Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name
Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday.
Speaker 1: Time for an episode from the vault. This one asks
Speaker 1: the question, can Rob and Joe really make an episode
Speaker 1: of Stuff to Blow Your Mind about the concept of
Speaker 1: a leg lamp? Can they? We did? Yes, this was
Speaker 1: I was surprised as anyone, and it turned off that way,
Speaker 1: But yeah we did one. Uh who did this episode
Speaker 1: of major award calling back of course holiday film a
Speaker 1: Christmas story and talking about leg shaped lamps and then
Speaker 1: diving into the deep ancient and occult history of lamps
Speaker 1: and other objects shaped in the likeness of a human
Speaker 1: leg or foot. This is from the holiday season from
Speaker 1: last year. Uh so we hope you enjoy it, either
Speaker 1: again or for the first time. Now. Welcome to Stuff
Speaker 1: to Blow Your Mind, a production of My Heart Rate Deo. Hey,
Speaker 1: welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is
Speaker 1: Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. And this is gonna
Speaker 1: be our last core at our last new Core episode
Speaker 1: of the year. And what do we have for you here?
Speaker 1: Another holiday episode? And we really didn't know until just
Speaker 1: a few days ago exactly what the holiday episode would be.
Speaker 1: We were talking about doing an episode on reindeer related stuff,
Speaker 1: and maybe we'll do that next year. We and then
Speaker 1: we were talking about, well, let's let's we've done previous
Speaker 1: episode where we talked about holiday inventions, Christmas inventions and
Speaker 1: so forth, maybe we could do another one of those,
Speaker 1: and um uh, you know, we started looking into some
Speaker 1: topics and we wound up focusing entirely upon the holiday
Speaker 1: film A Christmas Story, well not just on the movie,
Speaker 1: on the movie's most sacred prop that's right. And I
Speaker 1: mean for a little bit they we were thinking, well,
Speaker 1: look at all the things that are to talk abou
Speaker 1: in a Christmas story. We could talk about soap poisoning,
Speaker 1: freezing your tongue to a flagpole, the dangerous posed by
Speaker 1: BB guns, how furnaces work. I gotta say, I having
Speaker 1: looked into the medical literature on soap poisoning, first of all,
Speaker 1: it is a real thing. Second, that's some pretty dark territory,
Speaker 1: not not not the most fun way to head into
Speaker 1: the holidays. Well, I mean it's pretty dark in that
Speaker 1: Christmas story. You know. There he is he's a he's
Speaker 1: a child, and he's blind and his parents feel such
Speaker 1: remorse for having him put that bar of soap in
Speaker 1: his mouth. Now, from what I could tell in my
Speaker 1: brief investigation, I don't think it's dangerous to put a
Speaker 1: bar of soap in your mouth for a few minutes,
Speaker 1: but you definitely don't want to like eat a significant
Speaker 1: amount of it, right, So, so so poisoning is a thing. Yes, Okay,
Speaker 1: don't don't swallow soap. But like I said, we're not
Speaker 1: We're not focusing on the soap here. We're talking. We're
Speaker 1: gonna be talking about, um, the Old Man's Major Award.
Speaker 1: We're gonna be talking about that leg lamp now, Rob.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you've had this experience, but I
Speaker 1: can say most of my exposure to to a Christmas
Speaker 1: story the movie comes in the form of a sort
Speaker 1: of running, droning background noise that's going on at a
Speaker 1: at a some kind of family house around Christmas while
Speaker 1: it's just playing on an infinite loop on some cable
Speaker 1: TV station that that is turned on in a room
Speaker 1: I might not even be in very much, But when
Speaker 1: this happens, I noticed that this must have something to
Speaker 1: do with like the patterns with which I come and
Speaker 1: go into certain rooms in the house, so that that
Speaker 1: would be an interesting thing to study on its own.
Speaker 1: But will pretty frequently have the experience of seeing one
Speaker 1: scene in the movie like five times in the same day,
Speaker 1: and it's always the same scene. And for me, it
Speaker 1: has definitely been the scene where the old man is
Speaker 1: in the house and and a big crate arrives and
Speaker 1: it was that we get the lines about it being
Speaker 1: FREGGI lay and he digs through the straw and then
Speaker 1: pulls out this glorious leg lamp. Yeah, I have I
Speaker 1: have a similar experience with a Christmas story. Um, it
Speaker 1: would there were so there are. There have been some
Speaker 1: dedicated viewings of it, uh you know, throughout the years. Um,
Speaker 1: but most of it it's just it's on TV during Christmas,
Speaker 1: and therefore you watch it or you watch part of it,
Speaker 1: and so when you actually sat down and watch it
Speaker 1: in its entirety, there will be these scenes that you
Speaker 1: remember really vividly, and then there are scenes that you
Speaker 1: didn't realize we're part of the movie at all. That
Speaker 1: sort of thing. I should probably inform everyone what this
Speaker 1: movie has. A number of you were probably familiar with it,
Speaker 1: some of you were not Uh. This was a three
Speaker 1: holiday film that was based on the writings of Jane Shepherd,
Speaker 1: particularly on the book In God We Trust All Others
Speaker 1: Pay Cash. It's one boy's account of childhood holiday dreams, desires,
Speaker 1: and fears. It's a fun movie with with some solid
Speaker 1: laughs in it, some some some good heart, but not
Speaker 1: to a sappy degree, especially for a holiday film. And
Speaker 1: in some ways you could almost think of it as
Speaker 1: kind of like a a proto Simpsons, you know, like
Speaker 1: it's it's some of the gags that they get up
Speaker 1: to in a Christmas story are the sorts of things
Speaker 1: that would happen on The Simpsons later on. But of
Speaker 1: course the Simpsons leans more into more into the satire
Speaker 1: and more into like pop cultural references, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm talking about. Like that, you can't you imagine an
Speaker 1: episode where Homer gets some sort of obnoxious award that
Speaker 1: he wants to display at the front of the house.
Speaker 1: Marge doesn't like it, and uh, and maybe something terrible
Speaker 1: ends up happening to the award and he he blames her. Yeah,
Speaker 1: now that you say that, I can't imagine that being
Speaker 1: a plotline. Okay, yeah, I mean Ralphie is essentially a
Speaker 1: good boy, uh, whereas Bart is a bad boy. So uh,
Speaker 1: you know we have to take that into account as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Bart would not dream of getting a BB gun for Christmas.
Speaker 1: He would just go and I don't know, shoplift to
Speaker 1: be begun or something. Yeah, oh well, I mean I
Speaker 1: hope he learned his lesson from that Christmas episodes of
Speaker 1: The Simpsons where he did shoplift. Remember, Oh that's right.
Speaker 1: Oh I remember that One's actually very sad because his
Speaker 1: mother is very disappointed in him. And yeah, strings, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's It's a solid episode like that sort of Simpson's
Speaker 1: episode reminds me a lot of of of this, though
Speaker 1: in a weird way. That Simpsons episode is more serious
Speaker 1: than a Christmas story is. Yeah, what is it? He steals?
Speaker 1: It's like a video game. It's like the bone Storm
Speaker 1: for whatever. Yeah, it's like essentially like a Mortal Kombat
Speaker 1: type game that just seems like the greatest thing ever.
Speaker 1: And they have like the muscled Santa Claus and the commercial. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're not gonna give a Christmas story the full
Speaker 1: weird house cinema treatment or anything here today. But I
Speaker 1: do want to just point out real quickly a few
Speaker 1: of the people involved in it because it's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: First of all, I was directed by Bob Clark, who
Speaker 1: also directed the notorious holiday proto slasher Black Christmas in four,
Speaker 1: which I have never seen, but it had a It
Speaker 1: had a great cast, including Olivia Hussey, Margo Kidder, Kira
Speaker 1: Dulia from two thousand and one of Space Odyssey, and
Speaker 1: of course weird how cinema favorite John Saxon. Everybody at
Speaker 1: home do a push up for John Saxon right now. Uh.
Speaker 1: He also directed Death Dream Murder by Decree, which is
Speaker 1: a Sherlock Holmes versus Jack the Rippers story, two Porky's movies,
Speaker 1: two Baby Geniuses movies, Porky's and Baby Geniuses. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: but still there's some good stuff in there. He passed
Speaker 1: away in two thousand seven, but I think a Christmas
Speaker 1: story is likely to remain his his legacy, Like this
Speaker 1: is the one that's gonna really stick. So I guess
Speaker 1: Black Christmas also has its place in film history as well. Sure,
Speaker 1: and uh, as far as the cast has well, has
Speaker 1: a wonderful cast Christmas story, but the two main characters
Speaker 1: worth pointing out for our purposes. The Old Man has
Speaker 1: played played by the always terrific Darren McGavin. This is
Speaker 1: the guy who played cold Shack the night Stalker. I
Speaker 1: think he was also in the Arnold Swartzenegger film Raw
Speaker 1: Deal Okay. And the mom is played by Melinda Dillon,
Speaker 1: who was in Harry and the Henderson's as well as
Speaker 1: Spontaneous Combustion, which is one of the films that we
Speaker 1: covered on Weird House Cinema this year. Did she play
Speaker 1: like the creepy scientist? She am? I right about that.
Speaker 1: It's really hard to remember. Everybody else just kind of
Speaker 1: grows dim against the burning fire. That is uh, that
Speaker 1: is a Doroff's performance in that. Brad Dorriff is just
Speaker 1: so good. Yeah, I just double checked she she's the
Speaker 1: German scientist. I think at some point Brad Dorroff goes
Speaker 1: to her house and maybe she catches on fire, and
Speaker 1: I don't know, probably that's probably the generally how it goes. Um.
Speaker 1: But I don't want to sell her short because Melinda
Speaker 1: Dylan is a great actor as well. She was she
Speaker 1: was in Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Absence
Speaker 1: of Malice. In that she was nominated for two Academy
Speaker 1: Awards and one Tony Award. Okay, but we don't want
Speaker 1: to leave anybody out for the like eight people in
Speaker 1: the audience who have never seen this movie or even
Speaker 1: just seen this sequence in the movie on five times
Speaker 1: in the same day on Christmas. But what's the deal
Speaker 1: with the major award? Well, it is, as we've been saying,
Speaker 1: a major award. It is something he has won for
Speaker 1: his achievements, uh, in a game. And what is the game? Well,
Speaker 1: I think it's like it's like a trivia contest, maybe
Speaker 1: done through the mail from a newspaper. Though I think
Speaker 1: it's worth saying that he actually does not supply most
Speaker 1: of the answers on the contest. He has to ask
Speaker 1: Melinda Dillon and she actually knows the answers. Then he
Speaker 1: fills them in and it sends it off or something,
Speaker 1: and apparently wins this trivia contest by answering questions like
Speaker 1: what is the name of the Lone Rangers and nephews Horse.
Speaker 1: But later in the film, after he receives his major award,
Speaker 1: when people ask him how what it was for, he says,
Speaker 1: it's for mind power. Yeah, so it's it's this wonderful design.
Speaker 1: It is a lamp that is shaped like a woman's
Speaker 1: leg wearing a fishnet stocking with the shade resembling a
Speaker 1: kind of mini skirt or short hoop drafts or something.
Speaker 1: And um, as we as we learned in the show,
Speaker 1: it's it's an item of much controversy in the household.
Speaker 1: And um, and it's clear that Mom does not like
Speaker 1: this lamp and certainly does not think it belongs at
Speaker 1: the front of the house where neighbors can see it. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, it's already Uh, it's it's becoming a topic
Speaker 1: of discussion in the neighborhood. And then what happens there
Speaker 1: is an accident. Somebody is cleaning too close to the
Speaker 1: lamp and it is accidentally destroyed. Now, I think one
Speaker 1: of the great points of humor in the movie is
Speaker 1: that it is never made clear why a lamp shaped
Speaker 1: like a sexy leg is the prize for winning this
Speaker 1: newspaper contest, Like that there's no connection there, Like why
Speaker 1: would this be what you get? Uh? And it's just
Speaker 1: not explained. Yeah, I mean it doesn't even say anything, um,
Speaker 1: you know on the lamp. It's not like the award
Speaker 1: is shaped like a lamp. No, this is just a
Speaker 1: lamp that shaped like a leg. Um, but but he is.
Speaker 1: He is fond of it. He thinks it is wonderful.
Speaker 1: She does not. It becomes a uh, it becomes a
Speaker 1: controversial issue between the two of them. It is destroyed.
Speaker 1: An attempt to rebuild the leg lamp seems pow ssible,
Speaker 1: but we'll never know if it was successful. We we
Speaker 1: we we we suspect that it was not. That this
Speaker 1: is something that, once broken can never be repaired. Well.
Speaker 1: I think also there's a little bit of subtlety there,
Speaker 1: because when the old man is trying to repair it
Speaker 1: with glue and failing, you sense in him a kind
Speaker 1: of a kind of waning enthusiasm, where it may be,
Speaker 1: in fact that he is realizing that his wife was
Speaker 1: correct in thinking that this lamp is rather tacky. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: but he didn't want to admit it earlier. Right, So
Speaker 1: this is this lamp. This is a hilarious part of
Speaker 1: the film. This is based on the chapter My Old
Speaker 1: Man and the Siviest Special Award that heralded the birth
Speaker 1: of pop art from the nine novel in God We
Speaker 1: Trust All Others pay cash. But it's really taken on
Speaker 1: a life of its own since then, Um, you can
Speaker 1: now buy like replicas of the lamp, reproductions of the
Speaker 1: rent lamp in various sizes. You can get Christmas tree
Speaker 1: ornaments where the Christmas I mean, you can basically get
Speaker 1: Christmas tree ornaments of it, or even Christmas lights of
Speaker 1: the lamp. Like the lamp has become like this, um,
Speaker 1: this weird symbol all its own. I was. I was
Speaker 1: reading about it on read Craiger's blog Inventor's Digest, And
Speaker 1: apparently Shepherd was inspired to create this fictional lamp based
Speaker 1: on knee high soda ads that he remembered seeing a
Speaker 1: magazine showing two shapely legs up to the knee. Uh.
Speaker 1: He remembered these from from being from when he was
Speaker 1: a boy. And then for the film production designer Ruben
Speaker 1: Freed Uh he did the rest. And the lamp is
Speaker 1: apparently protected by two different trademarks. Uh. They've been mass
Speaker 1: produced over the years, and yes you can buy them
Speaker 1: today as functional lamps. When this movie came out, you
Speaker 1: can only dream of such a thing. I think they
Speaker 1: made like just a handful of these for the film,
Speaker 1: But now it is achievable by anyone. Now, correct me
Speaker 1: if I'm wrong, But I believe I read somewhere that
Speaker 1: the original lamp prop made for the film no longer exists.
Speaker 1: That is what I was reading as well. Yeah, lost
Speaker 1: to history like so many great works, like many of
Speaker 1: the artworks of the Parthenon, or just think the great antiquities,
Speaker 1: they just fade to time. Well, speaking of antiquities, obviously this,
Speaker 1: this can't be where the story begins and ends, right,
Speaker 1: There has to be more of it. There has to
Speaker 1: be more to the lamp that is a leg and
Speaker 1: the leg that is a lamp. By god, if there's
Speaker 1: not more to it, will make more to it. Absolutely. Well,
Speaker 1: let's go to the obvious place to discuss all of
Speaker 1: this is to go way back and just talk about
Speaker 1: lamps in general. The lamp and the movie is of
Speaker 1: course an electric lamp with origins in the early nineteenth century.
Speaker 1: But the history of illumination technology goes way back. Obviously,
Speaker 1: you can think to our invention episodes on fire technology.
Speaker 1: And indeed the most basic form of illumination technology is
Speaker 1: of course a mere torch or a burning brand of
Speaker 1: some sword, or even a very primitive you know, burning stick.
Speaker 1: Uh you know, these wall get it done. But according
Speaker 1: to Brian M. Fagan and Garrett G. Fagan um in
Speaker 1: the UH in the seventy grade. Inventions of the ancient world.
Speaker 1: UM wick burning lamps go back at least as far
Speaker 1: as the Late Paleolithic period. It's thirty thousands through ten
Speaker 1: thousand years ago. All you need is a reservoir of
Speaker 1: fuel and a wick made from plant fiber or even
Speaker 1: something like human hair. And the fuel itself can be
Speaker 1: any number of things. That can be oil, it can
Speaker 1: be fat, and sometimes salt was added to oil to
Speaker 1: keep it from overheating. Uh. Tons of lamps survived from
Speaker 1: the ancient world as these were, of course widespread and
Speaker 1: extremely useful pieces of technology. Uh. They illuminate your environment.
Speaker 1: They turn uh night time, well not it doesn't turn
Speaker 1: nighttime into day, but you know, it provides some of
Speaker 1: the illumination that you would have in the daytime in
Speaker 1: a nice concentrated form. Yeah. And I think one of
Speaker 1: the things that's useful about a lamp or like a candle.
Speaker 1: We've talked about this on UH Core episodes of the
Speaker 1: show before, is that they they provide moderate light for
Speaker 1: a long period of time. They're constructed so as to
Speaker 1: gradually slowly feed the fuel into the flame rather than
Speaker 1: have the fire just burned through the fuel source as
Speaker 1: fast as it possibly can, like it would with you
Speaker 1: know many other things like a you know, a lit
Speaker 1: stick or something. Yeah. So the technology here, the the
Speaker 1: device itself allows you to make the most out of
Speaker 1: your limited fuel. Now real quick, I want to want
Speaker 1: to just mention the Fagans quickly. Um Brian Fagan, of course,
Speaker 1: Brian and Fagan is uh is someone I sade a
Speaker 1: lot on the show um Starters. The That Great Inventions
Speaker 1: book is super useful. But he's written a number of
Speaker 1: volumes and still has books coming out, including a new
Speaker 1: book with Nadia Durrani titled Climate Chaos Lessons on Survival
Speaker 1: from Our Ancestors. Now. The other Fagan, though, Garrett G. Fagan,
Speaker 1: was an Irish American ancient historian, best known for his
Speaker 1: social histories of Roman bathing and the Spectacles of the
Speaker 1: Roman Arena. And I could be wrong on this, but
Speaker 1: I do not believe these two Pagans are related at all.
Speaker 1: They just happen to work together in this one chapter, uh,
Speaker 1: in the seventy grade Inventions of the Ancient World that
Speaker 1: deals with illumination technology. Okay, so lamps go very far
Speaker 1: back for into the Paleolithic period, right, and lamp technology
Speaker 1: of this basic sword can be found from throughout Mesopotamia,
Speaker 1: and the shape of the reservoir varies, so you could
Speaker 1: you can use basically found objects as your reservoir. So
Speaker 1: seashells were often used because these were naturally occurring shallow
Speaker 1: bowls with ridges to accommodate a wick at one end.
Speaker 1: But then once you start making artificial reservoirs for your
Speaker 1: oil or your fat, whatever you're burning your fuel, um,
Speaker 1: then you're making them out of pottery or even metal.
Speaker 1: And this allows for all manner of simple and ornate
Speaker 1: lamp designs. And you know where we're going with that, right, Oh,
Speaker 1: of course. Yeah. The obvious question is how many of
Speaker 1: these lamps were shaped like legs? Well, are you going
Speaker 1: to tell me? Well, this is a difficult question to answer, Joe.
Speaker 1: Humans have, of course, always love to craft things in
Speaker 1: the likeness of animals and or themselves, and animal legs
Speaker 1: and feet have always been a favorite motif. In fact,
Speaker 1: uh Fagan includes an image of one in the book.
Speaker 1: It's a first century CE brazier from Pompey with beautiful
Speaker 1: like animal feet supporting it and of course, we still
Speaker 1: see this today with you know, tubs anything. It's like
Speaker 1: it's like the human Artistan can't help it. It's like,
Speaker 1: why have put feet upon this device or this prop
Speaker 1: or this piece of furniture? Uh? Could I not make
Speaker 1: those feet like actual feet? Uh? And I guess you
Speaker 1: can even say there's a bit of biomimicry there as well,
Speaker 1: like if you're going to support an object with these
Speaker 1: like stumpy pods, uh, well maybe make them look like
Speaker 1: a foot. That's true. In fact, you've got me thinking
Speaker 1: about how often the legs of you know, fancier pieces
Speaker 1: of furniture are kind of shaped to be organic or
Speaker 1: flesh like in a way. They might have kind of
Speaker 1: curves on them, similar to a human leg or to
Speaker 1: an animal leg, even if they're not explicitly trying to
Speaker 1: depict a human or animal leg like with toes and stuff,
Speaker 1: right though, of course, there are plenty of explicit depictions
Speaker 1: out there where it's like it's straight up looks like
Speaker 1: the foot of a lion or a goat or what
Speaker 1: have you. Thank you, thank you, thank so. Looking around
Speaker 1: in the history of lamp designs, um, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: sure I missed something interesting, But I've come across two
Speaker 1: different examples of UH from from from Greek and Roman
Speaker 1: traditions that are that are pretty interesting, particularly when dealing
Speaker 1: with the Greek ascos and the Greek alabastron. So an
Speaker 1: ascos is an ancient Greek pottery vessel used to pour
Speaker 1: liquids such as oils, so it is not quite a lamp,
Speaker 1: though it could have been used to store lamp oil
Speaker 1: and could have been used to refill lamps. And many
Speaker 1: of these were decorated and decorational, sometimes in the form
Speaker 1: of animals. And then an alabastron is similar. It's a
Speaker 1: a pottery vessel often used for holding oils or perfumes,
Speaker 1: named for the carved alabaster containers from Egypt that started
Speaker 1: the design key and the key thing here is that
Speaker 1: these are generally elongated, so um they are by their
Speaker 1: very nature and their sort of generic form kind of
Speaker 1: leg shaped. So you'll find both the of these in
Speaker 1: various shapes and forms, and and they're littered throughout museums
Speaker 1: and collections around the world. But I was able to
Speaker 1: find some images of for starters, there's a leg shaped
Speaker 1: ascos or alabastron that is or was in the collection
Speaker 1: of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, though I've had
Speaker 1: trouble finding out any additional information about it. I might
Speaker 1: have to ask anyone out there who has has visited
Speaker 1: the Royal Ontario Museum or or can visit it now,
Speaker 1: to go in and try and get me more answers
Speaker 1: on this. But the image I found is indeed uh
Speaker 1: an alabastron, or it appears to be an alabaster. It's
Speaker 1: hard to figure out what the scale is here. It
Speaker 1: is shaped like a essentially like a naked human leg,
Speaker 1: and it's free standing. It looks like it had it
Speaker 1: maybe has sandals drawn on it um and it was yeah,
Speaker 1: used to hold oil or something. This gives new meaning
Speaker 1: to the the expression that someone who can hold their
Speaker 1: liquor has a quote hollow leg. Yes, this is indeed
Speaker 1: hollow leg. I wonder if that yeah. I didn't even
Speaker 1: think about that that that phrase. Um. Now I was
Speaker 1: able to find more information on another one. There is
Speaker 1: a Greek pottery alabastron in the shape of aggrieved or
Speaker 1: armored leg from Corinth or Rhodes circus six century b
Speaker 1: c E. And it's part or was I'm not sure of.
Speaker 1: The Callos Collection in London included an image of this
Speaker 1: uh for you to look at as well. Joe. So,
Speaker 1: so this is less decorative um and but also is
Speaker 1: not a naked leg. It has armor on it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is more like an ancient RoboCop leg. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: the Callos Collection website shares the following quote. The callous
Speaker 1: example above is a very rare and fine alabasterone that
Speaker 1: takes the shape of a leg protected by a grieve,
Speaker 1: dating to the sixth century b c e. It is
Speaker 1: an interesting example of a plastic vase from this period.
Speaker 1: And note the use of the term plastic here. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's not modern plastic obviously. This just means that it's molded,
Speaker 1: and this is derived from the Greek verb plastine, meaning
Speaker 1: to mold. Quote. The grief is outlined in black slip
Speaker 1: and tapers towards the ankle area. The foot emerges beneath
Speaker 1: with carefully insize details for the sandal and toes. Although
Speaker 1: primarily used as a container, the form of this alabastron
Speaker 1: as a grieved leg implies that it may also have
Speaker 1: been used um at or dedicated to a sanctuary as
Speaker 1: a votive offering There is a very similar example of
Speaker 1: this rare type in the Museum of Pharmacia in Portugal,
Speaker 1: and they include an inventory number and I was able
Speaker 1: to look it up. It's number uh ten two, and
Speaker 1: you get kind of a delightful rear view of this
Speaker 1: free standing hollow leg was Okay, so it seems like
Speaker 1: a bunch of ancient Greeks really uh pouring stuff out
Speaker 1: of legs. Yeah. Now, again, these are not lamps. They're
Speaker 1: merely containers that may have contained lamp oil and may
Speaker 1: have been used to refill lamps. But we're not done yet. So,
Speaker 1: as the Pagans point out, the Roman period was a
Speaker 1: time of of pottery lamp mass production, and lamps of
Speaker 1: every design were used for not only practical reasons, you know,
Speaker 1: providing illumination when you need it, but also purely esthetic
Speaker 1: reasons and even religious and occult reasons. And that brings
Speaker 1: us to the next example, the Roman foot lamp. I
Speaker 1: initially found these on the Ferraby Keeper blog by Wayne Ferraby,
Speaker 1: a Brooklyn based writer, and I have to say this
Speaker 1: is quite a good, good looking blog. Looks like a
Speaker 1: lot of interesting content on here. I anyone wants to
Speaker 1: check it out it's uh Farrabee Keeper dot WordPress dot com.
Speaker 1: And uh, the great thing here is that we're not
Speaker 1: just talking about one lamp. We're not talking about oh well,
Speaker 1: here's the Roman foot lamp, and we we don't we
Speaker 1: have no idea why they made this. Instead, we have
Speaker 1: several different surviving lamps. And Uh, I've included images for
Speaker 1: you to look at, Joe. I invite anyone out there
Speaker 1: to either visit that Ferraby website or to to do
Speaker 1: Google image searches so you can pull this up for yourself,
Speaker 1: because these are these are wondrous and and really strange
Speaker 1: to look at. They are lamps in the shape of
Speaker 1: of a human foot, as the name implies. With with
Speaker 1: with with essentially a stopper or lid um at the
Speaker 1: aperture where the stump of the disembodied foot would be,
Speaker 1: and then there's another aperture at the big toe, and
Speaker 1: it is from this that the wick and therefore the
Speaker 1: flame would emerge. Right, So I guess you would hold
Speaker 1: this by the handle at the back of the foot,
Speaker 1: so you're holding it like behind the heel, and then
Speaker 1: you would have the flame sticking out of the big
Speaker 1: toe at the front. Yes, if you were holding it.
Speaker 1: But then, as we'll discuss, there are some questions regarding
Speaker 1: exactly what one does with a foot lamp um. But
Speaker 1: but I'm looking at it too. It also reminds me
Speaker 1: a bit of depictions of the hand of Glory, the
Speaker 1: you know, the occult item that is supposed to be
Speaker 1: like the the the disembodied hand of a like a
Speaker 1: criminals corpse that is then transformed in this into this
Speaker 1: magical item that burns candle light from the fingertips and
Speaker 1: you know, has strange energies and effects. Except this is
Speaker 1: not a hand. This is a foot. It's not a
Speaker 1: real it's a ceramic foot and uh, you know it's
Speaker 1: it's a a foot of pottery and uh and yeah,
Speaker 1: there is this flame that is emitting from either in
Speaker 1: front of the toe or from the toe itself. It
Speaker 1: depends on exactly how how the sculptor or has has
Speaker 1: has arranged it. You know. Now, what I would wonder
Speaker 1: is is this just like because somebody wanted an interesting
Speaker 1: lamp and they made lamps that look like looked like
Speaker 1: all kinds of things, or would a foot lamp have
Speaker 1: a particular significance in say a religious or political context
Speaker 1: or something. Yeah, and that is that is the riddle
Speaker 1: that that that the rest of us are left having
Speaker 1: to solve. So Ferraby points out that the symbols and
Speaker 1: motifs of the ancient Romans don't always make sense to
Speaker 1: us today, which I think is a very fair point.
Speaker 1: And uh and he He says that the best explanation
Speaker 1: that he could find where that these were sort of
Speaker 1: literal footlights placed on the floor or ground, especially at
Speaker 1: the base of murals, which which is inter It's still
Speaker 1: hard to figure out exactly like what at me, is
Speaker 1: it just you know, pure novelty. It's like, well, it's
Speaker 1: it's a foot lamp, or it's a it's a lamp
Speaker 1: that goes on the ground where our feet are. Let's
Speaker 1: make it in the shape of a foot as well. Well,
Speaker 1: to call back to the Simpsons. That kind of reminds
Speaker 1: me of why is their corn on the curtains in
Speaker 1: the kitchen, I don't know, kitchen food corn? Yeah, Or
Speaker 1: imagine um time travel or visiting our current agent finding
Speaker 1: solar powered outdoor lights that look like mushrooms? Why do
Speaker 1: they look like mushrooms? Well, I mean it basically comes
Speaker 1: down to there on the ground where mushrooms are. Um,
Speaker 1: so why not make them look like mushrooms? It amuses us.
Speaker 1: It just makes sense, yes, But I decided to look
Speaker 1: into this a little bit deep deeper, and I looked
Speaker 1: in a book titled Light and Darkness and Ancient Greek
Speaker 1: myth and Religion from two thousand ten. Uh. This has
Speaker 1: numerous authors on it, but is edited by Christophilis and Levaniuk,
Speaker 1: and they mentioned that Roman foot lamps were used in
Speaker 1: incubation rituals, citing a couple of sources as well that
Speaker 1: I try to follow, but I don't think they actually
Speaker 1: have English translations. So incubation rituals or dream incubation rituals
Speaker 1: involved involved sleeping in sacred places in order to receive
Speaker 1: dreams or visions, and it seems that copious amounts of
Speaker 1: lamps were often associated with many of the sites where
Speaker 1: you would engage in incubation rituals, as described in a
Speaker 1: book by Sandra Blakely titled God's Objects and Ritual Practice.
Speaker 1: I don't remember what episode it was in the past,
Speaker 1: but somehow this came up, but I think we were
Speaker 1: talking about ancient rituals for dream incubation, specifically with regard
Speaker 1: to the Greek god of healing and medicine Asclepius, where
Speaker 1: people who were sick and wanted healing would come to
Speaker 1: the temple of Asclepius and actually sleep in the temple
Speaker 1: in order to like they'd make an offering or do
Speaker 1: a ritual and they'd sleep in the temple in order
Speaker 1: to receive a dream from the god as a form
Speaker 1: of cure for their illness. Yeah, there you go. That
Speaker 1: would that would be dreaming incubation. That's what we're talking
Speaker 1: about here. But how do these lamps come into play?
Speaker 1: I found another source that had some wonderful inside here.
Speaker 1: Uh And this was a ninety six paper titled Material
Speaker 1: on the Cult of Sarapis by Dorothy Kent Hill. And um,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna read a quote from it here, but first
Speaker 1: I want to run through a couple of things here
Speaker 1: so that everyone will will know what what's being referred to. So,
Speaker 1: first of all, Ureus is a curling snake motif probably
Speaker 1: best recognized as a symbol of divine authority on the
Speaker 1: heads of of of of Egyptian sarcophagus is. Uh. So,
Speaker 1: I think everyone's probably seen one of these before, you know,
Speaker 1: like a like a hooded cobra or a snake that
Speaker 1: is emerging from a head dress or from the head
Speaker 1: of one of these artistic depictions, also known as a
Speaker 1: boss snake. Okay, yeah, and then Sarapis, it was a
Speaker 1: echo Egyptian deity. He was introduced but not necessarily created
Speaker 1: by Greek pharaoh Ptolemy the first Soda as an attempt
Speaker 1: to unify Greek and Egyptian culture, specifically as a generaldine.
Speaker 1: Pinch points out, in Egyptian mythology a di z he
Speaker 1: was meant to be a combination of APIs and Osiris
Speaker 1: and Zeus and Dionysus. Now, Sarapus is often depicted with
Speaker 1: something on his head that might be confused by the
Speaker 1: casual viewer as maybe something that is also involved in illumination,
Speaker 1: Like it looks like you look at images of him
Speaker 1: and it kind of looks like you're supposed to put
Speaker 1: a candle on top of his head. Yeah, yeah, And
Speaker 1: it doesn't really look like a hat or anything. It
Speaker 1: just looks like there's some kind of like container or
Speaker 1: bucket or something attached to his head in in the
Speaker 1: form that he's in now, as as a piece of
Speaker 1: statuary or something. Yeah, So at first I was thinking,
Speaker 1: well that maybe it's illumination is involved in more ways
Speaker 1: than one here, But as it turns out, Sarapis is
Speaker 1: often depicted with this um with this thing on his
Speaker 1: head called a a modius, which is a basket grain measure,
Speaker 1: a Greek symbol for the land of the dead. Now,
Speaker 1: in this text by by Dorothy Kent hill Um, she
Speaker 1: includes two images of bronze lamps in the form of
Speaker 1: human feet, and that they're very much like we've we've
Speaker 1: described thus far, except there there's an extra interesting thing
Speaker 1: about them. So, yes, you have the big toe or
Speaker 1: or something just beyond the big toe that is clearly
Speaker 1: designed for the wick to go in and for flame
Speaker 1: to come out of. There is the the larger aperture
Speaker 1: at the stump of the disembodied foot. But in both
Speaker 1: of these you also have a rod that's basically going
Speaker 1: up from the base of the heel. And uh and
Speaker 1: and this is something that that she ends up reflecting on.
Speaker 1: I should also add at the top of this this
Speaker 1: rod that's emerging from the base of the heel, we
Speaker 1: see once once more, this ureus symbol. We see the
Speaker 1: curled snake. Oh yeah, there it is with the hood flared.
Speaker 1: So this is what what she had to say. Quote.
Speaker 1: Lamps modeled after parts of the body, especially the foot,
Speaker 1: were very common in antiquity. Such a lamp might reflect
Speaker 1: no more than a whimsical mood of a craftsman. But
Speaker 1: the ureus immediately suggests a connection with the giant detached
Speaker 1: sarapis feed recently studied by dal and Opsen. On these monuments,
Speaker 1: the ureus is usually curled somewhere in the neighborhood of
Speaker 1: the ankle. Here it coils on a rod which rises
Speaker 1: at the back of the foot. The space between the
Speaker 1: top of the foot and the tail of the snake
Speaker 1: is great enough to accommodate a small bust of sarapis,
Speaker 1: which would correspond in position to the busts on some
Speaker 1: of the stone feet. We have observed that something was
Speaker 1: attached to the cover, and may now suggest a bust
Speaker 1: of the god as the most plausible candidate. If the
Speaker 1: bust were placed in this position, the ureus would appear
Speaker 1: to loom over the head of the god. Wait a minute,
Speaker 1: so I feel like I must be understanding this wrong.
Speaker 1: But does this mean this would be a foot with
Speaker 1: the head on the on the leg of the foot,
Speaker 1: and then a snake over the head. Yeah. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: that's what I am. I am to understand here. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like, here's a foot, let's put it. Or
Speaker 1: or maybe we should think in reverse. I have a
Speaker 1: bust of a of a god. I want to display um.
Speaker 1: I want to display it. I don't want to just
Speaker 1: lay it on the floor though. I need something to
Speaker 1: hold it up, and also I need to illuminate it. Well,
Speaker 1: I need a foot, and I need a foot that
Speaker 1: emits fire, and and then you know they're able to
Speaker 1: work the urus into it as the as the rod
Speaker 1: that is holding the bust above the foot. And there's more,
Speaker 1: because she writes quote the smoke rising before the god
Speaker 1: from the lamp would create an eerie religious effect. Although
Speaker 1: Sarapis was by no means the only deity honored on
Speaker 1: Laps his frequent presence, there is evidence for the probability
Speaker 1: of his guardianship over this bronze foot, referring to the
Speaker 1: example that she's talking about in the article. Certainly, how ever,
Speaker 1: there are not good grounds for connecting all foot shaped
Speaker 1: lamps with the Sarapis cult. Interestingly enough, she also speculates
Speaker 1: she she brings up Psalms one nineteen the world thy
Speaker 1: word is a lamp into my feet and a light
Speaker 1: into my path um, suggesting that you know, there are
Speaker 1: various ways we could interpret a foot shaped lamp um
Speaker 1: that in and and uh, and and again it comes
Speaker 1: back to the basic question like how much of this
Speaker 1: is novelty, how much of it is based in some
Speaker 1: reference that just has not survived the ages, or indeed,
Speaker 1: I mean I have to say this, this idea of
Speaker 1: of the lamp being used to um to illuminate and
Speaker 1: create like a smoky effect before the the image of
Speaker 1: a god. Uh, there's something attractive about that. And and
Speaker 1: perhaps this idea too, Yeah that it's like if well,
Speaker 1: if I'm going to hold up the face of a
Speaker 1: god on some sort of a stand, then I need
Speaker 1: it to be in a foot as well. Like I
Speaker 1: there's something about the compulsion there that is that's fascinating.
Speaker 1: Like would be wrong to to to to to hold
Speaker 1: up that bust of Sarapis without a foot, without a
Speaker 1: human foot at the bottom? Would there be something kind
Speaker 1: of blasphemous about that? I wonder, Well, it's funny how
Speaker 1: the idea of a pedestal is derived from pad like foot,
Speaker 1: but in this case it's literally a foot. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: this is this is interesting too to think of in
Speaker 1: comparison to a Christmas story, because obviously, with the Christmas story,
Speaker 1: part of the whole deal with the lamp is that
Speaker 1: it is objectification of the female form. It's the idea
Speaker 1: of like, here is just the leg of a woman
Speaker 1: that is sexy, um, you know, without taking you into
Speaker 1: account the rest of her as a physical whole being
Speaker 1: and of course as a person um. In this it
Speaker 1: almost seems like we have the reverse where it's like, well,
Speaker 1: if we're going to have something else attached to this
Speaker 1: piece of a god, we need it to also be
Speaker 1: a physical piece of said God. Perhaps, okay, I'm going
Speaker 1: with you now. Realistically, I think that's about all the
Speaker 1: connects these ancient foot lamps with a Christmas story, you know,
Speaker 1: probably no more than to say making just including lamps.
Speaker 1: It look like feeder legs is just the sort of
Speaker 1: thing that human artisans might do. But I think if
Speaker 1: we were to be unrealistic about the connection, we could
Speaker 1: we could wonder that perhaps what has happened here is
Speaker 1: the old man has has entered into the worship of
Speaker 1: an ancient Greco Egyptian god and wishes to bring the
Speaker 1: city of Cleveland under his domain. His wife, however, clearly
Speaker 1: she serves the god Osiris, who Sarapis, you know, partially
Speaker 1: replaces whereas it was introduced to replace, and so she
Speaker 1: brings about the lamps destruction in a campaign to keep
Speaker 1: Cleveland under the sway of the green skinned god. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think there's also some underworld stuff you can do
Speaker 1: with him going into the basement to fight the furnace.
Speaker 1: That seems to connect maybe somehow. Oh, but you know,
Speaker 1: we also have to think about the fact that, okay,
Speaker 1: if if the god Sarapis is also still Osiris into
Speaker 1: some to to some extent, I mean, part of the
Speaker 1: whole myth of Osiris is that his body is dismembered.
Speaker 1: You know, that's part of the whole, uh, you know
Speaker 1: Osirius Smith's cycle. It's about his death and resurrection. And
Speaker 1: of course we see the lamp broken into pieces as well,
Speaker 1: and an attempt, a failed attempt to resurrect it. That
Speaker 1: that's very good. Kudo kudos to you. Rob. I'm I'm
Speaker 1: just I'm just interpreting the work of the gods. Here,
Speaker 1: I'm just a messenger. Yes, thank you, thank you. Now,
Speaker 1: on the subject of tenuous connections to ancient art, I
Speaker 1: wanted to talk about leg sculpture a little bit more broadly,
Speaker 1: and at the risk of getting sappy, I also just
Speaker 1: have to say that the idea of sculpture of the
Speaker 1: human form as a lamp got me thinking about a
Speaker 1: line in one of my favorite poems. I'm sure this
Speaker 1: is what I've brought up on the show before. I
Speaker 1: don't remember when, but it's the poem The Archaic Torso
Speaker 1: of Apollo by Rainer Maria Rilka. I'm sure I've read
Speaker 1: this one at you before. Rob. Let's see I read
Speaker 1: a little bit and i'll see of rings a bell. Okay, well,
Speaker 1: so this is the English translation by Stephen Mitchell. I
Speaker 1: can't read the whole poem, but but it's worth looking
Speaker 1: up The Archaic Torso of Apollo. It's an excellent poem.
Speaker 1: But Stephen mitchell translation begins, we cannot know his legendary
Speaker 1: head with eyes like ripening fruit, and yet his torso
Speaker 1: is still suffused with brilliance from inside, like a lamp,
Speaker 1: in which his gaze now turned low gleams in all
Speaker 1: its power. Alright, alright. From here, he goes on to
Speaker 1: describe this the kind of strange life flowing through this, uh,
Speaker 1: this dismembered sculpture from from ancient Greece. And it ends
Speaker 1: with a line that's pretty famous in in this translation.
Speaker 1: It says, for here there is no place that does
Speaker 1: not see you. You must change your life. So it's
Speaker 1: about Rolka's experience of looking at this uh, fragment of
Speaker 1: an an ancient sculpture of the human form that he sees.
Speaker 1: I think he sees it in the louver one day
Speaker 1: and uh and having this profound kind of stirring and
Speaker 1: even frightening human connection with it. Now, the word that
Speaker 1: appears as lamp in this English version I think I've
Speaker 1: seen translated as kendelabrum in others. But in any case,
Speaker 1: I like this because the line in the poem seems
Speaker 1: to be confessing the power of great sculpture, to suggest
Speaker 1: that there's something more than just mimicry of the shape
Speaker 1: of a human in great sculpture. It's not just that
Speaker 1: great sculpture gets the the outline and the form and
Speaker 1: the contours of human right it's that in great sculpture,
Speaker 1: something actually seems to be alive inside it, almost perceptibly
Speaker 1: moving or lighting up. And I think this is the
Speaker 1: case for Realka. Even though the sculpture he's looking at
Speaker 1: has arrived in the modern world in a totally degraded form,
Speaker 1: he mentions that it has no head. He calls it
Speaker 1: a torso. So I looked it up, and I think
Speaker 1: the actual artwork the he's talking about here is usually
Speaker 1: understood to be an artifact in the collection of the
Speaker 1: Louver called the coross of Melitas or the torso of Melitas.
Speaker 1: So it is the torso of this nude male figure
Speaker 1: that's a very common form of sculpture in an archaic
Speaker 1: Greek art known as the coros, and this one was
Speaker 1: excavated from the remains of Melitas. It is missing its head,
Speaker 1: it's missing both arms. It's missing one leg up to
Speaker 1: the upper thigh and the other leg from above the knee. Rob,
Speaker 1: I've got an image from a couple of angles for
Speaker 1: you to look at just down below here. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: is quite quite striking. Yeah, that did the life like
Speaker 1: muscle definition on this torso. I agree, even though it's
Speaker 1: like missing most of the parts of the body. There's
Speaker 1: still something a little bit haunting about it. I know
Speaker 1: what Roka is talking about, because I see a kind
Speaker 1: of hint of that that light or animating life force
Speaker 1: in it, though in a in a muted or half
Speaker 1: formed way, which I think is the ambiguity that makes
Speaker 1: the sculpture an interesting subject for poetry. It's it's what
Speaker 1: we we can't fully see or know about it that
Speaker 1: makes it unsettling, and something kind of rings within our
Speaker 1: chest when we look at it, and I think that's
Speaker 1: the thing also that leads real good to say you
Speaker 1: must change your life. But but this leads me to
Speaker 1: to the fuller observation I wanted to make connecting the
Speaker 1: leg lamp to art history, which is that I think
Speaker 1: you could make a pretty good case that when it
Speaker 1: comes to sculpture of the human form, the legs are
Speaker 1: the life. Now why would I say that? Here's the
Speaker 1: case I want to make. Uh. One thing that's interesting
Speaker 1: about this sculpture, the coross of Melitas, is that it
Speaker 1: seems to come from a period of transition in in
Speaker 1: ancient Greek art, when Greek art was moving from what
Speaker 1: modern art historians called the archaic period into what we
Speaker 1: now call the Classical period, and this transition was sometime
Speaker 1: in the fifth century BC. That seemed to be roughly
Speaker 1: the turning point. Uh. And so rob to illustrate, I
Speaker 1: want to let you look at a couple of statues
Speaker 1: of the human form, both from ancient Greece, and so
Speaker 1: there's gonna be one here you can look at on
Speaker 1: the left that's typical of the archaic style, and one
Speaker 1: on the right that's typical of the classical style. Uh.
Speaker 1: These are both images I found on the website of
Speaker 1: the met Museum, so both things in the collection there,
Speaker 1: but to describe them from you out there listening at home.
Speaker 1: The older statue, I would say is very rigid, with
Speaker 1: very straight upright posture. It is looking straight forward at
Speaker 1: you with very square shoulders, and the head is pointed
Speaker 1: straight towards you. So it's it's very just an aligned body.
Speaker 1: In fact, I would say that in a lot of ways,
Speaker 1: it looks similar to sculpture from ancient Egypt. Yeah. It
Speaker 1: it has a very two dimensional kind of appearance to it.
Speaker 1: It's forward facing. Um, it does not even though it
Speaker 1: is itself a three dimensional object. It is not really
Speaker 1: like owning that three dimension call space, right, And I
Speaker 1: want to be clear as I go ahead that I
Speaker 1: would say, for my part, I think both of these
Speaker 1: styles are beautiful, both striking in their own way. I
Speaker 1: certainly would not say that I think one is somehow
Speaker 1: better than the other, but there is a difference. So
Speaker 1: when you look at the second kind, the sculptures that
Speaker 1: are typical of the classical style beginning in the fifth
Speaker 1: century b c e. A good example of this, if
Speaker 1: you want to look it up at home. One is
Speaker 1: called the dory for Os or the spear Bearer by
Speaker 1: the ancient Greek sculptor Polyclitus p O L y K
Speaker 1: L e I t O s. And these classical ones
Speaker 1: are very different in that they have I would say,
Speaker 1: this powerful lifelike quality that we see developing in this period.
Speaker 1: It looks it looks like there is something alive and
Speaker 1: even moving inside this this totally still hunk of dead rock. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think if you've ever visited a sculpture garden
Speaker 1: gotten over and Organda does, to see some of these
Speaker 1: classical works and reproductions of the classical works, you know
Speaker 1: exactly what we're talking about. You know. It's that that
Speaker 1: feeling that this is this is life that was captured,
Speaker 1: uh and frozen. You know that you look at it
Speaker 1: at one of these statues and it looks as if
Speaker 1: it had just moved and it wasn't even necessarily posing
Speaker 1: for the artist, you know. Yeah, that's a great comparison.
Speaker 1: They often the classical sculptures look as if, you know,
Speaker 1: you're a fly on the wall and you have just
Speaker 1: frozen time in the middle of a scene, and and
Speaker 1: and this is what was happening while say, you know,
Speaker 1: the discus thrower was was winding up to throw, or
Speaker 1: somebody was leaning back to regard someone who had just
Speaker 1: entered the room. Does that make sense? Yeah? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: Like the spear bear here, he's kind of as the
Speaker 1: post like, oh are you sculpturing me? I'm sorry, I
Speaker 1: was just standing here naked. Yeah. So the question is
Speaker 1: what makes the difference? How do you go again? I
Speaker 1: think both styles are wonderful, But what makes the difference
Speaker 1: from this style that is striking as artwork but doesn't
Speaker 1: look life like to this kind of the classical period
Speaker 1: that almost it feels like it has a pulse, you know,
Speaker 1: it looks like there's something just about to move. I
Speaker 1: think there are a number of changes in artistic technique,
Speaker 1: and I fully admit that there's a lot about classical
Speaker 1: art that I don't know or understand, but I I
Speaker 1: am to understand that one of the most significant developments
Speaker 1: here is a change in the approach to the depictions
Speaker 1: of legs, hips, and posture, which would come to be
Speaker 1: known by later artists and scholars as contra posto. So
Speaker 1: I was trying to find a succinct definition of this.
Speaker 1: I found one on a website for the National Galleries
Speaker 1: of Scotland. So this museum describes contra posto as quote,
Speaker 1: a standing human figure carrying its weight on one leg
Speaker 1: so that the opposite hip rises to produce a relaxed
Speaker 1: curve in the body. Now, I hope when I say
Speaker 1: that you can kind of picture you realize, like, oh, yes,
Speaker 1: I have seen statues like this where the figure being
Speaker 1: shown has all of their weight shifted to their back
Speaker 1: leg and their other leg is kind of lifted and bent,
Speaker 1: and this sort of causes a a shift, a corresponding
Speaker 1: shift in the position of the hips, and then also
Speaker 1: causes a kind of twist in the spine where it
Speaker 1: looks like the character has been caught in the middle
Speaker 1: of turning or leaning or or relaxing or something. And
Speaker 1: the result is this, this powerful, striking quality of life
Speaker 1: caught in the middle of motion. Yeah. Absolutely. And again
Speaker 1: this is in contrast to the posture that would have
Speaker 1: been common for standing sculptures of the human form in
Speaker 1: Greek art of the period just before this, the Archaic period,
Speaker 1: where again the coross the the nude male figure would
Speaker 1: usually have a rigid, straight posture with weight equally distributed
Speaker 1: on both legs. Uh. And for again, for some reason,
Speaker 1: while I think that is artistically beautiful, it doesn't look alive.
Speaker 1: Something happens when you twist the form like that, the
Speaker 1: adjustment of the legs so that the weight is on
Speaker 1: one leg and not the other. It almost seems to
Speaker 1: peel back this opening in the shroud that separates animate
Speaker 1: from inanimate. You you shift the weight across the legs
Speaker 1: and the twist the hips in the spine accordingly, and
Speaker 1: something just happens. Stone can become flesh, and sculpture can
Speaker 1: sort of it can start to have that glow, that
Speaker 1: unsettling quality of movement or soul. I don't think I'd
Speaker 1: really thought about this much before, but yeah, absolutely, you
Speaker 1: look at you look at these uh, these statues, the
Speaker 1: ones that are the most lifelike. Can you do see
Speaker 1: this kind of Uh, it's it's in the legs. Often,
Speaker 1: it's it's how though the weight is distributed. I mean
Speaker 1: really one of the most iconic examples of this would
Speaker 1: probably be Michaelangelo's David. Um. Oh yeah, where if you
Speaker 1: you look look at the legs and it's exactly what
Speaker 1: we're talking about here. Well, yes, I think actually, uh again,
Speaker 1: I admit I don't know a ton about art history,
Speaker 1: but I think that this is something that was consciously
Speaker 1: sort of noticed and then recreated on purpose by Renaissance
Speaker 1: artists looking act to classical art, like they they sort
Speaker 1: of noticed this about the legs and the posture and
Speaker 1: said like, oh, hey, you know, let do like that
Speaker 1: and even kicking up kicking up a notch from there,
Speaker 1: because I think the Renaissance artists took it a step
Speaker 1: further where there would be sort of like a double
Speaker 1: twist in the body like you see on the David,
Speaker 1: where the the you know, the legs are the legs
Speaker 1: have the lower bodies weight shifted one way and then
Speaker 1: the upper bodies kind of kind of shifting back even
Speaker 1: in the other direction. Yeah, yeah, I'm looking at a
Speaker 1: photo of it right now, and yeah, absolutely, So there's
Speaker 1: my case. The legs are the life. It makes me
Speaker 1: want to go and uh and and visit a museum
Speaker 1: with a number of sculptures. I go to the met
Speaker 1: and started looking at the legs more because often there's
Speaker 1: the legs are not the the the obvious focal point
Speaker 1: of the statue. Instead, you're drawn to um what you're
Speaker 1: drawn to, like the chest or you're or or certainly
Speaker 1: with the nude statues, you might you know, notice what
Speaker 1: is there or isn't there concerning the groin. Oftentimes they
Speaker 1: have a weapon or their holding like the head of
Speaker 1: a medusa, or they're fighting a centaur. There's generally a
Speaker 1: lot going on. It's easy to miss the legs and
Speaker 1: not think about these things. But but now that it's
Speaker 1: been pointed out to me, like I I want to
Speaker 1: I want to go. I want to look at the
Speaker 1: legs of some statues and see see to what extent
Speaker 1: there there. You know, their life is brought about by
Speaker 1: this effect. Yeah, totally. Once you notice it, you kind
Speaker 1: of can't unsee it. Yeah, So to conclude, I guess
Speaker 1: you must change your life and uh, and how would
Speaker 1: you connect all of this to A Christmas Story and
Speaker 1: the major award? Well, I told you it was going
Speaker 1: to be tenuous, but okay, you know leg sculpture, right, Uh,
Speaker 1: that's what I got, all right now, Obviously we'd love
Speaker 1: to hear from everyone out there. Do you do you
Speaker 1: have additional insights on the history of lamps that look
Speaker 1: like legs or feet or the history of of sculpture
Speaker 1: and um and and an artifice depicting legs and feet?
Speaker 1: Certainly right in because we would love to hear from you. Also,
Speaker 1: just additional thoughts on the d occult uh secrets that
Speaker 1: are hidden within the film A Christmas Story? Are you
Speaker 1: going to fall asleep with it playing? To incubate a dream? That? Yeah,
Speaker 1: bring you a gift from the gods. It is a
Speaker 1: film with multiple like dream and vision sequences in it,
Speaker 1: so it kind of perfect for that, all right. Like
Speaker 1: we said this, this will probably be the last new
Speaker 1: episode of Stuff to Blow your Mind for the year,
Speaker 1: but we'll be back in January with all new episodes. Uh,
Speaker 1: we're gonna We're gonna be exciting. I'm excited to see
Speaker 1: what kind of topics we end up discussing. We have
Speaker 1: a whole list of potential topics, stuff we've thought up,
Speaker 1: stuff that that you have submitted to us, so we
Speaker 1: have we have plenty, plenty of material to draw from
Speaker 1: and we're looking forward to it. Uh. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: you can find all of our episodes and the Stuff
Speaker 1: to Blow your Mind podcast feed wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: Core episodes of the show on Tuesdays and Thursday's Listener
Speaker 1: Mail on Monday's short form artifact on Wednesdays, and on Fridays,
Speaker 1: we do Weird How Cinema. That's our time to set
Speaker 1: aside most practical and serious concerns and just talk about
Speaker 1: a strange film. Huge thanks as always to our excellent
Speaker 1: audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to
Speaker 1: get in touch with us with feedback on this episode
Speaker 1: or any other to suggest topic for the future, just
Speaker 1: to say hello, you can email us at contact at
Speaker 1: stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow
Speaker 1: Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listening to your favorite shows