Latest / The Smart Cookies podcast / The German Peasants' War: The Bloody History Of Medieval Rebellion | Prof. Lyndal Roper

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The German Peasants' War: The Bloody History Of Medieval Rebellion | Prof. Lyndal Roper · The Smart Cookies podcast

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Lyndal Roper is an Emeritus Regis Professor
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of History at the University of Oxford. Two months
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ago, she was named the Holberg Prize Laureate,
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given annually to a scholar for outstanding contributions
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for her pioneering work on early modern European
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history. And if that wasn't enough, ladies and
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gentlemen, her incredible latest book, the one
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I'm delighted we're going to be talking about
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today, Summer of Fire and Blood, The German Peasants'
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War. has won the prestigious Cundell History
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Prize for History Writing. Professor Roper Lindell,
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welcome to the program. Thank you so much, Zaza.
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It's great to be here. It's only fair that I
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let you know that so far at least, this podcast
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has won precisely zero awards. I'm feeling a
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tiny bit overpowered here. And jealous. And jealous.
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I'm not going to lie. No, I'm just a Melbourne
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girl. I don't know how these things happen. Well,
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please do tell me off the record once we stop
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recording because I need a tip. That being said,
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I'm also extremely grateful that you took the
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time to have a chat with me. The aim of this
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podcast, after all, has always been to try and
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bring this sort of exceptional knowledge closer
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to the mainstream. So thank you very much. I
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know you must be busy. Now, believe it or not,
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the subject of peasant revolts is pretty close
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to my heart. Coming from Slovenia, a tiny country
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where we didn't really have our own nobility.
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The two extremely bloody peasant revolts, one
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in, I believe, 1515, and the other one in 1575,
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I think it was called the Slovenian -Croatian
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Peasant Revolt, are still viewed as foundational
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for our nation. Also, as a kid, I just loved
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going up to the Ljubljana Castle, which is my
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city, the capital, where we have these huge bronze
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sculptures of peasants ready to fight the fat
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evil barons. And I just thought that was the
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most epic thing. Honestly, I'm kind of having
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chills thinking about it right now. So this is
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going to be a total treat for me. All right.
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I talk too much. The German peasant revolt you
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write about in the book wasn't some tiny local
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dispute, right? In fact, it was a vast affair
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that managed to shake the foundations of reality
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as the peasants as well as the ruling classes
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saw it at the time. In fact, the whole thing
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came pretty close to turning the world upside
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down. We will never know what would have happened
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if the peasants won, obviously, because they
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lost the war and lost it in a horrific fashion.
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I think you're right that 1 % of the entire population
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was killed as the rebellion was crushed. However,
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I don't think we can really begin to understand
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this extraordinary set of events if we don't
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try to bring a sort of magnifying glass to the
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realities of life on the ground. So my first
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question has got to be... how hard was the life
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of a peasant living at the beginning of 16th
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century in Germany? I think it was very hard.
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And yet at the same time, I don't think that
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revolutions come out of despair. I think they
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come out of optimism. And in some ways, you can
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see the early 16th century as a time when things
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were getting a little bit better, because I think
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to engage in a revolt, it means confronting the
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possibility that you're going to lose everything.
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And I think for that, you have to have a sense
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of hope and a sense of what is possible. So I'd
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say, yes, it was a really hard life. And in the
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area where the war starts, it's also an area
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of personal serfdom. I think it's really hard
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to think your way back into that system. It means
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that you are owned by your overlord. And so that
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means things like you're not free to move. You
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can't just up sticks, leave your farm and go
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to town. That's not on. In some areas, you even
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had to ask permission to be away overnight. And
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then it means you can't marry whoever you want.
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And if you marry someone who your lord doesn't
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own, you have to pay a big fine or you might
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not even be allowed to marry them. And can I
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tell you a story about someone to whom this happened?
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Because I was just, it's an artist. And I went
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to see his paintings in Stuttgart this weekend.
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So his name is Jörg Rathgeb. He married, he was
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a townsman. He was a successful artist. He was
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starting to make a name for himself. He's an
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absolutely wonderful artist. He's like an expressionist.
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If you can imagine an expressionist in the 16th
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century, this is this guy. And he marries a woman
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who is owned, who's a serf, and that means that
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any of their children will be serfs as well.
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So he writes to the Duke of Württemberg and asks
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to buy her freedom, and the Duke won't let him.
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So that means that for him, he can't get citizenship
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in the town. He can't set up a workshop that
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his children are going to inherit. It's basically
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the kibosh on his career. And you see then why
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someone like that artist would join the peasants,
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which is exactly what he did. He was a well -off
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man. He was living in Stuttgart by this point.
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He was sent... in a deputation to negotiate with
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the peasants and he switched sides. He joined
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them and for three weeks he's off on the road
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with the peasants. He's a revolutionary and he's
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at the Battle of Bublingen, manages to escape
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and then they catch him. You know what happens
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to him? We'll never know for sure but it looks
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from the records as though he was quartered.
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He was killed, executed in the most gruesome
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way imaginable. That's just one story to tell
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you what serfdom means. It didn't mean you couldn't
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be rich. You could, as a peasant owned by your
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lord, really do well on your farm. You had secure
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tenure. You could send stuff to market like the
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lord did. You could grow these new crops. You're
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not just a subsistence farmer. You can become
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rich. But that's what serfdom meant. Additionally,
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when reading the book, I was getting a bit of
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a headache from the endless list of tithes and
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taxes that, for example, you as a peasant owed
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to your Lord, the big tithe, the small tithe,
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death tax, giving away your best animal for holidays,
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a percentage of your crops, donating free labor
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every year. I mean, the list goes on and on and
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on. It does. And don't forget the eggs. eggs
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absolutely i won't forget them yeah you have
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to give these eggs as a proof, as part of your
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serfdom. And it's such an extraordinary idea
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that you have to pay your landlord eggs. And
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we know that these sometimes had thousands of
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eggs. And of course, it's about fertility as
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well. It's about fertility in the animal world,
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as well as fertility in the natural world. And
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these Jews, yes, they are English. I don't know
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how people kept track of them. And when the people
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that... Stuhlingen listed their grievances. They
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had 62 of them. It's just extraordinary. Also,
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the whole kind of geopolitical situation of the
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region was a bit complicated, wasn't it? Especially
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when we were looking at it through the modern
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lens. There was no nation state yet, obviously,
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where everything is neatly tucked into one. polity
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or the other it was a very annoying patchwork
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of territories and rights which ultimately meant
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that one village belonged to one lord but the
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village right next to it might belong to a different
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one and so the two villages had completely different
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sets of obligations and taxes which obviously
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created resentment so how does this how did this
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work in practice yes and not only that you could
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even be owned by the same lord and yet and you
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can be leased out and stuff like it's mad Because
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it's so imbricated in the local history because
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your village might have originally belonged to
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someone else who then pawned it and then you
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end up with a different overlord. Pawning the
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village just sounds so wrong. It's just extraordinary.
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It's a different understanding of property and
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of rights on things as never being total but
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very complicated and full of history. So when
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you're pawning the village, you're not just pawning
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geography or the land. You're pawning it with
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the people living there tied to this land. That's
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right. And so you can end up with territories
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where every village has a different right. And
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so, of course, you can imagine the rulers go,
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hey, why don't we unify this? Why don't we introduce
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uniform Jews and all the rest of it? So that's
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what they try to do. But, of course, that means
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that one village is losing something that it
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had. So I think what's really important here
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is that feudalism is not a stable, time -honoured
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system which never changes. It's constantly altering,
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moving, and people are... arguing about it, and
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it creates a very complex system. And politics
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is like that too. You said it was a patchwork
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of jurisdictions. It absolutely is. There's a
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Holy Roman Empire over the whole of it, but even
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areas that look like sort of precursors of what
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we might think of as a modern land or a modern
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state, not a nation state, but they're often
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ruled by... collectives of rulers so in Saxony
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you'll have the duke but then his brother is
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also governing part of the territory so that
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everything happens with collectives with many
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people having a stake in power and of course
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it's immensely complicated and it looked stable
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but when the pheasants war happens the whole
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thing starts to fall to pieces and it's fascinating
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how that happens. We talked about peasant life,
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so it is my duty to flip the table and ask you
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about the other side. Comparatively speaking,
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how comfy and plumpy was the life of some liege
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lord? I think it depends on which one. I think
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that, and here it's really important to remember
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that it's not just secular lords who are involved
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in feudalism. It's also religious bodies. convents
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and monasteries. And they are some of the worst
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feudal lords, which is not what we'd expect,
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but they really were. And a lot of the antagonism
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is directed against them. So I think being a
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lord, they're sort of big lords and they're starting
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to develop territorial governments. They've got
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a system of office holders who govern all the
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local areas. um the clothes that you see that
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are a high -ranking lord hat they are spectacular
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and you probably um you know the paintings that
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khanah or dura did you see these extraordinary
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clothes and it's the men's clothes that are so
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fabulous the marvelous colors the pearls They're
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just astonishing. And so you wear your political
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status. It's really extraordinary. Whereas a
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peasant probably had one or maybe a spare outfit.
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Clothes are really valuable things and are often
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stolen. They're not something that you have a
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whole wardrobe of if you're a peasant. And the
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houses in which they're living are starting to
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have a bit more furniture, but nothing like as
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furnished as they would later become. Yeah, and
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I don't remember his name, but there's a count.
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When the peasants start marching, he doesn't
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have like a horse. He's riding to one of his
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cousins. Hey, can you please lend me? A war horse,
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because I can't ride anywhere. There's all levels
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here. There are many levels and there are these
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poor knights. He's, in fact, not that poor. I
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was astonished that he needed a horse and couldn't
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get one. But there are many of these knights
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who are really small scale and who are often
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living by feuding. So they will attack local
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towns. They're kind of like robber. They're robber
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outlaws, really. Some of them also joined the
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peasants. So you can see how the whole social
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structure starts to fracture. Like you mentioned,
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an unexpected sort of general villain that appears
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in the Summer of Fire and Blood are the monks
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and the abbots and the nuns of all people. Before
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I read your book, I thought these guys and gals
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live these sequestered but Spartan lives, mostly
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transcribing the Bible during the day and then
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secretly a bit of Aristotle at night, like in
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The Name of the Rose, a film which I love. Although
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I know it's set in the medieval era, so before
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the printing press. In any case, it was quickly...
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made clear that these people were more comfortably
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relaxed, often owning estates and feather beds
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and even erotic art. Yes. I mean, you can see
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it from their point of view. These are people
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who are educated and who are trying to work out
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how best to use their estates. So they want to...
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put things down on paper, they want to have proper
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contracts, and they want to stick to them, and
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they want to use the peasant labor as best as
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they can. So from their point of view, this is
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about trying to create a stable system where
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everyone has the same rights and dues, and where
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they're producing as much as possible for the
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monastery and for the work of God. It's just
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that from the peasant's point of view, they're
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also the ones who most insist on serfdom, on
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owning the serfs, and who really insist on these
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marriage restrictions. And, of course, that's
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such an irony because the church itself has a
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theology of marriage, which is that marriage
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is a sacrament and it's free and it consists
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just in the free exchange of... of the marital
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promise between the couple. The priest is only
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a witness to this. And it's followed by sexual
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intercourse, which is what makes it absolutely
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binding. So the church is saying marriage is
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free. And here are convents and monasteries saying
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you can't marry this person who you want to marry.
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Or if you do, you have to pay a whopping fine.
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Because from their point of view, they have to
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secure their labor force. The Black Death has
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happened. People know that you need a labour
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force in the countryside. You need to be able
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to ensure that your farms are going to be farmed.
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So from their point of view, this is how they
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secure the labour force for the coming generation.
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But it is unbelievable. We think of them as kind
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institutions, the institutions that offer medical
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care, hospitality and all the rest of it. No,
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that's not how they're seen. We were so struck
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by this that we actually created a research project
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because we wanted to ask just how many convents
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and monasteries were attacked during the course
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of the Peasants' War. Because up to this time,
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people had described it locally, but they hadn't
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sort of put it all together and seen the pattern.
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And the area of the Peasants' War is absolutely
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huge. It's five, what are today five different
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European countries. So it's across the central
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area is what is now Germany, but it's going across
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France, Switzerland, Italy, and right around
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to Austria. So it is a huge area. And when you
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look at this, we have identified nearly 1 ,400
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monastic institutions. And 47 % of them were
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attacked in some way. That's an absolutely extraordinary
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figure. It's over, it's 641 who were attacked
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in some way. Some of them are burnt to the ground.
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Some of them, it's just the demand that you have
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to create an inventory. But of course, if you
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create an inventory, then you've got, they know
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what would happen if they were. Give me your
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stuff. And the Reformation is starting to do
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exactly that. It's starting to secularize convents
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and monasteries. Yeah, it's an odd image because,
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again, what I'm thinking of is the sound of music,
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nuns singing and telling you to fall in love
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and stuff like this. And then, yeah, here you
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have nuns coming to your house and they're like,
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give me your best chicken. Yes, yes, exactly.
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Give me the taxes that you owe and you can't
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marry whoever you want. And we have some chronicles
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from some of these convents. And there's one
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where they describe the peasant leader actually
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turning up in the convent and the discussions
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that they had. And they also talk about their
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fear of being raped. And they make light of it.
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They talk about looking under the bed to see
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if there are any peasants in there. But you can
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see it's not just a joke. Yeah. There were many
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other local peasant revolts before, but none
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on this massive scale, right? You argued that
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this wouldn't have been possible without the
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Reformation happening first. You write, and I
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wrote it down, the Reformation's possibilities,
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as well as its limits, cannot be grasped without
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an understanding of the peasant's war as the
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giant trauma at its center. Equally, the ideas,
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dreams, and hopes unleashed by the Reformation
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shaped the Peasants' War. Could you elaborate
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a bit further? This was so important to me because
19:13
with the historiography that I'd kind of been
19:17
part of over the last 30 years, and even the
19:20
work I'd done myself, I think we tended to think
19:22
of the Peasants' War as part of this line of
19:25
peasant revolts and not part of the Reformation.
19:28
But I think that it's the Reformation that really
19:33
drives It's a religious understanding of how
19:38
the world could be different. And I think that's
19:42
got to go back into the history of the Reformation
19:45
because it shows that the range of ideas that
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were around at this time was much wider and that
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encompassed all kinds of things like social welfare,
19:58
like how one understands political power. It's
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a much, much wider movement. than what we think
20:06
of Lutheranism or Zwinglianism or later confessions
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as being. In this early phase, it really is full
20:15
of different ideas. And there are just, I mean,
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it is an amazing period. There are lots of, there
20:21
are women who are writing and publishing pamphlets
20:24
in favour of the Reformation. And it's so interesting.
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They basically stopped publishing in 1525 after
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the defeat of the Peasants' War. Just really
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astonishing as that period of expansion comes
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to an end. We spoke about the monasteries and
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the convents as sort of villains before, but
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if there's one individual who comes across as
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the supreme bad guy for me, it has to be Martin
20:50
Luther, as shocking as it sounds, because the
20:53
man whose ideas basically kickstarted the whole
20:55
thing quickly performed an outrageous 180, condemning
21:00
the peasants. saying they have become possessed
21:02
by the devil and even asking for their blood,
21:05
basically. I did not like him reading the book.
21:09
Yeah, he says, you know, you must stab, slay
21:13
them as you would mad dogs. But yet I don't think
21:17
you can see this as a turnaround on Luther's
21:21
side. We now know much more about the background
21:25
from which Luther came. And we know that in part
21:27
because... archaeologists in Halle investigated
21:32
Luther's childhood home and the home in which
21:37
he lived later in Wittenberg. And what they were
21:39
able to show was that the family was well off.
21:43
It may not have been quite so well off when Luther
21:46
was a child, but this is a family who could afford
21:50
to eat suckling pig. That is pig that's not fully
21:53
grown. And Luther's father was a smelter that
21:59
is he was what we would call a mine owner he
22:03
does the smelting he's not a sort of miner with
22:08
no property at all he's someone who's dealing
22:12
with the counts who live up on the hills and
22:15
who have the leases to the mines so Luther comes
22:19
from a family that has always been more on the
22:25
side of the authorities And once you know that,
22:30
you can understand why Luther is never going
22:33
to call for revolution and for the whole world
22:39
to be overturned. What he adopts, I think, is
22:42
the stance of the prophet. He wants to speak
22:44
truth to power, but he's interested in that conversation
22:48
with power. And he wants to get the lords to
22:52
take arms against the peasants. And when you
22:55
remember that, his... own ruler Frederick the
22:58
Wise who was on his deathbed at this point he
23:01
doesn't want to put down the peasants with armed
23:06
force he's calling for negotiations and he even
23:09
says if God wants the peasants to win what can
23:15
we mortals do as a kind of resignation in Frederick
23:20
the Wise of this And, of course, then you can
23:24
understand why Luther is so determined that the
23:27
lords have got to put down this revolt and that
23:30
they've got to take up arms. So I can see it
23:33
from Luther's side as well. For him and for many,
23:38
rising up against established authority is never
23:42
acceptable. It is a tragedy, though, and it means...
23:49
the end of the Reformation as a really liberatory
23:55
movement, or so I see it. So would it be fair
23:58
to say that theologically he was a revolutionary,
24:01
but materially he totally defended the interests
24:05
of the ruling classes? He's a very complex figure,
24:08
yeah. And that puts it nicely. Theologically
24:11
he is radical and fearless, and he has... an
24:18
extraordinary gift of simplification, going to
24:23
the nub of something and putting it in a phrase
24:26
that you'll never forget, like, slay them like
24:29
mad dogs. You just can't forget that once you've
24:32
heard it. But he has the ability to put really
24:37
complex ideas into a very simple format and to
24:41
communicate it. And I think... That is an intellectual
24:44
gift, which we often underestimate, but which
24:46
is hugely powerful. Could you contrast him with
24:51
his arch nemesis, the apocalyptic preacher who
24:55
kind of took the opposite route when it came
24:57
to the revolts, Thomas Münzer? Yeah, what a guy.
25:02
What a lad. Yes. He's more my type of guy, I
25:06
have to be honest. As an Eastern European, he
25:10
speaks to me. Yeah, maybe I was a bit hasty here,
25:15
but also honest. So Thomas Munster, and first
25:22
I have to say, I think one of the things that
25:25
we've learned, especially over the course of
25:28
the last few years. after the two separate traditions
25:33
of East and West German historiography have come
25:36
together after reunification. I think one of
25:39
the things that's come out of that is that we've
25:42
realised that Thomas Munster is not the be -all
25:44
and end -all of the Peasants' War. He's not the
25:47
only person, he's not the only preacher involved
25:50
in the Peasants' War. He's involved in it in
25:53
Thuringia. That's only one of the, I don't know
25:57
how many battles. There's probably about... at
25:58
least 20 major battles. There are people in Alsace,
26:03
there are local preachers, we know of about 200
26:07
who are involved in the south in one way or another
26:10
and we know there's preaching everywhere and
26:13
it's not just Thomas Müntzer. And who is it who
26:15
invents Thomas Müntzer as the sort of tool of
26:20
the devil? Well, it's Luther, because it's Luther
26:24
who says, it's Münzer who is responsible for
26:27
the peasants' war. And of course, if you say
26:29
it's Münzer who's responsible for the peasants'
26:31
war, you don't need to think about the condition
26:33
of the peasants. You slot the whole thing into
26:36
an eschatological drama in which Münzer is the
26:40
tool of the devil, and the fact that he's attacking
26:42
Luther's reformation shows that luther is on
26:46
god's side and this proves the truth of the lutheran
26:49
message so once you see the peasants war in that
26:52
eschatological frame you don't have to deal with
26:55
what is actually going on and what the feudal
26:58
system is and of course that is the move that
27:01
the lutheran church then makes luther supporters
27:05
come out with all of this and it's crucial because
27:09
the attack that had always been made on luther
27:13
is If you go on like this, the peasants will
27:16
revolt. And what happens? He has gone on like
27:19
that, and the peasants have revolted. So he has
27:23
to get out of being responsible for the peasants'
27:27
war, and that's the other kind of issue he's
27:30
having to deal with. But going back to Münzer,
27:33
he is an extraordinary figure, and he's the theologian
27:38
who gives us the fullest. picture of the Peasants'
27:41
War because we have his letters and we have his
27:44
written works before the war. We don't know exactly
27:48
what he was thinking or doing during the war,
27:50
although we can sort of guess at it. So he is
27:54
a very radical thinker. But extraordinarily,
27:57
his social background is much the same as Luther's.
28:01
He comes from a mining area, a mining town. He
28:04
understands merchants. Many of his closest friends
28:08
are merchants. But he's also someone who can
28:13
relate to many people. He must have been a really
28:17
talented pastor. And one of the things he did
28:21
was give sermons that were based on dreams of
28:26
members of his congregation. He took those dreams
28:29
seriously and analyzed them and made them part
28:32
of what he was preaching. And I think that's
28:35
such an interesting dimension because what Münzer
28:38
insists on is that God speaks to us now. And
28:44
God doesn't communicate just through the dead
28:48
letter of scripture, as he would understand it.
28:50
God speaks to us in dreams and visions. Whereas
28:55
for Luther, It's all scripture, scripture, scripture.
28:59
And we have to understand the Bible. So it's
29:02
two very different understandings of God's relationship
29:07
to his people that we can see at work there.
29:11
And Münzer is also a brilliant rhetorician, just
29:16
as Luther is a wonderful user of language. And
29:19
what's also fascinating is that they even take
29:22
over words from each other. Mad dogs is something
29:26
that is a phrase that Münzer had also used. So
29:31
they are very interesting kind of opposites.
29:35
And Münzer really, so he doesn't say much about
29:42
peasants, and I don't think he really understood
29:45
the situational life of peasants either. But
29:48
what he sees is. the need for Christians to come
29:54
together and for the mighty to be overturned
29:57
from their seats and for an apocalyptic coming
30:02
to turns to usher in God's rule. It was really
30:12
amusing reading about how these fellas are writing
30:15
pamphlets against each other like it's nobody's
30:18
business, sort of like battle rappers would freestyle
30:21
at each other today. They were really going at
30:24
it. But you said that he kind of eschewed anything
30:27
worldly and physical, Münzer. Why did he want
30:32
the peasants to live better? lives on earth or
30:35
did he just want to bring about the apocalypse
30:38
as fast as possible what was going on in his
30:41
thinking religious thinker i don't think he's
30:44
so interested in making lies to the peasants
30:50
better but what he um does that what what he
30:56
shares is a vision of creation um where god made
31:03
the earth god made the fish in the waters the
31:07
birds in the air the wood in the forest and therefore
31:11
it's wrong for an individual to say that they
31:17
own those resources so it's an understanding
31:22
of creation and of right living between people
31:25
and of brotherhood that is part of this whole
31:28
theology of the Peasants' War, which you can
31:31
also see in Münzer. I recently interviewed Professor
31:36
Kenneth Bartlett about the Renaissance, and we
31:39
talked a bunch about Savonarola. He kind of reminded
31:42
me of him. Do you think that's an apt comparison
31:44
or not really? Well, it's so funny because the
31:49
Lutherans also take over Savonarola. I can't
31:54
believe I'm sounding Lutheran right now. That's
31:57
the opposite of what I wanted. I think what's
32:00
different is that Munza, there's that streak
32:06
in Savonarola, which is anti -woman. It's anti,
32:10
it's opposed to wrong living, that you have to
32:17
burn things to do with gaming or rest, that women
32:20
shouldn't. I'm getting more and more reserved
32:23
towards him. Yes. That isn't there in Munza.
32:27
Oh, it isn't there. Okay. And Münzer is remarkably
32:31
pro -woman. And that also is coming out of a
32:35
situation in which women in Mühlhausen, before
32:38
Münzer gets there and Mühlhausen becomes where
32:42
Münzer's main theater of operation is, women
32:46
there have been doing all sorts of things before
32:48
Münzer got there. There's even a case where a
32:50
woman said she was encouraged by her priest.
32:56
to distribute mass. I mean, it's really, really
33:00
extraordinary. Women are involved in attacking
33:04
clergy. Munza's own wife is involved in an incident
33:10
where they disrupt the sermons of a local monk.
33:17
Munza is not someone who would concentrate on
33:23
your individual sins. For him, it's about a whole
33:28
system and it's about injustice and it's about,
33:31
he uses the word tyrant a lot. Tyrannical power
33:38
is what he's opposed to. And he's also got this
33:45
whole understanding of the dream of Daniel and
33:47
how important visions and bringing about a new
33:52
society are. So I'd say he's much more wide -ranging,
33:57
much less sort of individual sin -directed, unlike
34:03
Savonarola. I loved it when more Lutheran preachers
34:08
kept telling this anecdote, the critical anecdote
34:12
about Münzer, how when his son was born, supposedly,
34:15
when they told him... He treated it as if somebody
34:19
told him that the weather has changed slightly
34:21
or something, that he was a really odd person
34:23
and emotionally completely kind of storm -based.
34:27
I like that. Yes, it's a really interesting story
34:29
and it's one that they keep telling. You always
34:33
wonder about stories that people keep telling.
34:34
Quite petty. I do like it. But what is so interesting
34:38
about that story is that the person who brings
34:41
the news... is the wife of the local official
34:45
in Arshtet where this happens. And that's so
34:50
interesting because it shows that Münzer is really
34:56
well in with the ruling elite. I believe that
35:04
theologically we have sufficiently set the stage
35:06
for the things that were about to come. Was there
35:09
some material aspect to it as well that finally
35:14
lit the fuse in 1525? I don't see it as being
35:20
driven by a particular bad harvest or a particular
35:27
new imposition. And I don't see it that way because
35:33
I... I mean, if you look for bad years, yes,
35:36
there were bad years, but you can always find
35:37
a bad year. And, of course, it's always different.
35:43
What's bad for one crop is not necessarily bad
35:46
for another. Nor do I think it's just that things
35:50
piled up and then it all exploded. I think it
35:55
is very much to do with what starts out. as a
36:01
series of strikes, but is from the very word
36:05
go influenced by preachers. So I mentioned how
36:10
there were many. In Balswood, there's this preacher,
36:13
Balthasar Hultmeier, a really charismatic preacher,
36:17
not as charismatic as Minster probably, although
36:19
I haven't heard either of them. Maybe they were.
36:22
But religious ideas are there already, and he's
36:26
trying to introduce the Reformation. And he's
36:29
getting involved in this. And then I think it's
36:32
as people start to put together theology and
36:40
their understanding of serfdom. And where that
36:41
comes out is in what becomes Article 3 of the
36:47
12 articles, which is the peasant program that
36:51
they put together. And that is a highly religious
36:53
document, those 12 articles. And Article 3 says,
36:58
that Christ bought our freedom with his precious
37:02
blood. The poor shepherd or the highest person,
37:08
no one accepted. And therefore, we are free and
37:13
want to be free. I just love that. And want to
37:17
be free because it... It conveys that want. And
37:25
what that article does is it links the demand
37:28
for communion in both kinds to the abolition
37:32
of serfdom. And that's just such a powerful combination.
37:36
And, of course, this is the issue that is now
37:39
becoming the key issue right across the Reformation
37:42
area as place after place says. We want communion
37:45
in both kinds and we want a preacher who will
37:49
preach the word of God. And the very first article
37:51
of the 12 articles says, we want the power to
37:54
appoint our own preacher. We want someone who
37:57
will preach the word of God with no human additions.
38:00
And they mean nothing about indulgences, nothing
38:03
about saints cults, none of this anymore. We
38:06
want the pure word of God. Those are religious
38:10
ideas which are coming together with this attack
38:13
on serfdom. And that's absolutely explosive.
38:16
And when you get that with this theology of creation,
38:20
I think you have an understanding of how all
38:24
this fits together and how it makes one coherent
38:27
program. As you mentioned, the peasants come
38:29
up with this incredible document of the 12 articles
38:31
committing their demands to paper. What were
38:35
they after besides the... wanting to institute
38:39
local preachers that they wanted and the abolition
38:42
of serfdom? What were some of the other demands?
38:44
And before we get onto that, one thing that's
38:47
important to just point out is that we think
38:50
that those 12 articles were in fact written by
38:53
a townsman, a guy in Memmingen called Sebastian
38:57
Lotzer, who'd been a sort of lay pamphleteer
39:00
for the Reformation. He's such an interesting
39:03
character. Again, he's one of these others you
39:05
look at and you think, Why did he get involved
39:08
in the peasants' war? He could have stayed in
39:11
Memmingen. He could have built up his business
39:15
as a furrier, but why did he do this? What happens
39:18
with him is he gets more and more radical and
39:20
then he says to the peasants, I'll offer to be
39:25
your notary, or rather they ask him to be their
39:28
notary and he says, yeah, I'm sure you'd be better
39:33
served with someone else. but I'll do it and
39:35
I won't take any payment. And off he goes with
39:38
the peasants. I mean, just another extraordinary
39:40
story. So he's the guy who probably put the 12
39:43
articles together, but he didn't just make them
39:46
up. At this point, there were hundreds of local
39:50
complaints that had been drawn up. They're all
39:52
about local issues. And the brilliance with this
39:56
document is that it takes the essentials out
39:59
of all those hundreds. And if you read the ones
40:01
of them that still survive, you think, God, how...
40:03
Is anybody going to make sense out of this? But
40:07
Lotzer does and he creates this coherent thing.
40:10
So they want the tithe. They don't say we won't
40:15
pay the tithe. They want the tithe to be used
40:18
by the church for the support of the preacher.
40:21
And this is important because tithes had become
40:24
a sort of investment vehicle. It's like we were
40:28
talking about with feudalism earlier. It's property
40:30
rights that are so good. complicated they get
40:33
turned into investment vehicles it's like future
40:36
markets and then part of the tithe goes to some
40:41
other institution or person somewhere else and
40:44
then what's left over is what's used to support
40:46
your local pastor and so the peasants say we
40:51
want the tithe to be used just for our local
40:53
pastor and we want control of it and we want
40:57
to decide who that pastor is So it's about the
41:01
tithe, it's about not paying a lot of these complex
41:06
tithes on things like the fruit that you grow
41:11
in your orchard, it's also about the right to
41:15
hunt and how important this is and of course
41:20
that constantly comes up in peasant revolts and
41:23
it's grounded through the argument that it's
41:27
god's creation and so uh it can't be lords who
41:31
are the only ones to have the right to hunt in
41:34
the forest and then article 11 um so it's got
41:38
11 articles and the 12th article is if anyone
41:41
can prove that any of these are not scriptural
41:44
we'll take them back so i think that's again
41:48
that's an echo of luther because he said if anyone
41:51
can show that what i've what i've argued is against
41:55
scripture I'll revise it. You write that many
42:01
lords were genuinely astonished that the peasants
42:04
turned against them and thought them unreasonable
42:06
or even mad, which since we outline how hard
42:10
they tended to squeeze the peasants, seems quite
42:13
mad in turn. But I suppose history teaches us
42:17
that if you're used to enjoying a privilege for
42:19
like hundreds of years, you don't really see
42:21
it as a privilege anymore, right? I think, actually,
42:25
that's a really interesting question that you're
42:27
asking. And I think I need to think about this
42:29
more. What is so striking, what struck me was
42:33
how some Lords react by the surprise, the feeling
42:38
that the peasants didn't love them. Yeah, that
42:41
struck me as well. That was really funny because
42:43
they were like, oh, I thought they liked me.
42:45
Why are they so evil towards me? All I want is
42:48
a bunch of eggs and their best animals and free
42:51
labor. I think on the Lord's side, there really
42:54
is this understanding that this is mutual, that
42:58
the peasants love them. And what is also interesting
43:01
is that at the very beginning, when they start
43:04
swearing brotherhood with one another. The peasants.
43:08
the peasants when they start swearing brotherhood
43:10
with each other then um what the local officials
43:14
will do is they'll call everybody together and
43:18
make them renew their oath of loyalty to their
43:21
feudal lord it's as if they think i really they
43:25
love us if we just remind them it'll all be all
43:28
right but of course it's not but it works both
43:31
ways as well because the peasants think that
43:35
if they can get the lords to swear brotherhood
43:37
with them and they're all brothers together and
43:41
they're all equal, then they will have won. But
43:44
of course, they're not going to win. Those lords
43:47
are not going to give up everything they own
43:49
and it's not going to be just fine by swearing
43:52
brotherhood. So you can see that that myth of
43:55
brotherhood really works both ways. There is
43:58
an underlying assumption that this rests on...
44:03
human indebtedness, human affection, and there's
44:10
an inability to see that it doesn't. And that
44:15
suggests that these lords don't really know what
44:21
peasant life is like and that the way the peasants
44:24
are behaving towards them is respectfully, is
44:28
sort of a bit servile, and they don't... understand
44:33
the depth of alienation and hatred that there
44:38
is behind it is that because they're so far removed
44:41
up in their castles and stuff and they have all
44:44
of these intermediaries that are actually dealing
44:46
with the peasants or do they just don't want
44:50
to know I think it's because they have the intermediaries
44:54
dealing with the peasants. And I think the occasions
44:58
on which they see peasants are strictly regulated.
45:01
And I think the intermediaries are the ones who
45:04
have a much better feeling for the alienation
45:09
that there is locally. And they're the ones who
45:12
are constantly sending reports back. The guy
45:15
we mentioned earlier who had to borrow... a horse
45:18
i think it was some sort of account he ends up
45:21
being forced by the peasants to swear um kind
45:25
of like this this pledge with them to to be a
45:27
brother but then he's still scheming in the background
45:31
he has his own private game of thrones sort of
45:33
thing going on and then at the end he just loses
45:35
out with the lords and with the peasants and
45:38
his his house dies out yeah That was a great
45:41
story. Yeah. But we know about it in part because
45:46
one of his officials, in fact, many of these
45:49
officials, they are extraordinary people. They
45:51
write reports. I don't know how they possibly
45:55
had the time to write these reports, but they
45:58
write pages. highly emotional, saying, oh, I
46:02
don't know what to do. Everybody's turning against
46:04
us. My brother's turning against us and this
46:09
is what happened and I rode out. And he writes
46:14
repeatedly, sometimes more than once a day. It's
46:17
a guy called Tom von Herder. And there are others
46:20
like him who write even more emotional accounts
46:22
of what it was like. And they're the reports
46:26
that they're sending. to Wilhelm up in his castle.
46:32
I was really struck on the chapter where you
46:34
talk about the peasant armies marching together.
46:37
You say that movement meant freedom because otherwise
46:40
they were tied to the land like we talked about
46:42
before. So this was the first time most of these
46:44
people ventured further than their next village
46:47
or town, which is mind -boggling for the modern
46:50
mind. Personally, I lived on a couple of different
46:52
continents already, as I believe have you. But
46:55
here we have people... living and dying roughly
46:58
on the same patch of land for hundreds of years?
47:01
Well, I think that they probably move more than
47:04
we think. They're always going to market because
47:08
they're having to do that every week. And here
47:10
it's really important to think about the women
47:11
because they're often the ones who are going
47:14
to market, selling the eggs, selling the hens
47:17
and the cheese. It's not that they're completely
47:22
immobile. And of course, that's how they come
47:24
into contact with these ideas. Print has just
47:27
been used fantastically by the Reformation. But
47:32
that's just the local town, right? Yeah, that's
47:35
a local town. Because at the beginning you said
47:36
sometimes you needed permission. Yeah, that's
47:39
right. To even leave the lands of your liege
47:41
lord. That's right. So what you see in the Peasants'
47:44
War is people going further and further and further.
47:46
So, for example, we know that they gathered on
47:49
the moor in Baltringen. I went there, and it
47:55
is extraordinary. It's sort of like a big bog.
47:58
How they could all gather there, I don't know.
48:01
But, of course, horses can't go in there, so
48:03
it's a safe. space. So as people come from all
48:07
the area around, say, Baltringen, and they're
48:09
coming from further and further afield, and then
48:12
as they start gathering in bands and start to
48:15
move and march together. Then they start meeting
48:19
people with dialects that they can't understand
48:21
and that they have to respect. And one of the
48:25
ordinances said you can't, you must respect people
48:29
with different dialects. So you can see that
48:33
this is not just that they're, I mean, some of
48:36
them go huge distances. I got really interested
48:38
in this. work out could you trace their itineraries
48:43
and sometimes they don't go that far they only
48:44
go about 20 kilometers in the whole war but some
48:47
of them will go hundreds of kilometers there's
48:51
a famous march through the black forest led by
48:54
hans mueller where many people go hundreds of
48:57
kilometers and live out of doors i mean just
49:02
that experience of being with your brothers an
49:06
all -male band probably, not many women, just
49:10
snitching the oxen that you're going to barbecue
49:15
together and sleeping under the stars. I mean,
49:19
it must have been just intoxicating. At a certain
49:25
point, the revolt turns from having... like you
49:27
just described, an almost carnivalesque vibe.
49:30
So peasants boozing in monastery cellars, grilling
49:33
lamb and poking fun at the aristocrats to a more
49:36
ominous thing, which happens after the Weinsberg
49:38
massacre. You write, I have it written down here.
49:43
After the Weinsberg massacre, the mood had darkened.
49:45
The lords had absorbed the full significance
49:48
of the taboo the peasants had broken by committing
49:51
violence against their social superiors. What
49:55
happened at Weinsberg? What happened at Weinsberg
49:58
was a salt seller was passing and realised that
50:04
there was no one in the castle and told the peasants.
50:08
So a peasant band comes and takes the castle
50:12
and another one goes down into town where the
50:16
people who should have been defending that castle
50:18
were hanging out. Life in these castles must
50:21
have been just so boring. So cold and grim. So
50:27
they were down in town having a good time. And
50:30
what they do is they force a group of 24 nobles
50:34
in their retinue to run the gauntlet. And running
50:38
the gauntlet basically means you run through
50:40
lines of soldiers. who each hit you and in the
50:47
end you die and it's exhaustion and it's a soldier's
50:56
form of punishment which here the peasants take
51:00
over and of course some of them will have spent
51:03
time as mercenaries fighting in the armies. It
51:09
is deeply shocking. One of them is, we don't
51:15
know whether he jumped or was pushed, but he
51:17
falls from the church tower. So that is deeply
51:23
shocking. On the other hand, it's important to
51:26
remember that shortly before, a group of people
51:29
on the Lord's side had attacked and killed a
51:32
number of peasants. And for the most part, the
51:36
peasants' war is remarkably non -violent against
51:41
people. This is a major exception. The lords
51:45
are pretty violent consistently against the peasants.
51:50
But I wouldn't say it was a non -violent movement
51:52
because once you form an army, once that gets
51:57
bigger and bigger, and they usually reach the
52:00
size of about 6 ,000 or so, And there's a limit
52:04
on that because you have to be able to provision
52:06
a group of people, and that is always the difficult
52:09
factor. So those armies are clearly going to
52:15
pose a physical threat at some point. So on one
52:21
hand, you have these peasants who are not professional
52:24
fighters, even though some of them might have
52:26
been mercenaries in the past, and they have some
52:28
of these poorer knights with them, usually leading
52:30
them. And on the other... You have professional
52:33
armies with horses and stuff. How do these military
52:37
engagements usually go? Because there are a number
52:40
of battles and sieges that happen during the
52:44
peasants' war. In many cases, they're more like
52:47
massacres. Frankenhausen is a classic example
52:50
where it said afterwards that 6 ,000 peasants
52:54
were slaughtered. and maybe six on the Lord's
52:59
side, also they claim. We don't think that figure
53:01
can be right, but that's the order of difference.
53:05
So what happens is there are the first cannon
53:10
shots and often that is enough to make the presence
53:18
break ranks. And then it's the cavalry, the fact
53:23
that you have numbers of horses riding at you.
53:27
And how the peasants tend to work militarily
53:31
is that they create a group of wagons together.
53:36
And the wagons have usually the plunder on them.
53:39
And then the peasants defend that sort of wagon
53:42
castle so that they mount a sort of defensive
53:46
battle strategy. The trouble is that once that
53:54
breaks and once they start to flee, they are
53:58
just picked off by the cavalry. And the amount
54:02
of slashing that you can do from that height
54:08
leads to just dreadful injuries and a massive
54:12
loss of, they're very, very bloody. So after
54:17
the Weinsberg massacre kind of raises the stakes
54:20
on both sides, how does the war progress? from
54:22
there? Well, then it spreads. It goes further
54:26
and further. It moves up into Franconia, Turingia,
54:29
and things really gather pace. And interestingly,
54:35
around the middle of May, it comes to a showdown
54:39
in many areas in Assas, Chervilla, in Berblingen,
54:44
down south, in Frankenhausen. This sort of mid
54:50
-May and then towards June, with Königshofen
54:54
later. It's a series of battles and what's interesting
54:59
is that the peasants don't give up. They keep
55:01
on fighting. Armies keep on getting formed and
55:05
they keep losing massively. Alsace is one of
55:11
the worst places and, I mean, there are... really
55:20
shocking atrocities. There's one in a village
55:25
where I actually wanted to ride to it to see
55:32
it. And at first I thought there was nothing
55:36
there. And then we saw a, what would you call
55:40
it, a sort of little, an ossuary. And there were...
55:47
hundreds and hundreds of skulls piled up there.
55:50
And in that case, the peasants had fled to the
55:53
village and the village had been set on fire
55:55
from all four corners and they'd locked themselves
56:00
in the church. Just a really dreadful atrocity.
56:04
And there are just endless rape atrocity stories
56:09
from Alsace in particular as a consequence of
56:14
all this. Since there was a labor shortage even
56:20
before the war, hence the free labor often demanded
56:23
of the peasants, why were the lords so incredibly
56:27
bloodthirsty then when quelling the rebellion?
56:29
Because the casualty numbers seem outrageous.
56:32
Like you write in the book, 1 % of the total
56:36
population. That's where the punishment strategy
56:41
is so interesting. Because they're very careful
56:44
not... to execute everybody. They like to work
56:48
with fines. And the people who they do execute
56:51
are the people in towns. And it's important to
56:54
remember that the Peasants' War doesn't just
56:56
involve peasants. It involves a lot of townspeople
56:59
as well. Some towns are completely immune from
57:03
it. Someone like Augsburg, nothing. Nuremberg.
57:08
But then towns that are kind of small. where
57:12
the peasants can be a real threat, they often
57:16
manage to combine with the local population.
57:18
So that's what we see in Wurzburg, for example,
57:20
many, many other examples like that. So what
57:24
the lords do afterwards is they go on these punishment
57:29
tours. They go to town after town. will turn
57:35
up with a list of people who they require to
57:37
turn up on the marketplace and then they execute
57:40
them on the marketplace. And that is a deeply
57:43
shocking thing to do because normally executions
57:46
happen outside the town because the executioner
57:50
is someone who's polluting. So if you can imagine
57:54
what it means to have the blood of these people
57:59
in your town. market square which is of course
58:03
where the peasants come to with their wares it's
58:06
deeply deeply shocking and there is a chronicler
58:11
who I suddenly realized when I was looking at
58:14
the stuff in the archive of course he wrote an
58:18
account of the peasants war he actually wrote
58:19
the three because he had to go on these punishment
58:24
tours and imagine waking up every morning knowing
58:27
that you're going to execute 12 people on the
58:30
on the square of the town where you now are.
58:33
So these are really shocking executions. The
58:41
numbers of people involved is not on the scale
58:45
of those who were killed in battle, but it's
58:48
enough so that no one ever forgets. And they're
58:51
very, very careful not to execute all the serfs.
58:55
And in many cases, the serfs' own lords intercede
58:59
for them because they don't want to lose. their
59:01
property uh how very predictable by the way since
59:07
the the peasants had a good head start and since
59:10
the lord seemed to be on the ropes and so like
59:15
super surprised and shocked and capitulating
59:18
in many cases and you write about uh how many
59:21
monasteries and even castles they managed to
59:23
raise and how quickly and widely the revolt spreads
59:27
why do you think the revolt ultimately fails?
59:34
Why does it ultimately fail? Is it just because
59:38
they didn't have horses and professional military?
59:40
Yeah, I think largely it is that simple. On the
59:44
other hand, I think what is astonishing is how
59:47
long they managed to keep going. And I think
59:49
the reason why they do is because they're able
59:52
to tap into that wealth of monasteries and convents
59:55
and of castles. because sometimes these monasteries
1:00:01
had stocks of arms. Sometimes they managed to
1:00:05
get arms, what would you call them, sort of arms
1:00:09
dumps. They managed to get the town one. Gunpowder.
1:00:13
So they weren't necessarily that badly armed.
1:00:19
We're not talking about people with, you know,
1:00:21
just with sticks facing people with guns. No,
1:00:25
it's not. like that um but i think it is the
1:00:29
lack of training um it's uh also just that a
1:00:35
movement like this really in a sense needed to
1:00:38
be a guerrilla war and it wasn't what they constantly
1:00:42
tried to do was to get bigger and bigger and
1:00:44
bigger and the trouble is as soon as you reach
1:00:45
a certain point you have to fight because you
1:00:49
can't keep people waiting you can't keep them
1:00:53
you know in a in a hyped up Right. Especially
1:00:57
people with like their own farms and families
1:01:00
that they left behind. Exactly. They thought
1:01:02
about that. They had a rotation system, but that's
1:01:05
the fundamental problem they've got. How you
1:01:07
keep them with you and how that drives you into
1:01:13
a situation where you face a pitch battle and
1:01:15
you're going to lose a pitch battle. I think
1:01:17
the thing that I don't understand is why it came
1:01:20
to so many pitch battles when they must have
1:01:22
realized they were going to lose. They win in
1:01:26
Freiburg with a masterstroke where they managed
1:01:29
to get hold of the hill that's opposite Freiburg
1:01:34
and from where. And I've been there, so I know
1:01:37
you can see every individual house in Freiburg.
1:01:40
You can just pick them off. They got hold of
1:01:43
that. They managed to take Freiburg effectively,
1:01:47
but they couldn't keep it. And I think they were
1:01:52
never going to win. On the other hand, the lords
1:01:56
had a lot of luck and it wasn't as straightforward
1:01:59
as it might seem. They were very disunited. One
1:02:03
of the things I've got so interested in lately
1:02:05
is that the key alliance that means that they
1:02:09
defeat the Thessalonians at Frankenhausen is
1:02:11
between Georg of Saxony and his son -in -law,
1:02:15
Philip of Hesse, who's the guy who later commits
1:02:17
bigamy. So Philip of Hesse is a Lutheran and
1:02:21
Georg is a determined Catholic. And they fell
1:02:24
out. They weren't talking to each other shortly
1:02:27
before the peasants' war. And then Philip's lands
1:02:31
get attacked and he needs help. And he can't
1:02:35
get it from Frederick of Saxony because he's
1:02:38
saying, well, you know, if the peasants are going
1:02:40
to win, what can we do? He has to make a deal
1:02:44
with Georg and he writes to Georg and he doesn't
1:02:48
write back. He gets nothing back from him for
1:02:51
two weeks. at the height of the peasants' war,
1:02:54
and only when he finally makes yet another desperate
1:02:59
plea to Georg do they unite. If they had not
1:03:03
united, I don't think they would have beaten
1:03:06
the peasants at Frankenhausen. So there's an
1:03:08
element to this which is also very contingent,
1:03:11
and it's to do also with personal relations,
1:03:15
of a level that you really wouldn't understand.
1:03:18
This seems to me like a father -son. conflict
1:03:21
it's his father -in -law uh he's the next generation
1:03:25
he's a guy who's really proud of his long legs
1:03:28
and we know about those long legs because you
1:03:32
can see them in his armor which is still in vienna
1:03:36
i went to see the armor in vienna i nearly fell
1:03:39
over when i saw oh goodness that is philip he
1:03:43
really did look like that so yeah sometimes it's
1:03:47
really quite surprising things that turns the
1:03:51
outcome in a particular direction, even if the
1:03:53
structural forces, I think, mean that the peasants
1:03:56
wouldn't have been able to win. Too bad. And
1:04:00
I think you said that the ultimate winners of
1:04:03
the war weren't these middle -rank lords, but
1:04:08
the princes, the high nobility, in the end. Why
1:04:12
was that? Because... Many of these minor lords
1:04:19
who had gone over to the other side, they just
1:04:22
then lose power massively locally. It's clear
1:04:27
that you can't get very far by allying with them.
1:04:30
And many of them are punished as a result of
1:04:34
their involvement in the war. And I think it
1:04:37
becomes clear that you need military force. If
1:04:43
you're someone who has to go around begging to
1:04:45
get a war horse, your position is not really
1:04:50
strong enough. So I think in the longer term,
1:04:54
it very much strengthens their position. Lindell,
1:05:01
reading the book, I felt a lot of, shall I say,
1:05:04
sinister echoes with our own times. I don't know
1:05:07
if I'm exaggerating. Many economists that I hosted
1:05:09
on this podcast now say that we're living in
1:05:12
the age of techno -feudalism. There's a cost
1:05:14
of living crisis everywhere. The gap between
1:05:17
the rich and the poor widens every year. Technology
1:05:20
seems to be making it worse, not better. Did
1:05:23
you have some of the same feeling in writing
1:05:24
the book or am I trying to put words into your
1:05:27
mouth here? No, absolutely. And I think that's
1:05:30
where it's really important to go back to something
1:05:32
like the business war because they're coming
1:05:34
up with ideas that they formulated in a period
1:05:37
before when the attack on ecology is just beginning.
1:05:44
And that's why this creation theology is so important
1:05:46
and why I think this idea that resources, natural
1:05:51
resources, are collective, that they shouldn't
1:05:55
be an individual's possession. The way they think
1:05:58
about it is really interesting for us to think
1:06:03
about with them because they're living... before
1:06:05
the onslaught on natural resources, which we've
1:06:10
seen before the growth in industrialization,
1:06:12
but they're seeing the beginnings. Charcoal is
1:06:15
one of their major forms of power. And they're
1:06:18
seeing how the woods are being chopped down and
1:06:21
how wood is becoming a scarce resource. And then
1:06:24
I think what you see is the linking of wealth.
1:06:29
with political power and you see it in the peasants
1:06:32
war the fuga um who are the richest merchants
1:06:35
in the world the bankers yeah the bankers they
1:06:38
back the authority they give them loans they're
1:06:41
starting to use their political their financial
1:06:45
uh power to gain political influence and and
1:06:49
it's absolutely dramatically clear and how important
1:06:53
the minds are to them so that when the miners
1:06:56
start rising up at the same time as the peasants
1:06:59
they make sure to buy them off because they can
1:07:02
see that's really dangerous so i think you can
1:07:05
see that i think you can see how the arrival
1:07:08
of a new medium a new medium of print is in some
1:07:12
ways not unlike the arrival of the internet and
1:07:16
how that affects everything affects how politics
1:07:20
is carried out. So technology is also playing
1:07:23
a role here because the technology of print means
1:07:27
you can't keep ideas bottled up. But what I think
1:07:31
we're seeing now is a move back in many ways
1:07:35
to early modern forms of communication, where
1:07:38
what is important is who said it? Which influencer
1:07:41
was it? Do I believe them? And people didn't
1:07:43
at first trust print. That wasn't authoritative.
1:07:46
It was who said something. where the news was
1:07:49
from, which is why local officials and them giving
1:07:51
news to you is so important. So I think you can
1:07:55
see all that. I think you can see also longer
1:07:58
term what comes out of the Peasants' War, which
1:08:03
is so much about brotherhood. In some ways, you
1:08:06
can see the sexual conservatism, the insistence
1:08:10
on marriage as the only role for women, the ending
1:08:13
of... of convents and all that you can see this
1:08:16
much um fiercer attitude towards the control
1:08:21
of sexuality the control of women these kinds
1:08:24
of things um also starting to come through just
1:08:30
as they are political issues now and i think
1:08:34
goodness um it also shows you um What else does
1:08:42
it show? There's just so many parallels. But
1:08:45
I think the exciting thing also that it's important
1:08:48
not to forget is that a time like this also produces
1:08:52
extraordinary creativity. And you see in an artist
1:08:57
like Jörg Rathgeib, who got forgotten because
1:08:59
he just doesn't fit any of our preconceptions
1:09:02
about art, that there he is. Or there's an extraordinary
1:09:06
document that comes out of the Peasants' War.
1:09:09
to the assembly of the common peasantry. And
1:09:12
there it talks about political ideas, about the
1:09:15
importance of dues not being justified because
1:09:19
they come out of history, but because it's about
1:09:21
what we owe to one another. The author is proposing
1:09:26
that an ordinary person could be the leader.
1:09:29
It doesn't have to be, they shouldn't be tyrants.
1:09:33
It's a really exciting political. that doesn't
1:09:38
fit our preconceptions of the period. So a time
1:09:42
like this also can lead to new ideas, to creativity
1:09:49
and to resistance, I guess. And I think it's
1:09:56
important to remember that as well. In 2026,
1:10:02
we have a lot of... luther's uh these days defending
1:10:06
the interests of the billionaires i think we
1:10:08
need a munzer or two uh that's just what i think
1:10:11
that would be a bit refreshing uh lindell thank
1:10:14
you so much for this amazing conversation i cannot
1:10:17
recommend the book um enough it was an amazing
1:10:21
read um people can get it pretty much everywhere
1:10:24
find bookstores everywhere i believe and do you
1:10:27
have any sort i don't think you have social media
1:10:28
you're you're too smart and busy for that No,
1:10:31
I don't. Okay, great. No, please don't. It's
1:10:36
slippery slope. Thanks again. Thank you, Zaza.
1:10:39
They were great questions, and that was a really
1:10:41
helpful discussion for me. So thank you for that.
1:10:43
Your engagement is just terrific. Thank you.
1:10:46
Thank you so much for listening, darling. Please
1:10:48
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1:12:00
um thanks thanks abel um means a lot please keep
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