WEBVTT - The Cauldron, Part 3 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.360 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:14.960 Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:18.160 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. And hey, 0:00:18.280 --> 0:00:20.239 we were out for a little bit, but now we're back, 0:00:20.239 --> 0:00:23.160 and you know what, we're back with more cauldrons. Our 0:00:23.200 --> 0:00:26.160 brains are like pots, and those pots are full of pots, 0:00:26.320 --> 0:00:29.240 and the pots have pots in them, and it's it 0:00:29.320 --> 0:00:33.120 never stops. I know, my my wife is still teasing 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:34.920 me about this. It's like, you guys are still doing 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:38.040 episodes about cauldrons and soup, and I'm like, yeah, there's 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:40.519 like we're probably going to do three or four of 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:44.479 these total, and we're still not going to cover everything. 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:46.160 And a lot of it comes down to the fact, 0:00:46.200 --> 0:00:48.000 and certainly go back and listen to those first two 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:50.400 episodes if you haven't, comes down to the fact that 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:54.600 we're talking about ancient technology and and since it in 0:00:54.800 --> 0:00:59.400 we inevitably use technology as a way of understanding ourselves, 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:03.000 understand ending the cosmos, etcetera. It ends up becoming a 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:05.840 part of our not only a discourse, but of course 0:01:05.840 --> 0:01:09.120 our religions and uh and so forth. And we see 0:01:09.120 --> 0:01:12.520 that with the cauldron for sure. Yes, though I have 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:15.360 to say one of the big examples we're going to 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:16.960 talk about in this episode. I don't know if the 0:01:16.959 --> 0:01:18.960 whole episode will end up focusing on it, but it's 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:23.520 a really interesting historical artifact that is called a cauldron. 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:28.120 Like it is called the Gunda Stroop cauldron. But I 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:30.319 was reading a paper on it, and the very first 0:01:30.360 --> 0:01:33.520 sentence of the paper, this author insists that it is 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:39.039 not a cauldron, it is a ceremonial container. Yeah. I 0:01:39.080 --> 0:01:41.039 mean this is something that is kind of under the 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:45.080 surface of many of these discussions, right, and like obviously 0:01:45.400 --> 0:01:47.680 not all of these people would have called this a cauldron, 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:49.800 And then you get into discussions of Okay, is it 0:01:49.840 --> 0:01:51.800 a cauldron or a pot? Is it a cauldron or 0:01:51.800 --> 0:01:54.200 a bowl? Is it a cauldron or some other kind? 0:01:54.280 --> 0:01:59.200 You know what exactly? Is the ship billed? Daddy? Oh okay, 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:01.400 this is a call and come on, it's it's a 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.480 it's a big metal pot. I think we can call 0:02:04.520 --> 0:02:08.360 it a cauldron. Yeah. So you, as we've discussed in 0:02:08.360 --> 0:02:11.040 previous episodes, we wanted to get into European traditions with 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:15.280 the cauldron, and uh, cauldrons in Europe are sometimes uncovered 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:19.359 in bogs, places, as we've discussed in the show before, 0:02:19.680 --> 0:02:23.440 that had sacred connotations to the ancient people who visited them. 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:26.360 They were a place between land and water, and so 0:02:26.400 --> 0:02:28.800 they were also seen as a place between life and death. 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:32.080 So various funeral rites seem to have been conducted at 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:36.120 various bogs and peat bogs, and given the low oxygen 0:02:36.720 --> 0:02:40.720 acidic soil of bog environments, we often gain a great 0:02:40.760 --> 0:02:43.840 deal more insight into what occurred there, especially when it 0:02:43.840 --> 0:02:47.600 comes to organic materials that would have otherwise decayed. So 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:52.280 you know, bodies were left in these bogs and teared 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:56.320 in these bogs, and we also see examples of cauldrons 0:02:56.320 --> 0:03:01.200 and cauldron like artifacts. One notable bog retrieved cauldron is 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:05.520 the Gunda strap cauldron, an incomplete but very stunning silver 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:11.760 artifact discovered in a bog in Himmland, Denmark in eight now. 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:14.519 While dating has been a matter of some discussion here, 0:03:14.520 --> 0:03:18.440 exact dating anyway, is suspected to date back to between 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:21.120 one fifty b c E And the dawn of the 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:24.560 Common Era. It was evidently given to the bog and 0:03:24.800 --> 0:03:28.040 an act of sacrifice, perhaps to a god or gods, 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:32.600 but its origins don't seem to be quite Danish. It 0:03:32.720 --> 0:03:38.320 It bears images that are generally associated with more Southern cultures, lions, deer, 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:42.160 griffin's um there. There seems to be a hornet or 0:03:42.200 --> 0:03:46.680 antlered god on there, alongside other potential gods and goddesses. 0:03:46.760 --> 0:03:50.240 It contains scenes of warriors falling in battle, and there 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:54.920 is actually an image of a magic cauldron. Uh is 0:03:55.040 --> 0:03:58.640 on this cauldron with a gigantic figure, perhaps a god 0:03:58.760 --> 0:04:02.320 or a goddess, about to dunk a smaller man into 0:04:02.320 --> 0:04:06.560 its depths. That's right, we got cauldrons on our cauldrons uh. 0:04:06.600 --> 0:04:09.480 And I want to come back to more interpretation of 0:04:09.520 --> 0:04:13.480 this panel later on. Yeah, definitely. As we're talking about 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:15.720 the gun distract cauldron, look up the images of it. 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:18.520 That's spelled g U n d E s t r 0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:21.040 U p uh. There are a lot of images online 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:24.880 that show the various panels here, the various uh, the 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:27.440 various images that we're going to be discussing here, including 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:30.000 this one of what is clearly a giant of some 0:04:30.080 --> 0:04:33.680 sort uh taking a man and dunking him head first 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:37.720 uh into a bucket or cauldron or vessel of some 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:41.800 sort adjacent to this battle scene. So the exact origins 0:04:41.920 --> 0:04:44.440 of the cauldron here are still a matter of debate, 0:04:45.000 --> 0:04:48.400 with some pointing to the Thracians or what is and 0:04:48.600 --> 0:04:51.599 these would have been people from what is now Bulgaria 0:04:51.720 --> 0:04:56.400 and Romania. Yet there are also Celtic helmets and trumpets 0:04:56.400 --> 0:04:59.480 depicted on the cauldron, suggesting it might have been made 0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:03.920 in a place in the aforementioned region where Thracians and 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:08.320 Celts coexisted, though it's uncertain how this then wound up 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:11.200 in Denmark. Could have been a tribute, could have been 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:14.640 spoils of war. Either way, it may be accurate to 0:05:14.680 --> 0:05:17.960 think of the Goodness Drop cauldron and not a product 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:20.880 of a single culture, a single place, or even a 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:24.200 single time, but something that was created by mingling cultures 0:05:24.240 --> 0:05:27.039 on the move, in part due to Roman expansion and 0:05:27.120 --> 0:05:31.040 conquest during this time period, and ultimately constructed by different 0:05:31.160 --> 0:05:34.480 artisans over many years. Oh, I didn't think about the 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:36.520 Roman connection, but yeah, so if this would have been 0:05:36.520 --> 0:05:39.480 in the first century b c e. And the middle 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:42.240 of that century was when Julius Caesar himself was waging 0:05:42.240 --> 0:05:46.560 a war of conquest in Gaul against Celtic tribes in 0:05:46.600 --> 0:05:50.440 that region, So yeah, that's an interesting possibility. So yeah, 0:05:50.520 --> 0:05:54.080 Rob you you you dug this thing up, not not physical, 0:05:54.920 --> 0:05:57.360 you had throught it into our outline, but I got 0:05:57.400 --> 0:06:00.599 really obsessed with it, um and I I find this 0:06:00.880 --> 0:06:05.400 artifacts so interesting, specifically because of the different mysteries about 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:07.960 it's it's provenance, like you were just talking about, but 0:06:08.120 --> 0:06:12.840 also about what it's depicting, because there there are tons 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:16.120 of what you know, it clearly is showing scenes that 0:06:16.240 --> 0:06:20.160 are part of a rich mythology that we apparently know 0:06:20.600 --> 0:06:24.240 little to nothing about, and so there are a lot 0:06:24.279 --> 0:06:27.400 of attempts to try to understand what the different panels 0:06:27.440 --> 0:06:31.279 are depicting and if and if so, how they connect 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:35.320 to mythologies that we might know something about. But but 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:38.480 coming back to that provenance question, Yeah, I think it's 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:42.359 so interesting that there are at least three different distinct 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:46.279 sort of regional inputs. Now, as you already mentioned, based 0:06:46.279 --> 0:06:50.359 on physical characteristics of the cauldron, like the silversmithing techniques 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:53.279 that were used to create it, it seems to be 0:06:53.320 --> 0:06:56.800 a product of southeastern Europe. Yes, but most scholars pointing 0:06:56.839 --> 0:07:00.160 to uh to the metal working techniques of the Thracians 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:03.200 who live in As you said, what is today Bulgaria 0:07:03.320 --> 0:07:05.680 or Romania, and I was trying to figure out what 0:07:05.720 --> 0:07:09.520 are some examples of this distinctive style that's uh, that's 0:07:09.520 --> 0:07:13.200 so strongly linked to Thracian culture. Well, I was reading 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.360 about this on the website for the National Museum of Denmark, 0:07:16.400 --> 0:07:19.120 which has a lot of great materials about the Gundistrict Cauldron, 0:07:19.640 --> 0:07:22.840 and they compare the gun District Cauldron to the metal 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:26.880 working on a gilded silver pitcher from Bulgaria from roughly 0:07:27.000 --> 0:07:30.520 three hundred b C. And looking at it, I would agree, Yeah, 0:07:30.560 --> 0:07:35.080 the techniques and the artistic style look extremely similar. Like 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:39.000 the way the animal figures are embossed. Remember that this 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:41.760 is not just like an illustration or carving, but this 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:46.360 is like hammered and punched metal. So it has raised 0:07:46.440 --> 0:07:49.480 animal figures with like textures that you could feel with 0:07:49.520 --> 0:07:53.320 your fingers running over them. And those textures are very 0:07:53.360 --> 0:07:56.920 similar between the two works. So like the animal figures 0:07:57.240 --> 0:08:00.960 are embossed and punched with patterns of exture that seemed 0:08:00.960 --> 0:08:04.360 to indicate hair or fur, and it's extremely distinctive. You 0:08:04.360 --> 0:08:06.920 see some of the same patterns on the on the 0:08:06.960 --> 0:08:10.960 apparent herring bone patterns on the clothing of the people 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:14.280 on the gun district cauldron. So based on the techniques, 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:16.760 it's pretty clear that it was created by an artisan 0:08:16.800 --> 0:08:20.360 who had been trained in the traditions of Southeastern Europe. 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.720 But as you also said, the imagery depicts objects and 0:08:24.800 --> 0:08:28.480 motifs associated with the culture of the Celts who were 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:32.480 in more kind of western Central Europe at the time. Uh. 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:35.560 And a few examples of this would be a Celtic 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.679 musical instrument known as the car nix, which we can 0:08:38.720 --> 0:08:44.000 discuss in more detail later, certain types of Celtic ceremonial 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:48.439 jewelry such as an object called a torque, which I 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:50.880 can also get to in a minute, and things like that. 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:54.439 So those are your two inputs. It's like Celtic subject 0:08:54.520 --> 0:08:58.640 matter done in the metal working style of the Thracians 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:01.440 or of Southeastern Europe, and then it's found in the 0:09:01.559 --> 0:09:04.280 territory of neither one. It's found up in Jutland in 0:09:04.360 --> 0:09:08.520 modern day Denmark in a bog So yeah, you really 0:09:08.559 --> 0:09:11.120 have to wonder how all this comes together, Like did 0:09:11.160 --> 0:09:16.000 a Celtic person commission a Southeastern European silversmith to make 0:09:16.000 --> 0:09:19.960 a pot containing images from their culture and mythology, or 0:09:20.000 --> 0:09:22.800 maybe did it somehow arise from a border region where 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:26.160 these cultures came into contact, and then somehow this item 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:28.920 ends up in the bogs of Jutland. It would be 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:33.080 like finding what a Bulgarian band that only does covers 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:37.160 of Celtic music in modern Denmark and wondering like how 0:09:37.200 --> 0:09:39.880 they came to be there. Ah, yes, the thrash metal 0:09:39.960 --> 0:09:43.840 polka bands of Canada. Now I wanted to mention just 0:09:43.880 --> 0:09:47.760 a little bit more about the state that this cauldron, 0:09:48.000 --> 0:09:50.959 the so called cauldron, was in when it was discovered. 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:55.719 Uh So, altogether this object weighs about nine kilograms or 0:09:55.760 --> 0:09:59.520 about twenty pounds, and it appears to have been deposited 0:09:59.520 --> 0:10:04.160 in the ball deliberately, especially because it was disassembled when 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:06.440 it was put into the bog. So this cauldron has 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.920 many detachable features, so the rim can be taken off, 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:14.480 and the silver image panels which line the sides of 0:10:14.520 --> 0:10:17.240 the pot, those can be taken off, and when it 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:21.280 was found, they were all removed and placed inside the vessel. 0:10:21.800 --> 0:10:23.360 So I don't know, you see that, And that makes 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:25.280 it sound like this wasn't just sort of like it 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:27.520 wasn't like it fell off a wagon or something. That 0:10:27.720 --> 0:10:31.080 sounds like somebody put it in there. There is no 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:33.559 text anywhere on it, so it's not like a political 0:10:33.600 --> 0:10:36.240 cartoon where everything's labeled so you know what it means. 0:10:36.640 --> 0:10:40.559 It's you just have to infer from the imagery. Uh So, 0:10:40.760 --> 0:10:43.800 so that makes it difficult to identify things. But the imagery, 0:10:43.960 --> 0:10:46.480 as you already said, Rob, is is fascinating. There are 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:51.320 animals you would not expect to see. There are lions, uh, 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:54.600 there are images of gods that we know little or 0:10:54.640 --> 0:10:58.559 nothing about. In fact, there are even images of elephants. 0:10:59.040 --> 0:11:01.640 Ah and yeah that that should be surprising, especially like 0:11:01.679 --> 0:11:04.800 where are these images of elephants coming from? Yeah, exactly. 0:11:04.840 --> 0:11:06.640 So at this point I just want to pick out 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:09.400 a few of the individual plates and focus on what's 0:11:09.440 --> 0:11:12.600 going on on them, one at a time. So the 0:11:12.640 --> 0:11:14.200 first one I wanted to look at, I've got a 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:15.920 picture for you to look at, Rob, but of course 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:18.520 we will describe it for for you out there, the listener. 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:22.679 So it shows a god or a mythic figure that's 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:27.920 mostly human inform, except it has antlers like a stag 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.520 growing from its head. And this figure is sitting cross 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.520 legged right next to an actual stag, and then on 0:11:35.600 --> 0:11:37.080 the other side of it. There are a bunch of 0:11:37.080 --> 0:11:41.199 other animals there, four legged, predatory looking animals that might 0:11:41.200 --> 0:11:44.280 be dogs or maybe lions, I can't tell for sure. 0:11:44.800 --> 0:11:47.920 And then I love this. A tiny dude riding on 0:11:47.960 --> 0:11:51.680 the back of a fish is it is now compared 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:54.920 to the god with the antlers, the dude is much smaller, 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:57.240 But I don't know if it's a question of perspective. 0:11:57.280 --> 0:12:00.079 Maybe he's farther away, or maybe maybe this is just 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:03.120 separate imagery, or maybe the god is supposed to be 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:05.640 really big, or maybe the dude's supposed to be really small. 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:08.120 I can't tell what the deal with the size differences. 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:11.560 But if it is a regular sized man on the 0:12:11.600 --> 0:12:13.840 fish is back, that is a very big fish. It's 0:12:13.840 --> 0:12:17.600 got to be like dolphin or shark sized. Yeah. And 0:12:17.920 --> 0:12:20.240 there's also a kind of a different flavor to these 0:12:20.280 --> 0:12:23.440 two images. So they the hornet or ant alerd god 0:12:23.559 --> 0:12:25.800 or whatever this being is supposed to be is in 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:29.160 it has has a kind of a serene pose. His 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:33.760 legs his or her legs are crossed, uh, holding us 0:12:33.800 --> 0:12:36.719 what a serpent in one hand? Uh? And I'm not 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:39.520 sure what the implement is in the other hand. Oh, well, 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:42.160 that's Uh, that is a Celtic object. Actually, I think 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:45.840 this is an object that is bigger than just Celtic culture, 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:48.920 but it was big in Celtic culture called a torque, 0:12:48.960 --> 0:12:52.120 which is a type of metal ring worn around the 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:56.319 neck that seems to have had significance um for multiple 0:12:56.400 --> 0:13:01.480 Iron Age European culture, symbolizing power. It's power status or rank, 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:04.360 sort of like a crown. So if somebody's wearing a torque, 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:07.040 that would seem to indicate that they are a leader 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:10.120 or a high status person. So this figure with the 0:13:10.160 --> 0:13:13.840 antlers has the torque in his right hand, and then 0:13:13.840 --> 0:13:16.280 in the other hand he's grasping, like you said, the 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:18.880 neck of a giant snake. But I just wanted to 0:13:18.920 --> 0:13:22.000 point out that the snake has features on its head, 0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:26.480 which one scholar I was looking at identified as rams horns. 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:30.400 So that's a snake with ram horns. Oh wow. So 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:33.040 that there's clearly a lot going on here, as as 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:37.359 one often finds with depictions of powerful individuals or deities 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:40.559 or demigods. Uh. And and it's one of these images 0:13:40.600 --> 0:13:42.960 that I think it speaks across the ages. When you 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:45.440 look at this, you get a sense of power and 0:13:45.480 --> 0:13:51.080 divinity from it. Meanwhile, the individual writing the fish or dolphin, 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.240 I I it looks more comical to me, and I 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:56.800 makes me wonder if there is in fact it is 0:13:56.840 --> 0:14:00.120 supposed to be comical on some level, like if even 0:14:00.160 --> 0:14:02.440 if it is a god of some sort, maybe it 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:05.920 is a trickster god. Maybe it's something that is not 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:09.439 supposed to be interpreted with the same air of reverence 0:14:09.600 --> 0:14:13.160 as we have with this this central individual. Yeah, I agree, 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:16.040 fish boy looks very funny, and I think it's partly 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.880 in the way his knees are bent and he's sort 0:14:19.880 --> 0:14:22.960 of reaching forward while riding the fish, almost as if 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:26.840 you can imagine him kind of uh rocking and kicking 0:14:26.880 --> 0:14:31.160 back and forth and saying like go faster, come on now. Obviously, 0:14:31.160 --> 0:14:36.320 another possible explanation for differences could also be different authors 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:39.800 over time. But as we alluded to earlier, but an 0:14:39.840 --> 0:14:42.440 interesting thing I wanted to point out again. So there's 0:14:42.480 --> 0:14:44.760 a lot we don't know about what these images are 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:48.320 supposed to depict. But this antler headed god who is 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:50.560 holding a torque in one hand, is also wearing a 0:14:50.600 --> 0:14:53.640 torque around his neck, so he appears to be a 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:58.000 leader or high status figure himself. But maybe by holding 0:14:58.040 --> 0:15:01.600 a torque in one hand. Uh. I don't know, just speculating, 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:04.160 but maybe it means he can also make a king. 0:15:04.320 --> 0:15:14.240 He can also give the crown to another thank But 0:15:14.320 --> 0:15:16.920 to go on to discuss another panel, Rob, I wanted 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:18.920 to come back to one you sort of mentioned earlier, 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:22.360 the panel that has the cauldron dunking on it, because 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:24.960 this panel is really interesting and there was some good 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:28.880 interpretive material on the National Museum of Denmark website about it. 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:32.760 So this is one of the interior wall panels that 0:15:32.800 --> 0:15:35.920 this would be lining the inner wall of the cauldron, 0:15:36.360 --> 0:15:38.280 and there's a lot going on on it, so let's 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:41.280 try to break it down piece by piece. So one 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:44.200 thing is that there is a row of soldiers on 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:47.800 the bottom and they are on foot, they're holding spears 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:50.880 and shields, and they are moving towards the left side 0:15:50.920 --> 0:15:54.520 of the panel. And then above them is a straight 0:15:55.000 --> 0:15:59.560 horizontal tree branch with little leaves forking off of it. 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:03.400 And then above the tree branch are soldiers on horseback 0:16:03.600 --> 0:16:06.760 moving in the opposite direction of the procession. Below they're 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:09.640 moving to the right side of the panel. And then 0:16:09.680 --> 0:16:12.200 on the lower right side of the panel, there are 0:16:12.400 --> 0:16:18.320 three warriors playing instruments that are known as carnacs. When 0:16:18.320 --> 0:16:20.240 I first looked at these things, I had no idea 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:22.360 what they were, but I looked them up, and these 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:24.520 are a well known type of artifact. Rob I've got 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:26.440 a close up for you to look at here. But 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:30.800 the car knicks was a wind instrument used by the 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:33.680 Celts of the Iron Age. It is essentially a giant 0:16:34.480 --> 0:16:38.400 s shaped trumpet, but most of the length of this 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:43.560 trumpet is a vertical pipe reaching far up above your head. 0:16:43.680 --> 0:16:47.120 So picture a kind of long periscope tube, except it's 0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:49.240 not going to your eye, it's connecting to your mouth, 0:16:49.680 --> 0:16:52.280 and you blow through it, and then the sound comes 0:16:52.280 --> 0:16:54.520 out of this tube that ends maybe a whole other 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:59.360 person's height above your head. Uh. And so the the 0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:02.120 bell art of this instrument, the part where the sound 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:04.840 comes out, would often be shaped to look like an 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:08.000 open jawed head of an animal such as a dragon 0:17:08.160 --> 0:17:12.200 or a serpent, or maybe sometimes a bore. The carnyx 0:17:12.280 --> 0:17:16.600 was identified in ancient literary sources as associated with warfare, 0:17:16.760 --> 0:17:18.879 so you might play it on the battlefield for a 0:17:18.920 --> 0:17:23.160 coordination of tactics or for intimidation of the enemy long 0:17:23.200 --> 0:17:27.080 distance communication. There you go, but what's going on with 0:17:27.160 --> 0:17:29.800 the warriors on the bottom row of the panel, Well, 0:17:29.800 --> 0:17:32.440 they seem to be moving toward the left side, where 0:17:32.600 --> 0:17:35.800 one by one they will face a god of some 0:17:35.880 --> 0:17:38.879 kind depicted as a giant who is you know, at 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:42.280 least twice as big, a probably three times as big 0:17:42.320 --> 0:17:46.320 as the warriors, and the god or the giant will 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:49.640 grasp a warrior with both hands, turn him upside down, 0:17:49.760 --> 0:17:53.440 and then dunk him head first into a cauldron. Now, 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:56.439 I think there's plenty of room to question the the 0:17:56.520 --> 0:18:00.600 interpretation of these panels. Again, they don't come with words 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:03.479 on them, so they don't explain, and they don't super 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:07.680 clearly connect to mythology that we know about. Connections that 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:11.199 would be established have to be kind of inferred. They 0:18:11.240 --> 0:18:14.919 might be kind of tenuous. But the curators of the 0:18:15.040 --> 0:18:19.160 National Museum of Denmark argue that the warriors on foot 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:22.160 in the bottom of this panel, they are being represented 0:18:22.200 --> 0:18:25.359 as probably in the underworld, meaning that they were just 0:18:25.560 --> 0:18:28.920 killed in battle, and so they're being depicted as I 0:18:28.960 --> 0:18:31.840 don't know, the the dead forms of their former selves. 0:18:32.200 --> 0:18:34.440 And you can tell they're in the underworld because they 0:18:34.440 --> 0:18:39.240 are underneath this horizontal tree branch Apparently the tree branch 0:18:39.359 --> 0:18:43.480 probably denotes the earth itself and the division between world. 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:46.440 So if the tree branches is the earth, what's below 0:18:46.440 --> 0:18:48.320 it is the underworld, and what's above it is some 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:52.520 kind of heavenly afterlife, and from here the the The 0:18:52.560 --> 0:18:54.959 interpretation goes on to say that as these figures are 0:18:55.040 --> 0:18:59.080 dunked into the cauldron by the God, their fate is decided, 0:18:59.520 --> 0:19:04.480 and this fate might include being resurrected or reincarnated in 0:19:04.640 --> 0:19:08.320 some exalted state, such as in this heavenly realm up 0:19:08.359 --> 0:19:11.199 above on the top of the panel, and perhaps as 0:19:11.240 --> 0:19:14.919 a person of higher status or rank. I remember that 0:19:14.960 --> 0:19:17.960 the soldiers shown above the branch were on horseback, so 0:19:18.040 --> 0:19:21.199 maybe this means a fallen warrior could be resurrected as 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:24.360 an officer or as a member of the equestrian classes 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:28.360 higher socioeconomic class. And I thought it was really interesting 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:32.159 how this recalls the imagery of cauldrons used in visions 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:35.320 of Hell and multiple very different Asian cultures that we 0:19:35.320 --> 0:19:38.240 talked about in the previous part of this series, where 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:41.159 the cauldrons were not only an instrument of torture in 0:19:41.160 --> 0:19:45.000 the realms of Hell, but they were secondarily a symbol 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:49.000 of transformation into something more honorable and refined, if you 0:19:49.000 --> 0:19:52.680 could be reincarnated as a sort of better being after 0:19:52.760 --> 0:19:56.080 the stint in hell and it it makes me think again, 0:19:56.160 --> 0:19:59.200 Like seeing this motif a rise in multiple different cultures, 0:19:59.280 --> 0:20:02.719 separated rightly in time and geography and language and and 0:20:02.760 --> 0:20:05.960 all these different barriers, makes one wonder if there's not 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:10.760 a common universal human experience underlying that theme, which would 0:20:10.760 --> 0:20:13.760 seem to me to be very likely the transformation of 0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:16.800 raw food into cooked food, or of dirty clothing into 0:20:16.800 --> 0:20:20.800 clean clothing, as would be just you know, natural things 0:20:20.840 --> 0:20:24.160 where we see transformed by the work of the cauldron. Yeah, 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:27.679 like the basic nature of of cauldron technology and the 0:20:27.760 --> 0:20:30.879 idea that it it enables transformation, It does seem to 0:20:30.880 --> 0:20:34.240 be something you just see in culture after culture after culture, 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:38.280 just across vast distances on the planet. And the laundry 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:41.199 note is is important too. I've seen that pop up 0:20:41.200 --> 0:20:44.560 in a few different sources pointing to specific cauldrons of 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:49.880 note uh, And often discussions regarding that cauldron come back 0:20:49.960 --> 0:20:53.720 to cooking and the preparation of food, the transformation of 0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:57.720 of of of organic matter into some sort of delicious 0:20:57.840 --> 0:21:01.520 or hearty dish, but also sometimes laundry is discussed as 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:04.639 a possibility as well, And uh, I mean that is 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:06.880 a transformation we I think we tend to totally take 0:21:06.880 --> 0:21:09.719 for granted that you can have, you know, foul and 0:21:09.800 --> 0:21:14.200 soiled clothing, and yet here is this fabulous specialized cauldron 0:21:14.240 --> 0:21:16.639 in your house or at the local laundry map or 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:19.120 in the basement of your building that you put these 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:22.440 items into and you come back later and behold, they 0:21:22.440 --> 0:21:25.439 have been refreshed, they are they are new again. Yeah, man, 0:21:25.480 --> 0:21:27.879 who doesn't love clean laundry, especially clean sheets, is a 0:21:27.920 --> 0:21:31.639 wonderful thing. Okay, I got another panel I want to 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:34.119 focus on. This one's very special and it may be 0:21:34.320 --> 0:21:36.680 the most important of all of them due to its 0:21:36.760 --> 0:21:40.240 placement within the cauldron, and that is the panel that 0:21:40.400 --> 0:21:44.119 is in the bottom of the cauldron bowl. Now I 0:21:44.200 --> 0:21:46.280 might not have even noticed this one just by looking 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:48.919 at pictures of the plates on the Internet, because a 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:51.639 lot of the photography that's out there focuses on the 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:54.959 side plates for good reason. But I actually saw this 0:21:55.000 --> 0:21:57.919 one brought up in a curator's video feature from the 0:21:57.960 --> 0:22:00.960 British Museum that was focused on the District cauldron. I 0:22:00.960 --> 0:22:03.960 think maybe when um, when they had it on loan 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:08.200 or something. But it was by an archaeologist named Julia Farley, 0:22:08.240 --> 0:22:10.840 and this was really interesting, so that this panel is 0:22:10.880 --> 0:22:12.760 at the bottom of the pot, so if you're looking 0:22:12.800 --> 0:22:15.359 down into the pot, it's what you'd see at the 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:19.000 very bottom, assuming the pots empty. And because of that feature, 0:22:19.040 --> 0:22:21.359 I started to think about how if the pot had 0:22:21.440 --> 0:22:24.720 something in it, like soup or whatever. I don't know 0:22:24.760 --> 0:22:26.840 if this was ever used to serve sup probably not, 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:29.639 actually more more of a ceremonial vessel, but I don't know. 0:22:29.640 --> 0:22:32.199 I guess I couldn't rule that out. Um, if it 0:22:32.280 --> 0:22:35.119 had anything in it, this panel would be hidden and 0:22:35.160 --> 0:22:37.960 then it would be revealed as the contents were taken 0:22:38.040 --> 0:22:41.240 out of the bull. Um. So what what do you 0:22:41.280 --> 0:22:46.800 see in this panel? Well, it depicts a gigantic bull reclining. 0:22:47.160 --> 0:22:49.399