WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.319 I want you to completely erase the image you 00:00:02.319 --> 00:00:05.059 currently have of the Middle Ages or, you know, 00:00:05.179 --> 00:00:06.940 the early Renaissance. Right, just throw it out 00:00:06.940 --> 00:00:09.779 entirely. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Forget the sweeping 00:00:09.779 --> 00:00:12.980 Hollywood historical dramas. Strip away the pristine 00:00:12.980 --> 00:00:15.859 stone castles, those glittering velvet gowns, 00:00:15.980 --> 00:00:19.620 the perfectly choreographed feasts. And the soft 00:00:19.620 --> 00:00:22.539 lute music playing in the background. Yes. We 00:00:22.539 --> 00:00:24.960 have this huge tendency to look at history through 00:00:24.960 --> 00:00:28.699 a heavily sanitized romantic filter. But today, 00:00:28.800 --> 00:00:30.420 we're going to look at the actual documented 00:00:30.420 --> 00:00:33.219 reality. The really messy reality. Oh, it's so 00:00:33.219 --> 00:00:35.579 messy. And to do that, you need to picture yourself 00:00:35.579 --> 00:00:37.780 stepping into the great hall of an English noble's 00:00:37.780 --> 00:00:40.939 house. First, dirt your camera down to the floor. 00:00:41.619 --> 00:00:43.780 You aren't stepping on clean flagstones. You're 00:00:43.780 --> 00:00:46.259 stepping onto a thick layer of marsh rushes. 00:00:46.359 --> 00:00:49.259 Rushes that in many documented cases haven't 00:00:49.259 --> 00:00:51.719 been swept out or completely changed in years, 00:00:51.939 --> 00:00:54.439 sometimes decades, honestly. Which is just horrifying 00:00:54.439 --> 00:00:56.320 when you realize what's actually trapped inside 00:00:56.320 --> 00:00:58.960 them. Underneath that top layer of relatively 00:00:58.960 --> 00:01:01.700 fresh straw, there's a festering, compressed 00:01:01.700 --> 00:01:04.260 biological nightmare. We're talking spilled. 00:01:04.459 --> 00:01:08.200 Sour beer, congealed animal grease, shatter fish 00:01:08.200 --> 00:01:11.719 bones, human spittle, vomit, and the daily waste 00:01:11.719 --> 00:01:14.659 of both the household dogs and, well, the people 00:01:14.659 --> 00:01:17.319 themselves. The smell alone would probably knock 00:01:17.319 --> 00:01:20.000 a modern person entirely unconscious. Honestly, 00:01:20.180 --> 00:01:22.260 yeah. Now, holding your breath, I want you to 00:01:22.260 --> 00:01:24.359 look up from that floor and look over at the 00:01:24.359 --> 00:01:27.040 grand dining table. Standing there is a young 00:01:27.040 --> 00:01:30.840 nobleman. He's maybe 12 years old. And he is 00:01:30.840 --> 00:01:33.659 sweating profusely, shaking with absolute terror, 00:01:34.079 --> 00:01:36.060 holding a carving knife over a roasted crane. 00:01:36.200 --> 00:01:39.739 because he knows with absolute certainty that 00:01:39.739 --> 00:01:42.140 if his knife slips even a fraction of an inch, 00:01:42.560 --> 00:01:44.959 if he hits a specific bone in that bird's chest 00:01:44.959 --> 00:01:47.180 and ruins the presentation of the meat for the 00:01:47.180 --> 00:01:49.299 lord of the house, he is going to be dragged 00:01:49.299 --> 00:01:52.000 away and brutally, physically beaten. It completely 00:01:52.000 --> 00:01:54.200 shatters the illusion, doesn't it? That is the 00:01:54.200 --> 00:01:57.540 visceral, unvarnished reality of the past. Welcome 00:01:57.540 --> 00:01:59.819 to today's Deep Dive. I'm so excited for this 00:01:59.819 --> 00:02:03.340 one. Me too. Our mission today is to explore 00:02:03.340 --> 00:02:06.920 a stack of incredibly dense, just unbelievably 00:02:06.920 --> 00:02:09.560 fascinating source material that rips the polite 00:02:09.560 --> 00:02:12.580 veneer right off of English history. We're looking 00:02:12.580 --> 00:02:15.439 at an 1868 publication, which was later updated 00:02:15.439 --> 00:02:19.379 and reprinted in 1894 and 1904 by a completely 00:02:19.379 --> 00:02:22.300 obsessive, brilliant group called the Early English 00:02:22.300 --> 00:02:25.560 Text Society, or the ETS. Yeah, and this specific 00:02:25.560 --> 00:02:27.840 volume is edited by a man named Frederick J. 00:02:28.020 --> 00:02:30.479 Furnival, and it contains these sweeping forwards 00:02:30.479 --> 00:02:33.659 on early English education, exhaustive catalogues 00:02:33.659 --> 00:02:36.259 of global academic preservation efforts, and 00:02:36.259 --> 00:02:39.219 a collection of bizarre medieval treatises. Treatises 00:02:39.219 --> 00:02:41.300 with amazing titles like The Book of Nurture. 00:02:41.389 --> 00:02:44.490 The broader mission here is just so vital for 00:02:44.490 --> 00:02:47.030 anyone who loves language, history, or just human 00:02:47.030 --> 00:02:49.430 psychology. Because, you know, to truly understand 00:02:49.430 --> 00:02:50.930 the English language, you can't just read the 00:02:50.930 --> 00:02:52.710 high -minded poetry of Chaucer or the polished 00:02:52.710 --> 00:02:54.889 plays of Shakespeare in a vacuum. No, of course 00:02:54.889 --> 00:02:57.050 not. You cannot separate a language from the 00:02:57.050 --> 00:02:59.250 environment in which it was spoken. You have 00:02:59.250 --> 00:03:01.229 to understand the gritty, hyper -structured, 00:03:01.550 --> 00:03:04.090 and sometimes terrifying daily lives of the actual 00:03:04.090 --> 00:03:06.650 human beings who spoke it. And the ETs completely 00:03:06.650 --> 00:03:09.590 understood this. They undertook this monumental 00:03:09.590 --> 00:03:13.550 agonizing effort to rescue this social history 00:03:13.550 --> 00:03:16.530 from literally rotting away in the forgotten, 00:03:16.750 --> 00:03:19.009 damp archives of Europe. Which is exactly what 00:03:19.009 --> 00:03:20.870 was happening. I can promise you by the end of 00:03:20.870 --> 00:03:22.990 this deep dive, you will never look at the English 00:03:22.990 --> 00:03:25.710 language, the concept of a university education, 00:03:26.129 --> 00:03:28.889 or even your own dining room table the same way 00:03:28.889 --> 00:03:31.879 again. Definitely not. So, let's get into the 00:03:31.879 --> 00:03:34.000 mechanics of this rescue mission, because the 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:35.780 story of the Early English Tech Society itself 00:03:35.780 --> 00:03:38.199 is almost as wild as the medieval manuscripts 00:03:38.199 --> 00:03:40.400 they were trying to save. Let's look at what 00:03:40.400 --> 00:03:42.300 Dr. Furnival and his colleagues were actually 00:03:42.300 --> 00:03:45.319 up against when they founded the Society in 1864. 00:03:45.560 --> 00:03:47.680 They were basically up against a ticking clock 00:03:47.680 --> 00:03:50.979 and just widespread societal apathy. Their explicit 00:03:50.979 --> 00:03:53.340 goal, written right into their founding documents, 00:03:53.780 --> 00:03:56.319 was to bring the mass of Old English literature 00:03:56.319 --> 00:03:58.680 within the reach of the ordinary student. Right. 00:03:58.939 --> 00:04:01.819 But there was a deeper, deeply felt nationalistic 00:04:01.819 --> 00:04:04.319 motivation too. They wanted to wipe away what 00:04:04.319 --> 00:04:06.460 they called the national reproach under which 00:04:06.460 --> 00:04:09.539 England had long rested. The reproach being that 00:04:09.539 --> 00:04:12.340 England, as a nation, seemed to care very little 00:04:12.340 --> 00:04:14.900 about its own early language in daily life. Yeah. 00:04:15.069 --> 00:04:17.529 Which is wild to think about from a modern perspective, 00:04:17.709 --> 00:04:20.410 isn't it? Oh, absolutely. Today, the UK exports 00:04:20.410 --> 00:04:22.829 its history as one of its primary cultural products. 00:04:23.209 --> 00:04:25.750 You've got The Crown, endless Tudor documentaries, 00:04:26.410 --> 00:04:29.029 historical fiction everywhere. Exactly. But in 00:04:29.029 --> 00:04:31.430 the mid -19th century, Furnival and his colleagues 00:04:31.430 --> 00:04:34.029 were walking through cathedral libraries and 00:04:34.029 --> 00:04:36.449 private manor archives, and they're just watching 00:04:36.449 --> 00:04:39.529 irreplaceable, one -of -a -kind villa manuscripts 00:04:39.529 --> 00:04:42.839 literally turning to dust. or being eaten by 00:04:42.839 --> 00:04:45.360 mice. They realized they were losing the cultural 00:04:45.360 --> 00:04:48.240 code of their own civilization, and it was a 00:04:48.240 --> 00:04:50.939 massive structural undertaking to fix it. They 00:04:50.939 --> 00:04:53.199 didn't just casually publish a book here or there. 00:04:53.500 --> 00:04:55.779 They organized their efforts meticulously. They 00:04:55.779 --> 00:04:58.100 launched the original series, right? which focused 00:04:58.100 --> 00:05:00.740 on completely unprinted manuscripts. Yeah, but 00:05:00.740 --> 00:05:04.199 the sheer volume of material forced them by 1867 00:05:04.199 --> 00:05:07.620 to open an extra series. The second series was 00:05:07.620 --> 00:05:10.079 devoted to creating fresh, accurate editions 00:05:10.079 --> 00:05:12.579 of text that had been printed before. Like William 00:05:12.579 --> 00:05:16.000 Caxton's early books. Exactly. Caxton stuff and 00:05:16.000 --> 00:05:18.680 other rare black -letter books that were completely 00:05:18.680 --> 00:05:21.339 inaccessible to a normal person. I want to pause 00:05:21.339 --> 00:05:22.939 on that term, black letter books, for a second, 00:05:23.000 --> 00:05:24.699 just to make sure we're visualizing this correctly. 00:05:25.019 --> 00:05:27.540 We aren't talking about easily readable paperbacks 00:05:27.540 --> 00:05:30.040 here. Oh, not at all. Black letter refers to 00:05:30.040 --> 00:05:32.459 the Gothic script used in early printing presses 00:05:32.459 --> 00:05:35.839 and late medieval manuscripts. It is incredibly 00:05:35.839 --> 00:05:40.019 dense, heavy, dark lettering that is notoriously 00:05:40.019 --> 00:05:42.509 difficult for modern eyes to read. It just looks 00:05:42.509 --> 00:05:45.410 like a wall of spiky ink. It does. The letters 00:05:45.410 --> 00:05:47.930 often bleed together, the spelling is entirely 00:05:47.930 --> 00:05:50.430 phonetic and wildly inconsistent, and the texts 00:05:50.430 --> 00:05:53.689 are full of archaic abbreviations. Transcribing 00:05:53.689 --> 00:05:56.389 just one page of a black letter manuscript requires 00:05:56.389 --> 00:05:59.449 intense linguistic training and hours of painstaking 00:05:59.449 --> 00:06:02.529 focus. So you have this group of academics squinting 00:06:02.529 --> 00:06:04.870 by gaslight, trying to decipher these crumbling 00:06:04.870 --> 00:06:07.850 complex texts. And the part that makes this feel 00:06:07.850 --> 00:06:09.569 incredibly relatable to me, like someone trying 00:06:09.569 --> 00:06:11.829 to launch an NT project today, is that they were 00:06:11.829 --> 00:06:14.290 completely perpetually broke. Oh, they had no 00:06:14.290 --> 00:06:16.649 money. Right. They operated on a subscription 00:06:16.649 --> 00:06:19.649 model. If you joined the society, you paid one 00:06:19.649 --> 00:06:21.750 guinea a year, which is one pound, one shilling. 00:06:22.110 --> 00:06:24.079 I read that and instantly thought, This is just 00:06:24.079 --> 00:06:27.379 a 19th century Patreon campaign. They're crowdsourcing 00:06:27.379 --> 00:06:30.240 the salvation of the English language. That analogy 00:06:30.240 --> 00:06:32.319 holds up perfectly when you look at how they 00:06:32.319 --> 00:06:34.920 communicated with their subscribers. The prefaces 00:06:34.920 --> 00:06:38.420 Furnival wrote read exactly like frustrated Kickstarter 00:06:38.420 --> 00:06:41.040 updates. Yes. They were doing this incredibly 00:06:41.040 --> 00:06:44.420 vital backbreaking academic work and the British 00:06:44.420 --> 00:06:47.920 public largely ignored them. The texts lament 00:06:47.920 --> 00:06:50.540 this quite bitterly. Furnival points out the 00:06:50.540 --> 00:06:52.720 sheer hypocrisy of the intellectual class at 00:06:52.720 --> 00:06:54.519 the time. He brings up the Hellenic Society, 00:06:54.639 --> 00:06:56.959 right? He does. He notes that the Hellenic Society, 00:06:57.100 --> 00:06:59.160 which was dedicated to studying ancient Greece, 00:06:59.300 --> 00:07:02.680 had nearly a thousand well -funded members. Meanwhile, 00:07:02.879 --> 00:07:05.500 the ETs studying their own ancestors didn't even 00:07:05.500 --> 00:07:08.100 have 300 subscribers. Furtivall actually writes 00:07:08.100 --> 00:07:11.180 that it is nothing less than a scandal. You can 00:07:11.180 --> 00:07:13.899 feel his blood boiling through the academic prose. 00:07:14.600 --> 00:07:16.779 He writes that the cry of Great Britain and her 00:07:16.779 --> 00:07:18.839 colonies in the matter of language is still, 00:07:19.360 --> 00:07:22.980 let the dead past bury its dead. It's so dramatic. 00:07:23.199 --> 00:07:25.480 But it's true. They couldn't get people to care 00:07:25.480 --> 00:07:27.259 about the history in their own backyards because 00:07:27.259 --> 00:07:29.579 it wasn't considered as glamorous or classical 00:07:29.579 --> 00:07:32.639 as Roman or Greek history. And the scale of what 00:07:32.639 --> 00:07:34.399 they were trying to accomplish with those meager 00:07:34.399 --> 00:07:37.939 funds is staggering. This wasn't like a five 00:07:37.939 --> 00:07:41.810 year project. In their 1904 update, so 40 years 00:07:41.810 --> 00:07:44.250 after they started, they noted they still had 00:07:44.250 --> 00:07:47.250 50 solid years of work already sitting on their 00:07:47.250 --> 00:07:49.990 printing lists. Wow. And they predicted that 00:07:49.990 --> 00:07:52.290 at their current pace, there were easily another 00:07:52.290 --> 00:07:55.209 100 to 200 years of work waiting out there in 00:07:55.209 --> 00:07:58.829 the archives. They explicitly, soberly stated 00:07:58.829 --> 00:08:01.269 that the year 2000 would come and go and the 00:08:01.269 --> 00:08:03.230 society would still not be finished printing 00:08:03.230 --> 00:08:05.850 all the early texts. Staring up at a mountain 00:08:05.850 --> 00:08:08.050 of crumbling parchment, knowing you'll die long 00:08:08.050 --> 00:08:10.490 before you reach the summit and just choosing 00:08:10.490 --> 00:08:13.610 to keep transcribing anyway, it requires a specific 00:08:13.610 --> 00:08:16.189 kind of beautiful madness. It really does. But 00:08:16.189 --> 00:08:18.670 I think we need to interrogate the core motivation 00:08:18.670 --> 00:08:21.949 here. Beyond just the antiquarian urge to collect 00:08:21.949 --> 00:08:24.889 old things, why were they so desperate to print 00:08:24.889 --> 00:08:28.209 every single early English manuscript? What is 00:08:28.209 --> 00:08:31.149 the actual mechanical value to a modern language 00:08:31.149 --> 00:08:33.799 student? Well, the text provides a very clear, 00:08:34.000 --> 00:08:36.320 forceful answer to that. Furnable argues that 00:08:36.320 --> 00:08:38.940 until all early English manuscripts are printed 00:08:38.940 --> 00:08:41.820 and accessible, no proper history of our language 00:08:41.820 --> 00:08:44.519 or social life is possible. This is the crucial 00:08:44.519 --> 00:08:47.679 takeaway. Language is not a sterile mathematical 00:08:47.679 --> 00:08:50.220 set of grammatical rules that exists in a vacuum. 00:08:50.779 --> 00:08:54.159 It is a living, breathing organism that is entirely 00:08:54.159 --> 00:08:57.320 shaped by material conditions. Meaning, the words 00:08:57.320 --> 00:08:59.460 we invent are dictated by the things we need 00:08:59.460 --> 00:09:01.820 to touch, the food we need to eat. eat and the 00:09:01.820 --> 00:09:04.679 people we need to talk to. Precisely. The vocabulary 00:09:04.679 --> 00:09:06.840 of a culture is shaped by how they build their 00:09:06.840 --> 00:09:08.860 roofs, how they treat their sick, and how they 00:09:08.860 --> 00:09:11.580 navigate social hierarchies. If you only study 00:09:11.580 --> 00:09:14.200 the grand, macro -level documents, the political 00:09:14.200 --> 00:09:16.779 treaties signed by kings, or the polished theological 00:09:16.779 --> 00:09:18.840 sermons delivered by bishops, you are getting 00:09:18.840 --> 00:09:21.620 a highly curated, artificial version of the language. 00:09:21.720 --> 00:09:24.500 It's the PR version of English. Exactly. You're 00:09:24.500 --> 00:09:26.840 missing the language as it was actually used 00:09:26.840 --> 00:09:29.220 in the kitchens, the taverns, and the nurseries. 00:09:29.360 --> 00:09:31.750 I love that perspective. It's like trying to 00:09:31.750 --> 00:09:34.070 understand the social dynamics of the 21st century 00:09:34.070 --> 00:09:36.789 internet by exclusively reading the Terms of 00:09:36.789 --> 00:09:39.690 Service agreements for various websites and completely 00:09:39.690 --> 00:09:43.370 ignoring social media feeds, meme culture, and 00:09:43.370 --> 00:09:45.690 forum slang. That is a perfect analogy. You'd 00:09:45.690 --> 00:09:48.230 have a technically accurate view of the legal 00:09:48.230 --> 00:09:51.389 framework, but zero understanding of the actual 00:09:51.389 --> 00:09:54.870 humans using the network. The ETS wanted the 00:09:54.870 --> 00:09:57.929 whole messy human picture. Which brings up one 00:09:57.929 --> 00:10:00.309 of those fascinating historical paradoxes in 00:10:00.309 --> 00:10:03.649 these sources. England simply did not have the 00:10:03.649 --> 00:10:06.590 internal momentum, the funding, or even the specialized 00:10:06.590 --> 00:10:09.389 academic workforce to do this massive project 00:10:09.389 --> 00:10:12.029 alone. Right. So they had to look outward. Saving 00:10:12.029 --> 00:10:13.789 the origins of the English language required 00:10:13.789 --> 00:10:16.610 an unprecedented global alliance. This part of 00:10:16.610 --> 00:10:18.929 the text genuinely made me laugh out loud because 00:10:18.929 --> 00:10:22.159 the irony is just so thick. Think about the geopolitical 00:10:22.159 --> 00:10:24.700 reality of the late 19th and early 20th centuries 00:10:24.700 --> 00:10:27.600 Mid -victorian and Edwardian Britain. Oh, they're 00:10:27.600 --> 00:10:30.360 at the absolute zenith of their imperial power 00:10:30.360 --> 00:10:33.200 They are colonizing the globe painting the map 00:10:33.200 --> 00:10:36.480 pink projecting this image of supreme British 00:10:36.480 --> 00:10:39.759 superiority and self -sufficiency And yet when 00:10:39.759 --> 00:10:42.559 it comes to rescuing and translating their own 00:10:42.559 --> 00:10:44.899 foundational national identity their own ancient 00:10:44.899 --> 00:10:47.960 language they have to outsource the labor the 00:10:47.960 --> 00:10:51.490 sources actually talk about the Annexation of 00:10:51.490 --> 00:10:54.370 large tracts of our early English territory by 00:10:54.370 --> 00:10:56.940 foreign scholars. It is a brilliant irony. But 00:10:56.940 --> 00:10:59.259 we need to look at why that was the case. Why 00:10:59.259 --> 00:11:01.519 were foreign scholars better equipped to study 00:11:01.519 --> 00:11:04.080 early English than the English themselves? It 00:11:04.080 --> 00:11:06.840 comes down to the evolution of academia on the 00:11:06.840 --> 00:11:09.639 European continent versus in Britain. During 00:11:09.639 --> 00:11:12.580 the 19th century, particularly in Germany, there 00:11:12.580 --> 00:11:15.220 was a massive revolution in the field of philology. 00:11:15.399 --> 00:11:17.299 Let's define philology for the listener, just 00:11:17.299 --> 00:11:19.360 so we're on the same page. Philology is essentially 00:11:19.360 --> 00:11:21.720 the study of language in oral and written historical 00:11:21.720 --> 00:11:24.259 sources. It's a combination of literary criticism, 00:11:24.679 --> 00:11:27.490 history, and linguistics. The German universities 00:11:27.490 --> 00:11:30.049 had turned this into a rigorous, systematic, 00:11:30.330 --> 00:11:35.649 almost biological science. Yes, exactly. They 00:11:35.649 --> 00:11:38.129 were tracing the evolutionary roots of Germanic 00:11:38.129 --> 00:11:41.149 languages, of which English is one. So while 00:11:41.149 --> 00:11:43.309 English antiquarians were treating old manuscripts 00:11:43.309 --> 00:11:46.169 like quaint local hobbies, German scholars had 00:11:46.169 --> 00:11:48.269 developed the actual scientific frameworks needed 00:11:48.269 --> 00:11:51.730 to decode vowel shifts, dialect variations, and 00:11:51.730 --> 00:11:54.049 syntactic structures. So the English essentially 00:11:54.049 --> 00:11:56.149 had to import the scientific method of language 00:11:56.149 --> 00:12:00.580 study. The ETS texts list this absolute all -star 00:12:00.580 --> 00:12:03.299 roster of global contributors. It's a huge list. 00:12:03.460 --> 00:12:05.440 There's a massive German contingent scholars 00:12:05.440 --> 00:12:08.519 with names like Zapitza, Kolbing, and Hausknecht. 00:12:09.139 --> 00:12:11.500 There are Scandinavians like Erdmann and Koch. 00:12:12.019 --> 00:12:14.159 There are Dutch scholars like Logeman, French 00:12:14.159 --> 00:12:16.340 heavyweights like Paul Meyer and Guest on Paris, 00:12:16.679 --> 00:12:18.659 alongside Italians, Austrians, and Americans 00:12:18.659 --> 00:12:21.059 like Professor Child and Dr. Triggs. And instead 00:12:21.059 --> 00:12:23.720 of feeling threatened by this, the ETS embraced 00:12:23.720 --> 00:12:27.100 it. If you read these dry, highly technical academic 00:12:27.100 --> 00:12:29.860 prefaces, you suddenly stumble into these deeply 00:12:29.860 --> 00:12:32.559 emotional expressions of gratitude. It's surprisingly 00:12:32.559 --> 00:12:36.919 sweet. It is. The ETS editors describe this international 00:12:36.919 --> 00:12:40.039 sympathy and help as the pleasantest experiences 00:12:40.039 --> 00:12:43.039 of the society's life. They talk about how the 00:12:43.039 --> 00:12:45.799 shared labor wove a bond between lovers of language 00:12:45.799 --> 00:12:48.539 across the seas. It was a lifeline that kept 00:12:48.539 --> 00:12:51.059 them going amidst all the financial discouragement 00:12:51.059 --> 00:12:53.100 from their own countrymen. The international 00:12:53.100 --> 00:12:55.429 brotherhood of the book. It's a beautiful concept, 00:12:55.850 --> 00:12:58.009 and it proves a vital point about linguistics, 00:12:58.009 --> 00:13:01.820 I think. A language ultimately belongs not just 00:13:01.820 --> 00:13:04.419 to its native speakers or its country of origin, 00:13:04.700 --> 00:13:07.399 but to anyone willing to put in the grueling 00:13:07.399 --> 00:13:10.580 specialized work to study and preserve it. Right? 00:13:10.799 --> 00:13:13.600 Sometimes it takes an outsider's sterile objective 00:13:13.600 --> 00:13:16.259 perspective to see the mechanics of a language 00:13:16.259 --> 00:13:18.460 that native speakers just take for granted. That 00:13:18.460 --> 00:13:20.360 is exactly right. The native speaker is often 00:13:20.360 --> 00:13:22.820 blind to the structure of their own tongue. So 00:13:22.820 --> 00:13:25.419 with this global army of philologists assembled, 00:13:25.559 --> 00:13:27.820 the question becomes, what specifically were 00:13:27.820 --> 00:13:30.370 they uncovering? We've talked about the high 00:13:30.370 --> 00:13:33.529 -minded reasons for preserving texts, but a huge 00:13:33.529 --> 00:13:36.049 portion of this effort wasn't dedicated to grand 00:13:36.049 --> 00:13:38.870 epics about dragons or theological debates. No, 00:13:38.929 --> 00:13:41.690 it wasn't. It was dedicated to the astonishingly 00:13:41.690 --> 00:13:44.450 intense hyper -specific rules of everyday behavior. 00:13:44.750 --> 00:13:47.350 Which brings us to the actual content of these 00:13:47.350 --> 00:13:50.009 rescued texts, specifically the books of nurture 00:13:50.009 --> 00:13:52.590 and courtesy. And this is where the daily reality 00:13:52.590 --> 00:13:54.629 of the Middle Ages hits you like a truck. It 00:13:54.629 --> 00:13:57.750 really does. The ETS introduces us to a fascinating 00:13:57.750 --> 00:14:00.289 figure named John Russell and his book of nurture. 00:14:01.090 --> 00:14:03.029 John Russell wasn't a poet, he wasn't a monk, 00:14:03.490 --> 00:14:05.809 and he wasn't a philosopher. He was the usher 00:14:05.809 --> 00:14:07.870 and marshal to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester. 00:14:08.059 --> 00:14:10.440 Let's contextualize how important that job title 00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:13.720 is. Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, was a brother 00:14:13.720 --> 00:14:16.620 to King Henry V. So royalty. Very close to the 00:14:16.620 --> 00:14:19.460 throne. He was a massive political player, a 00:14:19.460 --> 00:14:21.899 patron of learning, and a ferocious collector 00:14:21.899 --> 00:14:24.840 of manuscripts. His collection essentially laid 00:14:24.840 --> 00:14:27.360 the foundation for the famous Bodleian Library 00:14:27.360 --> 00:14:30.360 at Oxford. So John Russell was the man managing 00:14:30.360 --> 00:14:32.320 the daily household logistics for one of the 00:14:32.320 --> 00:14:34.580 most powerful, cultured, and wealthy men in the 00:14:34.580 --> 00:14:37.519 entire English kingdom. He was the ultimate operations 00:14:37.519 --> 00:14:40.519 manager. And in his old age, Russell decides 00:14:40.519 --> 00:14:43.720 to write a manual. He states he wants to train 00:14:43.720 --> 00:14:47.019 worthy successors in the art and mystery of managing 00:14:47.019 --> 00:14:50.830 a noble household. But this isn't a vague philosophical 00:14:50.830 --> 00:14:53.769 guide to leadership. Not at all. It is a grueling, 00:14:53.950 --> 00:14:57.190 obsessively detailed manual on meal time etiquette 00:14:57.190 --> 00:14:59.769 and the physical duties of serving. Obsessive 00:14:59.769 --> 00:15:01.870 is definitely the right word. These courtesy 00:15:01.870 --> 00:15:04.250 books functioned as literal survival manuals 00:15:04.250 --> 00:15:06.690 for young people navigating the treacherous social 00:15:06.690 --> 00:15:09.830 waters of a noble court. It reads exactly like 00:15:09.830 --> 00:15:12.970 a modern, hyper -specific YouTube tutorial or 00:15:12.970 --> 00:15:15.710 a life hack blog, but with life or death stakes. 00:15:16.000 --> 00:15:18.580 Russell provides the definitive guide to folding 00:15:18.580 --> 00:15:21.320 napkins in complex shapes, the exact temperatures 00:15:21.320 --> 00:15:23.659 to serve different wines, and most importantly, 00:15:23.899 --> 00:15:27.620 how to carve meat. Ah, yes. The carving. There's 00:15:27.620 --> 00:15:29.720 an entire highly technical section on carving 00:15:29.720 --> 00:15:31.779 birds. Let's go back to that 12 -year -old boy 00:15:31.779 --> 00:15:33.299 I mentioned at the beginning of the deep dive, 00:15:33.700 --> 00:15:36.500 the one carving the crane. Russell explicitly 00:15:36.500 --> 00:15:38.940 warns the carver that when breaking down a crane, 00:15:39.259 --> 00:15:41.759 you must beware the Trump in his breast. The 00:15:41.759 --> 00:15:44.299 Trump. This is a perfect example of why the ETs 00:15:44.299 --> 00:15:47.340 felt these texts were vital. The Trump refers 00:15:47.340 --> 00:15:51.259 to a very specific, tough, trumpet -shaped bone 00:15:51.259 --> 00:15:53.960 and cartilage structure in the crane's breast. 00:15:55.000 --> 00:15:57.500 If a young carver's knife hits that structure, 00:15:57.940 --> 00:16:01.759 the blade slips, the meat tears, the juices splatter, 00:16:02.139 --> 00:16:05.100 and the presentation is completely ruined. I 00:16:05.100 --> 00:16:08.080 was trying to think of a modern equivalent to 00:16:08.080 --> 00:16:10.570 the stress of this moment. It's not just messing 00:16:10.570 --> 00:16:12.929 up dinner. It's like being forced to defuse a 00:16:12.929 --> 00:16:15.090 bomb in front of a live audience of the most 00:16:15.090 --> 00:16:16.990 powerful people in the country. That is exactly 00:16:16.990 --> 00:16:19.309 what it felt like. One slip of the knife and 00:16:19.309 --> 00:16:21.850 your entire social standing detonates. Because 00:16:21.850 --> 00:16:24.269 in this society, presentation and hierarchy were 00:16:24.269 --> 00:16:26.970 everything. A public failure at the carving table 00:16:26.970 --> 00:16:29.289 wasn't just a faux pas. It was a deep humiliation 00:16:29.289 --> 00:16:31.830 that reflected poorly on your master, which inevitably 00:16:31.830 --> 00:16:33.950 led to the physical beatings we'll get into shortly. 00:16:34.110 --> 00:16:37.049 And John Russell's manual was considered so valuable, 00:16:37.110 --> 00:16:39.169 so essential to understanding these high -stakes 00:16:39.169 --> 00:16:41.710 social mechanics, that it actually sparked a 00:16:41.710 --> 00:16:44.909 literary scandal, which the ETS editors gleefully 00:16:44.909 --> 00:16:47.129 uncovered and documented. Oh, this is fantastic. 00:16:47.169 --> 00:16:50.190 I love historical drama. So good. So decades 00:16:50.190 --> 00:16:52.669 after Russell writes his manuscript, early printing 00:16:52.669 --> 00:16:55.070 presses start popping up in England. And there's 00:16:55.070 --> 00:16:57.730 a very famous early printer named Wink into Word. 00:16:58.049 --> 00:17:00.350 He was a prominent figure, a direct successor 00:17:00.350 --> 00:17:02.590 to William Caxton, who brought the printing press 00:17:02.590 --> 00:17:06.069 to England. Wink into Word prints a highly successful 00:17:06.069 --> 00:17:08.809 book called The Book of Carrying, The Book of 00:17:08.809 --> 00:17:11.650 Carving. But the ETS scholars, because they were 00:17:11.650 --> 00:17:14.450 meticulously comparing all these different manuscripts 00:17:14.450 --> 00:17:18.210 side by side, noticed something suspicious. Wink 00:17:18.210 --> 00:17:21.630 into Word had blatantly plagiarized John Russell's 00:17:21.630 --> 00:17:23.789 work. He just lifted the material wholesale. 00:17:23.869 --> 00:17:26.509 He really did. But the mechanics of how he plagiarized 00:17:26.509 --> 00:17:28.980 it tell us so much about early printing. because 00:17:28.980 --> 00:17:31.319 he couldn't just copy and paste. He was working 00:17:31.319 --> 00:17:35.680 with physical movable type. Block printing. Every 00:17:35.680 --> 00:17:38.000 single letter had to be placed by hand in a frame. 00:17:38.180 --> 00:17:40.640 Right. If a line of Russell's poetry was too 00:17:40.640 --> 00:17:42.400 long to fit the width of De Word's expensive 00:17:42.400 --> 00:17:44.779 paper, De Word couldn't just shrink the font 00:17:44.779 --> 00:17:47.180 size like we do on a computer. He had to physically 00:17:47.180 --> 00:17:48.859 alter the words to make them fit the margins. 00:17:49.200 --> 00:17:52.079 It's the 16th century equivalent of lazily copying 00:17:52.079 --> 00:17:54.539 someone's homework but changing the syntax so 00:17:54.539 --> 00:17:56.359 the teacher doesn't notice, only he's doing it 00:17:56.359 --> 00:17:58.140 because of the physical constraints of early 00:17:58.140 --> 00:18:01.240 typesetting. Exactly. The ETS text gives this 00:18:01.240 --> 00:18:04.470 brilliant concrete example. John Russell originally 00:18:04.470 --> 00:18:07.690 wrote a rhyming couplet about fritters. A pool 00:18:07.690 --> 00:18:11.430 fruitcher is good hoot, but the cold ye not dooch. 00:18:11.970 --> 00:18:13.950 Meaning apple fritters are good when they are 00:18:13.950 --> 00:18:16.549 hot, but don't touch the cold ones. Solid advice. 00:18:16.910 --> 00:18:19.069 Wink into word, trying to cram this into his 00:18:19.069 --> 00:18:21.509 prose formatting, just hacks the syntax apart. 00:18:21.670 --> 00:18:23.869 He changes it too. Apple fruiters have been good 00:18:23.869 --> 00:18:26.390 hoot and all cold fruiters touch not. He ruins 00:18:26.390 --> 00:18:28.910 the rhyme and shuffles the syllables just to 00:18:28.910 --> 00:18:31.289 make the metal type fit the page. It's so clumsy. 00:18:31.609 --> 00:18:34.650 Furnival, the ETS editor, calls him a bare -faced 00:18:34.650 --> 00:18:37.289 plagiarist in the footnotes. You can tell Furnival 00:18:37.289 --> 00:18:39.369 thoroughly enjoyed catching this 400 -year -old 00:18:39.369 --> 00:18:42.529 printer in a lie. But beyond the drama of plagiarism, 00:18:42.730 --> 00:18:45.069 the ETS preserved a multitude of other courtesy 00:18:45.069 --> 00:18:47.990 texts. Another critical one is a treatise called 00:18:47.990 --> 00:18:51.210 Urbani Tatis. This document outlines the rules 00:18:51.210 --> 00:18:53.369 of behavior taught to young men, specifically 00:18:53.369 --> 00:18:56.390 the henchmen of King Edward IV. King Edward VI's 00:18:56.390 --> 00:18:59.690 inner circle. Yes. And this is where the romantic 00:18:59.690 --> 00:19:03.369 illusion of the pristine noble knight completely 00:19:03.369 --> 00:19:05.690 disintegrates. Completely, because the rules 00:19:05.690 --> 00:19:08.849 in Urbana Tatis are incredibly basic, which implies 00:19:08.849 --> 00:19:11.890 the baseline behavior was absolutely feral. The 00:19:11.890 --> 00:19:14.890 text explicitly orders these young noblemen not 00:19:14.890 --> 00:19:17.509 to spit in the hall. It tells them not to snite, 00:19:17.769 --> 00:19:19.930 which is the early English word for blowing your 00:19:19.930 --> 00:19:23.130 nose with your fingers. And most tellingly, they 00:19:23.130 --> 00:19:25.210 are strictly forbidden from wiping their noses 00:19:25.210 --> 00:19:27.509 on the dining tablecloth. When you're analyzing 00:19:27.509 --> 00:19:30.069 historical law or etiquette, the rule of thumb 00:19:30.069 --> 00:19:33.269 is you do not write a rule per a behavior unless 00:19:33.269 --> 00:19:35.950 that behavior is a persistent widespread problem. 00:19:36.289 --> 00:19:38.190 Right. They weren't writing rules against wiping 00:19:38.190 --> 00:19:40.029 your nose on the tablecloth as a preventative 00:19:40.029 --> 00:19:42.329 measure. They wrote it because the dupes tablecloths 00:19:42.329 --> 00:19:45.369 were constantly covered in snot. Precisely. And 00:19:45.369 --> 00:19:48.670 this loops back to the ETS's core argument about 00:19:48.670 --> 00:19:51.130 the value of these texts for understanding language. 00:19:51.650 --> 00:19:53.930 Why did they spend so much of their limited funds 00:19:53.930 --> 00:19:56.769 printing the Book of Nurture and Urbonitatis? 00:19:57.250 --> 00:19:59.690 Because these etiquette manuals are the only 00:19:59.690 --> 00:20:02.710 places where the exact vocabulary of medieval 00:20:02.710 --> 00:20:05.339 material culture is preserved. I really want 00:20:05.339 --> 00:20:07.799 to hammer this point home for the listener. A 00:20:07.799 --> 00:20:10.359 cloistered monk writing a theological tract in 00:20:10.359 --> 00:20:13.839 Latin is never going to list the 14 distinct 00:20:13.839 --> 00:20:16.200 verbs used to carve different types of meat. 00:20:16.400 --> 00:20:19.140 A king writing a treaty isn't going to use the 00:20:19.140 --> 00:20:22.039 specific regional term for a crumb brush or detail 00:20:22.039 --> 00:20:24.660 the recipe for hot apple fritters. Exactly. The 00:20:24.660 --> 00:20:26.700 courtesy books give us the job titles like the 00:20:26.700 --> 00:20:28.660 panter, who was the officer in charge of the 00:20:28.660 --> 00:20:31.160 pantry and the bread, or the sewer, who was the 00:20:31.160 --> 00:20:32.980 high -ranking servant responsible for tasting 00:20:32.980 --> 00:20:34.900 and placing the dishes on the table. If we want 00:20:34.900 --> 00:20:36.640 to know what these people touched, what they 00:20:36.640 --> 00:20:38.680 tasted, what tools they held in their hands, 00:20:38.680 --> 00:20:40.740 and what words they used to describe their physical 00:20:40.740 --> 00:20:44.000 reality, we absolutely need these mundane everyday 00:20:44.000 --> 00:20:46.839 manuals. They anchor the evolution of the English 00:20:46.839 --> 00:20:49.319 language in physical reality. Okay, so we know 00:20:49.319 --> 00:20:50.980 what the rules were. Don't whack your nose on 00:20:50.980 --> 00:20:52.720 the table. Don't hit the Trump in the crane. 00:20:53.799 --> 00:20:58.000 But I am intensely curious about the how. How 00:20:58.000 --> 00:21:01.599 did medieval society actually enforce these incredibly 00:21:01.599 --> 00:21:05.119 intricate, high stakes rules on children? Because 00:21:05.119 --> 00:21:07.500 kids are kids, whether it's the year 1400 or 00:21:07.500 --> 00:21:10.539 2024, they don't naturally care about the precise 00:21:10.539 --> 00:21:13.460 angle of a carving knife. Well, The answer the 00:21:13.460 --> 00:21:15.960 source material provides is deeply unsettling. 00:21:16.200 --> 00:21:18.680 The medieval and early modern upper classes did 00:21:18.680 --> 00:21:20.759 not teach their own children. They relied on 00:21:20.759 --> 00:21:23.380 a widespread systemic process of outsourcing 00:21:23.380 --> 00:21:25.819 parenting combined with a normalized culture 00:21:25.819 --> 00:21:28.420 of extreme physical discipline. Let's dig into 00:21:28.420 --> 00:21:30.359 this system, which was known as fostering out. 00:21:30.920 --> 00:21:33.099 If you were an upper class child, a boy or a 00:21:33.099 --> 00:21:35.660 girl, your parents very rarely raised you in 00:21:35.660 --> 00:21:37.900 your own home. Instead, around the age of seven 00:21:37.900 --> 00:21:39.759 or eight, you were sent away to serve in the 00:21:39.759 --> 00:21:42.059 household of another noble family, or perhaps 00:21:42.059 --> 00:21:44.480 a high -ranking church official. It was essentially 00:21:44.480 --> 00:21:47.339 a mandatory exchange program for the elite. You 00:21:47.339 --> 00:21:49.619 functioned as a page, a henchman, or a maid. 00:21:50.299 --> 00:21:52.420 The sources note that prominent chancellors men 00:21:52.420 --> 00:21:55.180 like Thomas Becket and William Longchamp maintained 00:21:55.180 --> 00:21:57.500 massive households that were essentially staffed 00:21:57.500 --> 00:21:59.980 by the fostered sons of the English nobility. 00:22:00.140 --> 00:22:02.000 I'm trying to wrap my head around the psychology 00:22:02.000 --> 00:22:05.519 of this. If you are a wealthy, powerful noble, 00:22:05.769 --> 00:22:08.309 Why would you send your own child away to be 00:22:08.309 --> 00:22:11.309 a servant for someone else, while simultaneously 00:22:11.309 --> 00:22:14.049 taking in a stranger's child to serve you? It 00:22:14.049 --> 00:22:17.029 seems entirely counterintuitive to the biological 00:22:17.029 --> 00:22:19.589 imperative of protecting your offspring. The 00:22:19.589 --> 00:22:22.569 ETS sources actually include a brilliant outside 00:22:22.569 --> 00:22:24.930 perspective on this exact question. It comes 00:22:24.930 --> 00:22:26.809 from a document known as the Italian Relation 00:22:26.809 --> 00:22:29.289 of England. It was written by a foreign observer, 00:22:29.549 --> 00:22:31.670 likely a Venetian ambassador, who was touring 00:22:31.670 --> 00:22:34.130 England and observing their customs. And his 00:22:34.130 --> 00:22:36.450 conclusion about why the English foster their 00:22:36.450 --> 00:22:39.049 children is brutally cynical. It is scathing. 00:22:39.390 --> 00:22:40.809 The Italian observer writes that the English 00:22:40.809 --> 00:22:42.710 send their children away because they are, quote, 00:22:42.990 --> 00:22:46.190 great epicures and very avaricious. He essentially 00:22:46.190 --> 00:22:48.470 claims that the English nobility are selfish 00:22:48.470 --> 00:22:51.259 gluttons. Pretty much. They prefer to be served 00:22:51.259 --> 00:22:53.940 by strangers because they want to eat all the 00:22:53.940 --> 00:22:56.720 best, most delicate, most expensive food themselves. 00:22:57.359 --> 00:22:59.640 They want to leave the coarse bread and the cold 00:22:59.640 --> 00:23:01.799 leftover baked meats for the household staff. 00:23:02.559 --> 00:23:04.680 He argues that if the English kept their own 00:23:04.680 --> 00:23:07.160 children at home, they would feel biological 00:23:07.160 --> 00:23:09.920 guilt or social pressure to feed their kids the 00:23:09.920 --> 00:23:13.240 good food. So to keep the best cuts of meat for 00:23:13.240 --> 00:23:16.369 themselves, they ship their kids off. It's a 00:23:16.369 --> 00:23:18.970 jaw -dropping accusation of terrible parenting. 00:23:19.490 --> 00:23:21.549 Now, the Observer does note the English defense 00:23:21.549 --> 00:23:24.250 of this practice. When confronted, the English 00:23:24.250 --> 00:23:26.170 claimed they did this to teach the children better 00:23:26.170 --> 00:23:28.789 manners. Right. The cultural logic was that parents 00:23:28.789 --> 00:23:31.529 are inherently too soft to emotionally attach 00:23:31.529 --> 00:23:33.549 to their own children to discipline them properly. 00:23:34.289 --> 00:23:36.849 A stranger, however, won't coddle your child. 00:23:37.269 --> 00:23:39.450 A stranger will force them to learn courtesy, 00:23:39.910 --> 00:23:43.269 to master carving, and to show absolute unquestioning 00:23:43.269 --> 00:23:45.869 obedience. And when they say force, they mean 00:23:45.869 --> 00:23:48.809 it in the most literal, violent sense imaginable. 00:23:49.150 --> 00:23:51.390 The physical brutality of this educational system 00:23:51.390 --> 00:23:54.089 is really hard to overstate. It was relentless. 00:23:54.930 --> 00:23:58.130 The ATS sources pull from the famous Paston family 00:23:58.130 --> 00:24:00.690 letters, which are an incredible primary source 00:24:00.690 --> 00:24:02.910 for 15th century life. There is a letter from 00:24:02.910 --> 00:24:06.309 Agnes Paston, a wealthy aristocratic mother writing 00:24:06.309 --> 00:24:08.750 to her contacts in London regarding her 15 -year 00:24:08.750 --> 00:24:11.759 -old son, Clement. This letter is so intense. 00:24:12.039 --> 00:24:14.160 She is writing to Clement's master, his tutor, 00:24:14.420 --> 00:24:17.500 and she explicitly demands that the master truly 00:24:17.500 --> 00:24:20.460 belash him till he will amend. Belash him? To 00:24:20.460 --> 00:24:22.920 beat him with a lash? A whip? This is a mother 00:24:22.920 --> 00:24:25.099 ordering the flogging of her own 15 -year -old 00:24:25.099 --> 00:24:27.720 son. And she adds a chilling justification, noting 00:24:27.720 --> 00:24:29.480 that his former master at Painbridge had done 00:24:29.480 --> 00:24:31.420 the same, and it was the only way to make him 00:24:31.420 --> 00:24:33.380 learn. But the way Agnes treats her daughter 00:24:33.380 --> 00:24:36.029 is even worse. Another relative writes a letter 00:24:36.029 --> 00:24:38.130 documenting how Agnes behaves toward her daughter, 00:24:38.390 --> 00:24:41.089 Elizabeth, who is of marriageable age. The letter 00:24:41.089 --> 00:24:43.130 states that Elizabeth has been beaten once in 00:24:43.130 --> 00:24:45.549 the week or twice and sometimes twice on a day 00:24:45.549 --> 00:24:48.329 and her head broken in two or three places. Her 00:24:48.329 --> 00:24:51.329 head broken in two or three places by her own 00:24:51.329 --> 00:24:53.609 mother. Over a dispute about a marriage arrangement. 00:24:54.190 --> 00:24:56.990 The absolute normalization of extreme physical 00:24:56.990 --> 00:24:59.789 violence as a tool for teaching obedience is 00:24:59.789 --> 00:25:02.650 terrifying. And this wasn't just the Paston family. 00:25:02.990 --> 00:25:05.349 It was the standard pedagogical theory of the 00:25:05.349 --> 00:25:09.769 entire era. The ETS texts, quote, the tragic 00:25:09.769 --> 00:25:12.450 account of Lady Jane Grey, the famous Nine Days 00:25:12.450 --> 00:25:14.809 Queen. Yes. She's known as one of the most highly 00:25:14.809 --> 00:25:17.970 educated young women in Europe. But she recounts 00:25:17.970 --> 00:25:20.470 her home life to the scholar Roger Asham, and 00:25:20.470 --> 00:25:23.019 it is just heartbreaking. Lady Jane Grey's account 00:25:23.019 --> 00:25:25.200 provides a vivid window into the psychological 00:25:25.200 --> 00:25:28.380 terror these children lived under. What exactly 00:25:28.380 --> 00:25:30.779 does she tell Asham? She tells him that when 00:25:30.779 --> 00:25:32.480 she is in the presence of her parents, she is 00:25:32.480 --> 00:25:34.880 paralyzed by fear. I have the exact quote here. 00:25:34.920 --> 00:25:37.660 She says, whether I speak, Keep silence, sit, 00:25:37.880 --> 00:25:40.480 stand or go, eat, drink, be merry or sad, be 00:25:40.480 --> 00:25:43.099 sewing, playing, dancing, I must do it, even 00:25:43.099 --> 00:25:45.400 so profitely as God made the world, or else I 00:25:45.400 --> 00:25:47.640 am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, 00:25:48.039 --> 00:25:50.339 yea, presently sometimes, with pinches, nippers, 00:25:50.480 --> 00:25:53.400 and bobs, that I think myself in hell." She tells 00:25:53.400 --> 00:25:55.740 Asham that the only time she feels any relief, 00:25:56.039 --> 00:25:58.359 any sense of safety, is when she is studying 00:25:58.359 --> 00:26:01.200 with her gentle tutor, Mr. Elmer, because he 00:26:01.200 --> 00:26:03.019 actually encourages her instead of hitting her. 00:26:03.200 --> 00:26:06.880 Pinches, nips, and bobs. It sounds almost quaint 00:26:06.880 --> 00:26:09.119 to modern ears, but she is describing a state 00:26:09.119 --> 00:26:11.819 of constant, unpredictable, low -level physical 00:26:11.819 --> 00:26:14.220 and psychological torment. She could never relax. 00:26:14.279 --> 00:26:17.579 Her body was never her own. Never. The sources 00:26:17.579 --> 00:26:20.380 also mention a boy named Sir Peter Carew. His 00:26:20.380 --> 00:26:22.380 parents were so frustrated with his inability 00:26:22.380 --> 00:26:25.000 to conform to their strict rules that they literally 00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:27.279 chained him like a dog in the Hakam dog kennel 00:26:27.279 --> 00:26:30.369 until he managed to escape. And Roger Asham himself 00:26:30.369 --> 00:26:33.130 notes that boys were regularly running away from 00:26:33.130 --> 00:26:35.430 the prestigious Eaton School specifically because 00:26:35.430 --> 00:26:37.769 they were terrified of the daily beatings. This 00:26:37.769 --> 00:26:40.769 forces me to ask a really profound question about 00:26:40.769 --> 00:26:44.329 the literature the ETS is preserving. If an entire 00:26:44.329 --> 00:26:47.359 culture normalizes the outsourcing of parental 00:26:47.359 --> 00:26:49.579 affection. If their upper classes are raised 00:26:49.579 --> 00:26:52.619 in a system where daily severe physical beatings 00:26:52.619 --> 00:26:55.440 are the primary mechanism for learning, how does 00:26:55.440 --> 00:26:58.359 that collective generational trauma shape the 00:26:58.359 --> 00:27:00.900 tone of the language, the letters, and the stories 00:27:00.900 --> 00:27:04.079 they leave behind? That is the exact analytical 00:27:04.079 --> 00:27:06.660 leap the ETS wants the reader to make. When you 00:27:06.660 --> 00:27:08.279 look at medieval and early modern literature 00:27:08.279 --> 00:27:10.859 through the lens of this childhood trauma, certain 00:27:10.859 --> 00:27:13.400 patterns become glaringly obvious. Like what? 00:27:13.480 --> 00:27:15.619 You see a massive preoccupation with absolute 00:27:15.619 --> 00:27:19.019 authority, divine punishment, and strict, unwavering 00:27:19.019 --> 00:27:21.839 hierarchies. The literature reflects a worldview 00:27:21.839 --> 00:27:25.220 where power is absolute and mercy is incredibly 00:27:25.220 --> 00:27:27.240 rare because that was their lived experience 00:27:27.240 --> 00:27:29.460 from the moment they could walk. Survival depended 00:27:29.460 --> 00:27:34.079 entirely on compliance. Exactly. The harsh, pragmatic, 00:27:34.400 --> 00:27:38.200 on -the -job training in these noble houses prioritized 00:27:38.200 --> 00:27:41.359 physical performance over intellectual curiosity. 00:27:41.960 --> 00:27:43.920 You learned to fold the napkin, play the lute, 00:27:44.180 --> 00:27:45.960 carve the meat, and ride the horse perfectly 00:27:45.960 --> 00:27:48.140 because your physical safety depended on it. 00:27:48.599 --> 00:27:51.660 Intellectual pursuit asking why instead of just 00:27:51.660 --> 00:27:54.200 doing what was actively discouraged because it 00:27:54.200 --> 00:27:56.380 challenged the hierarchy. So we have this image 00:27:56.380 --> 00:27:59.059 of the noble kids essentially outsourced and 00:27:59.059 --> 00:28:01.440 beaten into submission in these grand, drafty 00:28:01.440 --> 00:28:04.440 dining halls, terrified of carving a bird incorrectly. 00:28:05.359 --> 00:28:07.160 But what about the kids who were actually sitting 00:28:07.160 --> 00:28:09.519 in classrooms? The universities must have been 00:28:09.519 --> 00:28:11.440 safer havens for intellectual development, right? 00:28:11.940 --> 00:28:13.420 I mean, Oxford and Cambridge were established 00:28:13.420 --> 00:28:16.000 by this point. Well, that brings us to a fascinating 00:28:16.000 --> 00:28:19.380 evolution documented in the ETS forwards. Today, 00:28:19.579 --> 00:28:21.779 we view Oxford and Cambridge as the ultimate 00:28:21.779 --> 00:28:24.400 bastions of elite privilege, the playgrounds 00:28:24.400 --> 00:28:27.460 of the global wealthy. But the historical reality 00:28:27.460 --> 00:28:29.400 of their founding is completely the opposite. 00:28:29.900 --> 00:28:31.660 In the early Middle Ages, these universities 00:28:31.660 --> 00:28:33.839 were specifically designed and funded for poor 00:28:33.839 --> 00:28:36.359 men's sons. Oh, this makes me think of Chaucer's 00:28:36.359 --> 00:28:38.940 Clerk of Oxford from the Canterbury Tales. He's 00:28:38.940 --> 00:28:42.000 the classic starving student. His clothes are 00:28:42.000 --> 00:28:45.000 threadbare, his horse is incredibly skinny, and 00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:47.299 he spends every single penny he can beg from 00:28:47.299 --> 00:28:50.700 his friends on books instead of food. That archetype 00:28:50.700 --> 00:28:53.599 was completely based in reality. Wealthy men 00:28:53.599 --> 00:28:56.200 and noblemen initially viewed funding these universities 00:28:56.200 --> 00:28:59.240 as an act of Christian charity. They were providing 00:28:59.240 --> 00:29:02.660 endowments to help exceptionally apt, intelligent, 00:29:02.900 --> 00:29:06.119 but impoverished boys get a formal education, 00:29:06.559 --> 00:29:08.440 usually so they could enter the priesthood or 00:29:08.440 --> 00:29:10.460 the church bureaucracy. OK, that makes sense. 00:29:10.599 --> 00:29:12.720 The nobility didn't send their own sons there 00:29:12.720 --> 00:29:14.940 because, as we discussed, their sons were busy 00:29:14.940 --> 00:29:17.579 learning to joust and carve meat in other noble 00:29:17.579 --> 00:29:20.539 households. Formal academic study was seen as 00:29:20.539 --> 00:29:23.380 the domain of the poor cleric. But then a massive 00:29:23.380 --> 00:29:26.539 societal shift happens. How exactly did the wealthy 00:29:26.539 --> 00:29:28.920 end up taking over the universities? It was a 00:29:28.920 --> 00:29:32.220 gradual realization of power. As the state apparatus 00:29:32.220 --> 00:29:34.920 grew more complex, the nobility began to realize 00:29:34.920 --> 00:29:38.440 that formal education literacy, legal knowledge, 00:29:38.819 --> 00:29:41.640 administrative skills held immense political 00:29:41.640 --> 00:29:44.500 and social value. And the moment the rich realized 00:29:44.500 --> 00:29:47.299 the universities were valuable, they systematically 00:29:47.299 --> 00:29:49.720 moved in and took them over. A tale as old as 00:29:49.720 --> 00:29:52.529 time. The rich realized... something is useful 00:29:52.529 --> 00:29:55.200 and push everyone else out. But mechanically, 00:29:55.240 --> 00:29:57.140 how did they do it? Were they just buying their 00:29:57.140 --> 00:30:00.559 way in? The ETS texts cite numerous complaints 00:30:00.559 --> 00:30:02.799 from the era detailing exactly how this happened. 00:30:03.319 --> 00:30:05.779 It was a combination of networking, bribery, 00:30:05.859 --> 00:30:08.099 and the co -opting of charitable endowments. 00:30:08.759 --> 00:30:10.900 College masters would favor the sons of powerful 00:30:10.900 --> 00:30:13.079 lords to gain political favor. Right, of course. 00:30:13.460 --> 00:30:16.180 As a result, poor, incredibly intelligent students 00:30:16.180 --> 00:30:18.279 were systematically pushed out of university 00:30:18.279 --> 00:30:21.359 placements to make room for wealthy, often completely 00:30:21.359 --> 00:30:24.700 unapped, nobleman sons. Endowments meant for 00:30:24.700 --> 00:30:26.660 the starving clerks were swallowed up by the 00:30:26.660 --> 00:30:30.039 elite. It's a direct historical parallel to modern 00:30:30.039 --> 00:30:32.680 legacy admissions or college bribery scandals. 00:30:33.059 --> 00:30:35.359 The mechanism of exclusion just evolved. That 00:30:35.359 --> 00:30:38.539 is incredibly relatable. So once these wealthy 00:30:38.539 --> 00:30:41.019 students secured their spots at Oxford or Cambridge, 00:30:41.619 --> 00:30:44.599 what exactly were they studying? The ETS sources 00:30:44.599 --> 00:30:46.920 provide a breakdown of the curriculum and it 00:30:46.920 --> 00:30:49.420 is highly structured. It was split into two sequential 00:30:49.420 --> 00:30:52.940 parts, the trivium and the quadrivium. This is 00:30:52.940 --> 00:30:54.859 the foundation of the classical liberal arts 00:30:54.859 --> 00:30:57.539 education. You could not move to the quadrivium 00:30:57.539 --> 00:30:59.799 until you had completely mastered the trivium. 00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:03.000 The trivium consisted of grammar, rhetoric, and 00:31:03.000 --> 00:31:05.059 logic. Let's break down how that actually works 00:31:05.059 --> 00:31:07.660 mechanically in building a scholar, because grammar 00:31:07.660 --> 00:31:09.680 to us just means learning where to put a comma. 00:31:10.019 --> 00:31:12.579 In the medieval university, grammar was the mechanics 00:31:12.579 --> 00:31:14.799 of language itself, understanding the structure 00:31:14.799 --> 00:31:17.450 of reality through words. Once you understood 00:31:17.450 --> 00:31:19.690 the structure of language, you moved to logic, 00:31:19.950 --> 00:31:21.710 which is the mechanics of thought, how to construct 00:31:21.710 --> 00:31:24.650 a valid argument and identify fallacies. And 00:31:24.650 --> 00:31:27.069 finally, rhetoric, which is the mechanics of 00:31:27.069 --> 00:31:29.490 persuasion, how to use grammar and logic to convince 00:31:29.490 --> 00:31:32.430 an audience. It's a brilliant progression. First, 00:31:32.490 --> 00:31:34.670 you learn to structure a sentence. Then you learn 00:31:34.670 --> 00:31:36.809 to structure a thought. Then you learn to wield 00:31:36.809 --> 00:31:38.750 that thought as a weapon. And once you mastered 00:31:38.750 --> 00:31:41.130 the trivium, you graduated to the quadrivium. 00:31:41.730 --> 00:31:45.240 Arithmetic, music, geometry. and astronomy. What 00:31:45.240 --> 00:31:47.660 is fascinating about the quadrivium is that music 00:31:47.660 --> 00:31:50.380 was considered a mathematical science. It was 00:31:50.380 --> 00:31:52.880 the study of proportional relationships and harmony 00:31:52.880 --> 00:31:55.640 closely linked to astronomy and the music of 00:31:55.640 --> 00:31:58.480 the spheres. But there is a glaring omission 00:31:58.480 --> 00:32:01.259 in this entire curriculum. Yes. Notice what language 00:32:01.259 --> 00:32:03.869 we are not talking about. English. And for a 00:32:03.869 --> 00:32:06.250 long time, Greek was missing too. The sources 00:32:06.250 --> 00:32:08.210 note that the study of Greek was only introduced 00:32:08.210 --> 00:32:10.609 to the English university system very late, around 00:32:10.609 --> 00:32:14.049 the year 1500, by humanist scholars like Erasmus, 00:32:14.269 --> 00:32:17.950 Lineker, and Grosson. But the absolute intentional 00:32:17.950 --> 00:32:20.250 neglect of the English language in English schools 00:32:20.250 --> 00:32:23.029 is the most shocking revelation here. This is 00:32:23.029 --> 00:32:25.130 where we see the fierce academic battle for the 00:32:25.130 --> 00:32:28.140 English language emerge. All serious academic, 00:32:28.400 --> 00:32:30.440 legal, and theological work was conducted in 00:32:30.440 --> 00:32:33.359 Latin. Latin was the universal language of the 00:32:33.359 --> 00:32:36.359 educated European elite. English was considered 00:32:36.359 --> 00:32:39.759 a vulgar, base language, fit only for the uneducated 00:32:39.759 --> 00:32:42.119 peasants. If you wanted to be taken seriously, 00:32:42.420 --> 00:32:44.500 you did not write in English. Which means we 00:32:44.500 --> 00:32:47.220 have generations of brilliant English minds who 00:32:47.220 --> 00:32:49.359 are completely alienated from their native tongue. 00:32:49.720 --> 00:32:53.220 The ETS highlights two pioneering educators who 00:32:53.220 --> 00:32:56.559 tried to fix this, Richard Mollcaster in 1582 00:32:56.559 --> 00:33:00.900 and John Brinsley in 1612. These men had to aggressively 00:33:00.900 --> 00:33:03.440 advocate for the study of English in English 00:33:03.440 --> 00:33:06.240 grammar schools. Molkester's arguments are fascinating. 00:33:06.420 --> 00:33:08.759 He framed the purity and capability of the native 00:33:08.759 --> 00:33:10.900 English tongue as a matter of national honor. 00:33:11.359 --> 00:33:13.559 He was essentially looking at the academic establishment 00:33:13.559 --> 00:33:16.140 and saying, we have this robust, expressive, 00:33:16.299 --> 00:33:18.500 beautiful language right here, forged by our 00:33:18.500 --> 00:33:21.180 own ancestors. Why are we actively ignoring it 00:33:21.180 --> 00:33:23.500 to force our children to memorize Latin declensions? 00:33:23.559 --> 00:33:25.259 Yeah, why are we doing this? He begged for English 00:33:25.259 --> 00:33:27.359 to be treated with the same academic rigor and 00:33:27.359 --> 00:33:30.299 respect as the classical languages. And John 00:33:30.299 --> 00:33:32.220 Brinsley pointed out the practical absurdity 00:33:32.220 --> 00:33:35.119 of the situation. He complained that he had scholars 00:33:35.119 --> 00:33:38.140 who could write perfectly elegant, complex treatises 00:33:38.140 --> 00:33:40.380 in Latin. But if you ask them to write down their 00:33:40.380 --> 00:33:42.440 own thoughts in English, they couldn't do it 00:33:42.440 --> 00:33:44.960 purely or readily. They were functionally illiterate 00:33:44.960 --> 00:33:48.259 in their own native emotions. The irony is monumental. 00:33:48.799 --> 00:33:50.900 Think about the global position of the English 00:33:50.900 --> 00:33:53.920 language today. It is the dominant language of 00:33:53.920 --> 00:33:57.019 international business, global science, aviation, 00:33:57.519 --> 00:34:00.420 and the Internet. It is an absolute juggernaut. 00:34:00.660 --> 00:34:04.099 Yet in its infancy, its own academic institutions 00:34:04.099 --> 00:34:06.900 refused to teach it. Visionary educators had 00:34:06.900 --> 00:34:09.500 to plead and fight just to get it on the syllabus. 00:34:09.800 --> 00:34:12.019 And if we tie this all the way back to the early 00:34:12.019 --> 00:34:13.940 English tech society's mission that we discussed 00:34:13.940 --> 00:34:16.760 in the beginning, this reveals exactly why their 00:34:16.760 --> 00:34:19.820 work was so revolutionary. By dedicating massive 00:34:19.820 --> 00:34:22.300 amounts of academic rigor, international funding, 00:34:22.639 --> 00:34:24.840 and painstaking translation to preserving early 00:34:24.840 --> 00:34:28.059 English texts, Furnival and the ETs were finally 00:34:28.059 --> 00:34:30.639 fulfilling Richard Molcaster's 16th century dream. 00:34:30.860 --> 00:34:33.320 They absolutely were. They were proving, once 00:34:33.320 --> 00:34:36.619 and for all, that the vulgar tongue had a rich, 00:34:37.079 --> 00:34:39.880 complex, and vital history worthy of supreme 00:34:39.880 --> 00:34:42.980 academic study. They were validating the linguistic 00:34:42.980 --> 00:34:45.599 heritage of the ordinary person. But to truly 00:34:45.599 --> 00:34:47.820 validate it, to truly understand the context 00:34:47.820 --> 00:34:50.780 of this language they were saving, the ETS editors 00:34:50.780 --> 00:34:52.780 knew they couldn't just present the words on 00:34:52.780 --> 00:34:55.679 a page. They had to strip away the romance entirely 00:34:55.679 --> 00:34:57.880 and show the reader what the world actually looked 00:34:57.880 --> 00:34:59.840 and smelled like when those words were spoken. 00:35:00.019 --> 00:35:02.400 Which brings us to the final, most visceral part 00:35:02.400 --> 00:35:05.519 of our deep dive. The gritty physical reality 00:35:05.519 --> 00:35:08.639 of early English life. The dirt, the disease, 00:35:08.719 --> 00:35:11.980 and the diet. The ETS editors deliberately included 00:35:11.980 --> 00:35:13.980 extensive historical context about the living 00:35:13.980 --> 00:35:16.300 conditions of the time because, as we established 00:35:16.300 --> 00:35:18.659 earlier, you cannot separate a text from the 00:35:18.659 --> 00:35:20.440 environment in which it was written. And the 00:35:20.440 --> 00:35:23.619 environment was, to put it bluntly, a public 00:35:23.619 --> 00:35:26.960 health catastrophe. The sources include a famous, 00:35:27.119 --> 00:35:29.579 deeply disturbing letter written by Erasmus, 00:35:29.699 --> 00:35:31.699 the great Renaissance humanist scholar we mentioned 00:35:31.699 --> 00:35:35.730 earlier, who helped bring Greek to Oxford. Erasmus 00:35:35.730 --> 00:35:37.789 traveled extensively in England and he wrote 00:35:37.789 --> 00:35:39.969 a letter to the physician of Cardinal Wolsey 00:35:39.969 --> 00:35:42.750 detailing his observations of English homes. 00:35:43.050 --> 00:35:45.090 I'm going to warn you right now. This description 00:35:45.090 --> 00:35:48.469 is going to ruin your appetite. Erasmus specifically 00:35:48.469 --> 00:35:51.829 describes the floors of English houses, not just 00:35:51.829 --> 00:35:53.769 peasant hovels, but the homes of the wealthy 00:35:53.769 --> 00:35:56.000 as well. We talked about the rushes at the beginning 00:35:56.000 --> 00:35:58.760 of the show, but Erasmus provides the exact mechanical 00:35:58.760 --> 00:36:01.659 breakdown of why they were so dangerous. He writes 00:36:01.659 --> 00:36:04.219 that the floors are made of clay and then strewed 00:36:04.219 --> 00:36:06.699 with marsh rushes. And the crucial detail is 00:36:06.699 --> 00:36:09.000 how they manage these rushes. They didn't sweep 00:36:09.000 --> 00:36:11.639 them out every week. Erasmus notes that occasionally 00:36:11.639 --> 00:36:14.059 they would throw a fresh layer of rushes on top, 00:36:14.260 --> 00:36:16.019 but they would leave the foundational layers 00:36:16.019 --> 00:36:19.579 untouched sometimes for up to 20 years. 20 years. 00:36:19.900 --> 00:36:23.039 And he explicitly lists what is fermenting in 00:36:23.039 --> 00:36:25.559 that 20 year old compost heap in the middle of 00:36:25.559 --> 00:36:27.960 the living room. Spittle, vomit, the urine of 00:36:27.960 --> 00:36:31.719 dogs and men, spilled beer, fish bones, and as 00:36:31.719 --> 00:36:35.079 he delicately puts it, other dirt not to be named. 00:36:35.300 --> 00:36:38.320 It is a 20 -year accumulation of biological waste 00:36:38.320 --> 00:36:41.679 trapped indoors. Erasmus, who was remarkably 00:36:41.679 --> 00:36:44.559 forward -thinking regarding public health, explicitly 00:36:44.559 --> 00:36:47.440 linked this absolute filth to the rampant diseases 00:36:47.440 --> 00:36:49.880 that regularly devastated the English population. 00:36:50.440 --> 00:36:52.659 He specifically mentions the plagues and the 00:36:52.659 --> 00:36:54.840 terrifying sweating sicknesses. Let's define 00:36:54.840 --> 00:36:56.719 the sweating sickness because it's one of the 00:36:56.719 --> 00:36:58.579 most horrifying medical mysteries in history. 00:36:58.909 --> 00:37:01.329 It wasn't the bubonic plague. It was a completely 00:37:01.329 --> 00:37:04.070 different highly virulent disease that struck 00:37:04.070 --> 00:37:07.289 Engler in waves during the Tudor period. Mechanically, 00:37:07.489 --> 00:37:09.309 the sweating sickness was terrifying because 00:37:09.309 --> 00:37:11.530 of its rapid onset. A person could wake up feeling 00:37:11.530 --> 00:37:13.750 perfectly healthy, start experiencing a sense 00:37:13.750 --> 00:37:16.769 of dread and a severe fever by noon, begin sweating 00:37:16.769 --> 00:37:19.469 profusely, and be dead before dinner. Just hours. 00:37:19.889 --> 00:37:22.170 It struck with overwhelming speed, and no one 00:37:22.170 --> 00:37:25.039 knew how it was transmitted. We still don't know 00:37:25.039 --> 00:37:27.440 exactly what pathogen caused it, though some 00:37:27.440 --> 00:37:29.900 modern theories suggest a type of hantavirus. 00:37:30.280 --> 00:37:32.579 And Erasmus looks at these sealed, unventilated 00:37:32.579 --> 00:37:36.139 houses with 20 years of rotting vomit and urine 00:37:36.139 --> 00:37:39.150 on the floor and he connects the dots. He notes 00:37:39.150 --> 00:37:41.289 that the windows in English houses were often 00:37:41.289 --> 00:37:43.409 designed to let in light but couldn't be opened. 00:37:43.610 --> 00:37:46.969 So this noxious vapor, this miasma from the rushes 00:37:46.969 --> 00:37:49.210 just hung stagnant in the air of the house. They 00:37:49.210 --> 00:37:52.269 contrast that unimaginable squalor with the incredible 00:37:52.269 --> 00:37:55.510 ostentatious luxury that existed simultaneously 00:37:55.510 --> 00:37:58.809 in the exact same physical space. The economic 00:37:58.809 --> 00:38:01.409 disparity and the bizarre prioritization of resources 00:38:01.409 --> 00:38:05.289 are staggering. The ETS texts mention historical 00:38:05.289 --> 00:38:07.789 records of a thousand citizens of Genoa visiting 00:38:07.630 --> 00:38:10.969 England clothed entirely in silk, a fabric of 00:38:10.969 --> 00:38:13.409 immense, almost astronomical costs at the time. 00:38:13.750 --> 00:38:16.289 And the food. They are walking on floors soaked 00:38:16.289 --> 00:38:18.510 in animal waste, but they're throwing feasts 00:38:18.510 --> 00:38:22.110 that defy belief. The sources describe a wedding 00:38:22.110 --> 00:38:24.869 feast where 60 oxen were slaughtered and consumed. 00:38:25.329 --> 00:38:28.449 60 oxen for one party. and the complexity of 00:38:28.449 --> 00:38:31.030 the dishes they made. The text mentions a culinary 00:38:31.030 --> 00:38:33.849 creation called a gallimoffery. Oh, it's a fantastic 00:38:33.849 --> 00:38:36.369 word. A gallimoffery was essentially a chaotic 00:38:36.369 --> 00:38:39.090 culinary mashup. It was a massive dish where 00:38:39.090 --> 00:38:42.469 roasted meats, fish, heavily spiced sweets, fruits, 00:38:42.690 --> 00:38:45.190 and thick sauces were all jumbled and baked together. 00:38:45.610 --> 00:38:49.010 It completely shocked later more refined dietary 00:38:49.010 --> 00:38:51.869 observers who couldn't fathom the digestive fortitude 00:38:51.869 --> 00:38:54.670 required to eat it. It was an era of absolute 00:38:54.670 --> 00:38:58.650 extremes, extreme filth and extreme heavy opulence 00:38:58.650 --> 00:39:00.670 coexisting without any sense of contradiction. 00:39:01.050 --> 00:39:03.070 But what is truly fascinating from a psychological 00:39:03.070 --> 00:39:05.829 perspective is the intense historical resistance 00:39:05.829 --> 00:39:08.710 to changing these conditions. When new technologies 00:39:08.710 --> 00:39:10.550 emerged that could have improved hygiene and 00:39:10.550 --> 00:39:12.550 air quality, the population pushed back. They 00:39:12.550 --> 00:39:14.869 didn't want to clean up. No, they thought the 00:39:14.869 --> 00:39:16.690 dirt and the smoke were actually making them 00:39:16.690 --> 00:39:20.119 stronger. The source is, quote, a 16th century 00:39:20.119 --> 00:39:22.539 writer named William Harrison, who wrote a description 00:39:22.539 --> 00:39:24.980 of England. And Harrison is bitterly complaining 00:39:24.980 --> 00:39:27.559 about the modern introduction of chimneys and 00:39:27.559 --> 00:39:30.860 proper oak framed houses. He literally argues 00:39:30.860 --> 00:39:32.860 that having chimneys to vent smoke out of the 00:39:32.860 --> 00:39:35.739 house was making Englishmen soft. He calls the 00:39:35.739 --> 00:39:39.840 new clean air generation willow men. He was nostalgic 00:39:39.840 --> 00:39:42.039 for the good old days when rooms were built of 00:39:42.039 --> 00:39:44.099 softer willow wood but were constantly filled 00:39:44.099 --> 00:39:46.940 with thick choking smoke from an open fire in 00:39:46.940 --> 00:39:50.320 the center of the hall. Right. His logic is baffling 00:39:50.320 --> 00:39:53.360 but fascinating. He argued that the constant 00:39:53.360 --> 00:39:55.619 thick wood smoke hardened the timber of the house 00:39:55.619 --> 00:39:58.019 and therefore it must physically harden the bodies 00:39:58.019 --> 00:40:00.579 of the people living inside it. He claimed that 00:40:00.579 --> 00:40:02.860 the smoke kept them from catching colds, or the 00:40:02.860 --> 00:40:05.780 poes, as they called a head cold. He genuinely 00:40:05.780 --> 00:40:07.579 believed that breathing in thick particulate 00:40:07.579 --> 00:40:09.940 matter all day was a profound medical benefit 00:40:09.940 --> 00:40:12.300 and that chimneys were a sign of moral and physical 00:40:12.300 --> 00:40:15.059 decay. This specific anecdote brings us to a 00:40:15.059 --> 00:40:17.460 critical analytical point about historical text 00:40:17.460 --> 00:40:20.300 preservation. Why does the early English text 00:40:20.300 --> 00:40:22.900 society include these gruesome details about 00:40:22.900 --> 00:40:26.480 dirt, unventilated smoke, and bizarre dietary 00:40:26.480 --> 00:40:29.599 excesses in a volume dedicated to rescuing poetry 00:40:29.599 --> 00:40:31.920 and grammar? Because understanding the squalor 00:40:31.920 --> 00:40:34.320 is an absolute prerequisite for reading early 00:40:34.320 --> 00:40:37.380 texts accurately. It completely shifts the context 00:40:37.380 --> 00:40:39.800 of the literature. Exactly. Let's look at medieval 00:40:39.800 --> 00:40:42.460 poetry. When a medieval poet writes a soaring, 00:40:42.500 --> 00:40:44.840 beautiful verse about the sanctuary of a walled 00:40:44.840 --> 00:40:47.380 garden or spends three stanzas describing the 00:40:47.380 --> 00:40:50.480 pure, sweet scent of a rose, modern leaders often 00:40:50.480 --> 00:40:53.340 view that as just a polite, slightly boring literary 00:40:53.340 --> 00:40:55.400 trope. We think, oh, they just liked flowers. 00:40:55.519 --> 00:40:57.780 But when you add the context of the rushes, the 00:40:57.780 --> 00:41:01.360 poetry changes entirely. Yes. The poetry is not 00:41:01.360 --> 00:41:04.429 a gentle appreciation of nature. It is a desperate 00:41:04.429 --> 00:41:07.530 psychological escape from the overwhelming literal 00:41:07.530 --> 00:41:10.469 stench of their daily lives. The walled garden 00:41:10.469 --> 00:41:12.349 represents the only place they could breathe 00:41:12.349 --> 00:41:16.170 clean air. The scented rose is a physical necessity 00:41:16.170 --> 00:41:19.150 to mask the smell of rotting meat and urine on 00:41:19.150 --> 00:41:21.929 the floor. If you do not know about the biological 00:41:21.929 --> 00:41:25.030 reality of the rushes, the poetry loses its urgency, 00:41:25.469 --> 00:41:27.849 its stakes, and its true meaning. That is such 00:41:27.849 --> 00:41:30.260 a brilliant, illuminating point. It makes me 00:41:30.260 --> 00:41:32.360 think of the modern phenomenon of the perfectly 00:41:32.360 --> 00:41:35.219 curated social media influencer. You see this 00:41:35.219 --> 00:41:37.500 beautifully aesthetic photo, soft lighting, a 00:41:37.500 --> 00:41:40.400 perfect latte, pristine white sheets. But what 00:41:40.400 --> 00:41:42.579 you don't see is that just one inch out of the 00:41:42.579 --> 00:41:44.679 camera's frame, the bedroom is covered in piles 00:41:44.679 --> 00:41:46.920 of dirty laundry, empty takeout containers, and 00:41:46.920 --> 00:41:49.800 trash. Exactly. The medieval poetry is the curated 00:41:49.800 --> 00:41:52.619 post. What Furnival and the ETs did by publishing 00:41:52.619 --> 00:41:54.519 the Book of Nurture and the historical prefaces 00:41:54.519 --> 00:41:56.400 was zoom the camera out to show us the whole 00:41:56.400 --> 00:41:59.260 room. garbage smoke rushes and all. And that 00:41:59.260 --> 00:42:02.280 is the true enduring value of what Furnival and 00:42:02.280 --> 00:42:04.559 his international colleagues accomplish. They 00:42:04.559 --> 00:42:07.000 didn't just preserve a sanitized highlight reel 00:42:07.000 --> 00:42:09.559 of the English language. They refused to separate 00:42:09.559 --> 00:42:11.900 the art from the brutal, messy environment that 00:42:11.900 --> 00:42:14.260 created it. They preserved the holistic reality 00:42:14.260 --> 00:42:17.960 of the society that forged the words we use today. 00:42:18.280 --> 00:42:20.059 Which brings us to the end of our journey today. 00:42:20.199 --> 00:42:22.579 Let's pull all these fascinating threads together. 00:42:23.300 --> 00:42:25.579 We started with a small group of highly dedicated 00:42:25.579 --> 00:42:29.019 academics in 1864, scraping by on one guinea 00:42:29.019 --> 00:42:31.500 subscriptions, begging the British public to 00:42:31.500 --> 00:42:34.219 care about crumbling manuscripts. But the Early 00:42:34.219 --> 00:42:36.400 English Text Society didn't just preserve dead 00:42:36.400 --> 00:42:39.039 words on a page. Through their global collaboration, 00:42:39.260 --> 00:42:40.719 their international brotherhood of the book, 00:42:41.099 --> 00:42:43.440 they rescued the total human experience of early 00:42:43.440 --> 00:42:45.750 England. They gave us the strict life or death 00:42:45.750 --> 00:42:47.809 manners of the carving table and the fear of 00:42:47.809 --> 00:42:50.789 the trumps. They gave us the brutal psychological 00:42:50.789 --> 00:42:53.710 toll of the fostering system where children were 00:42:53.710 --> 00:42:56.929 beaten to ensure survival and compliance. They 00:42:56.929 --> 00:42:59.250 documented the centuries -long academic struggles 00:42:59.250 --> 00:43:02.110 to make English a respected language in its own 00:43:02.110 --> 00:43:05.090 universities. And they steadfastly refused to 00:43:05.090 --> 00:43:07.650 shy away from the dirty, smoky, disease -ridden 00:43:07.650 --> 00:43:09.769 physical reality of the people who spoke it. 00:43:10.110 --> 00:43:13.150 So here's my promise to you, the listener, fulfilled. 00:43:13.360 --> 00:43:15.659 The next time you read Shakespeare or Chaucer 00:43:15.659 --> 00:43:18.079 or any historical text, I want you to remember 00:43:18.079 --> 00:43:20.900 the physical reality behind those words. The 00:43:20.900 --> 00:43:23.000 people writing those beautiful sonnets and epic 00:43:23.000 --> 00:43:25.179 tales were not ethereal beings floating in a 00:43:25.179 --> 00:43:27.900 romantic past. They were real humans who worried 00:43:27.900 --> 00:43:30.800 intensely about carving meat correctly, who survived 00:43:30.800 --> 00:43:33.820 the... pinches, nips, and bobs their tutors and 00:43:33.820 --> 00:43:35.840 who had to carefully pick their way across the 00:43:35.840 --> 00:43:38.280 damp, fermenting muck in the rushes on their 00:43:38.280 --> 00:43:40.619 own living room floors. It makes their literary 00:43:40.619 --> 00:43:43.320 achievements all the more remarkable. To create 00:43:43.320 --> 00:43:45.880 enduring beauty amidst such incredible harshness 00:43:45.880 --> 00:43:48.500 and rigid social control is a testament to the 00:43:48.500 --> 00:43:51.239 resilience of the human mind. It really is. And 00:43:51.239 --> 00:43:52.739 we'll leave you with a final thought to mull 00:43:52.739 --> 00:43:55.639 over, applying this exact framework to our own 00:43:55.639 --> 00:43:59.969 lives. Back in 1904, The ETAs casually stated 00:43:59.969 --> 00:44:02.570 they had at least 200 years of work left just 00:44:02.570 --> 00:44:05.110 to preserve the past. They were looking forward, 00:44:05.170 --> 00:44:07.570 knowing the work of cultural preservation is 00:44:07.570 --> 00:44:10.469 never truly done. So I want you to imagine a 00:44:10.469 --> 00:44:14.090 global academic society in the year 2200. Imagine 00:44:14.090 --> 00:44:16.409 them digging into our massive, messy digital 00:44:16.409 --> 00:44:19.389 archives to understand our social history. What 00:44:19.389 --> 00:44:21.769 mundane modern document will be our book of nurture? 00:44:22.369 --> 00:44:24.809 What text will historians point to and say, this 00:44:24.809 --> 00:44:27.239 explains how they actually lived? Will it be 00:44:27.239 --> 00:44:29.179 a highly uploaded Reddit thread on the rigid 00:44:29.179 --> 00:44:31.599 etiquette of writing corporate emails? Will it 00:44:31.599 --> 00:44:33.940 be a frantic YouTube tutorial on optimizing your 00:44:33.940 --> 00:44:35.800 Zoom background to hide your messy apartment? 00:44:36.320 --> 00:44:38.320 Or will it be the unwritten, highly structured 00:44:38.320 --> 00:44:40.179 rules for who gets to speak in a group chat? 00:44:40.579 --> 00:44:42.400 Because whatever that document is, complete with 00:44:42.400 --> 00:44:44.760 all our modern anxieties, unspoken rules, and 00:44:44.760 --> 00:44:46.760 hidden digital filth, it will be the ultimate 00:44:46.760 --> 00:44:48.800 key for the future to understand exactly who 00:44:48.800 --> 00:44:49.139 we were.