Episode 77: Carnival and Lent

Veni, Veni, Venius and welcome to our podcast. ♪ Veni, Veni, Venius ♪ ♪ Veni, Veni, Veni, Venius ♪ Good evening and welcome to Ask a Medievalist. I'm M, the Ask Portia of our program, and joining me tonight as always is Dr. Jesse News. Hello! So, good evening to all the party people in the house. Today, we're gonna be talking about probably. Okay, I was gonna say it's like the most well-known. Catholic holiday. It's not, that's Christmas, but it's definitely the more fun Catholic holiday. Right, in terms of party. Well, maybe specifically, sort of specifically Catholic. It's not exactly specifically Catholic, but it is kind of specifically Catholic. Right. So maybe, Christmas would be all Christians, right? So yes, maybe it's the best known specifically Catholic. Yeah, traditions got beads. Yes indeed. Okay, it's best known renditions. Yes, include. Yes. For some reason, I'm thinking of beautiful Brazilian women wearing a lot of feathers. Yes. Possibly some various masks of different types. Absolutely. If you haven't guessed yet, we're talking about carnival. Yay! So, it's. This episode should be coming out right around Carnival, the end of the season, I guess, to February 13th this year. Yeah, yeah. Lent this year, hilariously, starts on February 14th. That's amazing. So, everyone has their Valentine's Day's early, I guess. Yeah. If you are gonna be following Lent, you'll give your chocolate back, as early all of these things. Get it out of your system. Yes, you will go out for dinner the weekend before, you will get your carnival on. Yes. Yeah. So basically, so here is the rundown. This is funny, because we've actually talked around this subject a lot. We had a whole thing in sort of feast of fools and topsy turvy holidays, but we haven't really specifically talked about carnival. So let's actually start with just the term. The OAD has it in English from 1549, which of course is somewhat late. That is very late. And this probably is only due to the fact that we'll talk about this. Even though England, of course, had previously been Catholic, it wasn't, of course, at this point. Or, you know, it was Catholic, and then famously it wasn't, and then it was, and then it wasn't. Going hot and cold there. Yes. Yes. So, you know, that, of course, doesn't explain why they don't have the term. It's actually, if we will talk a little bit later, just the fact that the period before Lent is dealt with differently in different areas. So obviously, a lot of areas do end up with carnival, but not not everybody. So carnival is, and this is, this is actually sort of interesting carnival. I wonder if it does show up in 1549 in English because at that point, England is under Mary. And so therefore, you know, we're trying to find some joy again. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, this is a fair, of course, but there is a funny thing about, you know, depending on which side of the coin you fall, there has been a lot written about the austerity, of course, of Protestantism. And the fact that, you know, one of the things that happens is, let's see. So 1549, Henry VIII is still king, actually. Mary's going to take over a little bit. But obviously, right, it's part of the turmoil. We're going in and out of this. And so, let's see, Edward, well, no, Henry's dead. Edward's king in 1547, right. And then, of course, he dies a few years later in 1553. And then we get the sort of Lady Jane Gray thing, but of course, Mary does manage to become queen and she continues on. So 1549 is, oh gosh. So 1549 is going to be sort of in the middle of Edward's reign. Obviously, yeah, there's a lot of turmoil going on. Henry switched England to Protestantism famously on his own personal reasons. Yes. And then keeps marrying until he finally has a son. And then, of course, famously, that queen dies a childbirth, so he keeps marrying. But Edward, you know, a child's king was never a stable situation. Right. So even though people don't know he's going to die, you are not going to trust that he's going to grow up in rule and that things are going to be fine. Right. Right. And of course, so the factions, of course, right, the Catholic and Protestant factions are still very much in turmoil. It's not clear at the time that Protestantism is going to remain the official religion of England. And obviously when Edward dies and Mary takes over in 53, 453, you know, she does switch it and then she will famously die and Elizabeth will get it and switch it back. And that's basically the end. They do have a couple Catholic monarchs after that shamelessly. But then they, you know, like James, the bloodless revolution, he leaves, you know, yes, he steps down. That's James the second. Second. Yeah. Yeah. We have James Charles Cromwell Charles James. Right. Right. For those two. Yes. And so Catholicism never actually comes back, although there are still, of course, you know, whispers of it and, you know, there can be whispers of it. But it does not officially come back after that. However, yes, this is the time of turmoil. So you can sort of see that being said, all of that being said, one of the interesting things about Carnival just as a term is that it's not 100% clear where it comes from. So one of the, the best guess of the OED puts its reputation behind this one. Okay. There's a whole set of notes actually about it. So it's worth pointing out also, by the way, speaking of England and the tensions that Carnival doesn't have to be Catholic. It just tends to be because of the austerity we just mentioned. One of the things that happens when, for example, Elizabeth takes over, or, of course, famously, when Henry switches things to begin with, is that a lot of Catholic stuff gets sort of destroyed. Right. Monasteries are torn down, but also, for example, you know, churches are whitewashed. So you have this sort of, you know, anyone who's walked into some of the Catholic cathedrals across Europe, gorgeous cathedrals, England obviously still has all its cathedrals. You know, they didn't tear them down. They, I mean, they tore down a lot of stuff. But, you know, a lot of the cathedrals like York Mainsterm things that were built under Catholicism are still there. But they did do, you know, they left a lot of stuff, a lot of windows, things like that, they did leave, they didn't destroy everything. But they did whitewash a lot of stuff. So occasionally, even today, someone will be, they'll be trying to clean things and they'll find paintings that were hidden, sometimes that were just plastered over, you know. So sometimes things were kind of preserved, you know, either just because that's how they were covered up, or possibly sometimes because it was the hope of the people covering them up that one day, they would be able to be uncovered. It's just that then they weren't for like hundreds of years. So this still absolutely, this still has what happens. But there is this sort of sense of austerity connected with Protestantism, which of course, especially in England, then you'll get the Puritans, which is where I was going without that. So yes, whereas Carnival, of course, is the opposite of all of that. Yes. The funny thing, of course, is that Lent is all of that. That's the whole point. But nonetheless, yes, a lot of Protestant traditions do view Carnival as something sort of excessive and Catholic. But that isn't entirely fair. And it's not like England didn't celebrate what we would call Carnival at all, because they absolutely do. They just do not celebrate it as what we would call Carnival basically. But the term seems to come from Italian, also French, originally from medieval Latin, of around the 11th to 12th centuries. Okay. And originates with sort of with a kind of mashing together of Carnival. Okay. Meaning to put away or to remove meat. Oh. Right. Which of course is literally the definition of Lent. So I mean, that entirely, but that's the point, right. Lent is a period of fasting. Mm-hmm. and Carnival, that's why you have this excess because it's before you have to fast, so you get it all out of your system. And so this does seem to be where the term comes from. And like I said, there are other sort of discussions about where it might come from, but the OED sort of has some extra notes where they say that they stand behind this one. (laughing) So that basically Carnival, right, Carnival of R8, that it's based on the very fact of you're about to give up meat. That's what it is. I mean, that is what it is, right? It's the celebration before that happens. But yeah, so that's the OED's general stance on what it is. So, funnily, the 1549 reference is actually a guy, Thomas, W. Thomas, who wrote the history of Italy, he calls it, and he says in their Carnival time which we call Shrove Tide. Ah, so it is a setting up of the differences sort of between somewhere like England and Italy, right, England, which is at this point Protestant, but also just is England, and is that, right there Catholicism was always a little different for everyone else's. Yes. And we've talked about people like Marjorie Kemp, a lot. Marjorie Kemp really loved the continental traditions, particularly things like weeping and, you know, passionate mysticism, and that was not as big a thing in England. - I'm, like, I realized that like BBC drawing room, dramas are not necessarily real life, but I'm not 100% shocked that, for some reason, the British would go in for a form of religion that, yes, it's like take all of your emotions and just push them really down inside. This is sort of the joke, right? Is that England, of course, in some ways, maybe the austerity came a little bit before the Protestantism, yes. Yes, yes, this is kind of fair. Again, not to say they didn't have their fair share of fun things, obviously. They do some great theater, but nonetheless, yeah, that this is, this is a fair sort of shot. This is a stereotype that they themselves bring up a lot. John Oliver talks about this frequently. - Yes. - It is a stereotype, absolutely, but it's a prevalent one even amongst the English. So yes, yeah, so there is this sense, right? So this interesting moment of, you know, this is the difference between us and them, and it's funny 'cause of course, the stereotype is something that fits pretty easily into a Protestant mindset, which is, okay, so, Lent, as we said, right, is the, Lent is officially the 40 days before Holy Week. It basically lasts actually for 46 days, 'cause usually it begins on Ash Wednesday and it ends kind of in the middle of Holy Week around that Thursday. - Yes. - But it officially commemorates the 40 days that Jesus fasted in the desert, and of course was tempted by Satan. - There is a movie about this, I feel like. - Well, sure, the less temptation, the less temptation of Christ is actually different. - No, I was gonna say, wasn't David Bowie in that? - Um, yeah, well, yeah, which one is he in? - He played Pylate, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, he was in the Willem Dafoe. - Yep, Mary Scorsese one. - Yes, Harvey Ketell. Yeah, that's, yeah, less temptation of Christ, that's based famously on a book by Nikos Constantzakis, who is Greek, and I've actually learned a lot more about him than my travels around Greece, which is sort of fun. - Oh. - Yes, you run into like where he was from and places he hung out, didn't you? - Oh. - It's quite fun, yeah. He hung out sort of around the sickly, he's in various places, and it's a lot of fun. - I think I didn't realize it was a Scorsese film before now, like he just likes to make films about Catholics, huh? - Yes, okay. - I mean, he is one, right? So this has something to do with Nikos, something, right? But yes, but yeah, it includes, yes, less temptation of Christ, it includes his temptation of the desert, well, his test in the desert, and his temptation. Yes, it doesn't, I think it does include that, all of that. - I feel like it would be weird to call it that without including that scene, like-- - Right. - And be like making a movie about Noah, but you never have any boats in it. - Yeah. But it's actually, the last temptation is actually different. - There's a difference. - There's another different temptation. - Yes, well, that's the point. This is why I was a kind of controversial book. I'm possibly underplaying this when I say kind of controversial was a book, and there's a movie to be fair. It's because we do see the beginning of his thing, but the real point of it is that when he's on the cross, he is tempted again, and he's given a sort of vision of himself, you know, dying old with a family, whatever, knowing this. And instead of being crucified. - Ah. - Right, that he is tempted, so the temptation, right, that he, you know, that he doesn't do what he was supposed to do, which of course is die for the sins of mankind, that he chooses not to do this. And he of course does choose to do that. So that's the last temptation. - Interesting. - Yeah, that is not a canonical temptation, we should say. - Perhaps fair. - But yes, it's, yeah, it's, you know, yes, it's a famous book, famous book, famous movie. Barbara Hershey is Mary Bagdalen, all of these things. - And David Bowie. - Yes, as pilot, which is fantastic. - Yeah, Mary Dean Stanton is Saul, Paul, yeah. Yes, so quite a cast. But anyway, but that's the last temptation. So that's kind of the point of it. But yes, the canonical temptation of Jesus is the one that happens during the 40 days in the desert. It is wonderfully referenced in good omens. - Oh yeah. So he does, in the scene, Zero Fail, and Crowley running to each other at the foot of the cross, basically. - Yes, it's not in the book, but it's in the series, it's in season one. - Yeah, like really, yeah. - The long thing in episode three or something, where it's just like them meeting through history. - Absolutely. So they, yeah, they meet up with the crucifixion. We see them through history, meeting up. - Yes. - And that's one of the places they meet up. And the Zero Fail is like, what did he do? And Crowley says he told them to be kind to each other, or to be nice to each other, and, you know, they're like, well, that would do it. - Yeah. - And then, you know, the Zero Fail says did you know him? And Crowley says, yeah, see, yeah, here's a quite nice boy, actually. And something like this, the Zero Fail is like, oh, wait, how'd you know? Maybe that's what he says. He says, how do you know? And Crowley says, oh, I showed him, you know, I, you know, the temptations, and that he could be, you know, all, you know, he could be what? In charge of, you know, all the kingdoms of the world, or something like this. And I'm missing the lie. He quotes the lie. He quotes the Bible in this moment. He, of course, 'cause Crowley having in this case, been the devil who tempted Jesus in the desert. And the Zero Fail says, oh, why is that? And Crowley says, I mean, he's a young boy from Judea, his travel opportunities are limited, here's what he says. But, you know, so it is, of course, a joke, but it is also, yeah, that's the official temptation. And the point is that this is a test that you go through as a religious leader to purify yourself, right? Fasting purifies. That is the point. So it is a commemoration of Jesus' fast in the desert. He gets, he's been baptized by John the Baptist, right? He goes off the desert to fast, to overcome the temptations of the devil. And then when he comes out the other side after 40 days, he goes off to preach, you know, does his thing for, however many years, six years, eight years. However long it is at this point, some number of years. And that, of course, his final act is his entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and there. And so that's Holy Week. So basically, Lent is a period where everyone can memorize this fast, but also you do it yourself, right? That's the moment when you need to be cleansed coming up to Holy Week. Jesus didn't need to do that coming up to Holy Week. He did it before he started preaching publicly and stuff. But we need to do it if one is Christian coming up to Holy Week because obviously the whole point of Holy Week is things like repentance and forgiveness and you got to be purified and cleansed to deal with all that Now it's worth pointing out of course that this does originate with Judaism Jesus, of course, having been Jewish famously as we're these original disciples and so on many of them um and Moses Is up on Mount Sinai for 40 days. Mm-hmm Getting the 10 commandments and so that is one of the famous 40 days. There obviously 40 is a big number Right, they're just wondering the desert for 40 days 40 40 is the number It's a symbolic number clearly for Judaism. It goes way before Judaism I mean, it's a symbolic number in ancient Middle Eastern stuff But this is why so this is why the 40 But Moses was up on Sinai for 40 days Gets the tablets. He's gone so long right into 40 days that famously that people left behind some of them make a golden calf He comes back down smashes the tablets He then goes back up the mountain For another 40 days Ask God to forgive everybody and make some new tablets. God does Moses comes back down That second trip I'm gonna say it's a second trip anyway It starts supposedly on the first day of the month of allul on the Jewish calendar Mm-hmm, and he comes back down on what is Yom Kippur and so that is In Judaism the 40 days of fasting and repentance and stuff like that. It's not all fasting You don't have to fast for 40 days. That's it But a little is a month of Repentance and thinking about all that stuff leading up to Of course, Russia Shana and the Yom Kippur and so that is that is direct You know, that is reenacting That 40 days that Moses took where God decided to forgive us and give us back think of events and stuff That's reenacting that when it supposedly happened right so that that's that's a very direct reenaction, but But that sense of the 40 days coming up to repentance all that stuff. That's basically what is being reenacted here But not at the time necessarily that it happened right Jesus did not do this immediately before Holy week It's just you know, that's when you do it because that's when you need it So yeah, so that's lent And as I said that it runs into holy week which we should probably go over Lent starts with Ash Wednesday Mm-hmm. This is why the day before which is a Tuesday Is known as for example, Mardi Gras or Shrove Tuesday That Tuesday, yes, right Mardi Gras fat Tuesday Shrove Tuesday. That's an English of course Tuesday The key is the Tuesday, right because that is the day before let begins on Ash Wednesday and One of the things that you're sort of supposed to do So Ash Wednesday, of course you if you know if one is observant of course one goes to church and Famously right gets Ash is I think some of the churches around here have had up signs that were like Ashes to go or something during the Covid season I don't know how that like I'm very curious if that meant that like you could walk up Outside and they would do it or if they were like giving away a little paper bag of ashes I think so yeah, I think that's what you could sort of do it yourself. Yes. Yes And obviously the ashes are symbolic of grief and repentance and mourning, right? This is also incredibly old the idea of you know pouring ashes over your head or rubbing ashes in your hair This is in the Bible as a form of grief. This is you know, this is old old Right grief and repentance grief and repentance. So that's the point right the ashes are that start of that season of grief and repentance The ashes are supposed to be made out of the or are made out of the palms From the previous years palm Sunday the palm fronds that they give you yes And then the following year you burn them down So this is one thing you're supposed to do on this Tuesday, right and Then the next day is the ashes on Ash Wednesday So show the reason why the English Famously called this shrub Tuesday is because it's supposed to be a day of absolution right striving Right. Oh, yes That's that's the thing when you are given Last rights, right? Like it's called being shriven. Yes, but it really just means confession and absolution Okay, to be shriven. So So that's what things you're supposed to do, right? You're supposed to purify yourself cleansing You know you again you burned the sort of palm fronds from last year for use says the ashes the next day So of course, this is different from what we think of You you do things also like eat sweets. Mm-hmm because after this you won't but it's supposed to be more of a moderate thing Right like because you are supposed to be cleansing and absolving yourself in preparation for lent Yes, this is sort of the last day you get to eat sweets for More than 40 days, honestly again because it's the 40 days just takes you through the Thursday of Holy Week and there's another few days No, that's 46 days So it's really like a total of 4748 days. Mm-hmm Through Easter, right that you don't get to eat all this stuff Or at least until like good Friday So yeah, one of the things you might have our pancakes in this instance So pancakes become a big thing for this day And here we would like to name check the hellboy comic on pancakes. Ah, yes This is like my favorite two-page comic that I've ever seen and it is just the The general that sort of adopts hellboy when he appears. Yes feeding him pancakes for breakfast. Yes. Yes, he's a professor, but yeah, professor broom yeah, and and I've read it to my now six-year-old a Few years ago now actually and he'll still go around and sometimes just like say but hellboy. You've never even tried pancakes Yes Yes, because hellboy at first doesn't want to try them doesn't think he likes them Yes, and of course they become his favorite food which remains fairly true throughout the rest of his Existence that we have to this point. There's also extremely accurate like apparently it was based on Mike Benilla's daughter who just wanted to eat noodles. This is extremely accurate for small children. Yep that Yes, yeah With repeated exposure the food that once made them cry will be the one they profess is their favorite. Yes, and Just works it works on a lot of levels really. Yep, but you know and pancakes of course are not only very worthy But it is of course, right? This is why they might become the sort of thing you would eat us for a Tuesday, which they did become Because they are amazing and delicious. You don't get them every day. Mm-hmm You certainly don't usually get them on a Tuesday heavy come on. No, but also it's it's a moderate thing Right, there are other days you get pancakes if you're following let you're not going to get them for like seven weeks But there are other days, you know during the year I wish you could have but this is a nice thing you will do It's your last chance Right, so rather than like having had them over the weekend, but then Adding those extra couple days you can have them on that Tuesday, and then not have them again for like seven weeks But yeah, so pancakes become one of the big things that you can have on show Tuesday But this is obviously yes a much more moderate version Compared to Marty Gras, which of course is French Although in fairness not all of France quite goes with this there are a few parts of France that do follow the I mean The English route and do the sort of show of Tuesday pancakes thing But this is of course a reminder that England and France have a lot of close ties and certain parts of England particularly are very closely tied to certain parts of France and so You know That's not necessarily a huge surprise But otherwise, of course, yes, Marty Gras This is where we get the idea that Tuesday fat Tuesday is a day of excess Mm-hmm, right we do whatever you want eat as much as possible all of these things because you're not gonna get stuff for the next Seven weeks this while yeah, yeah, it's a good time Yes, officially lent kind of ends basically as I said in Holy Week around kind of Monday Thursday but Essentially right lent takes you into Holy Week Holy Week officially starts with Palm Sunday, which is the sixth Sunday of Lent Mm-hmm. The seventh Sunday is no longer Lent and that is of course Easter But yeah, so you get Palm Sunday, which is Jesus's entry into Jerusalem and Palm Fronds where you know laid before him etc So that's where the palms come from you reenact it and then you keep those Palm Fronds and the next year you burned them on That Tuesday To make the end Ash's fresh Wednesday. Then you get sort of Holy Monday and Tuesday, which are, you know, you can do various things. They're not whatever. Holy Wednesday is the day that Judas betrays Jesus. Monday, Thursday is the last supper, and then Good Friday, of course, is the crucifixion. For those who haven't been with us for the last 70 smurgole episodes, I believe that episodes 2 and 3 were about Passover/Easter. That's a few scroll back in our archives really far. Yes. You can hear much more information about these. Yes. Yes, we have talked about these extensively for sure. Yeah. And Good Friday, of course, then is the crucifixion. It is somewhat ironically named. Holy Saturday is the day that Jesus remains buried, so that's a huge day of mourning. And then Easter Sunday, of course, is the resurrection celebration. All bets are off. Eat as much chocolate as you want, etc. Yeah. It's good. Peeps. Peeps for everyone. Exactly. To be fair, of course, that tends to start on Good Friday. But yes, it depends on where you are. Yes. Yes, but yes, of course, keeps out the best. But yes, so this, so Lent, this is right. This is why, because similar to God forgiving Moses and the people of Israel and, you know, giving us the 10 commandments again, this, of course, is leading up to something slightly bigger, arguably, which is Jesus sacrificing himself to save all of humanity from hell. So, you know, you want to have celebrated Lent appropriately, really be worthy of that. The fun thing, of course, is that there's the realization that in order to get people to really be willing, and by people, of course, we mean lay people. But even many religious people, let's be fair. You know, that all priests necessarily want to be fasting all the time. This is a famous medieval trope of monks who do the opposite of fasting all the time. So, to get people in the mindset where they're willing to do that for all of Lent, which is a fairly long time to be fair, carnival starts to expand. So, it's not just, it becomes not just the Tuesday before, but perhaps the whole weekend or week before. And actually slowly, but surely, you tend to get an entire season, an entire carnival season. So, for example, while New Orleans will have its parades on February 13th, yeah, with this year, of course, right? Because that's the Tuesday. That's what all the big stuff happens. The season arguably starts, well, we're in it, has already set the season arguably starts after, well, after or at Epiphany, or three Kings Day. Oh, that's pretty far back. Yes, which is January 6th. That's the end of 12th night. So, you get the end of the Christmas season, which ends on January 5th, if you are following things like 12th night, of course. Yeah. And then Epiphany, and sort of the start of the Lent and season. So, hilariously, you go straight from one celebration into another. That seems fine. And it serves to, yes, to keep the party going, because then you're going to have this sort of month and a half of nothing. And there's definitely the sensibility of wanting to get it all out of your system. I like how in the US this year, it like coincides with tax season kind of. Oh, of course. Yes. That seems appropriate and correct. Yes. I will say the funny thing is, because in the US, we go so far back, right? We, like, you have Halloween into Thanksgiving into Christmas. Yeah. And basically, then the US, at least, I don't know about the rest of the world, but has started this thing called Dry January, or Dry January, where January kind of becomes like Lent. Oh, yes. I've also seen Vigannuary where you, yes, you don't eat meat or dairy products. Yes. And this is a fascinatingly secular version of exactly the same thing. It's an honestly for repents, but it's more that you've had all this excess, and so now you shouldn't. But it's not just you've had all this excess, and now you should go back to normal. If you've had all this excess, and now you should go the opposite. Yes. Which is a really interesting mindset, and is one that is tied to this tradition of carnival and Lent, right? That you go from periods of extreme fasting or feasting into periods of extreme fasting. And it's a really weirdly specific tradition, I think. So this is sort of the secular version of it. Presumably, things like Dry January are for people who won't then be going into Lent, although you could do Dry January, really have those two weeks of February, and then go back into Lent. But I think it's mostly for people who probably aren't going to be doing Lent, right? That you would do it now, and then just sort of go back to normal. Whereas I was like, maybe you keep going, but then you have to cool it off. I want to say most of the people that I know who celebrate Lent don't celebrate it by giving up, you know, all the food stuff that you would probably traditionally do. They'll say something like, I'm giving up disposable plastic packaging for Lent, or added sugar to my coffee, or just like one thing. Yes, it's become more of us, like honestly giving up disposable plastic packaging sounds like really hard. Yes, it also is simultaneously like easier than not eating cheese for 47 days or whatever. Right, right. Yes, yes, and this is the funny thing. So there are a few things to be said about this. First of all, of course, the interesting thing. So let's go into this, right, carnival. It's worth mentioning, oh, we mentioned right, three kings. So this is of course, we get something like king cake, right? Which of course, the thing in New Orleans where you eat the cake and you get the little figurine, and then you get good luck. And there's a lot of various traditions surrounding things like that. We've talked about some of them in other, you know, things like on sweets or on topsy-turvy days. There's a kind of old tradition of, you know, hiding something in foodstuffs and then whoever gets it either just maybe gets good fortune or sometimes like cast a paper, the round of drinks or whatever it is. Sometimes you get a little paper crown and you get to be the king for the day. Yes, I think that's a French one. I remember yeah French class. Yes, yeah. So there's this sort of interesting and the funny thing is it's sort of based on the three kings because of course, right, they bring Jesus his presence. So that sort of bleeds into length, but it's also a tradition that then some thought was based on actual royalty, right? So the interesting thing about these traditions is there's been a real push as with a lot of traditions to trace them back to pagan stuff, right? Carnival is very dinosaur. Oh yeah, back in alien. There are a lot of people who have speculated it's related in some way to satire in alia, but no probably not. Right? I mean, yeah, it's like quite a gap in the calendar. Yes. Yeah, and John Bosse among others, but he's sort of one of the scholars in 85. Ah, let's see. Christianity in the West would be in his book. This book, this specific book. He's got a lot of them. We've mentioned it before. I'm pretty sure. But anyway, he sort of says there's not a lot of evidence of carnival as we know it before the 1200s. And this, of course, right, the OED going to the idea that in 1549 there would be like carnivals, the thing that happens in Italy and we have sure of Tuesday. Ah, right. Yes. So yeah, so that sort of sensibility. Again, right, very much that's Italian word English. Maybe also that's Catholic and we're Protestant, but again, because of the turmoil happening at the time, you know, that's a little bit less. Sure, a little less sure. But, um, but definitely that sort of contrast, you know, and again, the OED that it's probably sort of from Italian, which then gets it from medieval Latin. And the same is true then for the French, right? But again, medieval Latin and the OED says basically from the 11th to 12th centuries. So this is a sort of early, you know, it's, you know, it's high medieval, basically. This is a high medieval. So this is not even right early Middle Ages, like the 5600s. This is really high medieval. This isn't necessarily even an early, early tradition. And one of the interesting questions is, why does it become so public and important in a lot of places and then less so in others, right? And that, of course, is based on the fact that Carnival isn't sort of an official thing, right? That Tuesday isn't even a kind of official, it's an important day because it is supposed to be a day of absolution. You get the ashes, ray fresh, Wednesday, stuff like that. But the fact that it then becomes a marker for like your last day to do certain things before you have to stop doing them. Yeah. or eat certain things before you have to stop eating them. That obviously isn't like, that's not official, right? That's not like on the church calendar in the same way, right? Like, it is that day, but there's not a feast, there's not a specific official feast to celebrate that fact. So basically people make their own. And the question is sort of why. And this is one of the sort of interesting things, which is that in some places, it's clearly, I mean, in all the places that have carnival that we talked about, right? So famously places like Venice, New Orleans, New Orleans, Rio. These are all places where it's incredibly public. It is a huge public festival. And in other places where it's not as big, there's some sort of question about why isn't there a huge public festival. And this, I mean, has something to do probably with, you know, where you are. But it's not like England doesn't have public festivals. So the question becomes sort of, what is it about this that some places started to really celebrate this publicly and other places did not? Now it's probably a good mention, good time to mention Bactine. Who may have mentioned before, of course. But Roblin in his world, which, you know, Bactine wrote long before it got translated into English, where Bactine sort of sets forth his theories about the carnivalesque and the grotesque. And specifically his sense of, and this is again, this is a modern theorist writing about the Middle Ages. But it's become a really important way that people think about the Middle Ages. That first of all, the carnivalesque is all the things we sort of said, right, these moments of great excess. And that it's tied there for to the grotesque, which tends to be sort of, you know, bodily excess, right, all the things of the flesh as opposed to the things of the spirit. Sure. And one of the things that's happening in the Middle Ages in sort of the 1200s around the time that, you know, Carnival maybe starts, starts taking off a little bit, or just the ideas of it start percolating. You have the increasing sort of professionalization of the clergy on the one hand. And therefore, a kind of increased structure and also structure around things like confession and absolution and the taking of communion. And so solely but surely lay people get pushed out of that space. You don't get to take communion regularly. Hopefully you still get to take it once a year. And this would be the time, right, before Easter. But you honestly might not get that. And if you do, you don't get the chalice, you only get the wafer. And the chalice is kind of removed from the public from lay people very purposely. So lay people are kind of getting pushed out of this a little bit. And a lot of it's been kind of taken, right, the clergy are sort of taking these things. And so you have other things like the rise of festivals like Corpus Christi. Juliana of Cognon, we've definitely talked about her before, but she creates this whole festival and it's always sort of to fix this. Right, she wants a festival that's going to celebrate Corpus Christi, the Eucharist, particularly because it's sort of been taken away. Yes. You know, and even more so from her as a woman, right? You know, she doesn't have the option of becoming a priest even if she wanted to, which I just, you know, I mean, she's a woman religious, so, but she does not have that option. So you get the sort of sense of public, right, the sort of extent to which public displays of feasting, but also just festivals, right, religious festivals versus the extent to which they're sort of being taken away, made more individual, right, even sometimes more specific to the clergy, who might or might not celebrate certain things with laypeople in the vicinity. And so there's a, there's a lot of stuff going on at this period regarding the rise, arguably the rise of sort of popular festivals, where the people are sometimes taking things into their own hands to do things and to celebrate things. And so in this case, it's very, very clearly a celebration of the flesh, right, coming up to length versus then, arguably, what is supposed to be a very communal sense of absence and repentance, things that we tend to think of as very personal. Yeah, right. So today, I mean, I think it's tremendous that people celebrate lent by instead, maybe instead of potentially like not eating certain things, which tends to be again, very individual, we live in a secular world, that they might try to do something that's a little more communal, like not use plastics or something, right, that it's an individual thing that you do, but you're sort of doing it to help the communal world, right. Yeah. I have to admit that I am a little surprised that there could be a layperson led festival in some ways, celebrating the non-spiritual and that the church wouldn't have tried to crack down on it in some way. Yes, so this is the, this is the other thing about the carnivalesque. The reason the carnivalesque gets to exist, and of course, again, carnivalesque is the term that back team uses, I mean, based on the whole idea of carnival, which is arguably kind of where, not where it actually originates, but it's a great example of this. The reason you let things like that exist is because otherwise you don't get the thing you want. If you want people to observe lint, you have to let them have carnival, right. You can't squash them and then also squash them even more and expect them to observe lint, right. Because if you squash carnival, they're going to rebel when it comes to lint, right. You can only squash people so much. Okay. Before they rebel. Right. Now, this is one of the interesting things about carnival, because there are two arguments. One argument, we have said this, I think, before, but we'll reiterate it. One argument is that carnival is potentially a path to rebellion. Like you said, let's lay people get out some steam, do some things, feel their power. The problem is that the whole point, again, of letting it happen, it's like a kettle. It blows off steam so that it doesn't explode. Right. So you let them blow off steam so that they don't actually explode, right. If you let them blow off steam, then they will come back and do what they're told, which is unfortunate. Yes. Absolutely. And that actually becomes this really interesting question about it, right. But that is pretty clearly why it happens. I know I like to compare this sometimes to not exactly, but a little bit to the purge. We've mentioned this, I think, before. Yes. The movie, and then also I think there's TV series, but movie series, there's a series of movies, there's TV show, there's bunch of stuff. I still can't believe these movies exist. I know. I know. But that is kind of the argument, right. That you let people do whatever they want for 24 hours, and then for the rest of the year, people behave. That is, of course, not exactly how it works. I think a better, a better example is probably Terry Pratchett, where you have things like the thieves guild and the assassin's guild. It's something to keep a lid on it. Yes. So that there's rules. There's rules. So if you're just a murderer, you get in trouble, but you could be an assassin. Yes. If you're just the thief, you get in trouble, but if you're part of the thieves guild, then it's okay. Yes, you're following the rules. You submit receipts and things. Yes. Exactly. And carnivals basically like that. You have to have that pressure valve so that then people will follow the rules. And there are a lot of variations of that. I mean, that's what weekends are for. Right. But that is what carnival does. And there's something sort of interesting about the extent to which it's public. And then like I said, I think because in a lot of these places lent was also very public. Right. As a community, you didn't eat meat or at least, you know, on Fridays or so on. And so the whole thing is very public. Whereas in places arguably where a lot of this was much more individual, then carnival itself was also sort of individual. You might live in a place that then doesn't really end up with the carnival, but just, you know, you eat pancakes on that Tuesday. And so that becomes a kind of interesting thing, though, that it's it's really this communal expression of things. Some great examples. I know we've just named a lot of places. Of course, like France famously does certain areas of France absolutely have carnival. This is a is why New Orleans has it, obviously Spain, which is why like Rio has it. Well, the Iberian peninsula, sorry, Spain, Portugal, yes. Which is why Brazil, why Brazil has it. Italy, of course, as well, Venice, you know. But also, we should mention the Netherlands. Oh, yes. Okay. Yes. Asley. Now, there is of course, they have a bit of their own thing like the English of the Catholic versus Protestant thing going on. Right. I mean, the countries have some connections. Yes. Right. Yeah. Plenty. But one of the best depictions of Carnival in art is in Peter Brugel. We've mentioned him a lot. He does all, you know, he does the life of his people. Yes. And so he's a great example of a lot of things because he likes to illustrate people doing their thing. So in this case, Brugel the Elder has got the fight between Carnival and Lent. And it's super great. And the not to be confused, by the way, with the battle between Carnival and Lent, which is by a later Dutch artist, Jan Mintz Moleneer. I did not pronounce that correctly, but and that was painted roughly 1633 to 1634. That's quite fun, but we are talking about Brugel, the original. And so Brugel paints his, the fight between Carnival and Lent, in around 1559. It's in Vienna these days, if you know. But anyway, so this is Southern Netherlands. And it's again a phenomenal image of basically the, you know, town square in front of the church. It's full of people. The church is like in the upper right hand corner of the painting. And you have the rich coming out the front of the church and they're all kind of cloaked and stuff because, you know, you're going to be beginning, be beginning penance. The right side of the painting is the Lent side, arguably. So they're coming out and they're sort of cloaked and they're, they've been doing the whole show of Tuesday thing, right? They've been shriving themselves. They're giving, they're giving alms to people. Yes, because, right, the rich have been reminded, this is the thing you should be doing, right? Yes, absolutely. And out the side entrance, you get the poor, coming in also, right? These are the poor who are in church. They are also clearly in the shriving sort of mode. They're covered, then cloaked. And some of them are carrying chairs, which presumably means that they had to bring their own seating because they aren't rich enough for important enough to get to sit in the benches that are in the church, which obviously, you know, the pews would be full because it's an important day. So then as we come down the, the right side, yes, we are giving alms to the poor and so on and we come around and we have a platform on wheels with a really thin figure, thin female figure who's holding what looks to us, it's a giant paddle, basically a giant paddle. It looks kind of like a pizza paddle thing. Yes, what he says in it out of the oven. Yes, so it's a giant wooden paddle and she's got two fish on it. And around her feet, she's got, you know, plain bread and pretzels and I think onions, and these are all things you can eat on blend or during lint, during the lint and season, right pretzels, that's nice. But anyway, so this is the, right, that's the lip side. So we have this very austere figure and again, right, everyone cloaked heads covered, that's what I mean, right, so they're pulled over their heads. And then of course on the left side, we have carnival. And so carnival is a very backest looking figure, probably sort of supposed to be a butcher or something, riding a barrel, of course, right. And he's got a skewer with meat on it. Oh yeah. Right, so his meat skewer and her pedal with fish, it looks also, it's a little bit of a parody of like a joust, of course, also because they're both riding these weird carts, right. She's on this very austere chair and he's, that's very much like the ones people are sitting on in church, right. And he's on this big barrel, of course. And they're both being pulled, right. So she's being pulled toward him and he's being pushed toward her, right, for the, the confrontation, right for the, the joust. And of course, he's being pushed by carnival figures, wearing fun colors and fun hats and all the stuff. And she's being pulled by a monk and a nun. And meanwhile, you've also got figures with him, you've got figures in masks, right. So very clearly carnival masks, which is something, of course, we know like Venice is famous for. These are, these aren't, those kind of brilliantly colorful masks. These are sort of weird masks, but they're fun masks. And you know, the people around him also, of course, are carrying food. Obviously, we got music being played. And then as we move up the painting behind him. So on the right side, we got the church, and on the left side, we have a tavern. And the tavern has the symbol of a blue boat, which might be a reference to a painting, sorry, a poem. Oh, okay. Yeah, there's a poem by Jakub van Estborn called the blue boat or the blue ship from about 1413. That's basically about a ship of fools. Herodomist Bash has a painting, the ship of fools. Of course, he does. Yes, of course, I mean, of course he does. Yes, that might be sort of an homage to the poem as well. And so, yes, in this case, probably the tavern is a sort of reference to that, right? So the tavern is the place for the fools, right? The ship of fools. Very carnival-esque. You have lots of drinking and partying and everything else. And as you move sort of towards the top of the painting in the middle, you have people who are clearly sort of partaking of one side of the other. So you have more cloaked figures who are clearly moving on to the estuary of Lent. And then you have figures like kids playing and people playing and stuff like that, clearly still part of the carnival. Yeah, but it's a great sort of rendition of this. And a lot of fun little, you know, Easter eggs, of course, as in all his paintings. Yes. I mean, you can look at all the figures and see what they're carrying or what they're doing. I would love to see this in person. Like, there's just so much going on. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. As per always, right? I mean, he is the king of, you know, kind of early, where's Waldo type of, yes, type of art. But yeah. And I think some people have might have ashes already. You know, so there's a reminder, like on the Lent has sort of started on one side, but not on the other side yet. So that becomes, yeah, all sort of part of the the picture, right? No, sort of this this fight. And of course, the meat versus the fish, obviously. Yeah. So the masks, right, the music. So all of these things that are very, very carnivalist. Yeah. The sort of, I would say, you know, one of the final fun things about carnival, the fact that again, right, depending on where you are, Marty Gras, right? So that Tuesday, Shrove Tuesday, the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday is always kind of the main day and the end point. But carnival definitely expands, right? And that's another thing that's depending on sort of the communal aspect of carnival in different places. It expands sometimes just for sort of maybe the week before, but again, sometimes all the way kind of from epiphany on. And there is that really interesting sense of kind of where did it come from. It is again, even though it doesn't seem that way. And for people who are Christian, but not invested in carnival, it can seem very pagan. But it is important to emphasize that in fact, it is a deeply, deeply Christian themed holiday or event. It's just that of course, it is popular. It's called a very popular event. It is connected to an official holiday season, the Lenten season, but it is a reminder of the way in which of course lay people do shape religion. And in this case, really from a deeply sort of Christian standpoint, right, that you have to have had all this excess so that you can go into the lint, right? Like in some ways, you know, one might all say you need things to repent for. That's not exactly accurate. But there is that sort of sensibility, right? But yeah, that it seems to be sort of driven by a communal lay sensibility in ways that other things kind of around that time were being driven. And again, like I said, the rise of something like the Feast of Corpus Christi that happens in the 13th to 1400s, it's founded in the middle of the 1200s, but then, you know, takes a while to really get going. And arguably, it gets going around the same time things like Carnival Dew, right? As the community starts to need these things because the clergy is kind of taking things away from them maybe, right? And there's a sense of certain things disappearing and becoming more official and you don't have access in the same way, right? Communion, you have to be really careful before you take it and you're sort of not allowed it anymore. So to feel that sense of both the joy of kind of excess and also the repentance and all the things you're supposed to feel in that season, right? That it becomes sort of this lay practice that obviously becomes somewhat official in a lot of ways, you know, because again, yeah, you can't can't really squash things and then expect people to also still observant. But yeah, so there we go. So Carnival, this is why it exists so that you can observe lent. Of course, right, it becomes weird when you start to reach a point like the modern era, when people want to celebrate Carnival who have nothing to do with lent, right? That, of course, then yes, you get all the, yeah, I mean, lots of stereotypes, all the things. But originally, of course, that is not the point. The point is, the point isn't even necessarily like the excess. The point is the sort of joyous celebration of the this period because then you go into one of server-pentance and grief. The ends, I mean, it's a big deal, right? You are leading up to, first of all, death, which is terrible, right? Good Friday and Holy Saturday. And then the joy of the resurrection. But there's a, you know, a lot of penance to get through before that happens. So, yeah, everyone deserves a big festival before they have to go through all that. Yep. I mean, for my part, I find it's a little too bad that most of the big Carnival celebrations are in places with warmer climates. I mean, like that also makes sense a little bit because a lot of them, what should we say? They involve a small amount of recreational nudity, and it is frequently, like, as we're recording this, it is negative three degrees here, which doesn't go totally well with recreational nudity. This is, I think, why I wanted to point out, like, the Netherlands. It doesn't get that cold necessarily, but they certainly have winter, right? The people in Bruegel's paintings are all pretty well dressed, you know? And Venice, of course, it doesn't get that cold again, but it's cold. I mean, February, you know, is February and Venice, it's chilly. All right. So, I'm going to look up what temperature it is in Venice right now. Yes. You know, so anyway, I think the point is, see, I mean, on balmy, I have 46, which sounds delightful, honestly. Yes, it does. I mean, it's balmy if you're from the Midwest, but probably not, could you shift to, like, public nudity? Yeah. Well, I guess my point is, is mostly that we could really use some sort of big holiday, yes, in the middle of winter, yes, because, like, Christmas/new years is one thing, but, like, January/February in the Midwest is a whole other treat. I mean, I think it's worth pointing out that, of course, if, see, and this is again, right, some parts of the Catholic world, but not everybody. And England, again, has short Tuesday, even as their Protestant, but, you know, Bavarian Catholics, who moved to Milwaukee and Chicago and was, you know, et cetera, that part of the Midwest, Carnival is not a thing that they brought with them. No. Is that because of the weather? I don't know. I think, I really do think it has something to do with the sort of communal versus individual sense. This isn't just me. I mean, Bosse has some things, John Bosse has some things to say about this as well. And certainly others have said, right, but there is something like the low countries, which, of course, are now like the Netherlands and Belgium and stuff. Do have this communal sensibility. Even England has some of it, right? They certainly did plays on Corpus Christi and things. Parts of France, of course, have it. Italy has it. Germany maybe isn't as much with some obvious exceptions. A huge communal festival type of thing, right? They do have exceptions. They got toberfest. But this isn't one of the things that really became as big, you know, fair enough. So there, but there is something interesting about that. I do think if they brought it with them, it would be a thing. Oh, probably. We kept all their fish fries and whatever. Exactly. They absolutely believe and let, you know, and they do Carnival. We shouldn't say that they don't. They absolutely do. I mean, Munich has got Carnival. So they absolutely have Carnival. It's not one of the big ones. It's not, you know, Brazil, Rio, it's not, it's just not as well known. I mean, probably it's not touristy in the same way because of the weather, honestly. Yeah. People who go to Bavaria, the winter want a ski. That seems fair. As opposed to, you know, but I, but yeah, I mean, it is interesting. It's one of those things they didn't necessarily bring it. They certainly brought the lintin practices with them, but not so much this communal dance and the streets type of thing. So, um, yeah. So Carnival didn't quite make it into Milwaukee, but beer certainly did. Yeah, well, and fish fries, as you said. So they did bring some excellent things with them. Perhaps we are better equipped to handle beer and deep fried foods. Right here. Yep. I mean, I don't know where there are too many Protestants around. I have no idea. What's, what's, what was the thing? What's stopped it? Not sure. You know, New Orleans, of course, proudly holds onto its French sort of identity. So that is why it keeps going there. But to be fair, I mean, it's become a very, everywhere that it is famous that has kept it. It's become a very unique thing, right? And so New Orleans has really become a very interesting way to enact the politics of the city. Joe Roach has a famous sort of book on this where he sort of talks about it and the practice of, of the sort of the crews and the ways in which you know, racism is reenacted in those festivals, but also has been sort of combatted in some ways by them. You know, they're, they're sure of the official crew or the official parade route and then there's the kind of competing. Anyway, so, so it's, it's really interesting though because obviously there are a lot of people, they have embraced carnival. I mean, it's a huge tourist thing for people who don't care about Lent. But also for New Orleans just as a city, even for people who may not care about Lent, it became a very important way to kind of deal with aspects of the city, which is another thing that festivals do. That's why a communal festival like this arguably would be so important. Because then for a month and a half, you kind of have to do your own thing and not go out and drink. And you got to hold the community together through that period. Right? And so the interesting thing maybe about New Orleans is the way in which it is about holding the community together, but also has frequently been about emphasizing some of the fractures in the community and seeing what happens when they sort of collide. So yeah, anyway, there's a variety of sort of interesting things about that. But cities of the dead by Joe Roach is the book I just referenced where he starts to talk about it. Good title. Yes. Okay. Because again, right, it's, New Orleans has its necropolis's, I mean, sanitaries, of course, but it's also famously Gothic city, right? Yes. In the sense of that, of course, medieval, but modern terminology Gothic, where we think of, you know, vampires and the dead and zombies. Oh, yeah. Sanitaries. Sanitaries. Famous. Sanitaries. Yes. Boodoo stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Real cool. Yeah. Which again, right? So the collision of cultures, right? in the French Caribbean you have African and Catholic cultures colliding and creating things like what we know calls you do. And you know a whole series of kind of really fascinating cultures that get that all collide sometimes very literally in the Mardi Gras practices in New Orleans. Yes. If you're looking so for the syncretism that's where it is. Absolutely not on the other end in time it's now it's on our end of time. Yes. Yes. And there's some really for those who are interested there's some really this is a whole separate thing. But there's some really endless modern but there's really fascinating writings that just do a roach but others as well on on the way as I said racism has been both definitely a part of the Mardi Gras festivals in New Orleans but also of the ways in which African-Americans specifically residents of New Orleans have kind of combated it with their own parade route and crews and things like this and the way that as I said that happens sometimes literal collisions and all sorts of things. So there's some really really really interesting things that this is the point arguably of carnival and festivals like this is to work out publicly a lot of the frictions in the community. That's very much what carnival is about. The question is and this is one of the things that Bettina of course is working on is if you manage to sort of start to work them out in a festival atmosphere like this where you're maybe literally allowed to hit people or run into people or do things you wouldn't normally be allowed to do. Do they stay worked out afterwards? Does anything really change? The answer sometimes no but given the fact that the Mardi Gras crews and things in New Orleans have had to shift because of sort of racism and things they have been forced to public perception. I don't know maybe sometimes maybe maybe sometimes so there we go okay maybe sometimes there is change but yes but a public working out of frictions you know so the excess is of course a part of that it's the most obvious part of that but there are a lot of things going on which again is why it's sort of allowed to happen because you got to get all that stuff out so things don't explode whatever we'll get it stamped down for a month and a half during what. Yep okay awesome so we're going to leave it there I'm going to be editing out so many coughs from this episode um let's see if you want to join our discussion you can check out our facebook page which is ask notes that it's facebook.com/askamedievalist. 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