Latest / Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood / 60. The Impotence Trials

Transcript

60. The Impotence Trials · Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood

0:00
Speaker 1: You're listening to an airwave media podcast. Hi everybody, and
0:18
Speaker 1: welcome to Hooded What Now? The history podcast that's not
0:21
Speaker 1: your history class with me? Your host Katie Charlewood, history
0:25
Speaker 1: harlot and reader of books. Disclaimer, the Hooded What Now
0:31
Speaker 1: Podcast use this colorful language, swear words, cuss words, and
0:36
Speaker 1: curse words. Now, if you do not feel that language
0:40
Speaker 1: is appropriate, you have my permission to piss right off.
0:46
Speaker 1: You don't have to listen to my podcast. You don't
0:49
Speaker 1: have to. This is the way I speak, This is
0:52
Speaker 1: the way I would chat to my friends. If you
0:55
Speaker 1: don't like that, you don't have to listen. See here's
0:59
Speaker 1: what happen. And I got an email from someone going
1:01
Speaker 1: a request before reviewing, and they're probably gonna like put
1:04
Speaker 1: me down to zero stars or something because they wanted
1:09
Speaker 1: me to drop the F bomb less because they don't
1:13
Speaker 1: allow that word to float around their house. You know what,
1:18
Speaker 1: that's your prerogative. Don't listen to me. Just don't go
1:22
Speaker 1: away like this is not something you are allowed to
1:26
Speaker 1: have input in. If I was using you know, derogatory
1:30
Speaker 1: terms or ablest bigoted language, then I could completely understand
1:36
Speaker 1: being critiqued. But you don't get to have a say
1:40
Speaker 1: in this. Like I had someone say that, you know,
1:44
Speaker 1: they thought the fact that I used the word fuck
1:46
Speaker 1: and shagging on the Chanelle episode that it was highly inappropriate.
1:53
Speaker 1: And all I keep thinking is, this was a story
1:57
Speaker 1: about a fascist and a Nazi and a Nazi collaborator
2:04
Speaker 1: who got off scot free, who had sex with high
2:08
Speaker 1: ranking Nazi officials so that she could steal the livelihoods
2:13
Speaker 1: and or destroy and end the lives of her business partners.
2:18
Speaker 1: And the takeaway from that whole thing was the wording.
2:24
Speaker 1: The wording, the fact that I use the words fuck. Well,
2:28
Speaker 1: you know what, if the words fuck and shit and
2:33
Speaker 1: bollocks and shag are a worse offense to you than
2:39
Speaker 1: blatant anti Semitism and fascism and the murder of innocent people,
2:50
Speaker 1: then I don't know what to tell you other than
2:53
Speaker 1: you clearly need to sort it your priorities, because if
2:56
Speaker 1: curse words are worse to you than the murder of
3:02
Speaker 1: innocent people, there is something wrong with your brain. There
3:07
Speaker 1: is something wrong with you because on this podcast I
3:12
Speaker 1: have described horrific details. I have talked about murders, assaults, abuse,
3:20
Speaker 1: I have talked about the intimate details of a six
3:24
Speaker 1: year old's assault and murder to the point where I
3:29
Speaker 1: cried and struggled to make the episode. But the word
3:35
Speaker 1: fuck is the issue. Like you don't mind hearing those details,
3:42
Speaker 1: but the word fuck is offensive. Fuck the fuck off. No,
3:50
Speaker 1: it's actually really funny because I think I've told the
3:53
Speaker 1: crow story before, because this is just shows you how
3:56
Speaker 1: I am as a person. Five am, I'm king in
4:00
Speaker 1: my kid's room. I'm in the trundle and the kids
4:03
Speaker 1: room because they're they're struggling to sleep and they want
4:05
Speaker 1: me near them. And so I'm there and I hear
4:09
Speaker 1: this and I'm like, what the fuck is this noise?
4:14
Speaker 1: It's a banging. It seems like someone's trying to break
4:16
Speaker 1: in the window. And like and I'm like looking at
4:21
Speaker 1: the bathroom because it's where the noise is coming from.
4:24
Speaker 1: And there's a fucking crow. There's a crow banging on
4:28
Speaker 1: the window. And my mom's like, oh yeah, if you
4:31
Speaker 1: don't leave food out for the crow, then it will
4:34
Speaker 1: bang in the window five o'clock every morning, which is
4:37
Speaker 1: why we have to leave offerings with a crow every day,
4:40
Speaker 1: every night, I should say, because otherwise we're fucked basically,
4:45
Speaker 1: so I go outside in my five am exhausted state,
4:50
Speaker 1: swing open the door, point at this crow, which just
4:53
Speaker 1: stops and stares we're at me, and I go fucking nah.
4:59
Speaker 2: Like, because that's how I speak in other news, I
5:07
Speaker 2: was saying, I don't even know if I mentioned this.
5:08
Speaker 1: Last week, I got sent the most amazing Valentine's card.
5:13
Speaker 1: It was like handmade, And the worst part was I
5:16
Speaker 1: laughed at my own joke for solid eight minutes because
5:19
Speaker 1: on the front of the card it said Valentine, you
5:23
Speaker 1: have great facts and even greater tits. So it's my
5:25
Speaker 1: own joke and I found it hilarious. And there's like
5:28
Speaker 1: a fan letter inside, and there's these two little they
5:32
Speaker 1: look like the cards used to get in, like the
5:35
Speaker 1: sweet that the candy cigarettes like, it looks like those.
5:40
Speaker 1: So one was like, I think it's big Bird Sesame
5:44
Speaker 1: Street be my Valentine, and the other is Mary Carrie
5:50
Speaker 1: and it says my heart radiates for you, and I
5:54
Speaker 1: just sent me. I was crying. It was so fucking glorious.
5:57
Speaker 1: I love it so much. It's amazing. I love it
6:01
Speaker 1: so much. I'm actually going to frame it and it's
6:04
Speaker 1: going to go up with my collection of stuff I
6:06
Speaker 1: have these. I have some things that I frame when
6:09
Speaker 1: I put up in my room. I've got the the
6:12
Speaker 1: Irish Pride stamps, I got them up. I've got work
6:15
Speaker 1: from like Belfast based artists. I have a Pirate stamp
6:23
Speaker 1: from when I completed this Pirate Escape room and it
6:25
Speaker 1: had like a wax seal, which is just the best thing ever.
6:28
Speaker 1: I have a like a folio print of The Tempest,
6:33
Speaker 1: which is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays. And I
6:37
Speaker 1: have back when I had my comic book store, I
6:41
Speaker 1: had these tickets made up for a very first cinema
6:47
Speaker 1: showing that I did for for like loyal customers that
6:50
Speaker 1: we used to do these special events. And I have
6:53
Speaker 1: my first ones that I had from that way back then.
6:56
Speaker 1: And I think I've got like a Captain Marvel thing
7:00
Speaker 1: in some like local artwork, and then that's just it
7:03
Speaker 1: is just fun. So it's gonna go up there with that.
7:05
Speaker 1: And then once I get like approper like pod space,
7:08
Speaker 1: a pod loft or shed or whatever the hell it's
7:11
Speaker 1: going to be, I'm gonna start putting stuff up in
7:14
Speaker 1: there because it's amazing. I'm just I love it so much.
7:20
Speaker 1: Oh oh, and merch should be here by the end
7:23
Speaker 1: of the week. Now that I've got everything sorted, so
7:28
Speaker 1: marriage is officially finally coming. All they took me forever
7:31
Speaker 1: to do. But I know what you're thinking. You're thinking
7:35
Speaker 1: quite that, jibber, jabber, in fact me, In fact you,
7:38
Speaker 1: I will, But first we've got to get our source on.
7:44
Speaker 1: Our sources are trail by impotence by Pierre Dumont, impotence
7:52
Speaker 1: trials in pre revolutionary France by J Gaines, trial by
7:57
Speaker 1: public performance by our winters behind closed doors, and bince
8:04
Speaker 1: trials and the transitstorical right to martal privacy by Stephanie B. Hoffman.
8:10
Speaker 1: I use it in comfortably good. Then let's begin. It
8:15
Speaker 1: is February, the month of love, and of course because
8:21
Speaker 1: it is the month of romance, I was thinking what
8:25
Speaker 1: would be a good topic to discuss, like could I
8:31
Speaker 1: was trying to think of like really great love stories,
8:33
Speaker 1: and the only one I could think of was Shirley
8:36
Speaker 1: Dobigny La Lapa, and I've already covered her on a
8:39
Speaker 1: previous episode, so go listen to that. And then I thought,
8:44
Speaker 1: you know, every other sort of great love story, I
8:47
Speaker 1: find this very patriarchal or ends with one or both
8:52
Speaker 1: dying in a horrific way. You know, there was no
8:54
Speaker 1: like nice one. And I was like, you know, let's
8:58
Speaker 1: just go the opposite route of talking about great love.
9:01
Speaker 1: Let's talk about things falling apart because I can, because
9:06
Speaker 1: it's my podcast, and I'll do what I want to
9:09
Speaker 1: do what I want to. So divorce, I mean, I
9:14
Speaker 1: am a child of divorce, So maybe you want to
9:18
Speaker 1: subconsciously push me to hear huh, whom's to say? Anyway,
9:24
Speaker 1: let's get divorced, But not now, because that's too easy.
9:29
Speaker 1: We sign some paperwork, we clear at each other across
9:32
Speaker 1: the court room, and we go our separate ways. Now
9:35
Speaker 1: it sounds as if I've been divorced. I have not.
9:37
Speaker 1: I haven't even been married. I've never made it to
9:40
Speaker 1: that stage. I've been engaged too many times and never
9:46
Speaker 1: really made it to the altar like it that never happened.
9:50
Speaker 1: Maybe that's why I eat so many lemons, because I'm
9:54
Speaker 1: so bitter. Getting divorced back in the day pretty hard
10:00
Speaker 1: tough to do. Excuse the pun, and especially the further
10:05
Speaker 1: back you go when you get to like the late
10:08
Speaker 1: thirteen hundreds, early fourteen hundreds, all the way up until
10:12
Speaker 1: the seventeenth century, like separating and marriage is dissolving was
10:21
Speaker 1: really fucking hard to do. So it all comes back
10:25
Speaker 1: to the church. Are we surprised now because it's the
10:30
Speaker 1: olden times medieval times to be exact, not the restaurant
10:34
Speaker 1: which I've never been to. I'm not really keen on
10:37
Speaker 1: turkey legs, but i still feel like I should go
10:41
Speaker 1: to one at some point for the lulls. So we're
10:45
Speaker 1: merely going to focus, like starting from the fourteen hundreds,
10:49
Speaker 1: and we're going to be in both England and France.
10:54
Speaker 2: Now.
10:54
Speaker 1: I've spoken about France and the impotence trials before on
10:59
Speaker 1: TikTok and Instagram because I'm obsessed with this idea. It's
11:06
Speaker 1: I can't help myself. It's just weird and creepy and
11:12
Speaker 1: I'm kind of into it, like not as a voyeur.
11:15
Speaker 1: To clarify, I found this little cultural bubble, this specific
11:19
Speaker 1: incident within this timeframe to be fascinating. I'm not a
11:25
Speaker 1: creepy weirdo, a promise. I mean I am a creepy weirdo,
11:28
Speaker 1: but not for that. For many other things, awful awful
11:32
Speaker 1: twisted things, but not that. So this whole situation starts
11:36
Speaker 1: because of church laws from the thirteenth century. So basically
11:44
Speaker 1: English and French laws at the time were fairly similar,
11:48
Speaker 1: probably because they had the same sort of rulers, so
11:51
Speaker 1: they all came under canon law. So the rules of
11:55
Speaker 1: the Roman Catholic Church, it's all Catholicism, it's all their rules. Now,
12:00
Speaker 1: remember this is the past and this is based on
12:04
Speaker 1: thirteenth century Christian laws, right. So under these rules, marriage
12:11
Speaker 1: was seen as between a man and a woman and
12:14
Speaker 1: was monogamous, so him, her, nobody else, ah nothing, just
12:21
Speaker 1: the two of them, nobody else. So under this rule,
12:25
Speaker 1: cheating as a no no no extramarital affairs by either
12:29
Speaker 1: party ah ah. So the second rule was that once
12:33
Speaker 1: a Christian marriage was like fully formed, it could not
12:36
Speaker 1: be dissolved if either of the parties were still alive.
12:40
Speaker 1: So basically, once the marriage was consummated, once they blinked, shagged, screwed,
12:48
Speaker 1: did the deed, knocked boots and other such euphemisms, then
12:53
Speaker 1: it was a solid marriage and they had to wait
12:55
Speaker 1: for one of them to croak it before they could remarry.
12:59
Speaker 1: The third rule was that close relatives could not marry,
13:04
Speaker 1: so this could be like brother, sister, father, daughter, or
13:12
Speaker 1: even depending on how it was seen brother in law
13:18
Speaker 1: sister in law kind.
13:20
Speaker 3: Of like, well, Henry the Eighth uses this at some
13:23
Speaker 3: point because he basically says that because when he's trying
13:27
Speaker 3: to like get rid of Catherine of Aragon, right, he's
13:30
Speaker 3: trying to chuck Catalina, He's.
13:32
Speaker 1: Not happy what's there gone. So what he does is
13:36
Speaker 1: he tries to use this kind of logic church logic
13:41
Speaker 1: by saying that their marriage wasn't valid because she was
13:46
Speaker 1: his sister in law, his brother's widow, and as such,
13:50
Speaker 1: under the eyes of God, their marriage wasn't valid. However,
13:55
Speaker 1: they did get a papal dispensation which allowed them to marry,
13:59
Speaker 1: which sort of circumvented that rule. But yet I know
14:05
Speaker 1: swings a roundabouts in it. The fourth rule was that
14:08
Speaker 1: once a marriage was fully formed again consummated, that that
14:12
Speaker 1: marriage was now a sacrament of the church. So there's
14:16
Speaker 1: like what seven sacraments in total. I'm trying to remember now,
14:20
Speaker 1: like a good I went to Catholic school, Give me
14:24
Speaker 1: a minute. I also went to Sunday school. I used
14:26
Speaker 1: to collect those Saints cards like Bookemont cards. Lady knows
14:30
Speaker 1: so much about theology, Kerry, Well, I'll give you three
14:32
Speaker 1: fucking guesses. The seven sacraments are baptism, were christening, communion, confirmation, marriage,
14:48
Speaker 1: last rites. There's going to be more what I miss.
14:52
Speaker 1: There's the sacrament of penance, which is basically confession, contrition, satisfaction.
14:59
Speaker 1: So your pennance, you do your five hill Mary's and
15:02
Speaker 1: our Father congratulations. And then the other one I think
15:06
Speaker 1: is I want to say Holy Orders and nineteen the sick.
15:11
Speaker 1: I think it comes under last rites. Right, it's been
15:14
Speaker 1: a while, Okay, it's been a while since I've had
15:17
Speaker 1: to do any Catholic stuff. Roman Catholic the o g
15:21
Speaker 1: kind woo woo woo. It's always really funny though, because
15:25
Speaker 1: like my dad's side are Jewish and my mum's side
15:28
Speaker 1: are like Roman Catholics, so you get the Old Testament
15:32
Speaker 1: and the Old Testament with DLC donloadable content. And yeah,
15:37
Speaker 1: so marriage is one of the sacraments, and so this
15:40
Speaker 1: would be like the twelve hundred. So we're talking Henry
15:44
Speaker 1: the third probably Ish run about this era, and he's
15:48
Speaker 1: part of the Plantagenet line, so he's from Eleanor of Aquitaine, right,
15:53
Speaker 1: who also had her marriage annulled. Lest we forget, because
15:57
Speaker 1: they got annulled because apparently the daughters, So the two
16:00
Speaker 1: daughters she had with her husband does not an actual
16:04
Speaker 1: marriage make even though she wanted to get rid of
16:08
Speaker 1: him for years. It took him pushing it. But go
16:12
Speaker 1: listen to the episode. Eleanor is a badass. Go listen
16:15
Speaker 1: to her. So by the time these thirteenth century rules
16:19
Speaker 1: come around, marriage is indissolable. You cannot dissolve it. It
16:25
Speaker 1: is what it is. You're stuck. Their pal don't know
16:28
Speaker 1: what to tell you. Like, effectively, divorce isn't really a
16:33
Speaker 1: thing because France and England at this point are just
16:37
Speaker 1: super Catholic, and because of the way things worked, you
16:41
Speaker 1: basically ended up with two forms of divorce, the first
16:45
Speaker 1: of which was dissolving the marriage annulment as if it
16:49
Speaker 1: never happened, Go live your lives right. The second was
16:54
Speaker 1: more akin to like a separation, so they could separate,
16:58
Speaker 1: but they certainly couldn't remark like, it just wasn't an option,
17:03
Speaker 1: like one of them had to die before the other
17:06
Speaker 1: could remarry. So like if you got divorced and you
17:10
Speaker 1: didn't get permission to remarry, and you then remarried, it
17:14
Speaker 1: would be seen as adultery and like, if you're a woman,
17:17
Speaker 1: you're gonna get fucking stoned and shit, well maybe not
17:20
Speaker 1: stoned in medieval France, but like things wouldn't work out
17:24
Speaker 1: well for you, shall we say? And so if you've
17:28
Speaker 1: got an abusive husband or he's just like, I don't know,
17:30
Speaker 1: really boring, or you're not happy with your wife, there's
17:34
Speaker 1: no way to like escape that other than I don't know,
17:39
Speaker 1: a carefully coordinated murderer that looks like an accident, maybe
17:43
Speaker 1: because it was really tough for divorce to happen. But
17:48
Speaker 1: then of course there's you know, the trick up the sleeve,
17:52
Speaker 1: which is the core one of the core values really
17:56
Speaker 1: of Christian marriage, which is pro creation. So, especially in
18:02
Speaker 1: medieval France, like sex during marriage wasn't just like approved,
18:09
Speaker 1: it was fucking mandatory, excuse the pun. And like the
18:14
Speaker 1: long and short of it is, it was basically illegal
18:17
Speaker 1: not to have sex with her spouse in medieval France.
18:21
Speaker 1: So if you're married and your marriage does not produce children,
18:26
Speaker 1: it was basically seen like this act against God, like
18:30
Speaker 1: you were doing something bad. It was a slight against
18:34
Speaker 1: the Almighty because you have not pro created, which is
18:38
Speaker 1: a really shitty take. Regardless of the century are in.
18:43
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's basically illegal not to have sex with
18:46
Speaker 1: their spouse and not to create children. So what would
18:50
Speaker 1: happen is women who were generally unhappy in a marriage
18:53
Speaker 1: for whatever reason, they would come forward and claim that
18:57
Speaker 1: their husband was impotent, their marriage wasn't consummated and ergo
19:02
Speaker 1: and annulment was necessary, and they would go forward to
19:05
Speaker 1: these ecclesiastic courts, right, And these ecclesiastic courts would determine
19:12
Speaker 1: whether or not the man was impotent. So they had
19:15
Speaker 1: a couple of tests, right, because they had to make
19:18
Speaker 1: sure not only that the husband could perform his husbandly juries,
19:24
Speaker 1: but also that the wife had not been I don't
19:29
Speaker 1: want to say penetrated, but also penetrated. But I am
19:37
Speaker 1: getting ahead of myself. The couple have to go to
19:40
Speaker 1: this ecclesiastic court. So this court run by the church
19:45
Speaker 1: because it's canon law not common law. Right, so church law,
19:50
Speaker 1: which basically was the ruling shed at the time, you know.
19:54
Speaker 1: So there was four main things that happened at these trials.
19:57
Speaker 1: The first, obviously, paperwork got to have that tape, so
20:02
Speaker 1: they would go through personal documents, so private letters, papers,
20:08
Speaker 1: prayer books with annotations, on them, the whole shebang. They'd
20:12
Speaker 1: collect those and they would peruse them and to look
20:16
Speaker 1: for evidence of non consummation within the marriage. The couple
20:22
Speaker 1: would also be interrogated. That's right. They would actually take
20:27
Speaker 1: them into rooms like separately and fucking interrogate them to
20:32
Speaker 1: get the information they were looking for. They didn't like
20:36
Speaker 1: torture them, but this was like a professional interrogation, Like
20:41
Speaker 1: they had people whose specific job it was to like
20:44
Speaker 1: interrogate spouses. Canon law also meant there had to be
20:49
Speaker 1: like a decision maker, so there had to be a judge,
20:52
Speaker 1: so one person was making the decision. There wasn't a
20:54
Speaker 1: jury like a common law would have. It wasn't like
20:58
Speaker 1: a group of peers. It was wondered it was going
21:02
Speaker 1: to be a dude. And the last thing was like
21:04
Speaker 1: rules of evidence, which we're going to get to. So
21:11
Speaker 1: after all this is sort of done, they've been interrogated,
21:15
Speaker 1: you know, the defendant, the husband effectively. Usually it was
21:20
Speaker 1: rare to be the women, but generally the man is.
21:23
Speaker 1: They would come into the court, they would have to
21:25
Speaker 1: say their peace, they would have to acknowledge, you know,
21:29
Speaker 1: their accusations, and they would have to testify against it.
21:34
Speaker 1: I'm just going to take a moment to apologize from
21:36
Speaker 1: my voice going because it's it's not great right now.
21:40
Speaker 1: So basically, this libel case would be drawn up against
21:44
Speaker 1: the defendant, the husband, and it would have to you know,
21:48
Speaker 1: accuse him of being I don't know, frigid, for being
21:52
Speaker 1: physically incapable, and you know, a bunch of reasons, like
21:57
Speaker 1: they had to be married a certain amount of time
22:00
Speaker 1: to prove that a long enough period of time had
22:02
Speaker 1: like passed, you know, to show like we should have
22:05
Speaker 1: conceived by now or consummated or however they're playing it.
22:11
Speaker 1: And for the most part, like the burden of proof
22:14
Speaker 1: fil and the husband to prove that he, you know,
22:16
Speaker 1: had a fully working penis. Effectively, so many many tests
22:23
Speaker 1: would be done. So in England they would bring in
22:28
Speaker 1: what they called honest women to check the penis to
22:33
Speaker 1: make sure that it was you know, working properly, could
22:37
Speaker 1: get an erection, so on and so forth, and they
22:40
Speaker 1: would report back to the court their findings. And in
22:43
Speaker 1: France they would generally use sex workers for this. Now,
22:46
Speaker 1: I don't know if honest women is a phrase for
22:51
Speaker 1: sex workers specifically, if you are a medievalist, please let
22:55
Speaker 1: me know this because I couldn't find it. I tried
23:01
Speaker 1: Google did not work for me, and I don't really
23:03
Speaker 1: have that many medieval books. So if you know, I
23:07
Speaker 1: would like to be informed in both courts. Like, once
23:12
Speaker 1: you know it was established that in erection, could you know,
23:14
Speaker 1: occur and then be maintained. The next step was ensuring
23:19
Speaker 1: it could function properly. So they would have to in
23:26
Speaker 1: a cold, sterile court room, surrounded by people. They would
23:35
Speaker 1: have to expel bodily fluids, they would have to masturbate
23:40
Speaker 1: while being watched and ensure ejaculation. Now this may surprise you,
23:49
Speaker 1: gentle listeners, but unless you're into voyeurism, unless you like
23:54
Speaker 1: being watched, that level of pressure and that amount of
23:58
Speaker 1: people watching you, unless unless you are very much into
24:03
Speaker 1: that sort of thing, chances are those husbands would be going,
24:07
Speaker 1: not coming, not at all. Needless to say, during these
24:12
Speaker 1: impotence trials, the success rate was very, very low. Most
24:20
Speaker 1: males were not able to pass this test and ergo
24:23
Speaker 1: their marriages were annulled. Some would be done then and there,
24:28
Speaker 1: but then others would have the opportunity to perform a
24:32
Speaker 1: trial by congress, which is just as bad as you
24:36
Speaker 1: think it is, but for now, let's talk about the women. So,
24:41
Speaker 1: just like pre marriage, a lot of women, especially noble women,
24:46
Speaker 1: would have to have a gynological exam to prove that
24:49
Speaker 1: they were pure. And Okay, this is really funny to
24:54
Speaker 1: me because medical science, although not perfect, has come a
24:59
Speaker 1: long way. Biology has we have learned a few things.
25:04
Speaker 1: But back in the medieval times, there was this belief
25:08
Speaker 1: that if a woman's timen was intact, she wouldn't be
25:13
Speaker 1: able to urinate. I don't know where this came from,
25:19
Speaker 1: but it was a thing. So they would get checked
25:22
Speaker 1: in stuff and women were expected to hold in their
25:27
Speaker 1: pea and if they didn't pay, they were virgins. Oh
25:34
Speaker 1: my goodness, I almost forgot about this. Okay. So one
25:37
Speaker 1: thing that would come up in these ecclesiastical courts was
25:42
Speaker 1: sexual positions. So, according to the Church Roman Catholicism, all
25:49
Speaker 1: that jazz, the only appropriate sexual position for consummation in
25:55
Speaker 1: marriage was the missionary style. Like that was how you
25:59
Speaker 1: were supposed to do it, no other way, And so
26:02
Speaker 1: there was this assumption that if you were in any
26:05
Speaker 1: other position that it would not create. There would be
26:09
Speaker 1: no conception, there would be no furius, there would be
26:11
Speaker 1: no baby. Like by putting a wife in a position
26:15
Speaker 1: that would not result in conception was very much seen
26:20
Speaker 1: as fraudulent, like on the part of the husband. So
26:24
Speaker 1: if he had put her in like doggy style or whatever,
26:27
Speaker 1: he was committing fraud because it wasn't going to result
26:31
Speaker 1: in a baby. Because again the purpose of their marriage
26:35
Speaker 1: is to create more little Catholics, Like, that's the purpose.
26:39
Speaker 1: So both parties when they were being interrogated would have
26:42
Speaker 1: to intimately discuss their sexual positions, and if they said
26:46
Speaker 1: anything other than missionary, they were deducting points. But yeah,
26:52
Speaker 1: if they weren't using the correct positions, if she was
26:58
Speaker 1: able to hold inner pee, and or if he had
27:01
Speaker 1: a flippery flobbery fallis that marriage was dissolved and they
27:05
Speaker 1: could go on with their lives. However, there was another option.
27:11
Speaker 1: If a husband was deemed impotent by the impotent trials,
27:15
Speaker 1: or if he felt slighted enough, he could demand a
27:20
Speaker 1: trial by Congress, which is basically doing the do in
27:25
Speaker 1: front of a team of experts. Now I say experts.
27:30
Speaker 1: The couple would be brought to a neutral location where
27:33
Speaker 1: they would have to perform their conjugal duties in front
27:37
Speaker 1: of a team of surgeons, midwives, and priests. Now, which
27:46
Speaker 1: just think about that. Surgeons fair enough, midwives I can
27:50
Speaker 1: get behind. Priests. Priests are the experts on this, okay,
27:58
Speaker 1: So yeah, they're in this neutral territory. They've both agreed
28:01
Speaker 1: on it. They're there. They then get searched because men
28:06
Speaker 1: had been known to like sneak in tiny vials of
28:10
Speaker 1: blood in an attempt to hoodwink the court into thinking
28:14
Speaker 1: that they had taken their wife's maidenhead. Like enough people
28:18
Speaker 1: smuggled it in and were then caught that they had
28:22
Speaker 1: to just do this. So after getting there, being searched stripped,
28:28
Speaker 1: the estranged couple were then expected to get on a
28:32
Speaker 1: bed and bink in front of these people. Now, as
28:39
Speaker 1: I said before, the married couple are estranged, and as such,
28:45
Speaker 1: some of these trials by Congress could literally last hours.
28:53
Speaker 1: If you are a sexually active person, I'm just gonna
28:57
Speaker 1: let you imagine just how uncomfortable that would be. Take
29:03
Speaker 1: a moment, It's okay, it's okay. So the men, the
29:10
Speaker 1: surgeons and the priests, they would like be behind this
29:13
Speaker 1: partition sort of spying, and the midwives would be perched
29:17
Speaker 1: by the pillows. I could only imagine them like shouting
29:20
Speaker 1: given tips, tutting and muttering disapprovingly, and so like they're
29:26
Speaker 1: there so they don't miss any piece of the action.
29:29
Speaker 1: So after this goes on for however long it goes on,
29:33
Speaker 1: like they check, you know, the sheet to make sure
29:37
Speaker 1: there has been an appropriate expulsion of fluids. Uh huh.
29:43
Speaker 1: And if a man was deemed just like incapable at
29:47
Speaker 1: this point, like either way, whether it was by the
29:52
Speaker 1: impotence trail itself or by the trail of Congress, he
29:55
Speaker 1: would be seen as like a laughing stock. He would
29:57
Speaker 1: be ridiculed. It would have been very much a thing.
30:01
Speaker 1: Now we're gonna get into some particular cases. So in
30:06
Speaker 1: thirteen seventy in England, there was a case between Tia
30:10
Speaker 1: Lampard and John Sanderson, and three honest women have to
30:17
Speaker 1: physically examine John and return back to the court. And
30:23
Speaker 1: they say, and if you don't want to hear descriptions
30:26
Speaker 1: of penises, might not want to listen to this. So
30:32
Speaker 1: basically it said that his penis was like an empty
30:36
Speaker 1: intestine of mottled skin, and it does not have any
30:40
Speaker 1: flesh in it, it doesn't have veins, and the middle
30:45
Speaker 1: of its front is totally black. I don't know about you,
30:49
Speaker 1: but this does not seem like a typical description of
30:52
Speaker 1: a penis to me. I'm sorry, but this description is
30:55
Speaker 1: just like so much worse, Like that was had aloud
31:00
Speaker 1: in court afterwards, like that's got to suck and blow. Jeez. Okay,
31:08
Speaker 1: so you know they attempt to get it up, so
31:10
Speaker 1: they're you know, they're stroking it and they place it
31:16
Speaker 1: in semen. I'm sorry, but what the actual fuck they
31:21
Speaker 1: thought that? Like, how did they collect it? Oh my god,
31:26
Speaker 1: I'm just having Oh no, oh no, the rainbow Bright
31:29
Speaker 1: video not Rainbow Bright Rainbow dash. Oh no, my little pony. Nope, nope,
31:34
Speaker 1: don't look it up. If you don't know what it is,
31:36
Speaker 1: don't look up the rainbow Dash jar. You will be
31:41
Speaker 1: scarred for life. So apparently they have a bowl of
31:47
Speaker 1: sperm for dipping. I don't foot what what the actual
31:56
Speaker 1: I'm sorry they had a ball, oh gravy for them
32:02
Speaker 1: to slap the schlong in.
32:04
Speaker 2: I just.
32:06
Speaker 1: I thought people were weird now, and I'm not here
32:09
Speaker 1: to yuck anybody's young, but really, really a dick dish
32:18
Speaker 1: for dipping? What? Anyway? Back on point, back on point.
32:24
Speaker 1: So basically, they tried playing with it. They tried dipping
32:29
Speaker 1: it in the seamen saucer and nothing happened. There was
32:33
Speaker 1: no movement, there was no excitement, there was no growth.
32:37
Speaker 1: It wasn't turgid or rigid. It was merely flaccid. And
32:44
Speaker 1: this gets sent back to the court and they're like, yeah, no,
32:50
Speaker 1: clearly something's wrong here. There's clearly an issue, and as such,
32:54
Speaker 1: this marriage is annulled because clearly he cannot perform his
32:57
Speaker 1: conjugal duties. I actually they really feel bad for him
33:02
Speaker 1: in this situation because that's not great, Like that's everybody
33:08
Speaker 1: in town's going to know that now. That's that's a
33:11
Speaker 1: wee shame. Oh oh. And also his scrotum, I've forgot
33:15
Speaker 1: this bit his scroum. The skin was there, but the
33:19
Speaker 1: actual like balls didn't seem to be there. So there
33:26
Speaker 1: was just like I know, like you know when you
33:29
Speaker 1: peel the skin off like a KFC and it's just
33:33
Speaker 1: kind of there, Like I think that's what it's like.
33:36
Speaker 1: It's just kind of there but nothing in it, like
33:40
Speaker 1: a deflated balloon but wrinkleer. So, yeah, they get this
33:45
Speaker 1: information that marriage is annuled. So back in thirteen sixty eight,
33:51
Speaker 1: this woman Catherine pennel. She takes her husband, Nichola's cantalop
33:56
Speaker 1: to court to another marriage and so they call him
34:01
Speaker 1: in he's supposed to get his physical. He doesn't show
34:05
Speaker 1: up like he gets the heck at a dodge in
34:08
Speaker 1: just scarpers like he disappears. They can't find him, like,
34:15
Speaker 1: I can only assume that he knew it wasn't gonna
34:18
Speaker 1: go well for him, and so he just went into hiding.
34:21
Speaker 1: And I mean, I can't really blame him for that,
34:25
Speaker 1: because clearly this is not something people want to go through.
34:31
Speaker 1: Because Catherine's testimony said that when she placed her hands
34:34
Speaker 1: like on where her husband's genitalia should be, there wasn't
34:39
Speaker 1: anything there. I think the term she used was it
34:44
Speaker 1: was as flat as the palm of a man's hand.
34:48
Speaker 1: I don't know a women's palm's not also flat. I
34:51
Speaker 1: don't know. So there's a theory that Nicholas had congenital
34:56
Speaker 1: adrenale hyperplesia, which is basically a condition like since birth
35:03
Speaker 1: that would create a situation where the penis would not
35:06
Speaker 1: fully form or grow effectively. The person would have a
35:10
Speaker 1: micro penis. It's rare, but it does occur. Now, there
35:15
Speaker 1: is always the option that perhaps Nicholas was intersex but
35:20
Speaker 1: was raised as a boy, or perhaps Nicholas was a
35:23
Speaker 1: trans man. We're not sure, like we don't have the evidence,
35:29
Speaker 1: but it very well could be just floating the idea.
35:33
Speaker 1: So those two cases were in England. So now we're
35:35
Speaker 1: going to move on to France. So in the eighteenth century,
35:39
Speaker 1: the Marcree de jev was accused by his wife, the
35:44
Speaker 1: Mademoiselle de Masklinet, that they'd be married for three years
35:48
Speaker 1: and that the marquis like he would not do anything.
35:53
Speaker 1: He would basically lie beside her and do nothing else,
35:59
Speaker 1: and she would try, but he just was not He
36:04
Speaker 1: would reject her advances of you know, attempts at intimacy
36:09
Speaker 1: and copulation. So she would you know, try and arouse him,
36:14
Speaker 1: and he just wasn't having any of it. Right the mercury,
36:17
Speaker 1: he's brought in, he's examined and they have to check
36:21
Speaker 1: his member. So he has to go through many many
36:26
Speaker 1: observations and tests. So they're doing all these tests. They're
36:31
Speaker 1: checking the shape, the color, the number, they were checking
36:36
Speaker 1: how many were there as if they're I don't know,
36:39
Speaker 1: examining klingons, Like are they expecting a double Dick situation, Like, Okay,
36:46
Speaker 1: he has to undergo all of these tests and all
36:50
Speaker 1: the evidence has to point to him being able to procreate,
36:53
Speaker 1: like he has to be able to create more little Catholics.
37:00
Speaker 1: So this ends up as a win kind of but
37:04
Speaker 1: also not so he's shown to be able to get
37:11
Speaker 1: in erection. Unfortunately for the Marquis, he is unable to
37:16
Speaker 1: maintain an erection. But they have issues more than just
37:26
Speaker 1: the maintaining. They said that the tension, hardness, and the
37:35
Speaker 1: duration of which the erection lasted all pointed to him
37:40
Speaker 1: performing pearly. And the Marquis was about to be like
37:45
Speaker 1: ritually embarrassed and be divorced from his wife because the
37:51
Speaker 1: courts deemed him impotent. But luckily enough for him, his
37:57
Speaker 1: wife dies suddenly and so he is saved the embarrassment.
38:02
Speaker 1: I don't know how she dies. I'm hoping it was,
38:07
Speaker 1: you know, a medical thing or an accident of some kind,
38:12
Speaker 1: but who's to say. Now there's a different story for
38:20
Speaker 1: the Marquis de Langey Lane. Marquis de lange Langy Oh,
38:27
Speaker 1: it's it's like, clearly I'm not thinking properly. So the
38:32
Speaker 1: Marquis de.
38:32
Speaker 4: Lange he is not as lucky as the Marudre because
38:40
Speaker 4: it's what a century earlier, so the seventeenth century, and.
38:46
Speaker 1: He's been married for four years and he's accused of
38:51
Speaker 1: being impotent, but unlike Jeev, he was not accused of
38:57
Speaker 1: like disinterested sexual so they can an interest, but he
39:03
Speaker 1: just wasn't capable, that's the accusation, right. So the married
39:10
Speaker 1: couple are brought in and they are both examined, so
39:14
Speaker 1: they do all the tests, they check the color, the rigidity,
39:18
Speaker 1: all that stuff. They try to make her pay whatever.
39:22
Speaker 1: They bring in the ladies of the night to have
39:26
Speaker 1: some fun with him, and both parties are deemed to
39:29
Speaker 1: be sexually healthy and that they should be able to procreate.
39:35
Speaker 1: They're basically saying his gullies are in tip top shape
39:38
Speaker 1: and that the madame was not a virgin. Now, the Marquis,
39:45
Speaker 1: he's happy with this so far, but the Madame de Langeais,
39:49
Speaker 1: she's not so happy. In fact, she's absolutely livid. She's
39:54
Speaker 1: standing up in court making this trial continue because she's
39:59
Speaker 1: saying he's he's a harsh lover, so he's rough, and
40:03
Speaker 1: the physicians he's putting around, they're not for procreation like
40:08
Speaker 1: the sex they're having is for his gratification, his pleasure,
40:13
Speaker 1: and not for the matter of what it's supposed to
40:17
Speaker 1: be as per canon law, which is making babies. Right,
40:23
Speaker 1: And at this point the church is very much on
40:25
Speaker 1: her side because their marriage, after however many years, still
40:30
Speaker 1: has not produced any children, and that's not looking good
40:34
Speaker 1: for him. But if he had just kept his trap
40:38
Speaker 1: shot like, it could have proceeded and he may have
40:43
Speaker 1: been able to wiggle his way out of it. But
40:46
Speaker 1: his ego was bruised, and as such he effectively goes,
40:51
Speaker 1: fuck this for a game of soldiers. I want a
40:54
Speaker 1: trial by Congress. He demands a trial by Congress. He
41:00
Speaker 1: demands it. He's like, no, I'm going to prove to you.
41:04
Speaker 1: Then all my bits work he wanted. No, he needed
41:08
Speaker 1: to prove that he could in fact procreate, that he
41:12
Speaker 1: had the physical capability to do so. And then when
41:19
Speaker 1: they actually get round to doing the deed. I mean,
41:22
Speaker 1: maybe it's because he was in front of five physicians,
41:29
Speaker 1: five surgeons, and five matrons. No priests in this one,
41:33
Speaker 1: thank Christ. But yeah, he's trying to perform sexually in
41:40
Speaker 1: front of fifteen people, several of which are perched beside
41:45
Speaker 1: him on the pillows watching his every move. He can
41:50
Speaker 1: feel their eyes on him. Needless to say, this does
41:54
Speaker 1: not end well. They attempt to do the deed, he
41:58
Speaker 1: does not ejaculate, and his reputation is in tatus, and
42:06
Speaker 1: in a move that surprises absolutely no one, his wife
42:09
Speaker 1: is granted a divorce. So for the maquestinalge, he's you know,
42:15
Speaker 1: I mean, he's ridiculed. His reputation is not great. He
42:18
Speaker 1: has to return his wife's dowry. And to top it
42:22
Speaker 1: all off, he is forbidden to remarry because as far
42:25
Speaker 1: as they're concerned, like if you cannot do the deed,
42:30
Speaker 1: you should not get married, right, but it does. He
42:33
Speaker 1: gets remarried anyway, and with his second wife they end
42:37
Speaker 1: up having was it seven kids in total, So things
42:40
Speaker 1: didn't work out the worst for him all in all.
42:43
Speaker 1: And like it wasn't until what was it the late
42:45
Speaker 1: seventeenth century, early eighteenth century that you know, impotence trials
42:51
Speaker 1: and the trial of Congress really got phased out and disappeared,
42:55
Speaker 1: like it started fading in the late seventeenth and then
42:58
Speaker 1: by the eighteenth it was very sprad if at all
43:03
Speaker 1: because you know, partly shagging in front of a room
43:06
Speaker 1: of people, which is becoming too much of a spectacle.
43:10
Speaker 1: And for France, the country is open with his sexuality.
43:15
Speaker 1: But there you go the impotence trials and trial by
43:18
Speaker 1: Congress where it was basically illegal not to shag your spouse.
43:23
Speaker 1: So what did we learn today? Don't get married in
43:28
Speaker 1: medieval times because that just seems unpleasant for everybody. Two,
43:36
Speaker 1: Do not let your bruise ego and your inflated sense
43:38
Speaker 1: of self importance put you in a situation where you
43:43
Speaker 1: should have to screw your wife in a room full
43:47
Speaker 1: of people. And unless you're into that sort of thing,
43:50
Speaker 1: and everybody consents because it's up to you. We don't
43:54
Speaker 1: judge here, Okay, as long as it's all consenting adults,
43:58
Speaker 1: you have a good time. And thirdly, church laws are
44:03
Speaker 1: fucking weird, man, fucking weird. Now, if you liked my
44:09
Speaker 1: telling of the impotence trials, which I'm very sorry up
44:12
Speaker 1: and there's my voice this whole time, probably from the ranting,
44:15
Speaker 1: you can always go and rate and review five stars
44:19
Speaker 1: apple podcasts and on Spotify and wherever you listen to
44:23
Speaker 1: podcasts like on Apple. If you write a review, doesn't
44:26
Speaker 1: matter what you say, as long as you give five stars.
44:30
Speaker 1: You can say anything. You could tell me your favorite
44:32
Speaker 1: Valentine's present you ever got, or the funniest card you received,
44:37
Speaker 1: or the Valentine's is just a hallmark holiday.
44:41
Speaker 2: Ill.
44:42
Speaker 1: Valentine's is just one day. So's Christmas, bitch, so's your birthday?
44:48
Speaker 1: It's just one day. Why are you celebrating that? Just saying,
44:53
Speaker 1: let's putting it out there. If you like my content
44:56
Speaker 1: and want to support me more, you can always tip
44:58
Speaker 1: me on PayPal. There's a link in description down below.
45:01
Speaker 1: You can get some merch which will be available by
45:04
Speaker 1: the end of this week. Woo woo, woo woo. And yeah,
45:08
Speaker 1: you can follow me on socials and interact with those
45:11
Speaker 1: and I don't know, share this podcast with people and
45:14
Speaker 1: make them listen to me and rate me because they're
45:17
Speaker 1: awesome and I am awesome and we should all be
45:19
Speaker 1: awesome together, don't you think. Yes? Now, recommendation time. So
45:26
Speaker 1: someone suggested that my recommendations that I do, I should
45:29
Speaker 1: post them on Instagram because when they're driving and listening
45:33
Speaker 1: to the podcast, they don't always catch where I'm like sharing.
45:39
Speaker 1: So that's fair, and I'm going to start doing that.
45:43
Speaker 1: For reading, I'm going to recommend Unwell Women by Eleanor Gleghorn,
45:49
Speaker 1: which is all about the misunderstanding, misinterpretation of women's illness
45:54
Speaker 1: throughout well whole time. For watching, you know what, I'm
45:58
Speaker 1: going to recommend the last of Us I Am. It
46:01
Speaker 1: just made me cry so many human emotions I can't
46:08
Speaker 1: And also Petrobiscal is amazing, oh so much. And for listening,
46:16
Speaker 1: I'm gonna recommend the new Harley Quinn podcast that's come out.
46:22
Speaker 1: It's voiced by Christina Ricci. It is a retelling of
46:27
Speaker 1: the story of Harley and how she became who she was,
46:30
Speaker 1: and it's from her perspective and it shows that she
46:34
Speaker 1: wasn't just a pawn in this game. She was the
46:38
Speaker 1: one moving the pieces. So yeah, that is me. That
46:43
Speaker 1: is everything for today. And there's actually going to be
46:46
Speaker 1: a bity so this week first time when are we
46:49
Speaker 1: well that you're gonna like that? So if you've made
46:51
Speaker 1: it to the end of this podcast, before I go,
46:55
Speaker 1: I just want to say thank you to everybody who listens,
46:58
Speaker 1: everybody who has listen, and everybody who continues to you,
47:02
Speaker 1: like dm ME on socials like share my Stuff, everybody
47:08
Speaker 1: who's still here, Like I really really appreciate you, and
47:12
Speaker 1: I want you to know that I am very grateful
47:16
Speaker 1: that you tune in every week, you download, that you listen,
47:21
Speaker 1: and that you like the stories I'm sharing. I'm sorry
47:23
Speaker 1: I've been losing my voice today and it's just been
47:26
Speaker 1: kind of affecting me as well. I think all this
47:29
Speaker 1: is I cannot get a bit much sometimes, you know.
47:33
Speaker 1: But I do want to say thank you and that
47:37
Speaker 1: you all mean so much to me because the fact
47:41
Speaker 1: that you're listening, the fact that you're here, You're just awesome.
47:47
Speaker 1: I love you, all of you. And with that I
47:51
Speaker 1: shall bid you with you adios or revoir of what
47:56
Speaker 1: is them? My friends, Bye Bye,