WEBVTT - The Horned Helm, Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.360 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:14.680 Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:17.759 My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick, and 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:20.759 today we're doing the Horned helm. That's right. This is 0:00:20.760 --> 0:00:23.080 gonna be one of our essentially one of our Invention 0:00:23.600 --> 0:00:27.680 themed episodes. But I've decided, you know, we really need 0:00:27.720 --> 0:00:30.240 to come back to armor, and the best place to 0:00:30.280 --> 0:00:33.920 start with armor is really the helmet. I think the 0:00:34.000 --> 0:00:36.440 helmet is is one of these wonderful things to consider 0:00:36.479 --> 0:00:38.600 because on the one hand, there is the more sort 0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:42.760 of combat centric and you know, medieval uh, and even 0:00:42.800 --> 0:00:45.640 fantasy idea of a helmet or sci fi helmets, like 0:00:45.800 --> 0:00:48.559 you can get very fantastic with the concept. But at 0:00:48.560 --> 0:00:51.680 a very basic level, I feel like we all have 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:56.880 some experience wearing a helmet, taking this bit of artificial exoskeleton, 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:01.200 slipping it over our own skull, and then enjoying its protection. 0:01:01.600 --> 0:01:06.000 Do you remember the scene in cone Heads where it 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:10.440 is revealed that Dan Ackroyd's cone Head Belder enjoys driving 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:14.080 a motorcycle, but he's not a fan of helmet laws. No, 0:01:14.240 --> 0:01:16.759 I don't remember this. Does he have a weird helmet 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:19.440 or he just he can't wear human helmets. I would 0:01:19.440 --> 0:01:22.319 imagine that's the source of his frustration, because it seems 0:01:22.360 --> 0:01:25.080 like Belder is actually normally pretty much a rule follower. 0:01:25.160 --> 0:01:27.240 But but yeah, he doesn't like the helmets, and I 0:01:27.240 --> 0:01:29.520 think it's probably because he has to get one custom made. 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:32.040 Oh man, I haven't seen that forever, but I do 0:01:32.080 --> 0:01:35.000 remember it had a really fun stop motion monster towards 0:01:35.000 --> 0:01:38.000 the end. Yes, yeah, yeah, Beldar has gotta fight one 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:42.319 with his golf skills. It also has a great line that, 0:01:42.800 --> 0:01:45.479 for some reason is is just used for all occasions 0:01:45.480 --> 0:01:50.480 around our house, which is your cone is too young. Well, 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:52.960 you know, I I don't remember if they wore helmets 0:01:52.960 --> 0:01:56.080 in that at all, like the more like space centric 0:01:56.320 --> 0:01:58.200 cone heads, but I feel like there was some sort 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:00.480 of a hornyed crown that one of them war. Yeah, 0:02:00.520 --> 0:02:03.440 I think that's right. So one of the we're gonna 0:02:03.440 --> 0:02:06.520 be discussing helmets in general. But but one thing that 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:09.160 we're also going to discuss here is the idea of 0:02:09.200 --> 0:02:12.639 the hornett helm a helmet with horns on it. It's 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:15.800 it's an ancient motif in human civilization, and it ties 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:20.040 into some of our earliest ceremonial practices and models of 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.600 imaginative thinking. There's also just something so elegant about the 0:02:23.639 --> 0:02:25.920 idea thing that may be worn upon the head and 0:02:26.080 --> 0:02:30.040 in doing so, transforms the individual from a mere human 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:34.440 into something symbolically different, a hybrid of human and beasts, 0:02:34.520 --> 0:02:38.440 channeling the archaic, chaotic gods of the hunt. Oh yeah, 0:02:38.520 --> 0:02:40.919 I mean it's it's theory anthropy. It's what you see 0:02:41.200 --> 0:02:43.640 in those ancient cave paintings that's so exciting, when you 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:47.359 start to see the human and the animal forms joined together, 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:50.919 suggesting fantastical thinking. It's clearly there in the horned helmet 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:54.160 as well. Um, and and and so when you see 0:02:54.160 --> 0:02:56.960 these ancient motifs. Like one example that I was looking 0:02:56.960 --> 0:02:59.960 at before we came in here today was Roberty familiar 0:03:00.040 --> 0:03:03.440 with the sutton who helmet. Oh yes, yes, the sudden 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:05.400 who helmet. I had to pull up a picture of it. 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:08.200 But this is one of these that I remember from 0:03:08.200 --> 0:03:11.400 an early age seeing perhaps on the cover of a 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:15.280 national geographic but it was certainly featured in some sort 0:03:15.320 --> 0:03:20.040 of historical book that I had access to as a kid. Yeah, 0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:23.840 it's just spectacularly creepy. With these hollow eyes, the way 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:28.040 the mustache is rendered on the plate of the face covering. 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:30.680 I think it also had a leather component when it 0:03:30.760 --> 0:03:34.480 was actually worn. But it's this decorated Anglo saxon helmet 0:03:34.560 --> 0:03:37.200 from I think it was from the seventh century. It 0:03:37.280 --> 0:03:40.840 was buried in this in this ship burial somewhere in 0:03:40.880 --> 0:03:43.960 East Anglia. And I've actually seen this up close and 0:03:43.960 --> 0:03:46.520 and they're there are replicas of it that are really 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:49.320 cool because they reproduced the artwork that would have been 0:03:49.320 --> 0:03:52.000 originally visible on the sides and all the it's got 0:03:52.000 --> 0:03:55.040 all these panels over it. Basically it's a helmet covered 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:58.560 with like comic strips, and in all the little panels 0:03:58.600 --> 0:04:02.480 there are scenes depicted. In one of them shows these figures, 0:04:02.760 --> 0:04:06.120 like human shaped figures with horns, apparently wearing some kind 0:04:06.160 --> 0:04:10.840 of horned helmet. Oh wow, So evidence of hornet helmets 0:04:10.920 --> 0:04:15.120 on a helmet. That's wonderful, Yes, but it doesn't necessarily 0:04:15.120 --> 0:04:19.400 show the characters wearing horned helmets, say, going into battle. 0:04:19.440 --> 0:04:21.800 It appears to have more kind of a ritual or 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:26.440 religious significance surrounding the horns. Yeah, and this seems to 0:04:26.480 --> 0:04:31.200 be basically underlying the earliest versions of of this, you know, 0:04:31.760 --> 0:04:35.160 hornet helmets go back thousands of years, as far back 0:04:35.200 --> 0:04:39.720 as twelfth century BC. We see this in Cyprus, Bronze 0:04:39.760 --> 0:04:44.520 Age Europe, uh and uh. Generally, the idea is that, yeah, 0:04:44.520 --> 0:04:47.839 this probably has its origins and in against symbolic thinking 0:04:47.880 --> 0:04:50.760 and thinking and ritual and the idea that you're transforming, 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:53.839 you're becoming something else, which of course has a role 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:56.560 in combat as well, and a role in intimidation, a 0:04:56.680 --> 0:05:00.719 sort of role in the basic um uh behavior of 0:05:00.800 --> 0:05:05.200 making yourself look larger than you are sure. But but 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:08.640 then there's also this uh, imaginative side to it. There 0:05:08.720 --> 0:05:12.919 is this ritual aspect of melding man and beast, the 0:05:13.000 --> 0:05:15.919 symbolic or meaningful aspects of the horns as opposed to 0:05:15.960 --> 0:05:19.360 having some kind of like combat purpose. That really comes 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:22.600 through in some of the Japanese traditions you see where 0:05:22.720 --> 0:05:27.360 like they're they're the kabuto, the Japanese warrior helmets, where 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:29.839 I believe a number of these helmets do actually have 0:05:29.960 --> 0:05:33.159 horns on them, sometimes deer antlers or cattle horns, but 0:05:33.440 --> 0:05:36.880 these would be linked to like a like a leadership 0:05:36.960 --> 0:05:39.120 class that they would be sort of a sign that 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:42.640 you were a commander. Yeah, and we we definitely see 0:05:42.680 --> 0:05:45.359 this in in the early history of helmets as well, 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:48.080 which we'll get into. But in terms of just the 0:05:48.120 --> 0:05:51.520 idea of a horned helm, obviously we have a modern 0:05:51.560 --> 0:05:55.479 connotation with Vikings. Uh. This is my understanding. I know 0:05:55.480 --> 0:05:57.080 you're gonna get into this more. It's I think it's 0:05:57.160 --> 0:06:00.440 largely a nineteenth century association, but uh, there are plenty 0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:04.839 of other warriors, uh, and in symbolic warriors uh that 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:08.640 actually wore horneted helms in Europe. And this included Bronze 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:12.080 Age Danes, Medieval Germanic warriors, and then of course, so 0:06:12.160 --> 0:06:17.200 we already mentioned Japanese samurai uh, armored warriors of Japan. Uh. 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:20.480 And what one also sees horns and horn like crenulations 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:22.920 as a common feature of crowns, which of course are 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:25.240 not really about protecting the head. It's more like, let's 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:28.000 take the thing, the symbolic thing a helmet can do, 0:06:28.400 --> 0:06:30.680 and just not worry about any of the protective aspects 0:06:30.720 --> 0:06:33.719 to a certain extent, Yeah, totally. So to come back 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:36.680 to the fact that the Vikings didn't actually wear horns, 0:06:36.720 --> 0:06:39.160 I think this at this point that's sort of one 0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:42.799 of those false facts that everybody knows that everybody knows 0:06:42.880 --> 0:06:45.599 at this point, you know, like most people have heard, Yeah, 0:06:45.600 --> 0:06:49.320 the Vikings didn't actually wear horned helmets. But the fact 0:06:49.320 --> 0:06:53.360 about where this Viking horn association comes from is pretty 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:55.760 interesting and it's kind of surprising. There's a great paper 0:06:55.800 --> 0:07:00.240 about this by a Yale linguistics professor named ROBERTA. Fry Inc. 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:02.560 Published in the year two thousand and it's called The 0:07:02.600 --> 0:07:06.640 Invention of the Viking Horned Helmet. And according to Frank, 0:07:06.839 --> 0:07:10.920 the origin of this misunderstanding that Viking warriors would wear 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:14.640 horned helmets into battle that lies primarily with a late 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:20.640 nineteenth century artist and costume designer named Carl Amile Dippler. 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.400 So Dirpler was a German artist and and was in 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:29.880 charge of designing costumes for an eighteen seventy six Byroid 0:07:30.000 --> 0:07:34.920 production of Wagner's musical epic Der Ring des Nibelungen The 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:39.600 Ring of Nibelung, which is a is a series of works. Uh. 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:42.480 I think there's four different sort of phases in this 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:46.120 cycle by Wagner, and it takes a lot of classic 0:07:46.240 --> 0:07:50.120 Norse mythology, but it sort of smashes it together with 0:07:50.320 --> 0:07:55.480 ideas about German national history and all these Germanic flavors. 0:07:55.520 --> 0:08:00.679 And one of these conflations was in Dirpler's costumes. Dippler 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:05.040 gave the gave several characters horned helmets, and this sparked 0:08:05.080 --> 0:08:09.280 the popular association between Vikings, who would have been roving 0:08:09.400 --> 0:08:13.840 Scandinavian warriors between something like the eighth and the eleventh century. 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:16.480 And then this idea of horned helms, which would have 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:19.920 actually been worn by some people, maybe some some ancient 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:23.640 Germanic people's, but not by the Vikings. But anyway, the 0:08:23.680 --> 0:08:26.400 spark of this association caught on, and there were other 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:29.800 instances here and there, but within about twenty years it 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:33.800 had become much more pervasive. ROBERTA. Frank writes quote. During 0:08:33.840 --> 0:08:37.760 the eighteen nineties, the horned helmeted Viking changed from a 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:41.640 series of widely scattered occurrences into a kind of weather 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:47.000 mass produced. Children's books were an ideal medium for imprinting 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:50.080 the image on the popular imagination. So it becomes a 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:53.000 staple of children's books. And once it's in children's media, 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:55.120 you know it's just going to be everywhere. Right, You're 0:08:55.160 --> 0:08:57.560 just in indicted at such a young age that even 0:08:57.559 --> 0:09:01.240 when you inevitably reach that point where you learn again 0:09:01.280 --> 0:09:04.280 the idea that everybody knows the Vikings didn't have horns, 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.360 it's almost too late because that motif is just burned 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:10.640 into your brain. Uh so you you end up carrying 0:09:10.679 --> 0:09:13.840 like both at the same time, contradictorily. Yeah, that's right. 0:09:13.920 --> 0:09:16.280 And another thing that I thought was interesting that this 0:09:16.559 --> 0:09:19.280 section was actually highlighted in a vox piece I was reading. 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:22.640 But this is also from ROBERTA. Frank's article. Uh. She 0:09:22.760 --> 0:09:26.800 notes that the idea of the Viking Age as a 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:31.880 distinct period in European history is also actually a late 0:09:32.000 --> 0:09:37.040 nineteenth century invention. Frank writes, quote, until the Viking Age 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:41.480 was invented, there was no horned, helmeted Viking, and vice versa. 0:09:41.760 --> 0:09:45.400 The two go together like Easter and bonnet. A Viking 0:09:45.520 --> 0:09:49.520 Age is first mentioned in eighteen seventy three in two 0:09:49.600 --> 0:09:53.800 independent Danish and Swedish articles. The period gets its first 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:58.240 monumental right up in Johanna steen Strips four volume Norman Ern, 0:09:58.520 --> 0:10:02.880 published between eighteens seventy six and eighteen eighty two. Perhaps 0:10:02.960 --> 0:10:06.920 only an expansionist empire building era could have thought up 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:10.719 an age that began with naval attacks on foreign shores 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:15.559 and ended when these attacks ceased. So yes, to clarify, 0:10:15.600 --> 0:10:18.960 there have been decorative horned helms in history, but the 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:23.720 Scandinavian warriors of the roughly eighth to eleventh century generally 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:27.319 did not wear helmets like this. Uh And and this 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:31.360 idea mostly comes from the late nineteenth century. Another thing 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:34.160 that I thought was kind of funny. What associations do 0:10:34.240 --> 0:10:36.400 you get from the idea of a horned helmet? What 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:40.319 does that suggest about the person wearing it well and instantly? 0:10:40.360 --> 0:10:42.040 And part of this I think has to do with 0:10:42.080 --> 0:10:46.000 the Viking motif becoming such a central part of a 0:10:46.120 --> 0:10:49.920 fantasy imagery as well, you know, sort of friends of Frazetta, 0:10:50.040 --> 0:10:53.240 um Art and so forth. Is the idea that this 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:56.400 is what a barbarian wears on their head. This is 0:10:56.440 --> 0:11:00.840 it's it symbolizes a barbaric or primal state of being, 0:11:01.520 --> 0:11:03.720 exactly right. I mean that's the same way I feel 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:07.559 like horned helmets at a gut level signify a kind 0:11:07.559 --> 0:11:12.360 of uncivilized brutality, like a theory anthropy mindset, where you know, 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:14.959 in battle, I am no longer a human, I am 0:11:14.960 --> 0:11:18.640 a charging bull. I am a beast without reason. And 0:11:18.720 --> 0:11:20.880 in light of that, I wanted to read a passage 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:24.439 that ROBERTA. Frank quotes from a novel by the historian 0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:28.320 Alfred Dugan. This is from the King of Athelney. It's 0:11:28.440 --> 0:11:30.640 about Alfred the Great, who was king of the Anglo 0:11:30.679 --> 0:11:33.440 Saxons in the ninth century. And I think this part 0:11:33.520 --> 0:11:38.080 is from Alfred's perspective. Quote on his head was one 0:11:38.160 --> 0:11:43.120 of those impractical but imposing helmets embellished with spreading ox horns, 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.680 which among the heathen were a badge of grandeur. That 0:11:46.840 --> 0:11:50.600 was a comforting site, implying that the pirates expected fair 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:54.520 play and no bloodshed. No sensible warrior would risk his 0:11:54.600 --> 0:11:57.439 life under a helmet which could be knocked flying by 0:11:57.440 --> 0:12:01.559 a single stroke. That isn't a full very good point, 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:05.280 and it really underlines too some of the forces we're 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:07.840 going to be discussing in in in this episode about 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:13.280 you know, early and important um helmet designs is that 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:15.840 you know you have you have the the need to 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:19.680 protect the head. You have this other aesthetic principle coming 0:12:19.679 --> 0:12:22.320 into play where you want to to look cool in 0:12:22.360 --> 0:12:26.119 the helmet or look imposing or signal something about your status. 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:28.480 But at the same time, you need to be able 0:12:28.559 --> 0:12:30.760 to fight in this thing you need. You don't need 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:34.680 horns that can as as the author states here, that 0:12:34.720 --> 0:12:36.840 will allow your helmet to be just taken off or 0:12:36.880 --> 0:12:40.760 just spun around violently on your head due to essentially 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:44.000 a miss by the opponent. You know, you need something 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:47.200 that is going to have a certain level of comfort, uh, 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:50.040 as well as durability. Yeah, you don't want to attach 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.760 levers to your armor where it can just easily be 0:12:53.840 --> 0:12:57.240 wrenched off of you. Right. Ideally your armor would be 0:12:57.280 --> 0:13:00.520 really tough and would be as like flat then close 0:13:00.600 --> 0:13:03.240 to your body as possible so that it stays put 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:08.040 and doesn't get dislodged. Yeah. Um. And certainly when you 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:10.559 start start looking at different helmets, even those that do 0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:13.160 have some sort of a horn or spike motif the 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:16.000 ones that see more use to one that can certainly 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:18.720 be ornate, you often see something that's a little smaller 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:22.920 in stature. Uh. For instance, for for single horns and spikes, 0:13:23.000 --> 0:13:24.920 we see plenty of examples of this where the top 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:27.959 of the helmet tapers into a spike of some sort. 0:13:28.360 --> 0:13:32.000 There are the the the kulakud helms of Persia and 0:13:32.000 --> 0:13:35.679 then you also have the famous pickle haba helms that 0:13:35.720 --> 0:13:38.800 are typically associated with the Prussian and German militaries of 0:13:38.840 --> 0:13:41.560 the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and you of course 0:13:41.600 --> 0:13:44.600 occasionally see them in biker movies as well. Oh yeah, 0:13:44.600 --> 0:13:47.680 if you look at a lot of Allied propaganda during 0:13:47.720 --> 0:13:50.320 the World War One era, it would often depict the 0:13:50.360 --> 0:13:53.800 German enemy with a with a pickle helba like a 0:13:53.960 --> 0:13:57.679 you know, a spear on the top of its helmet. Yeah. Now, 0:13:57.800 --> 0:13:59.559 one of the interesting things, of course, is the spear 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:02.880 has no real offensive purpose. You know that you're not 0:14:02.880 --> 0:14:05.880 gonna like, uh, you know, bend over and then run 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:07.880 into combat and try and stab people with the top 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:11.360 of your head. But there is a fun scene I 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:14.240 don't know if it has any even remotely you know, 0:14:14.360 --> 0:14:19.840 historic counterpart. But there was a film written and directed 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:24.600 by James Clavell of Showgun and uh the Fly Fame, 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:28.040 and it is titled The Last Valley, and there's a 0:14:28.080 --> 0:14:30.760 scene in which Michael Kine's character, who wears one of 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:33.760 these helmets, has casually taken it off for some sort 0:14:33.800 --> 0:14:37.320 of conversation and then use it to murder the other 0:14:37.400 --> 0:14:39.840 individual by stabbing them in the chest with it, and 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:42.160 then is it like the purloined letter, like they never 0:14:42.200 --> 0:14:44.120 know to look for the murder weapon on top of 0:14:44.120 --> 0:14:46.320 his head. Oh. I mean he does it in front 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:49.360 of numerous people, so it's it's not so much a 0:14:49.440 --> 0:14:53.320 murder mystery as more of a uh you know, I 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:55.440 don't think it's completely governed by the rules of war. 0:14:55.520 --> 0:14:58.160 It's kind of a shady act. But essentially, like he 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:01.359 and his bunch, if I remember correctly there, they're essentially defecting. 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:04.600 They find this this valley that's untouched by the wars 0:15:04.800 --> 0:15:07.600 ravaging the countrysides around them, and they're like, well, hell, 0:15:07.680 --> 0:15:09.960 we're just gonna stay here, but I need to kill 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:12.120 this guy first with my helmet. You never trust to 0:15:12.200 --> 0:15:16.040 Michael Caine. Uh. You know, we already touched on some 0:15:16.120 --> 0:15:19.480 of the fantasy elements here, but I know that I 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:22.800 grew up with a lot of Warhammer and Warhammer forty 0:15:22.800 --> 0:15:25.760 thousand imagery in my head, and they always had these 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:29.520 really horned up chaos warriors where they had really almost 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:34.920 like this exaggerated Viking heilm motif. Uh. Sometimes the horns 0:15:35.000 --> 0:15:36.880 met in the middle and kind of formed a ring, 0:15:36.960 --> 0:15:40.760 but other times they were just straight up horns um elsewhere, 0:15:40.760 --> 0:15:43.000 and I like current popular culture, you see a lot 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:46.960 of cool horns. For instance, Marvel's version of Loki often 0:15:47.080 --> 0:15:49.440 dresses up with a helm that has some just ridiculous 0:15:50.280 --> 0:15:53.640 horns spiraling out of the top of it. Uh. If 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:57.520 you watch The Mandalorian, there's actually a horned Mandalorian that 0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:01.840 pops up in that show, character called the Armor. And 0:16:01.880 --> 0:16:03.760 then um and then I was also thinking, as long 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:06.520 as we're talking about Disney, there's a sleeping beauty have 0:16:06.760 --> 0:16:10.040 Maleficent two has these horns that are either I'm not 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:12.000 I was never entirely clear if those were part of 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:16.560 her body or just part of her fantastic wardrobe. You know, 0:16:16.720 --> 0:16:19.320 I gotta say I've always been partial to Tim the 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:22.440 Enchanter from Monty Python on the Holy Grail, of course, 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:26.360 with his rams horns, which I don't recall exactly, but 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:28.600 it looks almost like they're more attached to like a 0:16:28.720 --> 0:16:31.680 hood than a helmet. I guess that's the thing when 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:34.120 you get into a magic user, right, like, what where 0:16:34.160 --> 0:16:38.760 does the the magical individual end in the magical costume begin? 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:41.440 You're not entirely certain. Yeah, and this would bring us 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.040 back to the idea of somebody with a kind of 0:16:44.440 --> 0:16:48.440 shamonic stature, right he's supposed to have. It suggests a 0:16:48.560 --> 0:16:52.440 hybrid nature animal human power, that kind of thing. Now, 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:55.200 in terms of just sort of the transformative aspects of 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:58.200 the helmet itself, we of course see plenty of examples 0:16:58.240 --> 0:17:00.960 of this in in our media. Uh Um, you know 0:17:01.000 --> 0:17:03.840 it goes everything from Darth Vader's helmet being such an 0:17:03.960 --> 0:17:07.840 iconic example of this too. So many different slasher villains 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:09.720 in horror, you know, they have some sort of signature 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:13.040 mask or masks that they wear. And I was thinking, 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:16.840 as cool as all those various masks are, I can't 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:19.560 think of a hornet example of that, you know, an 0:17:19.600 --> 0:17:22.479 idea of like some sort of a slasher murderer character 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:26.800 who has a helmet or a mask that incorporates horns. Yeah, 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:29.240 I couldn't think of one either, though I do think 0:17:29.520 --> 0:17:33.000 a good horned monster it would be wonderful. And it's 0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:36.600 underused in cinema. I've long maintained I think we've actually 0:17:36.600 --> 0:17:39.439 talked about this before, that the minotaur is one of 0:17:39.440 --> 0:17:43.760 the most under realized monsters in modern cinema. The minotaur 0:17:43.920 --> 0:17:47.480 should be so terrifying if rendered with the proper care 0:17:47.640 --> 0:17:50.520 the carrot deserves. But you know, I strained to think 0:17:50.560 --> 0:17:54.480 of good minotaurs in modern movies. Yeah, I mean there 0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:56.439 there have been some. There have been some good ones 0:17:56.600 --> 0:18:01.840 in the past few decades, but yeah, nothing recently. We'll 0:18:01.880 --> 0:18:04.080 have to get into this when we inevitably come back 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:07.800 into an episode on the minotaur. Um. You know, I 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:09.879 was looking. I was trying to think though about horror 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:13.399 film masks, and there is a very minotaur esque looking 0:18:13.920 --> 0:18:16.440 mask that shows up, apparently one of the Purge films, 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:19.879 so it's a Purge mask with horns. But having not 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:22.080 actually seen any of these movies, I don't know if 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:25.040 this is a major perjurer or a marginal perjur. It's 0:18:25.040 --> 0:18:27.760 just a background perjured. I'm not really sure how this 0:18:27.840 --> 0:18:30.960 thing works, but it's it's a cool looking, essentially a 0:18:31.000 --> 0:18:33.560 minotar mask. I'm thinking one of these days in the 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:35.840 in the Purge movies, they're just gonna get down to 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:39.200 like the Marie Hondo kind of level, where it's more 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:45.000 about like possessions, things you don't need than than humans. Yeah. 0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:48.840 I have no idea how how detailed they get in 0:18:48.880 --> 0:18:50.440 their world building in the show I think he did 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:53.439 a TV series which I hope gets into like white collar, 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:56.680 purge crimes and so forth. I mean, there's so many 0:18:56.720 --> 0:18:59.560 dimensions to that, like what are the full rules here? 0:18:59.600 --> 0:19:02.720 And is it just murders legal or like other crimes 0:19:02.760 --> 0:19:05.600 as well. I know the movies must address this, but 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:08.520 but I don't think I'm going to find out. Yeah, well, 0:19:08.840 --> 0:19:10.720 listeners will have to let us know you watch it 0:19:10.800 --> 0:19:13.239 so we don't have to. But you know, when you 0:19:13.240 --> 0:19:16.200 think about the helmet not as a decoration, I mean 0:19:16.320 --> 0:19:19.600 most of what we've been talking about is idea decoration 0:19:19.760 --> 0:19:23.080 and trying to create visual significance. When you think about 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.480 the helmet as a practical invention, I love that it's 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:30.200 pretty much just creating a second skull. You've already got 0:19:30.200 --> 0:19:33.080 a skull. It's a hard casing that covers the brain. 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:35.719 And then some people got the idea of what if 0:19:35.760 --> 0:19:38.800 I just did another one on top. Yeah, I guess 0:19:39.000 --> 0:19:41.119 you could basically think of it this way in terms 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:45.399 of human on human violence, Like the skull does a 0:19:45.440 --> 0:19:49.960 pretty good job protecting against um, you know, fists and kicks, 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:51.800 and I'll not to say that it can't be fractured 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:54.720 in those encounters as well. But once you start involving 0:19:55.200 --> 0:19:58.760 tools um offensive tools like it is the it is 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:03.240 such an elegant um defensive tool to develop as well. Like, Okay, 0:20:03.280 --> 0:20:07.080 if you're going to upgrade your strikes with pieces of 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:10.960 bone and uh and and you know, stones and so forth, 0:20:11.320 --> 0:20:14.480 then I want to have something around my head that 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:18.080 at least cushions the blow if if if not shields 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:20.879 me from from some of the more direct violence that 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:24.000 is inherent your attack. Yeah, that actually highlights that there 0:20:24.040 --> 0:20:26.360 are a couple of different physics issues going on when 0:20:26.400 --> 0:20:28.480 you're creating a helmet, right. One of them is you 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:32.359 want to prevent like just direct injury to the outer tissues, 0:20:32.440 --> 0:20:35.479 like to the skin and the bone of your skull, 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:38.359 because obviously you don't want fractures in your skull. But 0:20:38.400 --> 0:20:42.159 another thing is, even if nothing would break through, you 0:20:42.240 --> 0:20:44.840 also want to provide a certain amount of padding that 0:20:44.920 --> 0:20:48.960 will slow the rate of acceleration caused by jostling of 0:20:49.000 --> 0:20:51.479 the head and different directions. You know, when you get 0:20:51.560 --> 0:20:54.240 hit in the head, A lot of what can hurt 0:20:54.320 --> 0:20:57.959 you is if your brain suddenly slashes too fast against 0:20:57.960 --> 0:21:01.320 the inside of your skull from the acceleration of the blow. 0:21:01.680 --> 0:21:04.640 So like a football, helmet works because it pads that out, 0:21:04.680 --> 0:21:08.560 it slows it down. Yeah, So hopefully this provides a 0:21:08.600 --> 0:21:11.760 good a good initial overview of what helmets are and 0:21:11.840 --> 0:21:14.320 some of the different roles they play. But this leads 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.720 to the most obvious question, is this just a human thing? 0:21:17.920 --> 0:21:21.520 Is this pure human technology? Or do we because essentially 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:23.359 it is tool used, do we see this sort of 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:27.520 tool use in other animals out there? Well, we're going 0:21:27.600 --> 0:21:31.920 to answer that question after we come back. Thank thank 0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:36.200 thank Alright, we're back, So we're asking the question, Hey, 0:21:36.359 --> 0:21:43.640 do any animals wear helmets? Okay, so essentially no, um, 0:21:43.680 --> 0:21:46.440 I mean, there's some caveats. I guess it. It basically 0:21:46.440 --> 0:21:48.960 comes down to how far are you willing to stretch 0:21:49.040 --> 0:21:53.040 the idea of a helmet. So, for instance, hermit crabs, 0:21:53.080 --> 0:21:56.479 obviously they're they're acquiring a shell from another organism and 0:21:56.560 --> 0:22:00.680 using them as additional armor over their own exoskelets, and 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:03.600 and uh, you know, they're not wearing it on their head. 0:22:03.600 --> 0:22:05.360 But then that didn't make sense. Why would they wear 0:22:05.440 --> 0:22:06.959 just something over their head. They're going to cover their 0:22:06.960 --> 0:22:11.600 whole body. It's more like a mineral diaper, I guess yeah, 0:22:11.680 --> 0:22:16.040 a mineral diaper. Uh. You Also there are examples of 0:22:16.040 --> 0:22:18.920 of octopi using you know, coconut husts that sort of thing. 0:22:19.080 --> 0:22:22.439 But again, I don't know if i'd really qualify that 0:22:22.560 --> 0:22:26.600 as a helmet as like as specifically the shielding of 0:22:26.680 --> 0:22:30.240 one's skull, of one hit one's head, of one's brain 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:32.840 with some sort of additional layering. I think a thing 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:35.280 we're also going to run into with with this question 0:22:35.320 --> 0:22:41.080 about animals is, um, how external is the head covering 0:22:41.119 --> 0:22:45.280