We're Not So Different - TopPodcast.com

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The Work of God Oct 24, 2024

Show notes

folks, it's time to talk about Opus Dei, the shadowy "church within a church" of the Catholic Church. why are we talking about Opus Dei? well, mostly because it's been in the news and we were chatting about it via text and decided to do an episode about it. so we talk about the brief history of Opus Dei, some of the controversies surrounding the organization, how it differs from other clerical and monastic orders within the Church hierarchy, why the popes are so friendly with it, and more. then we talk about the recent news stories involving Opus Dei and its supposedly contentious relationship with Pope Francis, how recent changes will effect Opus Dei, and why everyone is fighting about a mountain in rural Spain.
Links: the first is to a Financial Times article that describes a lot of the history of Opus Dei, it is paywalled, just FYI. the second is about the Torreciudad question and the third is about recent changes between the Church and Opus Dei.

The Travels of Ibn Ba2ta (feat Derek Davison) Oct 16, 2024

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folks, we're back with part two of our miniseries on the life and travels of Ibn Battuta, the most well-traveled man of the Middle Ages, and Derek Davison is back to help us out. this time, we look at the final two big journeys of Ibn Battuta's life that take him from Turkey to India to China and back over a 15-year span and then a much shorter one from Tangiers up to Al-Andalus and then down through West Africa to Mali and back home again over 5 years. we also talk about the spread of Islam in the 14th century, how Ibn Battuta managed to avoid the Black Death, and why his arrival was always very bad news for the remaining fragmented parts of the Mongol Empire. it's a lot of fun and we want to thank Derek once again for taking the time to come on the show.

The Travels of Ibn Battuta 1 (feat Derek Davison) Oct 09, 2024

Show notes

folks, we're talking Medieval travelers today and that means we're talking about the man, the myth, the legend: Ibn Battuta. Even if he doesn't have quite the same western name recognition as Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta traveled much more extensively, taking three huge journeys that took him through Africa, Europe, and Asia. He walked the Silk Road and touched the Rock of Gibraltar, he was the Medieval traveler extraordinaire. but to properly do Ibn Battuta justice, we needed a guest who could speak to his extensive journeys and what they meant to the Medieval world, so we brought in Medieval and Modern Muslim scholar Derek Davison of the American Prestige podcast and the Foreign Exchanges substack.
Part one of the interview covers the general details about Ibn Battuta, his early life, and first major trip from 1325-1332, Derek will be back next week for part two where we will finish up the story.
Foreign Exchanges: foreignexchanges.news
Derek's twitter: @ dwdavison

Episode Request: Day in the Life of (Fill in the Blank) Oct 02, 2024

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folks, after a brief weather delay, we're here to close out our Day in the Life series with a grab bag of Medieval jobs we haven't gotten to thus far. this time, we jump around between five different topics suggested by our patrons: how were the famous English archers trained? what did ladies-in-waiting wait on all the damn time? what backbreaking chores did household servants do? how bad was life for a Medieval sailor? and what was life like for the construction worker shaping the monumental structures we can still see today? check it out as we wrap up this series in style.

The Name of the Rose 1: An Introduction (Patreon Ep Unlocked!) Sep 25, 2024

Show notes

In this introduction, we bring you up to speed on the background you need before we get into the book itself next time. We start with a question that is simple in theory but not in practice: what genre is this book? Could be murder-mystery, could be postmodernist ruminations on the nature of academia, who's to say? Next, we talk about that author Umberto Eco and the frankly insane number of things he was trying to get across in the book. Then we discuss what you need to know about liturgical hours, a concept that is foreign to us but quite important to the story. Then there's the very detailed historical setting of this historical fiction, which Eco was obsessed with: a combination of political, social, cultural, and religious factors that form the basis for the unfolding narrative. Finally, we unravel some of the secrets of the unnamed abbey, which serves as the physical setting for The Name of the Rose, including the Aedificium and its mazelike, 56-room library, which is modeled after the Sacra di San Michele abbey near Turin, Italy (see the cover image). There's a lot here but it's a fantastic novel and we can't wait to cover the whole thing along with you over the next few months!

Day in the Life of the Clergy Sep 20, 2024

Show notes

so far in our Day in the Life series, we've covered peasant farmers, knights, merchants, and royalty, which means that the only major group in Medieval Europe we've yet to cover is the clergy. but the clergy wasn't just stuffy archbishops in their giant cathedrals, the humble parish priest provided spiritual comfort as well as social services and material aid to his parishioners while the monks and nuns of the holy orders were working away in their abbeys and convents. this episode, we take a look at three separate levels of the clergy to get a flavor for what their daily lives were like: the parish priest, the archbishop, and the monk/nun. check it out!

A Day in the Life of a Royal Sep 11, 2024

Show notes

folks, we're back and continuing our Day in the Life series and this time we're talking about those fat cat royals in their palaces. sure, their positions could only exist based off the exploitation and suffering of like 98% of the populace but still, what the hell did they do all day? What did it mean to hold court? How were early Medieval courts different from their later counterparts and when did that start to change? What were things like at the court of Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV? Join us as we answer all these questions and more talking about the lives of Medieval royals.

Episode Request: A Day in the Life of a Merchant Sep 05, 2024

Show notes

folks, we're back and continuing our run of answering patron episode requests and our Day in the Life series by talking about what a normal day was like for a Medieval merchant. how was city life different from living on a farm? what was it like to live on a continent where most people made transactions on the barter system but also use coins for trade? what was Medieval currency like and how did Medieval currency exchanges occur without set standards? what was travel like in the Middle Ages? and, what was it like to be one of the vanishingly small number of people who traveled more than a couple miles from home on a daily basis? we talk all that and more as we look at the Medieval merchant

Episode Request: A Day in the Life of a Tourney Knight Aug 30, 2024

Show notes

folks, after consulting our very own sacred chickens, we decided to turn a few of these patron episode requests into a short series, focusing on a Day in the Life of various medieval European people. Last week was the peasant farmer, and this time, it's the High and Late Medieval tournament knight. we discuss the differences between earlier conceptions of knights, the whole chivalry thing, jousting as a social phenomenon, and what it's like to be knight tilting on the jousts. because if there's one thing humans have always loved, it's watching other humans run headlong into each other and develop lifelong but vague allegiances because of it. thanks to our patron Gaffsey for the question.
link to Eleanor's History Hit video on Medieval sports and tourneys: https://youtu.be/909Bo9_1jOU?si=0vT4zlJocoifvOZX

Episode Request: A Day in the Life of a Peasant Farmer Aug 21, 2024

Show notes

folks, throughout the history of the show, we've gotten a ton of questions that we answer at the beginning of almost every episode but we also get episode requests on broader topics. since we have something of a backlog of these, we figured we would start to address them and so we answer a request from our patron Dogspotter, who asked us to do an episode about what life was like down on the farm for the peasant and what kind of animals they had around. so we decided to take you through an exhausting day-in-the-life of a Medieval peasant on a farm.

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