and I think the three of

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Speaker 1: us are similar to a degree with Luigi. He doesn't

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Speaker 1: just write books. He also is a sculptor and architect.

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Speaker 1: He has made costumes for the ballet. And there's this always,

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Speaker 1: there's this consistent fascination with what we call meta language

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Speaker 1: language about language, and the codex just sort of an

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Speaker 1: extension of this. Nobody can read it, including Luigi, including

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Speaker 1: the author. He has said multiple times on record, Yes,

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Speaker 1: I wanted it to appear like a consistent alphabet, like

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Speaker 1: a real language, but it has no real meaning, which

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Speaker 1: is where we learned the fancy word for language without meaning,

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Speaker 1: a semic absence of semantic meaning.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think, you know, maybe I'm overstating the case,

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Speaker 3: and I don't know, maybe you'll you'll have more of

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Speaker 3: a recollection of this than me. But that there was

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Speaker 3: a time where some people, I'm sure anytime someone's presented

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Speaker 3: with something fascinating and bizarre like this, there will be

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Speaker 3: some that might not do their homework and be like.

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Speaker 2: What is this mystical historical tome?

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Speaker 3: But was there kind of a little microculture of folks

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Speaker 3: that believed in this to some agree or thought this

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Speaker 3: was an artifact. Okay, maybe I don't know, tell us

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Speaker 3: a little bit about what you've come up with on

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Speaker 3: that front.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, especially in the pre internet days, people we

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Speaker 1: have to realize people would encounter this book, which was

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Speaker 1: very rare before it had reprints. Only five thousand were

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Speaker 1: made in the first edition in nineteen eighty one, and

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Speaker 1: they were super They were like uber expensive, very pricey.

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Speaker 1: So if you happened upon one of these rare books,

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Speaker 1: you would naturally have a lot of questions. And even

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Speaker 1: the you know RESOLDI the publisher is the publishing company

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Speaker 1: is run by Well when he was alive. He's very strange,

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Speaker 1: singular Italian aristocrat who is pretty mysterious. His other great

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Speaker 1: achievement instead of in addition to publishing crazy fancy books,

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Speaker 1: was having the world's largest hedge maze on his estate

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Speaker 1: that tracks it's both Nola Amax looked at the camera

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Speaker 1: and just nodded like, yeah, that makes sense, hedge mays.

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Speaker 2: The weird books.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, so it was not infrequent that there would

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Speaker 1: be people, especially again the day's pre Internet was tougher,

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Speaker 1: when it was a little more difficult to fact check.

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Speaker 1: There would be people who just found this book and

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Speaker 1: were convinced that it was a real language. They just

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Speaker 1: happened not to know the language. There were even people

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Speaker 1: who got more fanciful and said, you know, I've tried

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Speaker 1: figuring out where this book came from, and I can't

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Speaker 1: find it. It must be from another world, despite the

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Speaker 1: fact that it is clearly a book printed in Italy.

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Speaker 2: I gotta wonder too.

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Speaker 3: But I mean, you know, typically the more working class

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Speaker 3: amongst us, I guess don't really have hedge mazes. I

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Speaker 3: also don't see this as being a particularly big money

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Speaker 3: making endeavor, with how few copies were in print, and

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Speaker 3: it seemed to be more of an art project than

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Speaker 3: some kind of get rich quick scheme. Obviously a lot

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Speaker 3: of love and attention. One of this where is this

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Speaker 3: guy's money coming from? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: The publisher Franco Maria Ricci or Ricci like Christina Ricci is. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he he definitely comes from. I got the sense he

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Speaker 1: comes from a sort of blue blood backgrounds. He also

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Speaker 1: published this incredibly fancy magazine called fm R, which are

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Speaker 1: his initials, But he was definitely an upper end kind

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Speaker 1: of dude. It's you know, as you said, a working

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Speaker 1: class person doesn't usually decide to publish encyclopedia about a

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Speaker 1: made up world.

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Speaker 3: Well, it's interesting too, because you know, this doesn't This

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Speaker 3: strikes me as the kind of thing that is much

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Speaker 3: more of like a passion project than it is even

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Speaker 3: really being that concerned with making sure. You don't usually

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Speaker 3: get to do that kind of stuff unless you're already

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Speaker 3: kind of set. You know, this is not a Harry

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Speaker 3: Potter book world. This is meant to be head scratchy

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Speaker 3: and to create many more questions than answer absolutely.

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Speaker 1: And one of the questions that we kind of ask

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Speaker 1: or we can get to at the end is as

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Speaker 1: more people learned the true story of the codex, which

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Speaker 1: again Luigi had never tried to hide, more people said, hmmm,

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Speaker 1: is this guy on drugs? And when you look at

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Speaker 1: the when you look at the illustrations, you can see

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Speaker 1: why people would ask that these are very weird. It

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Speaker 1: looks like they're drawn in colored pencil, an incredibly beautiful tale,

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Speaker 1: very vibrant. Yeah, vibrant, that's a great word for it.

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Speaker 1: But they're like biomechanical devices, it seems to it's the

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Speaker 1: book seems to exhaustively detail the various elements of this

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Speaker 1: different world like and it mimics the old school illustrated

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Speaker 1: manuscripts of old right.

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Speaker 3: Who would have the exhibits almost yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 3: botanical illustrations in depth stuff about animals.

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Speaker 1: There's a lovely little section on tools that are just

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Speaker 1: cartoonishly impractical. One of the most iconic images of this

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Speaker 1: was I think it was on the cover or the

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Speaker 1: slipcase of the first edition. It's a couple in bed

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Speaker 1: in an intimate position. They are making making love, you

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Speaker 1: know things some of.

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Speaker 2: The most cringe dated sounding thig. I don't know why.

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Speaker 2: It makes my skin crawl a little bit.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, as they engage, they fuse and meld and transform

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Speaker 1: into a crocodile.

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Speaker 3: Bro you know what it reminds me of if you

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Speaker 3: see it's become a meme. But there's a series of

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Speaker 3: like teen kind of between books you get it like

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Speaker 3: Scholastic called Animorphs, where it show the trajectory of like

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Speaker 3: the kid and like all the little in between stages,

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Speaker 3: and then they'd be like an animal. They've become meme

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Speaker 3: fodder and people have been making like different kind of

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Speaker 3: image macros with those. But this is very sort of

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Speaker 3: a sexy after dark animorphs type situation. And just to

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Speaker 3: be clear, all of the text is in this what

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Speaker 3: was the term you used, been.

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Speaker 2: A Semitic, Yeah, a Semitic script.

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Speaker 3: I guess it has the vibe of almost Arabic, a

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Speaker 3: very flowy kind of pictographic kind of quality to it,

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Speaker 3: or like cyrillic maybe, or something like an ancient That's

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Speaker 3: why I think that's what really adds to the whole ancientness.

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Speaker 1: Of one hundred percent. Yeah, it looks like an ancient language.

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Speaker 1: And apologies, folks, that's a Semic I was. Yeah, I said,

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Speaker 1: a Semitic, which is probably very different.

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Speaker 2: So he like, this.

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Speaker 1: Book earns this aura of mystery. It's a rare prize.

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Speaker 1: It's grail like to certain collectors. And eventually, as of now,

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Speaker 1: there have been multiple reprints, I think at least five reprints,

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Speaker 1: gradually making the book more accessible to the general public.

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Speaker 1: You know, the non head may ze owning aristocrats.

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Speaker 3: And accessible and that you can get your hands on it, right,

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Speaker 3: nothing that would make it maybe more accessible to wrap

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Speaker 3: your head around kind of add really quickly. Think the

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Speaker 3: crocodile image is a whole other page. Where so it's

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Speaker 3: like these exhibits where the first one it's the humans,

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Speaker 3: and they gradually, you know, exhibit by exhibit turned into

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Speaker 3: the crocodile. There's a whole other page where it's just

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Speaker 3: the crocodile on the bed, then one additional image where

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Speaker 3: it's just sort of looking around deciding to leave, then

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Speaker 3: one where it slids it is off the bed, and

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Speaker 3: then one where it's just an empty bed. I mean,

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Speaker 3: this is taking the piss in the best possible.

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Speaker 1: Way, you know, I like a sequential almost like comic

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Speaker 1: books panel. But yeah, yeah, So the book is more

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Speaker 1: accessible to people in that they can obtain a copy. Really,

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Speaker 1: if you think about it, this just means there are

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Speaker 1: more people who now also cannot read this book, which

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Speaker 1: is it's weird and like to the point about conspiracy

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Speaker 1: and trying to solve the mystery of the Codex. Numerous

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Speaker 1: people have tried to decipher the script, and this makes

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Speaker 1: Sarah Fiini just tickle tickled pink. He talks about it

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Speaker 1: pretty openly in his interview with Wired.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: He says in the interview that he describes a gentleman

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Speaker 3: who put who copyrighted a system that translates arbitrarily the

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Speaker 3: signs of the Codex into meaningful texts written with the

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Speaker 3: Latin alphabet. It doesn't matter much to me it's an

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Speaker 3: obsession related to the persistent fascination with mystery. I always

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Speaker 3: said that there is no meaning behind the script. It's

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Speaker 3: just a game. But here's the thing, guys, whenever someone

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Speaker 3: says something like that, you just assume that they're just

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Speaker 3: trolling you and that they're, you know, wanting you to

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Speaker 3: do better and figure it out. Like it's remember on

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Speaker 3: the puzzler Ben I can't remember if it was when

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Speaker 3: we were on it together, if it was when when

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Speaker 3: one of us were on individually. But there's that crazy

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Speaker 3: uh what's the word like cipher piece of art that's.

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Speaker 2: In Langley, virgin and you know that in the middle

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Speaker 2: of the of this like.

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Speaker 3: Courtyard, you know, for the CIA, and uh, it's got

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Speaker 3: these ciphers and like some of them have been decoded,

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Speaker 3: but there's a handful that haven't. And the artists actually

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Speaker 3: will tell you if your decoding is correct. But he

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Speaker 3: gets so many requests from that that I think he

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Speaker 3: charges by, you know, by the answer these days like

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Speaker 3: twenty five fifty bucks.

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Speaker 1: Name is zach Aj told us about it in one

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Speaker 1: of his episodes with Us A Ridiculous History.

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Speaker 2: Y's right.

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Speaker 1: Check it out, folks, and also check out his episode

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Speaker 1: coming up in the future, because we're going to have

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Speaker 1: that guy back on. We've actually we've got some guests

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Speaker 1: we're really excited about. Maybe we could ask Luigi to

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Speaker 1: come on. Oh, it sounds like he'd be game. I

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Speaker 1: also think my episodes of The Puzzler are live. If not,

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Speaker 1: if they haven't been already, they will be very soon.

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Speaker 1: So keep an eye out.

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Speaker 2: Ben.

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Speaker 3: You did some bad little ways back and then we

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Speaker 3: had him on uh and then my my episodes are

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Speaker 3: coming up, if not out in the world right now.

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Speaker 2: We love that guy.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I'm looking forward to those. And you can

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Speaker 1: also hear other guests of ours on AJ's show The Puzzler.

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Speaker 1: I think Morocca went on there. Our friend o Fira

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Speaker 1: Eisenberg has been on there.

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Speaker 3: And Ben from a Badass of the Week Ben Thompson, Yes,

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Speaker 3: Chus who is on an episode earlier this week.

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Speaker 1: Anyway, Saraphini, if you're listening to this big fans, check

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Speaker 1: out our show and let us know if you want

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Speaker 1: to come on. So this book has all sorts of strange.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of tough to describe it other than pulling

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Speaker 1: out some of these iconic things that we like there's

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Speaker 1: also cultural exploration. These different groups shown with their traditional dress,

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Speaker 1: the way they interact with their children, important rituals. It

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Speaker 1: dives into you bacteria, which doesn't make any sense. But

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Speaker 1: he let's go back to this Wired interview. It's a

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Speaker 1: great source, he says. The codex is to him kind

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Speaker 1: of like a blog. He said, quote, I was trying

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Speaker 1: to reach out to my fellow people, just like bloggers do.

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Speaker 1: There's a connection between codex and digital culture. I was

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Speaker 1: somehow anticipating the Internet by sharing my work with as

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Speaker 1: many people as possible. I wanted the Codecs to be

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Speaker 1: published as a book because I wanted to step out

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Speaker 1: of the closed circle of art galleries.

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Speaker 2: And here's the key quote.

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Speaker 1: What I want my alphabet to convey to the reader

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Speaker 1: is the sensation that children feel in front of books

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Speaker 1: they cannot yet understand.

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Speaker 2: And he nailed it.

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Speaker 3: That's mission accomplished. I mean, seriously, it's just it's a

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Speaker 3: really neat thing. And you know, I could see how

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Speaker 3: for some people it might be like vexing or like

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Speaker 3: there's that need to figure it out. But for me,

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Speaker 3: and I think I think you certainly get it too,

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Speaker 3: Ben is that's the whole appeal is like I don't

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Speaker 3: need to solve the mystery or answer you know, the question,

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Speaker 3: or like, you know, have the key code for the cipher.

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Speaker 3: It's really just about kind of experiencing it. And it

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Speaker 3: really takes you back to that feeling of wonder that

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Speaker 3: you get when you are a little kid. In the

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Speaker 3: world is a lot more incomprehensible because it's so easy

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Speaker 3: to get to a place where everything's kind of old

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Speaker 3: hat and a little stale and boring.

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Speaker 2: And that's why we like art so much.

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Speaker 3: And this is a great example of like how art

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Speaker 3: can really bring back that childlike wonder.

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Speaker 1: Before we go to our next book that no one

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Speaker 1: can read, we will answer the question we set up

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Speaker 1: earlier was Luigian drugs. He says, I did mescaline, the

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Speaker 1: drug that was used to expand the boundaries of your mind.

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Speaker 1: I'm talking about a real mind transfer forming tool. It

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Speaker 1: had nothing to do with today's recreational use. At the

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Speaker 1: time in the US, Native Americans were allowed to use

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Speaker 1: it for religious purposes, but it didn't help me in

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Speaker 1: the creative process. And then he goes on about how

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Speaker 1: if you're under the influence of mescaline, you think everything

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Speaker 1: you're doing is amazing, and then when you sober up,

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Speaker 1: you're like, I don't know if this.

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Speaker 2: Is the flag.

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Speaker 3: I think he's not wrong, but I will say that

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Speaker 3: I think there's a bit of a misconception where people

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Speaker 3: think that artists are doing are while high, and I

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Speaker 3: think that's usually not the case. Most oftentimes what happens

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Speaker 3: is a psychedelic experience like this will shift their thinking

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Speaker 3: in some way, and it'll inspire them and it'll give

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Speaker 3: them maybe a key into a new process or something.

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Speaker 3: But I think for the most part, you know, probably

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Speaker 3: best to wait until the after globe before you start

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Speaker 3: trying to do any.

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Speaker 2: Of this stuff and feel like it's going to be meaningful, yeah, or.

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Speaker 1: You know, get your thumbnail sketch in or write the

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Speaker 1: idea or the thing down, knowing that you have to

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Speaker 1: come back in a more baseline state.

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Speaker 2: I think it was I think it was Maynard.

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Speaker 1: From two who had a great quote about that, because

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Speaker 1: he was super into meditation and he said, yeah, you

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Speaker 1: do drugs right, and they can inspire you and get

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Speaker 1: you to a point. I think he was talking about hallucinogens, yeah,

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Speaker 1: And he said, but the real thing, the real creative

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Speaker 1: act is arriving at the ability to reach that mental

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Speaker 1: point again without drugs.

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Speaker 3: One hundred percent or if you look. I mean a

402
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Speaker 3: lot of this stuff too reminds me of the work

403
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Speaker 3: of David Lynch, who is a huge proponent of transcendental meditation.

404
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Speaker 3: He always talks about catching the big fish's actually I

405
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Speaker 3: think a book that he wrote, but the idea of

406
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Speaker 3: your mind and your consciousness or this like vast sea

407
00:22:38,960 --> 00:22:42,000
Speaker 3: of inspiration and ideas. You just have to know how

408
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Speaker 3: to calm those waters enough to be able to kind

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Speaker 3: of penetrate them and pluck out those ideas and then

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Speaker 3: write them down, you know, whether that's like the actual

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Speaker 3: fully fleshed out idea or just the seed or the

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Speaker 3: germ of an idea.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 3: That's a big proponent. He always says too, They're like,

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Speaker 3: always write them down. If you forget an idea, Yeah,

416
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Speaker 3: y'all want to commit so side.

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Speaker 2: He says that every time.

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Speaker 3: But I really do think in a lot of ways

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Speaker 3: what people are achieving with transcendental meditation is getting their

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Speaker 3: mind to a controlled state of this kind of openness

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Speaker 3: that I think maybe often comes from can come from

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Speaker 3: doing hallucinogens, whether medically prescribed or you know, quote unquote recreational.

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Speaker 3: But I think sometimes the term recreational can be a

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Speaker 3: little bit flippant because I know a lot of people.

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Speaker 2: They aren't taking these things to party. They're taking these

426
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Speaker 2: things to.

427
00:23:31,359 --> 00:23:34,520
Speaker 3: Like have an experience there to be just like being therapeutic.

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00:23:34,600 --> 00:23:35,840
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 1: And this brings us to whatever we mentioned the Codex.

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Speaker 1: We also will also have people inevitably mention the Voyage Manuscript, No,

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00:23:46,160 --> 00:23:48,400
Speaker 1: what the heck is this thing?

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Speaker 3: So I think in my mind I get these things

433
00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:54,280
Speaker 3: twisted a little bit, because to me, it was more

434
00:23:54,400 --> 00:23:57,639
Speaker 3: much more clear that the Codex outside of some of

435
00:23:57,680 --> 00:23:59,960
Speaker 3: these little niche pre internet kind of communities, or even

436
00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:02,480
Speaker 3: the ones that continue to look for meaning or maybe

437
00:24:02,480 --> 00:24:07,840
Speaker 3: there is none. The Voyage Manuscript is an often debated

438
00:24:08,040 --> 00:24:15,240
Speaker 3: text that similarly has some indecipherable texts and images that

439
00:24:15,280 --> 00:24:18,359
Speaker 3: are describing a world that maybe is just off the

440
00:24:18,760 --> 00:24:22,440
Speaker 3: off the map kind of you, but really was believed

441
00:24:22,520 --> 00:24:27,359
Speaker 3: to have been authentic or representative of some undiscovered country.

442
00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:27,640
Speaker 1: Right.

443
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:31,520
Speaker 3: It's an illustrated manuscript written in an unknown language and

444
00:24:31,600 --> 00:24:34,240
Speaker 3: thoughts who have been created in the fifteenth or sixteenth century.

445
00:24:34,400 --> 00:24:37,360
Speaker 3: It's got age on its in its favor too, because

446
00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:40,640
Speaker 3: a lot more questions come with something that is legitimately

447
00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:42,840
Speaker 3: old and can be confirmed to be so.

448
00:24:43,280 --> 00:24:46,720
Speaker 1: Right, like even you know, even knowing that the Shroud

449
00:24:46,880 --> 00:24:51,919
Speaker 1: of Touring and many relics of saints were proven to

450
00:24:52,040 --> 00:24:56,960
Speaker 1: be hoaxes, a lot of them were frauds, manufactured centuries

451
00:24:57,000 --> 00:25:00,320
Speaker 1: and centuries. They're still very old and appear to be

452
00:25:00,359 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 1: the case with this manuscript. It's not named after the

453
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:07,359
Speaker 1: original author. The author is unknown. We don't know when

454
00:25:07,359 --> 00:25:12,920
Speaker 1: it was created exactly. Instead, it's named after a bookseller

455
00:25:13,440 --> 00:25:18,439
Speaker 1: named Wilfrid voy or Wilfrid Voyage excuse me, because he

456
00:25:18,600 --> 00:25:22,600
Speaker 1: purchased it in nineteen twelve. Then ever since that moment,

457
00:25:23,280 --> 00:25:28,520
Speaker 1: people have been trying their darndest to decipher this text.

458
00:25:28,920 --> 00:25:32,600
Speaker 1: A lot of people spoiler over the years, they think

459
00:25:32,680 --> 00:25:35,399
Speaker 1: they've figured it out, but the problem is no one

460
00:25:35,440 --> 00:25:37,480
Speaker 1: agrees with each other that's right.

461
00:25:37,520 --> 00:25:42,000
Speaker 3: And a lot of real research and then scientific study

462
00:25:42,040 --> 00:25:44,240
Speaker 3: has gone into this, whether it be through dating it

463
00:25:44,600 --> 00:25:46,800
Speaker 3: or trying to find some sort of key to the

464
00:25:46,920 --> 00:25:50,760
Speaker 3: indecipherable language in there. Extensive research has suggested that it

465
00:25:50,920 --> 00:25:55,480
Speaker 3: was manufacturer or created somewhere in Central Europe, and through

466
00:25:55,520 --> 00:26:00,160
Speaker 3: that carbon dating radio carbon dating, it's been determined who

467
00:26:00,160 --> 00:26:03,480
Speaker 3: have been somewhere in the early fifteenth century. And a

468
00:26:03,520 --> 00:26:07,600
Speaker 3: particularly long standing theory that was debunked by radiocarbon dating

469
00:26:07,760 --> 00:26:09,679
Speaker 3: conducted in two thousand and nine was that it was

470
00:26:09,720 --> 00:26:16,360
Speaker 3: written by thirteenth century English scientist Roger Bacon okay, inventor of.

471
00:26:16,359 --> 00:26:24,000
Speaker 2: Bacon yes, yes, and the inventor of Roger exactly.

472
00:26:24,440 --> 00:26:28,320
Speaker 1: He invented both of those. There is also this idea.

473
00:26:28,800 --> 00:26:32,560
Speaker 1: Another origin story is that perhaps the first owner of

474
00:26:32,640 --> 00:26:36,240
Speaker 1: the book is the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph the Second.

475
00:26:36,760 --> 00:26:39,879
Speaker 1: That guy was in play from fifteen seventy six to

476
00:26:39,920 --> 00:26:43,880
Speaker 1: sixteen eleven. If he did own it, then there are

477
00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:47,000
Speaker 1: some scholars who will say he purchased it from the

478
00:26:47,080 --> 00:26:51,880
Speaker 1: mathematician and occultist John Dee, also spymaster John d.

479
00:26:52,359 --> 00:26:54,840
Speaker 2: I still want to see his calendar. I still want

480
00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:56,800
Speaker 2: to see what his calendar is about. Perfect.

481
00:26:57,280 --> 00:26:59,400
Speaker 1: I mean, what we see also here is that they're

482
00:26:59,440 --> 00:27:04,880
Speaker 1: trying to tie it to notable mysterious historical figures right well.

483
00:27:04,840 --> 00:27:07,720
Speaker 3: And can we just say it's pretty clear that these

484
00:27:07,840 --> 00:27:12,800
Speaker 3: Codex Seraphina and the Nonos was inspired by this, Like

485
00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:15,560
Speaker 3: I mean, no, if you look so just to a

486
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:17,840
Speaker 3: lot of the things that we've been describing about the codex,

487
00:27:18,280 --> 00:27:20,440
Speaker 3: you're going to see a lot of very similar type

488
00:27:20,440 --> 00:27:26,159
Speaker 3: of drawings and renderings here of strange alien beings interacting

489
00:27:26,240 --> 00:27:31,280
Speaker 3: with weird you know, tentacle dare i say, phallic type plants.

490
00:27:31,359 --> 00:27:35,760
Speaker 3: You know, there's some kind of weird sexy undertones as well,

491
00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:42,399
Speaker 3: like a very strange kind of pod people type birthing scenarios. Again,

492
00:27:42,560 --> 00:27:46,440
Speaker 3: exhibited forms of flora and fauna, laid out as though

493
00:27:46,480 --> 00:27:49,239
Speaker 3: it were some kind of encyclopedia, and all kind of

494
00:27:50,000 --> 00:27:53,600
Speaker 3: contained within these beautifully bordered pages, with all of this

495
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:58,800
Speaker 3: handwritten text that is a language that is indecipherable and

496
00:27:58,880 --> 00:28:01,359
Speaker 3: has been puzzled over for a long long time.

497
00:28:01,680 --> 00:28:02,120
Speaker 1: Yeah.

498
00:28:02,359 --> 00:28:02,719
Speaker 2: Yeah.

499
00:28:02,760 --> 00:28:08,120
Speaker 1: And this notion that the book was purchased by the

500
00:28:08,160 --> 00:28:11,480
Speaker 1: Holy Roman Emperor, it comes from a letter written in

501
00:28:11,600 --> 00:28:15,760
Speaker 1: sixteen sixty five by a scientist in Prague, and when

502
00:28:16,280 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 1: Voyage purchases the book in nineteen twelve, he finds the

503
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:25,840
Speaker 1: letter tucked into the pages of the manuscript. So, without

504
00:28:25,880 --> 00:28:29,280
Speaker 1: getting too far into the weeds, Voyage gets this from

505
00:28:29,280 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 1: a Jesuit college near Rome in Italy, and the bookseller

506
00:28:34,760 --> 00:28:39,120
Speaker 1: then coordinated a bunch of different exhibitions for lack of

507
00:28:39,160 --> 00:28:41,880
Speaker 1: a better word, like old school salons to show off

508
00:28:41,920 --> 00:28:44,520
Speaker 1: this book. He would take it to universities. He took

509
00:28:44,520 --> 00:28:47,400
Speaker 1: it to the Art Institute in Chicago at nineteen fifteen,

510
00:28:47,640 --> 00:28:51,120
Speaker 1: and I think ever since nineteen sixty nine it's been

511
00:28:51,320 --> 00:28:56,240
Speaker 1: in the library at Yale University. So you can go

512
00:28:56,920 --> 00:28:59,280
Speaker 1: see this. I don't know if they take walk INDs.

513
00:28:59,320 --> 00:29:01,520
Speaker 1: I think you have to, you know, emails.

514
00:29:01,360 --> 00:29:05,600
Speaker 3: By Yeah, I'm pasting an image into the chat for

515
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:06,840
Speaker 3: you guys, if you don't mind.

516
00:29:07,080 --> 00:29:09,720
Speaker 2: There's one panel in particular that I think is so

517
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:11,240
Speaker 2: cool and bizarre.

518
00:29:11,760 --> 00:29:16,240
Speaker 3: It's like a horse with a palm palm on its

519
00:29:16,280 --> 00:29:22,280
Speaker 3: head and its backside looks like a weird bejeweled.

520
00:29:22,400 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 4: Worm or larval co. Yeah, it is a really bedazzled

521
00:29:29,160 --> 00:29:30,360
Speaker 4: flug and it's.

522
00:29:30,200 --> 00:29:33,120
Speaker 3: Got wheels on it, and then in the margins there

523
00:29:33,120 --> 00:29:36,760
Speaker 3: are these little diagrams I guess on how to construct

524
00:29:36,800 --> 00:29:40,960
Speaker 3: the wheels or what they're made, treads and so on. Yeah,

525
00:29:41,000 --> 00:29:43,000
Speaker 3: it's like a little weird tank treads, and then hanging

526
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:46,560
Speaker 3: from its muzzle or its little bridle is another weird,

527
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:50,400
Speaker 3: little dangly piece of this bedazzled cocoon stuff.

528
00:29:50,840 --> 00:29:53,640
Speaker 1: Oh, and you know what, I think I recognize this image.

529
00:29:54,040 --> 00:29:55,240
Speaker 1: I think it's from the Codex.

530
00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:57,120
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, you're totally right.

531
00:29:57,160 --> 00:30:00,680
Speaker 3: And I think I was taken because they really do

532
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:02,520
Speaker 3: have a very similar art style. But now that I'm

533
00:30:02,520 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 3: looking at this one, it is much more detailed. The

534
00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:07,480
Speaker 3: stuff in the Voytage Manuscript is a lot more lo

535
00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:11,440
Speaker 3: fi and almost childlike, kind of in its naive style.

536
00:30:11,520 --> 00:30:14,600
Speaker 3: I guess, oh, oh, yeah, but they have a lot

537
00:30:14,640 --> 00:30:15,760
Speaker 3: in common, they really do.

538
00:30:16,240 --> 00:30:16,560
Speaker 2: Yeah.

539
00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:18,880
Speaker 1: I think you're right on the money there. And in

540
00:30:18,960 --> 00:30:21,520
Speaker 1: the story of the Voyage Manuscript, we also see a

541
00:30:21,560 --> 00:30:24,479
Speaker 1: lot of similarities of people trying to figure out this

542
00:30:24,560 --> 00:30:29,200
Speaker 1: thing over the years, because it's more than a century now,

543
00:30:30,120 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 1: some of the smartest people in the world have tried

544
00:30:33,120 --> 00:30:36,720
Speaker 1: to crack the code of the Voyage Manuscript and failed.

545
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:42,200
Speaker 1: We're talking about scholars of chemistry, law, intelligence agency types,

546
00:30:42,640 --> 00:30:46,880
Speaker 1: professional cryptologists from World War two. I almost said professional

547
00:30:47,120 --> 00:30:50,440
Speaker 1: cryptozoologists from World War two, which would be even cooler.

548
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:54,040
Speaker 3: Would be cooler, And honestly, if some of the images

549
00:30:54,120 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 3: we're seeing in this are meant to be taken as fact,

550
00:30:57,760 --> 00:31:00,800
Speaker 3: there's some cryptids in the mix that we have yet

551
00:31:00,840 --> 00:31:03,920
Speaker 3: to discover, you know, like least of which is that

552
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:06,520
Speaker 3: weird horse thing, which again is from the Codex, but

553
00:31:06,640 --> 00:31:10,640
Speaker 3: in the Voytage manuscript there's a lot of weird animals

554
00:31:10,640 --> 00:31:11,480
Speaker 3: depicted as well.

555
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:14,880
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, And let's talk about the book itself.

556
00:31:21,640 --> 00:31:24,240
Speaker 1: It's not quite the same as what you would consider

557
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:27,280
Speaker 1: a modern book today, right. It's got a bunch of

558
00:31:27,400 --> 00:31:31,760
Speaker 1: folios and they're very heavily illustrated. There are one hundred

559
00:31:31,760 --> 00:31:33,440
Speaker 1: and two of them, so it's about two hundred and

560
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:41,240
Speaker 1: thirty four pages. It's divided into six sections Botany, astronomy, astrology, biology, cosmology,

561
00:31:42,160 --> 00:31:48,160
Speaker 1: some kind of pharmaceutical thing, and maybe a section on recipes.

562
00:31:48,480 --> 00:31:53,080
Speaker 2: People think maybe there's a lot. God, dude, it's so fascinating.

563
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:53,960
Speaker 2: There's a lot of, I believe.

564
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:56,840
Speaker 3: In the biology section, a lot of depictions of these

565
00:31:56,880 --> 00:32:00,160
Speaker 3: weird little naked people kind of coming out of what

566
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:04,480
Speaker 3: looked like Mario World, like plumber tubes kind of, and

567
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:08,760
Speaker 3: they're holding these strange plants and creatures in their little

568
00:32:08,800 --> 00:32:12,520
Speaker 3: tiny naked fists. And again the birth of them is

569
00:32:12,520 --> 00:32:16,000
Speaker 3: sort of depicted as this like primordial soup sort of

570
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:19,640
Speaker 3: situation where they're coming out of this like these slime baths.

571
00:32:19,680 --> 00:32:22,840
Speaker 3: It's really really bizarre, fascinating stuff.

572
00:32:23,360 --> 00:32:27,440
Speaker 1: And then the women who are connected by tubes. There

573
00:32:27,440 --> 00:32:30,960
Speaker 1: are drids of nude women who are intertwined with these

574
00:32:31,120 --> 00:32:36,560
Speaker 1: various tubes. The longest section, I believe, is the botanical section.

575
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:41,280
Speaker 1: Lots of herbs and plants that just don't exist.

576
00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:43,440
Speaker 2: They're they're not real.

577
00:32:43,840 --> 00:32:47,880
Speaker 1: And then the astrology or very man Drake looking thing

578
00:32:47,880 --> 00:32:49,320
Speaker 1: exactly so you know what I mean. But they're like

579
00:32:49,360 --> 00:32:54,600
Speaker 1: really twisty, weird, kind of human like roots. But when

580
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:56,400
Speaker 1: you look at them and cross reference and with the

581
00:32:56,440 --> 00:32:58,840
Speaker 1: real stuff, there are things that are just not quite

582
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:03,000
Speaker 1: right about them. Yeah, but if you didn't have the

583
00:33:03,040 --> 00:33:07,560
Speaker 1: comparisons to make you would think, oh, yeah, that makes sense, right.

584
00:33:09,240 --> 00:33:11,360
Speaker 1: I like the you point it that way, there's something

585
00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:16,680
Speaker 1: that's just sort of off, and we we know. The

586
00:33:16,680 --> 00:33:20,080
Speaker 1: The fourth section, skipping around a little bit, has this

587
00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:24,680
Speaker 1: thing with a weird drawing of or drawings of these

588
00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:28,640
Speaker 1: nine medallions that are filled with stars and other shapes.

589
00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:32,240
Speaker 1: And then just as you have enough time to WTF

590
00:33:32,280 --> 00:33:34,880
Speaker 1: your way through that, you get to the pharmaceutical section.

591
00:33:35,360 --> 00:33:38,720
Speaker 1: It appears that they are telling you which plants can

592
00:33:38,760 --> 00:33:41,440
Speaker 1: be used to do certain things, and then drawings of

593
00:33:41,520 --> 00:33:43,280
Speaker 1: jars and bottles, et cetera.

594
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:46,640
Speaker 3: It's pretty cool, you guys. If you go to collections

595
00:33:46,680 --> 00:33:49,560
Speaker 3: dot library, dot Yale dot eedu slash catalog, I was

596
00:33:49,600 --> 00:33:51,360
Speaker 3: gonna give you the whole thing. That's actually pretty succst

597
00:33:51,520 --> 00:33:55,560
Speaker 3: slash two zero zero two zero four six h. There

598
00:33:55,640 --> 00:34:00,720
Speaker 3: is a fully scanned physical scan of this thing, including

599
00:34:00,760 --> 00:34:03,560
Speaker 3: the edges and the way it looks from the side,

600
00:34:03,640 --> 00:34:06,240
Speaker 3: the tail, the fore edge and all of that and

601
00:34:06,280 --> 00:34:09,480
Speaker 3: all of the extra little pieces. It is really cool.

602
00:34:09,680 --> 00:34:12,400
Speaker 3: You're not just seeing like some sort of like lifted

603
00:34:12,680 --> 00:34:15,359
Speaker 3: you know, text or scan to text kind of things.

604
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:17,720
Speaker 3: This is like all of the texture and the wear

605
00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:19,880
Speaker 3: and all of that stuff in the front and back covers.

606
00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:22,560
Speaker 3: And you can really see those folios you mentioned, Ben,

607
00:34:22,680 --> 00:34:24,800
Speaker 3: because when you look at it folded from the side,

608
00:34:25,040 --> 00:34:28,080
Speaker 3: there are kind of these little tracts that are almost

609
00:34:28,280 --> 00:34:30,359
Speaker 3: tucked in there, you know, kind of with their own

610
00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:33,880
Speaker 3: little self contained sections, rather than being bound like you

611
00:34:33,920 --> 00:34:35,440
Speaker 3: were saying, like a traditional book.

612
00:34:35,560 --> 00:34:38,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, like a weird pile of notebooks they got put

613
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:40,280
Speaker 1: together or journals.

614
00:34:40,960 --> 00:34:41,120
Speaker 2: This.

615
00:34:41,440 --> 00:34:44,160
Speaker 1: You can also buy a copy or reprints of this

616
00:34:44,600 --> 00:34:49,359
Speaker 1: facimile copies of it on at your favorite bookstore or

617
00:34:49,520 --> 00:34:52,160
Speaker 1: even Amazon today. If you want to help Jeff get

618
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:55,439
Speaker 1: back to the moon. Yeah, we got to help Jeff

619
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:58,800
Speaker 1: get this space. But yes you can. You can find

620
00:34:59,200 --> 00:35:01,680
Speaker 1: not just voy but also Codex. You can find them

621
00:35:01,719 --> 00:35:06,200
Speaker 1: available online, and it's worth it if you're interested in this.

622
00:35:06,640 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 1: Another thing that's fascinating about this book, man, is that

623
00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 1: people because people wanted to solve the mystery so much,

624
00:35:17,080 --> 00:35:22,759
Speaker 1: they had some crazy pitches. One of the earliest efforts

625
00:35:23,000 --> 00:35:25,720
Speaker 1: was in the early nineteen hundreds a guy named William

626
00:35:25,920 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 1: Romaine Newbold, very very smart at the University of Pennsylvania,

627
00:35:31,480 --> 00:35:34,120
Speaker 1: and he said, this just this is the only example

628
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:36,640
Speaker 1: we nique is so weird. He said, look, the visible

629
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:40,800
Speaker 1: text is meaningless. But each of those things that looks

630
00:35:40,880 --> 00:35:43,600
Speaker 1: like a letter, if you zoom in, I kid you

631
00:35:43,640 --> 00:35:47,799
Speaker 1: not with a microscope, then you will see tiny markings.

632
00:35:48,200 --> 00:35:50,520
Speaker 1: And I think it's Greek, and then I think it's

633
00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:52,799
Speaker 1: based on Greek, and I think there's a code that

634
00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:55,280
Speaker 1: I have figured out that will tell you what's really

635
00:35:55,320 --> 00:36:00,279
Speaker 1: going on. And people said, all right, well, try give

636
00:36:00,320 --> 00:36:03,719
Speaker 1: it a shot. And it turned out he really believed

637
00:36:03,840 --> 00:36:08,200
Speaker 1: he had solved it, but most other people disagreed. There's

638
00:36:08,239 --> 00:36:12,279
Speaker 1: a lot of work on Hebrew interpretations of it or

639
00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:16,560
Speaker 1: different like two steps ciphers. But right now we still

640
00:36:16,560 --> 00:36:19,319
Speaker 1: see a pattern of people saying, yes, I've figured it out,

641
00:36:19,560 --> 00:36:22,640
Speaker 1: and then other people coming along maybe after, as you said,

642
00:36:22,680 --> 00:36:27,560
Speaker 1: the glow wears off, and saying you hadn't really though,

643
00:36:27,719 --> 00:36:30,879
Speaker 1: because this seems like a roar shack almost you see

644
00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:31,800
Speaker 1: what you want to see.

645
00:36:31,920 --> 00:36:33,960
Speaker 3: A million percent, And that's the beauty of this kind

646
00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:37,600
Speaker 3: of stuff, you know, where it feels like it's begging

647
00:36:37,640 --> 00:36:40,319
Speaker 3: to be solved. But really the whole idea might be

648
00:36:40,440 --> 00:36:43,680
Speaker 3: that it's just an elaborate kind of troll. But maybe

649
00:36:43,719 --> 00:36:46,560
Speaker 3: troll is a little unfair or a little unkind because

650
00:36:46,600 --> 00:36:50,000
Speaker 3: to me, what would be the goal of a t

651
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:52,120
Speaker 3: want to be two rhymey, but what would be the

652
00:36:52,120 --> 00:36:54,719
Speaker 3: goal of someone trying to perpetrate like a fraud by

653
00:36:55,239 --> 00:36:57,239
Speaker 3: unleashing this end of the world? What would be the

654
00:36:57,280 --> 00:37:01,520
Speaker 3: nefarious intent behind it? I don't see it. The trill goal, yeah,

655
00:37:01,520 --> 00:37:05,080
Speaker 3: the troll goal, and pay the troll toll to execute

656
00:37:05,080 --> 00:37:05,719
Speaker 3: that troll goal.

657
00:37:06,040 --> 00:37:07,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.

658
00:37:08,280 --> 00:37:12,279
Speaker 1: It is interesting. There are Luigi Serafini actually had something

659
00:37:12,280 --> 00:37:16,520
Speaker 1: to say about this because his argument was it was

660
00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:22,000
Speaker 1: created as a fake, meant to entirely meant to be

661
00:37:22,200 --> 00:37:26,840
Speaker 1: sold to that emperor Rudolph too, because that guy likes books.

662
00:37:27,080 --> 00:37:29,279
Speaker 1: And then other people say it was a fake by

663
00:37:30,200 --> 00:37:36,200
Speaker 1: Voyage himself somehow entirely meant to increase his own reputation.

664
00:37:37,680 --> 00:37:40,840
Speaker 1: Neither of those things have been conclusively.

665
00:37:41,080 --> 00:37:43,279
Speaker 2: Wouldn't that be risky to do that?

666
00:37:43,440 --> 00:37:45,640
Speaker 3: Like, you know, I just mean to perpetrate a fraud

667
00:37:45,719 --> 00:37:48,719
Speaker 3: like that on such a powerful person who might not

668
00:37:48,880 --> 00:37:52,360
Speaker 3: take kindly to being tricked in that way.

669
00:37:52,719 --> 00:37:57,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, that's what That's what I'm thinking, you know, anyway,

670
00:37:57,920 --> 00:38:01,080
Speaker 1: that there is one thing on the we see this

671
00:38:01,200 --> 00:38:06,360
Speaker 1: pattern of you know, discoveries, claim discoveries and refutations continue today,

672
00:38:06,760 --> 00:38:11,720
Speaker 1: and there's even some recent attempts to use large language

673
00:38:11,719 --> 00:38:14,880
Speaker 1: models or AI to try to crack it, but people

674
00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:17,839
Speaker 1: just keep again kind of seeing what they want to see,

675
00:38:17,880 --> 00:38:21,000
Speaker 1: and nobody agrees that the code's been cracked yet. And

676
00:38:21,160 --> 00:38:23,279
Speaker 1: I got, you know, maybe this is where we end

677
00:38:23,360 --> 00:38:26,800
Speaker 1: because NOL at this point, I feel like actually solving

678
00:38:27,520 --> 00:38:30,520
Speaker 1: the riddle the code might be anti climactic.

679
00:38:31,040 --> 00:38:32,839
Speaker 3: We talk about that a lot on our other show

680
00:38:32,840 --> 00:38:34,360
Speaker 3: stuff that I want you to know. With our buddy

681
00:38:34,360 --> 00:38:38,319
Speaker 3: Matt Frederick, like, sometimes depending on what the mystery is,

682
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:41,520
Speaker 3: like if it's you know, obviously a search for justice

683
00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:44,600
Speaker 3: or someone that's done something horrible, or a crime or

684
00:38:44,680 --> 00:38:47,440
Speaker 3: fraud being perpetrated, you know, on the American people or

685
00:38:47,440 --> 00:38:49,840
Speaker 3: whoever it might be. Sure you want to get to

686
00:38:49,880 --> 00:38:51,640
Speaker 3: the heart of that, you want to see who's to blame.

687
00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:55,440
Speaker 3: But sometimes you know, these oddities or like things like

688
00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:59,440
Speaker 3: the Georgia guidestones for example, where there's this, oh gosh,

689
00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:03,120
Speaker 3: what's the various plot behind it? And based on everything

690
00:39:03,120 --> 00:39:06,080
Speaker 3: we know about that, the whole point of it was

691
00:39:06,520 --> 00:39:09,400
Speaker 3: to not know someone went to a lot of trouble

692
00:39:09,560 --> 00:39:12,960
Speaker 3: to make their personality not be part of it. It

693
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:15,160
Speaker 3: was more about like, what what does the journey that

694
00:39:15,280 --> 00:39:18,520
Speaker 3: this art or this piece of work or this information

695
00:39:18,800 --> 00:39:21,759
Speaker 3: takes you on. So to answer your question, yeah, big

696
00:39:21,800 --> 00:39:25,000
Speaker 3: time anticlimactive for things like this. You know, I think

697
00:39:25,520 --> 00:39:28,000
Speaker 3: almost one hundred percent of the time for me anyway.

698
00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:32,320
Speaker 1: And we say that because we, like the rest of

699
00:39:32,360 --> 00:39:35,080
Speaker 1: the world, don't know what's in the book. Perhaps it

700
00:39:35,200 --> 00:39:38,760
Speaker 1: is revelatory, or perhaps it's like that thing that seeing

701
00:39:38,840 --> 00:39:41,719
Speaker 1: in a Christmas tale or a Christmas story where the

702
00:39:41,800 --> 00:39:45,600
Speaker 1: kid finally gets the decoder ring and the big code

703
00:39:45,680 --> 00:39:49,439
Speaker 1: that he learns is spoiler, folks, three to one. It's

704
00:39:49,520 --> 00:39:51,320
Speaker 1: an advertisement for Oval Team.

705
00:39:51,239 --> 00:39:53,520
Speaker 3: I know, which is a banger of a drink. By

706
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:55,759
Speaker 3: the way, It's got mintal minerals in it. It's got

707
00:39:55,760 --> 00:39:58,520
Speaker 3: that multi flavor really good in a coffee. If you

708
00:39:58,560 --> 00:40:01,400
Speaker 3: want like a little bit of a moke situation, a

709
00:40:01,440 --> 00:40:04,879
Speaker 3: tablespoon of of the Oval scene in there, we'll get

710
00:40:04,880 --> 00:40:05,960
Speaker 3: you right where you want to be.

711
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:10,279
Speaker 2: I hope not. You know, that would be even worse.

712
00:40:10,080 --> 00:40:12,239
Speaker 3: Of an anti climax to find out that it was

713
00:40:12,280 --> 00:40:15,520
Speaker 3: actually meant to sell us widgets or something like that.

714
00:40:15,560 --> 00:40:15,799
Speaker 2: You know.

715
00:40:16,239 --> 00:40:18,600
Speaker 4: And to jump in here real quick, I have to

716
00:40:18,680 --> 00:40:23,240
Speaker 4: bring up the Elder Scrolls unreadable book the Agma and Finium,

717
00:40:23,520 --> 00:40:25,719
Speaker 4: which you might be sitting there saying you can read

718
00:40:25,760 --> 00:40:28,000
Speaker 4: that one, yes, but you will lose your mind if

719
00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:31,279
Speaker 4: you read it is the digric artifact of hermeus Mora.

720
00:40:31,760 --> 00:40:33,600
Speaker 2: Then you know that one quite well.

721
00:40:34,520 --> 00:40:36,920
Speaker 3: Lose your mind as in because it will infect you

722
00:40:36,960 --> 00:40:38,560
Speaker 3: as some sort of demonic force.

723
00:40:39,000 --> 00:40:40,720
Speaker 4: No, so look with hermeas Mora.

724
00:40:41,000 --> 00:40:42,000
Speaker 2: You know he's the day.

725
00:40:42,960 --> 00:40:45,560
Speaker 4: Yeah, why did you ask he's like he's the dadrich

726
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:49,120
Speaker 4: uh Dadrek god of knowledge and basically he has so

727
00:40:49,200 --> 00:40:51,399
Speaker 4: much knowledge that you will lose your mind just ever

728
00:40:51,480 --> 00:40:52,320
Speaker 4: chasing knowledge.

729
00:40:52,400 --> 00:40:54,200
Speaker 2: Okay, well that's sort of life, ain't it.

730
00:40:54,560 --> 00:40:56,480
Speaker 1: The daj are one of the most fun parts of

731
00:40:56,480 --> 00:40:56,839
Speaker 1: the game.

732
00:40:58,120 --> 00:41:02,719
Speaker 3: They're they're nefarious though right there, not necessarily, I.

733
00:41:02,719 --> 00:41:06,440
Speaker 1: Would say mostly, but it's also it's an elder god argument,

734
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:10,200
Speaker 1: like so different as to be incomprehensible to mortals.

735
00:41:10,640 --> 00:41:14,200
Speaker 4: Yeah, some some like you know, like uh, mullleg ball,

736
00:41:14,680 --> 00:41:18,680
Speaker 4: he's evil, that's simple. His weapons is great though, he is,

737
00:41:18,719 --> 00:41:21,160
Speaker 4: but we can't even describe what he is the god

738
00:41:21,200 --> 00:41:23,080
Speaker 4: of on air because it's so offensive.

739
00:41:23,120 --> 00:41:23,600
Speaker 2: That's right.

740
00:41:24,160 --> 00:41:27,320
Speaker 4: Uh but uh but then there's like a zero. We're like,

741
00:41:27,360 --> 00:41:29,439
Speaker 4: Yahara is not evil, but there is evil. I would

742
00:41:29,480 --> 00:41:32,239
Speaker 4: argue with Bofi is not evil, but that's just me.

743
00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:35,040
Speaker 3: Who's the one I'm messing with right now? In the

744
00:41:35,160 --> 00:41:38,480
Speaker 3: DNC that's still okay. Yeah, every time I read The

745
00:41:38,560 --> 00:41:40,680
Speaker 3: Dark the Black Books or whatever, I end up in

746
00:41:40,760 --> 00:41:41,319
Speaker 3: the the.

747
00:41:42,320 --> 00:41:46,080
Speaker 2: Tentacle e world handed to me man asque.

748
00:41:46,480 --> 00:41:49,200
Speaker 3: It's cool, but I feel like, am I not powerful

749
00:41:49,320 --> 00:41:50,640
Speaker 3: enough to be messing with that world?

750
00:41:50,719 --> 00:41:50,879
Speaker 2: Yet?

751
00:41:50,920 --> 00:41:52,839
Speaker 3: I keep kind of putting it off because every time

752
00:41:52,840 --> 00:41:54,320
Speaker 3: I go, I I can't.

753
00:41:54,640 --> 00:41:55,280
Speaker 2: I can't make.

754
00:41:55,160 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 4: Cancer tales of it. It's high level game, yeah it is.

755
00:41:57,920 --> 00:42:01,319
Speaker 4: It was originally designed to play after you have already been.

756
00:42:01,280 --> 00:42:03,239
Speaker 2: The main Then I'm gonna keep it.

757
00:42:03,360 --> 00:42:05,879
Speaker 3: I'm gonna keep it in in my back pocket until

758
00:42:05,880 --> 00:42:06,600
Speaker 3: I get a little bit more.

759
00:42:06,960 --> 00:42:10,120
Speaker 2: I do have a full set of dragon Bone armor, though.

760
00:42:10,160 --> 00:42:12,440
Speaker 3: That's pretty badass, so I feel a little overpowered.

761
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:13,719
Speaker 4: How well are you wearing it?

762
00:42:13,719 --> 00:42:13,919
Speaker 2: Though?

763
00:42:13,920 --> 00:42:15,799
Speaker 4: That's always the question. I don't know what that means

764
00:42:16,480 --> 00:42:19,680
Speaker 4: heavy armor level? How well are you wearing heavy armor?

765
00:42:19,800 --> 00:42:20,120
Speaker 2: Guys.

766
00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:23,120
Speaker 1: Okay, we're gonna talk about this off air yet. I

767
00:42:23,120 --> 00:42:24,759
Speaker 1: hope everybody enjoys skyline.

768
00:42:24,920 --> 00:42:28,239
Speaker 2: Everyone, We're gonna get out of here. We'll see if

769
00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:30,000
Speaker 2: that makes it to the final edit.

770
00:42:30,280 --> 00:42:33,319
Speaker 1: In the meantime, we can't wait to hear more of

771
00:42:33,400 --> 00:42:38,080
Speaker 1: your favorite UH strange books. There are other, you know,

772
00:42:39,080 --> 00:42:42,440
Speaker 1: other innovations in the world of bookery, like A House

773
00:42:42,480 --> 00:42:46,720
Speaker 1: of Leaves is a famous, famous UH form breaking book.

774
00:42:47,160 --> 00:42:49,799
Speaker 1: You can tell us about our Facebook page Ridiculous Historians.

775
00:42:49,840 --> 00:42:53,840
Speaker 1: Thank you as always to our super producer, UH mister

776
00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:56,799
Speaker 1: Max Williams, big fan of daydre.

777
00:42:58,840 --> 00:42:59,040
Speaker 2: Man.

778
00:42:59,200 --> 00:43:01,480
Speaker 3: Huge thanks to you Ben for being the research to

779
00:43:01,480 --> 00:43:03,920
Speaker 3: associate on this particular episode.

780
00:43:04,239 --> 00:43:06,840
Speaker 2: I always love talking about these these two volumes, and

781
00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:07,319
Speaker 2: you can I.

782
00:43:07,280 --> 00:43:09,839
Speaker 3: Don't remember exactly what episode you would look for, but

783
00:43:10,080 --> 00:43:11,960
Speaker 3: on stuff they don't want you to know. We definitely

784
00:43:12,000 --> 00:43:16,840
Speaker 3: have further discussions of this kind of thing, specifically these books,

785
00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:19,640
Speaker 3: but also you know, just in general, the idea of

786
00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:24,359
Speaker 3: historical frauds and kind of doomsday conspiracies that maybe we're

787
00:43:24,560 --> 00:43:27,840
Speaker 3: more of someone trying to get people under their control

788
00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:31,279
Speaker 3: than an actual facts, legitimate prediction, So.

789
00:43:31,320 --> 00:43:32,160
Speaker 2: Do check that out.

790
00:43:32,200 --> 00:43:36,800
Speaker 1: Thanks also to AJ Jacobs, the Puzzler, Jonathan Strickland aka

791
00:43:36,840 --> 00:43:39,120
Speaker 1: the quizt, Let's See Eaves, Jeff.

792
00:43:38,920 --> 00:43:44,120
Speaker 3: Goat, Gris Rasiotis, and all of you ridiculous historians out

793
00:43:44,160 --> 00:43:45,879
Speaker 3: there in Ridiculous history Land.

794
00:43:46,120 --> 00:43:47,400
Speaker 2: We'll see you next time, folks.

795
00:43:54,520 --> 00:43:58,320
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

796
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:00,520
Speaker 3: or wherever you listen to your favorite IT shows