Latest / Ridiculous History / That Time People Paid Rent With Eels
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, Before we get into today's episode, we want
- 0:04Speaker 1: to cite Dr John Wyatt Greenley, who is a world
- 0:09Speaker 1: class authority on not just deals but many things from
- 0:14Speaker 1: the medieval world, and want to cite his work because
- 0:19Speaker 1: he has put a lot of time and research into
- 0:22Speaker 1: the story that we're going to explore today. You can
- 0:26Speaker 1: also find his website, which we mentioned in the episode,
- 0:30Speaker 1: Historia car Tarum dot org if you would like to
- 0:33Speaker 1: learn more about his past, present and future work. Hey,
- 0:38Speaker 1: and as we're going through this episode, we've collected a
- 0:40Speaker 1: bunch of research from a bunch of different outlets, and
- 0:43Speaker 1: what we didn't realize is that much of the writing
- 0:46Speaker 1: that's done on this topic comes directly from the research
- 0:49Speaker 1: that Dr Greenley has performed. And two of the main
- 0:52Speaker 1: articles will be pulling from today are from history extra
- 0:56Speaker 1: dot com. The article is Fishing for Gold, how eels
- 1:00Speaker 1: our the Medieval Economy and another one is on Historia
- 1:03Speaker 1: Carterum dot org and that's the Eel Rents Project. So
- 1:08Speaker 1: once again, thank you so much. The citations are important
- 1:12Speaker 1: and much of what you will hear in today's episode
- 1:15Speaker 1: comes directly from the work of Dr Greenley. Ridiculous History
- 1:21Speaker 1: is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome back to
- 1:48Speaker 1: the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
- 1:51Speaker 1: for tuning in. We've got our super producers Casey Pagram,
- 1:56Speaker 1: got our super producer Max Williams, live and direct here.
- 2:02Speaker 1: My good Palin co host Noel Brown is on Adventures
- 2:05Speaker 1: will be returning soon. I am Ben, and I am
- 2:09Speaker 1: not going into today's episode alone. Found out that my
- 2:15Speaker 1: very old dear friend, my writer die Matt Frederick himself
- 2:20Speaker 1: is into the concept of this episode. No spoilers yet,
- 2:25Speaker 1: but Matt, there you are. How's it going? Man? Hello back,
- 2:32Speaker 1: Hi everybody? Yes, yeah, can we get around of applause
- 2:36Speaker 1: in there? Max for yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah, unnecessary unnecessary?
- 2:46Speaker 1: You know why why not while we're while we're throwing
- 2:48Speaker 1: Max under the under the producer bus, Max, give yourself
- 2:51Speaker 1: a round of applause for that applause to here. I
- 3:09Speaker 1: didn't know. I didn't know you could do that. I
- 3:12Speaker 1: didn't know either, So so Matt, thank you so much
- 3:17Speaker 1: for joining us today. Uh hit you up a little
- 3:21Speaker 1: a little while ago, like yesterday off air and asked
- 3:25Speaker 1: you about your position on eels in general. Right, Yeah,
- 3:31Speaker 1: Ben straight up slapped me in the face. With an
- 3:33Speaker 1: eel right before this with the question that doesn't work?
- 3:38Speaker 1: But yes, yes, this is all coming together very quickly.
- 3:41Speaker 1: But Ben, I have to tell you I couldn't be
- 3:43Speaker 1: more excited to discuss this topic with you today. Yes, yes, Now,
- 3:48Speaker 1: just before the three of us started recording today's episode, Matt,
- 3:53Speaker 1: you had a question for Max. What was that question? Oh? Yes,
- 3:58Speaker 1: how do you feel out sushi in general? That's the
- 4:02Speaker 1: first question? So in general? Yeah, all about it? Totally,
- 4:05Speaker 1: will do it? Okay? Okay? Is that like public sushi?
- 4:09Speaker 1: Is that high end sushi? Any sushi? I don't really
- 4:13Speaker 1: have much standards. I mean I'll eat like other lower
- 4:16Speaker 1: than publics. I don't know how much lower is really
- 4:18Speaker 1: than publics but I'll go there. Okay, I don't care,
- 4:20Speaker 1: got it? You heard that quick trip? Max? Is there
- 4:23Speaker 1: ready for your sushi? Uh? But okay? But what kind
- 4:28Speaker 1: of thing do you order? Is eel on the menu
- 4:31Speaker 1: for you when you get sushi? So it's been a
- 4:34Speaker 1: long time. I mean, look, you know, you go to Kroger,
- 4:36Speaker 1: you go to public, you get like the one that's
- 4:38Speaker 1: been sitting there for a couple of days. I mean
- 4:39Speaker 1: it's usually just like a California roll like that, they
- 4:42Speaker 1: might put something else in there also, like you know,
- 4:45Speaker 1: it's usually just like slim pickings. But if I'm getting
- 4:47Speaker 1: some nice sushi, yeah, I'll give me the weirdest thing
- 4:49Speaker 1: you have. I mean to call back a previous episode.
- 4:52Speaker 1: I mean, I'll do a cricket sushi roll. I'll do it. Yeah, okay, yeah,
- 4:58Speaker 1: dare to dream. I'm on board with this. I think
- 5:00Speaker 1: we're all kind of sushi fans. What about you, Matt,
- 5:02Speaker 1: you are you a sushi guy? But only if it's revolving.
- 5:07Speaker 1: If the sushi is revolving in some way, then I'm down.
- 5:10Speaker 1: If it's just yeah, yeah, if it's just static sushi,
- 5:14Speaker 1: not interested, Yeah yeah, because it's supposed to be fresh,
- 5:17Speaker 1: and what's more fresh than watching it rolled toward you
- 5:20Speaker 1: on a belt? Yeah. We we are big fans of sushi.
- 5:24Speaker 1: I'm also a big fan of Unagi specifically, which is,
- 5:28Speaker 1: you know, the Japanese freshwater eel. And today's episode is
- 5:33Speaker 1: about eels. We got there segue British British eels. Yes,
- 5:39Speaker 1: this ties into a weird dream of mine, an ambition.
- 5:43Speaker 1: I would say that I god, I want to do
- 5:46Speaker 1: at some point in life. But today's episode is also
- 5:50Speaker 1: a weird way about finance. You see, once upon a time,
- 5:55Speaker 1: fellow Ridiculous historians, the British used to pay their not
- 6:00Speaker 1: with money, but with eels, e e l s, eels
- 6:05Speaker 1: and other things like firewood and eggs. So it's it's
- 6:11Speaker 1: really cool. This, this is super cool. It makes me
- 6:14Speaker 1: kind of wish we were still there to an extent,
- 6:17Speaker 1: because I've got lots of just things around the house
- 6:19Speaker 1: I need to get rid of. If I could, if
- 6:21Speaker 1: I could pay rent with kids books, Oh my god. Um,
- 6:28Speaker 1: but yes, that that is what we're discussing today, the
- 6:32Speaker 1: economics of almost it is a barter system or it's uh,
- 6:39Speaker 1: it's so weird to imagine a living and or dead
- 6:42Speaker 1: creature as a piece of currency. Yeah. Yeah. And as
- 6:47Speaker 1: we know, as our fellow listeners of both Ridiculous History
- 6:51Speaker 1: and the show You and I created stuff they want,
- 6:54Speaker 1: you know, are aware, currency has been any number of
- 6:58Speaker 1: bizarre things in the past, from peppercorns two giant rocks.
- 7:02Speaker 1: And while we originally found this via History extra dot com,
- 7:06Speaker 1: it turns out the vast majority of the research in
- 7:08Speaker 1: this episode is the work of one person, Dr John
- 7:12Speaker 1: Wyatt Greenley, who was again the expert on this fascinating story.
- 7:17Speaker 1: I mean, let's look to him for examples. We've got
- 7:19Speaker 1: a cool example to get us into this way. Back
- 7:22Speaker 1: in eleven or some monks at a place called Ramsey
- 7:26Speaker 1: Abbey in Huntingdon's Share and they needed a way across
- 7:31Speaker 1: a local fin f e n. So there was this
- 7:34Speaker 1: landowner whose name was Ralph Tubberville. That's correct. There were
- 7:39Speaker 1: people named Ralph in the eleven hundreds. Uh So, Ralph
- 7:42Speaker 1: had this road and he said, I'm willing to lease
- 7:44Speaker 1: this and it was an elevated causeway. It was pretty
- 7:48Speaker 1: dope as construction went at the time. And so for
- 7:51Speaker 1: the right to use this road, the monks at Ramsey
- 7:55Speaker 1: Abbey said, okay, Ralph, we'll pay you and once a
- 7:58Speaker 1: year we're gonna kind of pay you were rent on
- 8:01Speaker 1: this road. But it's not gonna be in. It's not
- 8:04Speaker 1: gonna be in terms of what we would consider currency today,
- 8:08Speaker 1: was it. No, it would be one thousand eels per annum,
- 8:13Speaker 1: as well as two pounds each of pepper and ginger
- 8:17Speaker 1: and a pair of scarlet trousers that was specifically for
- 8:22Speaker 1: the man of Tuberville. It's just the weirdest attition there.
- 8:27Speaker 1: You know, what were the negotiations, like, you know, did
- 8:30Speaker 1: they start with the eels and then they eventually you know,
- 8:33Speaker 1: they tacked on scarlet trousers, like like seal the deal?
- 8:38Speaker 1: And also how many pairs of red pants do you need? Yeah,
- 8:42Speaker 1: it was Christmas time, and you know they just thought
- 8:45Speaker 1: it would really go with what Ralph had going on
- 8:47Speaker 1: on the upper part of his body. They just thought
- 8:49Speaker 1: the red is just gonna look nice with that green
- 8:52Speaker 1: tunic he had going on. Yeah, Tuberville was all about
- 8:55Speaker 1: the vibe, whether or not he was a clothes horse.
- 8:59Speaker 1: We know that when he passed away. This same abbey
- 9:04Speaker 1: later renegotiated the deal, and Ralph's widow was not as
- 9:09Speaker 1: in the pants as he was. She did not want
- 9:12Speaker 1: anymore scarlet trousers. Instead, she wanted half a mark in coins,
- 9:17Speaker 1: sixty cartloads of firewood. But as Greenley notes, she still
- 9:22Speaker 1: wanted those one thousand eels, which is wild. Do they
- 9:26Speaker 1: get them all at once? Is it? Like? What do
- 9:29Speaker 1: you do with a thousand eels at once? Like even
- 9:32Speaker 1: if you're i mean, if you're one person or a family,
- 9:36Speaker 1: even if you've got twelve kids, a thousand eels there's
- 9:39Speaker 1: not a great way in eleven nine to keep that
- 9:42Speaker 1: stuff good unless you're converting it to fertilize her. Immediately,
- 9:48Speaker 1: it was like eel the bitcoin of its day. You
- 9:51Speaker 1: could convert it to other currencies. I I don't know,
- 9:54Speaker 1: I don't know. Maybe there was a drying technique that
- 9:57Speaker 1: I just don't know about, as salted jelly deel kind
- 10:01Speaker 1: of thing. Well, well, here's the here's the weirdest part.
- 10:04Speaker 1: It was commonplace from like at least the tenth century onward.
- 10:08Speaker 1: People in England, all all across England paid some taxes
- 10:13Speaker 1: in terms of eels. Living eels were dead eels. And
- 10:17Speaker 1: that's because coins were not as common. And as coins
- 10:20Speaker 1: became a little more common, these eel rents did decline,
- 10:25Speaker 1: but they didn't decline for centuries. And this is where
- 10:29Speaker 1: our story takes place, because nowadays, you know, I was
- 10:33Speaker 1: thinking about this guy's During the pandemic, we saw a
- 10:36Speaker 1: lot more people carrying a lot less cash. And do
- 10:39Speaker 1: you guys remember when places like home depot and other
- 10:43Speaker 1: stores literally add signs up about a coin shortage. Did
- 10:47Speaker 1: you guys see any of that? They still have that
- 10:49Speaker 1: in my area. I don't know about you guys. Yeah,
- 10:51Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I haven't been to home depot in
- 10:54Speaker 1: a minute. It probably should be, but yeah, I do
- 10:57Speaker 1: remember that coin shortage completely. Yeah, and there's not enough coin. Well,
- 11:01Speaker 1: in medieval times there also was not enough coin um
- 11:05Speaker 1: and there just wasn't These are precious metals being pressed,
- 11:09Speaker 1: sometimes individually, sometimes in mass, but there aren't that many
- 11:13Speaker 1: coins that are metal going around. So as Dr Greenley
- 11:17Speaker 1: found a lot of places, a lot of landlords would
- 11:20Speaker 1: accept these things that they would call in kind payments
- 11:24Speaker 1: or in kind rent. So it could be eels, it
- 11:27Speaker 1: could be other things. It could be ale, beer, laggers,
- 11:30Speaker 1: those are really popular, eggs, grain, really anything that a
- 11:35Speaker 1: household could make use of. And firewood was also very
- 11:39Speaker 1: very common. That firewood as a whole other episode which
- 11:42Speaker 1: could we could continue into the America's into the times
- 11:46Speaker 1: of you know, the sixteen hundreds and prior to that,
- 11:49Speaker 1: when you could pay all of your rent with firewood
- 11:53Speaker 1: just because of the harshness of the weather and the
- 11:57Speaker 1: winters and the nights. Anyway, we're talking about eels today, Yeah,
- 12:02Speaker 1: we're talking about eels. Eels were not some especially rare
- 12:06Speaker 1: animal at this time. They were in fact incredibly plentiful.
- 12:11Speaker 1: And the lords of England, the rulers at the time,
- 12:14Speaker 1: they wanted their cut, they wanted their vig you know.
- 12:17Speaker 1: So if you look at if you look at the
- 12:20Speaker 1: ten eighties six Domesday Survey, you'll see that they had
- 12:23Speaker 1: more records of rent being paid in eels than they
- 12:27Speaker 1: did of rent being paid in corn. And like, this
- 12:31Speaker 1: was nuts. If you lived in the village of Harmston,
- 12:35Speaker 1: for instance, in Lincolnshire, then your community collectively would oh,
- 12:40Speaker 1: Earl Hugh of Chester seventy five thousand eels per year.
- 12:45Speaker 1: I like the use of per adam though, Matt, that
- 12:47Speaker 1: sounds so much classier. Sure, yes, but listen to this again.
- 12:54Speaker 1: We're talking crazy numbers here. Seventy five dollars to old Earl.
- 12:58Speaker 1: But by the end of the eleventh century there were
- 13:01Speaker 1: more than five hundred and forty thousand eels being paid
- 13:06Speaker 1: as rent in England. Panum. Yeah, so they have see perannum.
- 13:11Speaker 1: It's just smooth. You're smooth guy. So landlords, what did
- 13:15Speaker 1: they do with these eels? Well, they ate some of them.
- 13:18Speaker 1: But it goes back to the earlier question Max, Matt
- 13:21Speaker 1: and I had, which is what you do? What do
- 13:23Speaker 1: you do with all these eels. Dr Greenley explains how
- 13:26Speaker 1: a landlord would kind of cycle these out. So let's
- 13:30Speaker 1: go back to those Ramsey monks. They had tenants, and
- 13:35Speaker 1: their tenants collectively gave them more than seventy thousand eels
- 13:39Speaker 1: every year, and the monks couldn't need all of those.
- 13:43Speaker 1: They were they were probably at some point sick of
- 13:46Speaker 1: eating eel if you can believe it. Max can't believe it.
- 13:50Speaker 1: He's a big old fan. And and uh. And then
- 13:53Speaker 1: what they would do then is they would use the
- 13:56Speaker 1: eels that their tenants gave them as a way to
- 13:59Speaker 1: pay for stuff they needed at the monastery, Like they
- 14:02Speaker 1: seven a thousand eels a year to Ralph and later
- 14:05Speaker 1: as widow. And then they agreed to pay four thousand
- 14:09Speaker 1: eels each spring to peter Brew Abbey for the right
- 14:12Speaker 1: to take stone from a quarry nearby that the abbey controlled,
- 14:17Speaker 1: so eels could be literally money that you eat, which
- 14:22Speaker 1: I feel like, I feel like it's crazy that it
- 14:26Speaker 1: worked that long, because if you could just eat, like,
- 14:29Speaker 1: if you could just eat a green back right now,
- 14:31Speaker 1: the world would be a very different place. That's very true.
- 14:34Speaker 1: And a greenback is oh, you're talking about the paper
- 14:39Speaker 1: slash fabric stuff that we use. This currency, got it
- 14:45Speaker 1: literally eating money? Yeah, I guess that's the same thing.
- 14:48Speaker 1: Well that that this is a good way to get
- 14:50Speaker 1: into talking about something who already brought up. These are
- 14:53Speaker 1: not fresh eels usually usual. These are not the ones
- 14:56Speaker 1: that are coming straight out, and they were just speared.
- 15:06Speaker 1: As Professor Greenley points out, and he's literally the world's
- 15:09Speaker 1: foremost expert on this, it wasn't as if people were
- 15:12Speaker 1: stockpiling massive pools of live eels. These are actually preserved eels.
- 15:18Speaker 1: We we kind of joked about, you know, a drying technique,
- 15:21Speaker 1: but yeah, salt and time and smoking, drying all that
- 15:27Speaker 1: kind of stuff was very common. It was a common
- 15:30Speaker 1: practice to do that to these eels and then trade those.
- 15:33Speaker 1: So you are you actually would have God, I'm imagining
- 15:36Speaker 1: chests in some wealthy landlord's house, just chests of eel
- 15:42Speaker 1: uh that are required. It's like the medieval MTV cribs
- 15:46Speaker 1: where someone's taking a tour of the abbey and then
- 15:49Speaker 1: some guy who was like the celebrity, you know, host
- 15:52Speaker 1: of the abbey is is like, and this is our
- 15:55Speaker 1: eel room. Stacks on stacks on stacks or should we
- 15:59Speaker 1: say sticks on sticks on sticks, because when the eels
- 16:02Speaker 1: were dried and preserved, they were bundled into sticks. That
- 16:06Speaker 1: would be about twenty five eels per stick. So that
- 16:09Speaker 1: was the definition of bawling. How many eel sticks do
- 16:12Speaker 1: you have? You know what I mean? I'm so I'm
- 16:14Speaker 1: so sad that there wasn't some equivalent of poetry or
- 16:19Speaker 1: hip hop bragging about the amount of eels people had.
- 16:23Speaker 1: I wonder if it would hold up. I'd listened, I'd
- 16:24Speaker 1: listened to that mixtape once. Oh dude, yes, that would
- 16:28Speaker 1: be in my car right now. I wonder if they
- 16:31Speaker 1: if they had like quarter sticks. That was a quarter stick. Uh,
- 16:34Speaker 1: and just it's five eels just kind of wrapped up
- 16:38Speaker 1: but some kind of maybe red trousers. I don't know. Um,
- 16:42Speaker 1: it's really weird, man. We know this because there's an
- 16:45Speaker 1: historical record of who paid who what and what that
- 16:51Speaker 1: currency was. And the currency was sticks, right, That's how
- 16:55Speaker 1: you know it's a stick of eel. So um. There's
- 16:58Speaker 1: a quote here from an article on Dr green Mainly's
- 17:00Speaker 1: eel rent project on his website Historia carter Um, where
- 17:04Speaker 1: he walks us through the difficult business of calculating the
- 17:08Speaker 1: worth of an eel x mill owed y abbey z
- 17:12Speaker 1: sticks of eels per year, But really, what what does
- 17:15Speaker 1: that mean? And then there's another thing here when you're
- 17:18Speaker 1: talking about taxes, because you know, in medieval Europe as
- 17:23Speaker 1: everywhere else, you always had to pay the king in
- 17:25Speaker 1: the in that case or the rulers a little bit
- 17:28Speaker 1: of that eel off the top. How much eel did
- 17:31Speaker 1: they get off the top? And how do you figure
- 17:33Speaker 1: that out when you're dealing in sticks of eels. Yeah,
- 17:36Speaker 1: this is actually beyond the capacities of our great inflation calculator.
- 17:43Speaker 1: So we're going to refer to some excellent work by
- 17:46Speaker 1: Historia carter Um. Here we go, when we try to
- 17:51Speaker 1: make an educated guess about how much, you know, cold
- 17:55Speaker 1: hard scratch and eel was actually worth. We could see
- 17:58Speaker 1: that a single translates to about thirty six to seventy
- 18:04Speaker 1: two cents in dollars today, So a stick of eels
- 18:09Speaker 1: would equal something between nine dollars and six cents and
- 18:13Speaker 1: eighteen dollars and eleven cents in the modern day. So
- 18:19Speaker 1: Historia Carterum argues that if we take those two measures
- 18:22Speaker 1: as kind of our spectrum of high and low end
- 18:25Speaker 1: price points. Then we get a window of understanding that
- 18:28Speaker 1: we didn't have otherwise, and that gives us an even
- 18:32Speaker 1: better sense of just how many eels were moving in
- 18:37Speaker 1: this weird dried eel market. So there's a flip side
- 18:41Speaker 1: to this. Let's let's try to think of what what
- 18:45Speaker 1: we in the modern day could use to understand the
- 18:49Speaker 1: value of eels, and Dr Greenley has a great answer
- 18:53Speaker 1: here as well. If you are a friend of Jeff,
- 18:56Speaker 1: which is our euphemism for Amazon Prime subscribers, then you'll
- 19:01Speaker 1: be happy to do well. I don't know if you'll
- 19:03Speaker 1: be happy to know, but if you'll be fun at parties.
- 19:07Speaker 1: When you say an Amazon Prime membership is like what
- 19:10Speaker 1: a hundred nineteen dollars If you paid an eels, that
- 19:14Speaker 1: would only be about a hundred and sixty five to
- 19:17Speaker 1: three hundred and thirty eels, So just six to thirteen sticks. Man,
- 19:21Speaker 1: that's pretty great on a on a yearly basis, that's
- 19:26Speaker 1: not that many eels. I'm just kidding. Imagine how much
- 19:30Speaker 1: how much actual work that would take for an individual
- 19:33Speaker 1: to go out to a river and catch three hundred
- 19:36Speaker 1: and thirty eels, Like that's a lot of days and
- 19:40Speaker 1: hours and just to get your Amazon Prime membership. I
- 19:44Speaker 1: don't know, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, you're You're absolutely right, Matt.
- 19:48Speaker 1: It's it's weird because now I'm I'm going to spend
- 19:52Speaker 1: the weekend. I don't know about you guys been to
- 19:54Speaker 1: spend the weekend thinking like how much is this an eels? I'll,
- 19:58Speaker 1: you know, I'll be at the local bookstore or something,
- 20:02Speaker 1: and then yeah, I might try it. I might just
- 20:04Speaker 1: try it, see if I can. I can pay in
- 20:06Speaker 1: a in a stack of eels. That's really I just
- 20:10Speaker 1: see the headline already, like local lind A man arrested
- 20:13Speaker 1: for trying to shove eels down a man's pocket. You
- 20:19Speaker 1: guys don't understand history, he said, So you know what
- 20:24Speaker 1: I just thought of. Guys, let's have we have forgotten
- 20:27Speaker 1: to take into account the smell? We didn't even think
- 20:31Speaker 1: about the smell. Everybody's got eels up in their house
- 20:36Speaker 1: in a chest somewhere on sticks in a room. They're
- 20:40Speaker 1: carrying them around to pay for rent. What is what
- 20:43Speaker 1: is the smell like out there? Success bro money, The
- 20:50Speaker 1: fishy smell of some eels would be a dead giveaway
- 20:55Speaker 1: that the person you were talking to is just bawling
- 20:58Speaker 1: out of control. So uh yeah, well, you know, smells
- 21:04Speaker 1: in general were treated differently on a cultural basis back then. Right,
- 21:09Speaker 1: this is kind of pre deodorant. It does make you
- 21:11Speaker 1: wonder what that did for the I don't know how
- 21:15Speaker 1: to put this lightly, the sex drive of everybody waltson around. Yeah,
- 21:19Speaker 1: that's oh, that's a segue for sure, nicely done, Matt,
- 21:23Speaker 1: because I think the Church comes into play here. You know,
- 21:27Speaker 1: the Church is one of the biggest authority figures at
- 21:30Speaker 1: this time, and they are historically very concerned with sex
- 21:38Speaker 1: and very concerned with lent l e n T. Yes,
- 21:43Speaker 1: it's that lent rent. So we're just gonna be rhyming
- 21:46Speaker 1: all over the place. Yeah. So, so let's talk about
- 21:49Speaker 1: the species of the British river eel. Yes, so um,
- 21:53Speaker 1: most of the eels that end up being used in
- 21:56Speaker 1: this old rent situation are caught in autumn, that's to know, right,
- 22:01Speaker 1: And the reason for that is because there's a yearly
- 22:03Speaker 1: downstream migration. And back to Dr Greenley's article for History
- 22:08Speaker 1: extra fishing for Gold, how eels powered the medieval economy? Okay,
- 22:13Speaker 1: that are that are occurring in autumn? So lots of
- 22:16Speaker 1: them are being caught, but the rent wasn't due until
- 22:19Speaker 1: the start of Lent, so late winter or spring. So
- 22:22Speaker 1: everybody's catching, drying salting, doing whatever they do to those
- 22:26Speaker 1: eels to get them on the sticks. Um. And the
- 22:29Speaker 1: reason why rent was due at this time because there
- 22:33Speaker 1: was during Lent, you were prohibited from eating meat. Okay,
- 22:38Speaker 1: this is very important. So if you cut any fresh eels,
- 22:41Speaker 1: you can't eat them. Got dried eels, They're still good
- 22:43Speaker 1: for eating, but you can't eat them because you're not
- 22:45Speaker 1: allowed to. So the church understood this explicit connection between meat.
- 22:51Speaker 1: They believed there was an explicit connection between eating meat
- 22:56Speaker 1: and um carnetas. No, I'm just showing um the carnal urges. Yeah, yeah, Carnea,
- 23:06Speaker 1: I know. I was just saying, because they're so good,
- 23:09Speaker 1: they're almost sexual. They're so good. You're on the money, man,
- 23:14Speaker 1: you're on the eel money. Because they believe that the church,
- 23:17Speaker 1: that is, believe the eating meat, which they would you know,
- 23:20Speaker 1: define is like be for sheep, etcetera, what have you,
- 23:24Speaker 1: was going to inevitably make a person kind of nusty, right,
- 23:29Speaker 1: kind of amorous? And why is that? Because a creature
- 23:34Speaker 1: that was created va sex would in some way in
- 23:39Speaker 1: in inform your body or I don't know, symbolically make
- 23:44Speaker 1: you get all torned up. That's the concept. Yeah, you're
- 23:49Speaker 1: charged up. It's interesting too because, unless you think we're
- 23:53Speaker 1: picking on Europe too much, the consumption of certain animal
- 23:57Speaker 1: parts across the world has long been believe to increase libido,
- 24:01Speaker 1: you know, like especially eating sexual organs of animals. For
- 24:06Speaker 1: the Church at this time, it was just enough that
- 24:09Speaker 1: the animal was created through good old reproduction. And we
- 24:13Speaker 1: know what you're thinking, Hey, guys, don't fish also reproduce?
- 24:19Speaker 1: Don't they also kind of have a sexual union? Yes,
- 24:21Speaker 1: fish reproduced, But the Catholic Church wasn't worried about that,
- 24:25Speaker 1: probably because they couldn't walk to a nearby field and
- 24:28Speaker 1: just see, you know, I'll say it, eels getting down,
- 24:32Speaker 1: getting skin a max with each other the way they
- 24:34Speaker 1: can see cattle. But think about what an eel looks
- 24:38Speaker 1: like thin, think about the touch of an eel so slippery,
- 24:44Speaker 1: it's so it's so very penis Like I don't know,
- 24:50Speaker 1: just you think it would be the opposite, like, don't
- 24:53Speaker 1: get the eels, don't eat the eels. There's way too
- 24:57Speaker 1: much sexual stuff going on there, But no, it was
- 24:59Speaker 1: it was. It was the opposite of that. Yeah, you
- 25:02Speaker 1: bring up a great point. It is it is sort
- 25:04Speaker 1: of weird for us to look back and say, like, hey,
- 25:06Speaker 1: wasn't that one of the most phallic animals you could
- 25:09Speaker 1: have allowed? But but instead they were They said, no, nope,
- 25:14Speaker 1: it's a lent and even if you're married, you need
- 25:17Speaker 1: to be abstinent for this time. So meat is off
- 25:21Speaker 1: the table because it might make you violate this spiritual system.
- 25:26Speaker 1: Eating fish was thought to not excite the libido in
- 25:30Speaker 1: any way at all, so you could have as much
- 25:32Speaker 1: fish as you wanted. Eels were a great choice because
- 25:36Speaker 1: they were everywhere right in the rivers and the waterways.
- 25:40Speaker 1: And eel pies we're super, super popular. Eel pies are
- 25:47Speaker 1: still a storied, if declining tradition in the UK today,
- 25:51Speaker 1: and that is because virtually every medieval European at the
- 25:55Speaker 1: time believe that these fish reproduced a sexually, and it's
- 26:00Speaker 1: a very very old belief system that dates back to
- 26:04Speaker 1: Aristotle and the somewhat unique life cycle of the eel,
- 26:08Speaker 1: which is ugly. Just for the record, I think they're ugly,
- 26:10Speaker 1: but they probably think we're ugly. Too. Yeah, I'm sure
- 26:15Speaker 1: they would get real, real weirded out by us if
- 26:18Speaker 1: there were just some studying going on. I bet it's
- 26:21Speaker 1: happened in the past. But the reproductive cycle of these
- 26:25Speaker 1: eels really is fascinating. They would go out into the
- 26:28Speaker 1: open Atlantic, the the ocean there, and that is where
- 26:32Speaker 1: they would breed. Then they would migrate to land, and
- 26:36Speaker 1: this is when they're in a very small state as
- 26:39Speaker 1: a fairly new creature. So the young, the young essentially
- 26:43Speaker 1: called Elver's there's a term I did not know e
- 26:47Speaker 1: l V E r s. And they're heading up the river.
- 26:50Speaker 1: Once they find a home that's you know, somewhere amongst
- 26:55Speaker 1: the river. There they stay and then they grow for
- 26:58Speaker 1: over a decade around it decade until they eventually head
- 27:02Speaker 1: back to the sea to get it on and then
- 27:05Speaker 1: send their little young ones back up the river. And
- 27:10Speaker 1: then they die. Oh yeah, they do die after after coitas, no,
- 27:15Speaker 1: just after doing it, after doing it, they die. Uh.
- 27:19Speaker 1: And Aristotle very smart dude, right, he'd never made the
- 27:24Speaker 1: connection between Elver's, this juvenile form, and the growing form
- 27:28Speaker 1: we call eels. So he wrote with a lot of
- 27:33Speaker 1: self assurance that eels springs spontaneously out of the Mud.
- 27:38Speaker 1: And then other writers followed his example and said, that's it.
- 27:42Speaker 1: They come, they come from the Mud. This was so
- 27:44Speaker 1: well established in the European zeitgeist that persisted into at
- 27:49Speaker 1: least the fifteen hundreds, maybe longer. And part of that
- 27:54Speaker 1: was because if you look at an eel before it,
- 27:58Speaker 1: you know, gets to its final form, you wouldn't normally
- 28:02Speaker 1: see sexual organs. They only develop ovaries and testes at
- 28:07Speaker 1: the very very end of their lives, right before they
- 28:09Speaker 1: head out for that fatal romantic encounter on the high seas.
- 28:13Speaker 1: That's how they know. They gotta go like one, Oh
- 28:16Speaker 1: I got sorry, guys, I got balls. Now it's over
- 28:19Speaker 1: for me. That's how that's how it goes. That's so
- 28:23Speaker 1: messed up that that's like their death sentence or their
- 28:26Speaker 1: death cry or I don't know, that's just so weird
- 28:29Speaker 1: or is it awesome. There's a great way to go.
- 28:33Speaker 1: I suppose I like that optimism. Yeah, let's go with that.
- 28:36Speaker 1: And so people were searching for eel ovaries and test
- 28:41Speaker 1: these for centuries. It wasn't just Aristotle. We're not picking
- 28:46Speaker 1: on just one guy. Sigmund Freud also looked and he
- 28:49Speaker 1: couldn't find anything. So because these eels were not seen reproducing,
- 28:54Speaker 1: and because if you searched one of their bodies you
- 28:56Speaker 1: would not see anything that indicated they could reproduce, it's
- 29:00Speaker 1: kind of understandable that they were like, no, I don't know,
- 29:03Speaker 1: there's weird things that come from the mud. They go
- 29:06Speaker 1: to the sea. You can pay rent with them. What's
- 29:07Speaker 1: not to love? Seriously, And it wasn't until seventeen seventy
- 29:12Speaker 1: seven that an Italian dude named Carlo Mondini actually located
- 29:16Speaker 1: and eel Ovary and there was much rejoicing. So everybody
- 29:20Speaker 1: thank that guy because he made an important discovery that
- 29:26Speaker 1: may sound kind of irrelevant today, but it was something
- 29:29Speaker 1: that confused people for a very long time. And Sigmund Freud,
- 29:33Speaker 1: just to clarify, he was specifically looking for eel testes.
- 29:38Speaker 1: He he didn't find them, but so they knew. Just
- 29:41Speaker 1: imagine that. I could just see that just going out
- 29:47Speaker 1: getting another eel, just like holding it up, got a
- 29:51Speaker 1: microscope and he's just like the testes. The test is, yeah,
- 29:58Speaker 1: it's gotta paint, you know U. I imagine I imagine
- 30:02Speaker 1: Sigmund like being disappointed that he's known for his work
- 30:06Speaker 1: in psychology, and he's like, but I'm an eel man.
- 30:09Speaker 1: I'm on the quest for the balls. Psychology is very secondary.
- 30:14Speaker 1: But he would do a Reddit A m A and
- 30:16Speaker 1: people would be asking about Freudian theory, and his response
- 30:20Speaker 1: would be like, hey, guys, can we keep our questions
- 30:23Speaker 1: focused on eel tests? Please? That's right, that's right. Please
- 30:28Speaker 1: save all your questions unless they're about eels. There are
- 30:32Speaker 1: no eel test these they say they reproducing a dream,
- 30:37Speaker 1: a subconscious thought of another eel coming out of them.
- 30:43Speaker 1: You're nailing it. Sorry, it's perfect, it's perfect. I want
- 30:47Speaker 1: to read that Reddit A m A. So, so this
- 30:51Speaker 1: is the thing. Their unique position in religion and culture
- 30:56Speaker 1: of the time helps us understand why pay eel rent
- 31:01Speaker 1: remains such a long lived practice, even after coinage was
- 31:06Speaker 1: a little more common. Most of the other in kind
- 31:10Speaker 1: rents had disappeared by the century or so, but not
- 31:15Speaker 1: eel rent. Landlords continued to collect that from the thirteenth century.
- 31:20Speaker 1: You can see records that show people are paying with
- 31:22Speaker 1: the eel, like more than four hundred and fifty thousand
- 31:25Speaker 1: eels annually, and they were still making new inc and
- 31:28Speaker 1: new deals that we're all in Eel. You're right, we
- 31:32Speaker 1: are accellently rhyming a lot on this. I should tell you, Matt,
- 31:35Speaker 1: I think you missed it. Um, but Max was there
- 31:37Speaker 1: a few episodes ago Nolan got really close to freestyle
- 31:41Speaker 1: and I think, I think, yeah, I think he's gonna
- 31:43Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna get do it. Some finally finally
- 31:49Speaker 1: respond to the culture kings. Shout out to them, Man,
- 31:54Speaker 1: they're good dudes too, and yeah they're and uh, back
- 31:58Speaker 1: to eels. Dr Greenly also has an explanation for the
- 32:03Speaker 1: decline of this practice, the Black Death. Sorry, that's an
- 32:08Speaker 1: unexpected heavy twist, but yeah, the Black Death. Yeah, I
- 32:18Speaker 1: guess it was seen as a little less clean in
- 32:23Speaker 1: a lot of ways. And I can imagine that. Yeah,
- 32:26Speaker 1: it wasn't until after nine. Oh what a great year,
- 32:30Speaker 1: thirty nine. That's when red meat started to become way
- 32:34Speaker 1: more available to people, and you know, I would say
- 32:38Speaker 1: probably became pretty exciting given all the eel consumption over
- 32:43Speaker 1: the centuries. And at the same time, you know, the
- 32:46Speaker 1: population was much lower after Black Death, and that meant
- 32:50Speaker 1: there's way more currency per person out there, you know,
- 32:54Speaker 1: floating around. So you can imagine that the demand for
- 32:58Speaker 1: eels over all began to drop, and around that time
- 33:01Speaker 1: there were only I think around thirty four thousand eels
- 33:06Speaker 1: that were paid that I don't know, how do you
- 33:09Speaker 1: say this eel rent was only paid with thirty four
- 33:13Speaker 1: thousand individuals. I don't know how to say this stuff, guys.
- 33:17Speaker 1: And so we see this precipitous decline four hundred and
- 33:21Speaker 1: fifty thousand eels every year during the thirteenth century or so,
- 33:26Speaker 1: down to just thirty four thousand eels in the game
- 33:30Speaker 1: a little later, and then in the fifteenth century and
- 33:33Speaker 1: the fourteen hundreds we see another huge drop and by
- 33:37Speaker 1: fifteen hundred. By the year fifteen hundred, which is a
- 33:40Speaker 1: good one, but it doesn't stack up the thirteen forty nine.
- 33:43Speaker 1: To Matt's point, by hundred eel rents had mostly disappeared,
- 33:48Speaker 1: but not all the way. Nope, Nope. In the sixteen eighties,
- 33:54Speaker 1: there's this amazing mill in Norfolk that's still rented out
- 33:58Speaker 1: for thirty pounds. That's not all and sixty eels. Oh yeah,
- 34:05Speaker 1: so good luck to you you, Okay, I gotta ask
- 34:09Speaker 1: the question, like, can you like borrow that? He like
- 34:12Speaker 1: discussed that somebody like, hey, so I only got twenty pounds,
- 34:15Speaker 1: but I got like ninety eels with me. It's non
- 34:17Speaker 1: negotiable eels. You just have those exact measurements right there.
- 34:23Speaker 1: That's correct. They don't make eel change either. And like
- 34:27Speaker 1: you can't have sixty one eels because you have to
- 34:29Speaker 1: pay four eel storage when you're there, cost two eels
- 34:33Speaker 1: to store your eels. Right, it is weird sixty eels
- 34:37Speaker 1: because that's two sticks and a portion of another stick. Yeah, weird,
- 34:43Speaker 1: two five of a stick sticks on sticks. Uh. Next,
- 34:49Speaker 1: your questions are so astute that I feel like you've
- 34:52Speaker 1: been in this hustle before. I'm not gonna answer that.
- 34:55Speaker 1: I want to leave you just wondering a little bit.
- 34:57Speaker 1: All right, Okay, I respect, I respect an enigmatic man.
- 35:02Speaker 1: But you make a really great point, Max, Because there
- 35:06Speaker 1: it was this family, the Windham of family. Uh that
- 35:09Speaker 1: sounds so familiar. If you can get off exit eleven
- 35:12Speaker 1: here on Highway four hundred and you'll find Wyndham maybe
- 35:15Speaker 1: it was their family, Oh my god, connecting the dots um.
- 35:20Speaker 1: But they were of Felbrigg Hall and they really did
- 35:23Speaker 1: have a hard time collecting the payments because people weren't
- 35:29Speaker 1: pay and eel rents anymore. Sorry, we don't. We didn't
- 35:31Speaker 1: dry them this past autumn, you know, for Lent the
- 35:33Speaker 1: way we were supposed to because of the whole naughty thing.
- 35:37Speaker 1: But yeah, sorry, we don't have any eels, but we
- 35:40Speaker 1: do have that thirty pounds. So they felt like what
- 35:44Speaker 1: we can say from the Windhams is they felt like,
- 35:48Speaker 1: you know, they didn't want to change the old ways.
- 35:51Speaker 1: It is possible that this was a lent thing l
- 35:55Speaker 1: e n t for them, but it may also be
- 35:58Speaker 1: possible that they were super into eel. Pie is where
- 36:02Speaker 1: I'm gonna diverge just for a second, So I'm just
- 36:06Speaker 1: sending you guys a picture over our zoom call today
- 36:09Speaker 1: about pie mash and eels. Pie Mash and eel shops
- 36:15Speaker 1: have been in London since at least the eighteen hundreds
- 36:19Speaker 1: and they serve stewed or jellied eels. I desperately want
- 36:25Speaker 1: to try it out. What do you do? You guys
- 36:27Speaker 1: want to describe the picture? The second one? I said,
- 36:30Speaker 1: I have these saved on my computer sometimes. Oh man, Ben,
- 36:37Speaker 1: you know, I like recently haven't saying I'll try everything
- 36:40Speaker 1: and I'll try this with you, buddy, But this is
- 36:44Speaker 1: this is disgusting. It's like it looks like ice cream
- 36:49Speaker 1: that went bad and got like gooey on top, and
- 36:55Speaker 1: just Matt take over. The eel isn't the setting part,
- 37:00Speaker 1: it's the jelly. It's the Yeah, it's just so slippery
- 37:06Speaker 1: and it's just so gelatinously and transparent and you can
- 37:12Speaker 1: seal the you can see the eel bits in between
- 37:15Speaker 1: the jelly parts. Yeah, but I do want again, I
- 37:17Speaker 1: do want to point out it comes with sides. Okay,
- 37:21Speaker 1: I don't know why that was the saving gracy. It's
- 37:23Speaker 1: a combo meal. What do the sides look like? Like?
- 37:27Speaker 1: Nothing thus far is really at appetizing. I'm pretty sure
- 37:30Speaker 1: it's just parsley and lemon mashed potatoes. You know what
- 37:37Speaker 1: does the mashed potatoes look like? That you cover it
- 37:41Speaker 1: with the same sauce. Though, I really want to try it,
- 37:44Speaker 1: so sorry guys, folks, ridiculous histories. Please please check out
- 37:51Speaker 1: jelly to eels or let us know if you have
- 37:53Speaker 1: had an experience with them. We'd like to hear your take.
- 37:56Speaker 1: Here's the thing, like you said at you you were
- 38:00Speaker 1: pressed it when you talked about firewood, right payment and
- 38:03Speaker 1: firewood carrying over to the early United States or the colonies.
- 38:07Speaker 1: In the early days of what would become the US,
- 38:10Speaker 1: people also liked old eel pie. They just didn't like
- 38:15Speaker 1: paying eel rent. So today sushi may be the most
- 38:20Speaker 1: common use of eel in the US, Like we talked
- 38:22Speaker 1: about the very top unagi. But if you go back
- 38:25Speaker 1: just a few centuries ago, eel pie was the business.
- 38:30Speaker 1: People were all about it. Yeah, and we got some
- 38:34Speaker 1: great info here from Libby O'Connell who wrote The American Plate,
- 38:39Speaker 1: a culinary history in one hundred bytes, and she's discussing
- 38:44Speaker 1: just how big eel was everywhere Cape Cod. It was huge,
- 38:49Speaker 1: local streams all over the place, and they were so
- 38:52Speaker 1: sought after. Imagine this, you guys. They were using lobsters
- 38:57Speaker 1: as bait to catch the eels. Why, I mean, come on,
- 39:02Speaker 1: you get you're gonna tell me that you well, I
- 39:06Speaker 1: guess imagine jelly to lobster, Like I don't. I don't
- 39:09Speaker 1: think that's much better. So if you're going to prepare
- 39:13Speaker 1: your eels in that way, um, really, you prepare anything
- 39:17Speaker 1: in that way and you lose me. But the thought
- 39:20Speaker 1: of using a lobster to catch an eel just frustrates me.
- 39:24Speaker 1: Man well, you know, back in the day, lobsters didn't
- 39:27Speaker 1: have the same reputation they enjoy in the modern age.
- 39:31Speaker 1: And just to be clear here, that's because they were
- 39:35Speaker 1: served to people, often disadvantaged members of society, in a
- 39:39Speaker 1: really gross preparation. They weren't shelled, people didn't take the
- 39:42Speaker 1: meat out. They crushed it all together and made it
- 39:44Speaker 1: like this kind of gross soupy thing so delicious. Well,
- 39:52Speaker 1: you're fine as long as it's not jelly. Huh yep. Uh.
- 39:55Speaker 1: If it's crunchy, cool cool. If it's slurpy, I like it. Uh. Yes,
- 40:05Speaker 1: So this to turn into a little bit of a
- 40:08Speaker 1: gross food episode for some people, but I I definitely
- 40:12Speaker 1: want to try this. Like you said, eels were a hot,
- 40:15Speaker 1: hot commodity, but something happened. There was a decline in
- 40:21Speaker 1: the supply of eels. They were no longer as plentiful
- 40:24Speaker 1: as they were once upon a time, and this led
- 40:26Speaker 1: to a decline of interest in savory eel pie and
- 40:30Speaker 1: over time, o'caddle notes people in the US started to
- 40:36Speaker 1: move away from eating animals consumed in their natural form, like,
- 40:42Speaker 1: for instance, a lot of us listening to the show
- 40:43Speaker 1: today have never killed a chicken that we ate. We've
- 40:47Speaker 1: never slaughtered a cow or dressed a deer. We've gone
- 40:50Speaker 1: to a grocery store, We've gone to a restaurant or
- 40:53Speaker 1: something like that. So O'Connell argues that maybe that's what happened.
- 40:59Speaker 1: Maybe people got further and further away from the natural
- 41:03Speaker 1: state of the creatures they were consuming. And the Smithsonian
- 41:08Speaker 1: notes that eel has seen a resurgence and popularity driven
- 41:12Speaker 1: by the rise of sushi, but that lack of supply,
- 41:16Speaker 1: that dearth of supply continues to be an obstacle because
- 41:19Speaker 1: today the eel has been classified as endangered on the
- 41:24Speaker 1: International Union for Conservations Red List of Threatened Species because
- 41:28Speaker 1: the seafood supplies run low in Asia. There's also been
- 41:31Speaker 1: more poaching in the US, further depleting regional resources. You know,
- 41:36Speaker 1: that makes a lot of sense if there aren't as
- 41:39Speaker 1: many eel around and people are kind of changing their tastes,
- 41:42Speaker 1: and then eventually the eel, you know, are protected. We're
- 41:46Speaker 1: just not going to be eating him in the same way.
- 41:50Speaker 1: But it does make me sad that there isn't some
- 41:53Speaker 1: even if it's not iel, that there's some kind of
- 41:56Speaker 1: one to one like that that would be valuable enough,
- 42:00Speaker 1: like I can't there can't be a rat infestation in
- 42:03Speaker 1: somebody's rental home and then you take out all the rats,
- 42:06Speaker 1: you get a stick of rats, and then you can
- 42:08Speaker 1: use that to supplement your rent um. I mean you
- 42:13Speaker 1: can imagine it kind of in the way like a
- 42:15Speaker 1: pest control service would cost x amount of money. So
- 42:18Speaker 1: you may be able to work that in if you're good,
- 42:21Speaker 1: if you're a good negotiator. But it's not the same
- 42:23Speaker 1: thing as having a stick of eels. Yeah. Yeah, we
- 42:27Speaker 1: would need a perfect storm of economic factors to make
- 42:31Speaker 1: to create an animal that could be used as a
- 42:35Speaker 1: widespread regional currency. Right, we would need cultural Moray's that
- 42:40Speaker 1: not more a deels. There we go. We would need
- 42:45Speaker 1: we would need yes, we need cultural more ales. Uh,
- 42:49Speaker 1: we'd need some authority figures saying that there was some
- 42:52Speaker 1: necessity behind the food stuff. And then we would also
- 42:55Speaker 1: need uh for we would need for people to not
- 42:59Speaker 1: reject idea of eating it, and would also need to
- 43:02Speaker 1: be plentiful. Rats are plentiful, but people generally in the
- 43:08Speaker 1: West reject the idea of eating rats for sustenance. They're
- 43:11Speaker 1: seen mostly as vermins, sometimes as pets, but not as
- 43:16Speaker 1: not as like you wouldn't need to Okay, wait, no,
- 43:19Speaker 1: it's we're towards the end of the week. Oh that's
- 43:22Speaker 1: a weird question, Matt Max. Given the choice you had
- 43:26Speaker 1: to eat one, would you eat an eel pie or
- 43:30Speaker 1: a rat pie? Yeah? I worked in restaurants for like
- 43:35Speaker 1: a decade. I know how disgusting rats are. Like, no,
- 43:38Speaker 1: absolutely not. And I actually had some in a rental
- 43:41Speaker 1: home that I lived in and caught around thirty eight rats,
- 43:47Speaker 1: that's my estimate. But here's my problem, and I think
- 43:50Speaker 1: I may have told this story before. I'm kind of
- 43:53Speaker 1: an idiot. I didn't understand how rats function and how
- 43:57Speaker 1: a depth they were at finding their way back, even
- 44:00Speaker 1: if you take them away a couple of miles. I
- 44:03Speaker 1: think I did not want to kill them. They they
- 44:07Speaker 1: weren't hurting me in any way. It was just gross.
- 44:10Speaker 1: So I would trap them where you know there it's
- 44:13Speaker 1: a live trap where it just closes behind them after
- 44:15Speaker 1: they go for that sweet sweet peanut butter, and I
- 44:18Speaker 1: would take them away. There's a large airport near me,
- 44:23Speaker 1: and I would release them kind of out into the wilds,
- 44:26Speaker 1: out there where there's no civilization, thinking, oh, they'll find
- 44:30Speaker 1: a way to live over here. You know what I
- 44:33Speaker 1: caught thirty eight because I'm pretty sure I caught many
- 44:36Speaker 1: of the same rats, like three or four times. Oh
- 44:41Speaker 1: the rats are going back and they're like, yeah, I
- 44:43Speaker 1: got locked up for a second. But peanut butter. You know, dude,
- 44:48Speaker 1: get the peanut butter. It's so worth it. This guy
- 44:51Speaker 1: gives you peanut butter and he drives you back. You
- 44:56Speaker 1: might be a legends. Glad I moved out. Well, I'm
- 45:02Speaker 1: glad you made it here to Matt, and I'm super
- 45:05Speaker 1: glad you were able to join us on the show today,
- 45:09Speaker 1: ridiculous historians, thank you for tuning in. We want to
- 45:12Speaker 1: hear from you, folks, especially if you've lived in the UK,
- 45:16Speaker 1: you've visited, have you tried eel Pie and mash? Isn't
- 45:21Speaker 1: any good? You know? I think our our crew here
- 45:24Speaker 1: is a little bit um. Collectively, we're a little bit
- 45:27Speaker 1: dubious on whether or not this is worth a shot.
- 45:30Speaker 1: Some people not going to name names on the zoom call,
- 45:34Speaker 1: might play it safe and get some fish and chips,
- 45:36Speaker 1: you know what I mean, And there's nothing wrong with that.
- 45:38Speaker 1: Those are delicious, But let us know what your experiences like.
- 45:42Speaker 1: You can do that on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians.
- 45:45Speaker 1: I think we may also have our email working Ridiculous
- 45:49Speaker 1: at I heart media dot com. Uh, Matt, it feels
- 45:54Speaker 1: It feels just a tad weird for me to ask
- 45:57Speaker 1: you this, because we do hang out pretty much all
- 46:00Speaker 1: the time. But this is usually the point in the
- 46:02Speaker 1: show where we give our illustrious guests a second to
- 46:06Speaker 1: talk about some of their own upcoming projects or where
- 46:09Speaker 1: people can learn more about their work. Oh well, sure,
- 46:13Speaker 1: of course stuff they don't want you to know. I'm
- 46:15Speaker 1: assuming everybody that listens to this show is aware of
- 46:17Speaker 1: that one, just because you and Noel host this one.
- 46:21Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe not. We talked about you a lot. Okay, cool,
- 46:25Speaker 1: well thanks, Wow weird, no, but stuff that I wanted
- 46:29Speaker 1: you to know. I would highly recommend this brand new
- 46:31Speaker 1: show that our team is making with Tenderfoot TV. It's
- 46:34Speaker 1: called Algorithm. It is out right now. Yeah, you'll be
- 46:38Speaker 1: able to get I think three episodes by the time
- 46:40Speaker 1: you're hearing this fantastic stuff. It's hosted by Ben Kiebrick,
- 46:44Speaker 1: one of the producers on Monster of the Zodiac Killer
- 46:47Speaker 1: and Monster d C Sniper, as well as Camp Hell
- 46:51Speaker 1: and Awaki that's hosted by Josh Stain, another one of
- 46:56Speaker 1: the producers from those Monster series, but this time they
- 46:59Speaker 1: are hosting their own series, both through crime shows, both
- 47:02Speaker 1: compelling as all heck and scary. Highly recommend both, and
- 47:06Speaker 1: if you'd like to hear more about the history, culture,
- 47:10Speaker 1: and strange science of food, do check out our peer
- 47:13Speaker 1: podcast Savor, which is hosted by Andy Reese and Lauren
- 47:18Speaker 1: Vogelbaumb Thanks as always to our super producers Kasey Pegraham
- 47:23Speaker 1: and Max Williams. Over there, who will eat an eel
- 47:26Speaker 1: pie with me? If a rat pi is the only choice?
- 47:29Speaker 1: Thanks to Gabe Louizier, our research associate, Christopher Hasiotis, Eve's
- 47:33Speaker 1: Jeff Coche and of course Jonathan Strickland. I don't know
- 47:38Speaker 1: his position on eel pie, but something tells me we
- 47:41Speaker 1: will learn about it soon. I forgot to do that.
- 47:44Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. Jonathan, Nope, that's it. We're going. We're going
- 47:49Speaker 1: see you next time, everybody. For more podcasts for my
- 47:58Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio, a Apple podcast,
- 48:01Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.