Abby and Alan learn about the history of Death personified and the Grim Reaper. Tracing death gods and goddesses throughout history and the rise of the Grim Reaper after the Bubonic Plague.
Consider donating to Asian Americans Advancing Justice: Atlanta.
---
Check out Abby's book Horror Stories. Available in eBook and paperback.
Music by Michaela Papa, Alan Kudan & Jordan Moser. Poster Art by Pilar Keprta @pilar.kep.
lunaticsproject.com
Abby and Alan learn about the history of Death personified and the Grim Reaper. Tracing death gods and goddesses throughout history and the rise of the Grim Reaper after the Bubonic Plague.
Consider donating to Asian Americans Advancing Justice: Atlanta.
---
Check out Abby's book Horror Stories. Available in eBook and paperback.
Music by Michaela Papa, Alan Kudan & Jordan Moser. Poster Art by Pilar Keprta @pilar.kep.
lunaticsproject.com
[inaudible] hello
Speaker 2:Everyone. And welcome back to another episode of the lunatics radio hour podcast. I'm Abby Brinker. I'm here with Alan could an hello. And today we are talking about the grim Reaper
Speaker 3:Also known as death, death
Speaker 2:With a capital D my friends. That's right. Yes. And we're going to talk about it. Some other similar entities, we're going to work our way up to the grim Reaper.
Speaker 3:Okay. So I'm being forced to read this. Uh, there's a trigger warning on this episode because we're going to talk about pandemics and how awful they are. And if you don't want more of that in your life right now, then just skip right to the next one.
Speaker 2:Yes. Thank you. Thank you for reading that against your well, just content warning. Again, it's going to get a little dark, so if you're not ready for some pandemic tricky pandemic conversation, this is not the episode for you. Okay. Before we get into the tricky pandemic conversation, did you know that train to Busan had a sequel,
Speaker 3:Uh, UN I like train to Busan too.
Speaker 2:That's what I've heard. That's what, that's what the, the word is from my cousin, Jennifer.
Speaker 3:Huh? So I am aware that there is an animated movie train to Busan, and I don't know if it's a prequel or a sequel or just additional content. I don't know.
Speaker 2:Cool. Well, I'm excited. I didn't realize that there was an animated version. So there could potentially be three in the world. There could be four, two to three, right. Two to infinity, I guess really
Speaker 3:People could be writing them right now. Everybody's
Speaker 2:Just writing them and producing them. And they're being released every second of every day,
Speaker 3:Public domain folks. That's not true.
Speaker 2:Uh, so yeah, as you know, we are pretty big fans of that movie. So I'm excited to learn that there's more to watch
Speaker 3:Always down for train movies. Yes.
Speaker 2:Final, quick thing that I need to say about, I need to apologize for In the Alfred Hitchcock episode, I made the point. I said, I knew he had done things probably that were not great, but that, you know, overall he seems like a reasonable guy or something. Right. I kind of made the point that he seems like not like a Kubrick, I think is what I said turns out though
Speaker 3:Is not a Kubrick mean. Well,
Speaker 2:You know, Kubrick is like, it was like a psychopath director. He's famous for how he treats actors. Like, you know, like the shining onset, like very intense wants people to be kind of broken down. He's like the military, you know, like
Speaker 3:The guy that directed, um, Blair witch project,
Speaker 2:He just like actually sent them into the woods.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And just like literally in the middle of their night would with them just to keep like tired and scared. Right.
Speaker 2:That's that's interesting. That might be a good, a good episode
Speaker 3:That may or just it's depressing, maybe safety on set folks.
Speaker 2:That's right. All of this is to say, turns out Hitchcock was not so great of a guy and there's actually two episodes. Thanks to Bob Don for pointing it out. To me, there's a two or three episodes on behind the bastards about it. So, so I'll direct you all to that, but uh, very interesting episodes about the history of Hitchcock in general. But today we are here to talk, not about Alfred Hitchcock, but about the grim Reaper
Speaker 3:Also known as death with a capital D yes. Yes.
Speaker 2:Okay. Sources, can you guess WIC, Wikipedia, Wikipedia, a Britannica article by Amy McKenna, a YouTube video by[inaudible] and a history.com article. So in model it's actually interesting because in modern society,
Speaker 3:Would you like me to cite my sources? You have sources. Yes. Okay. Sure. My sources are comic books, the internet and movies. Thanks.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Thanks comic books, the internet and movies. Thank you. So it's actually interesting because in modern times, the grim Reaper really has come to personify death. Right. They really become one
Speaker 3:And a nefarious character.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, totally. But sort of like a cross society. Right. But kind of what we're going to talk about today is that there was a lot of different personifications of death and death gods and goddesses throughout history that have bubbled up into different things in the end. Many different societies have believed in different depictions of the character of death. But today we are going to shine light on the grim Reaper piecing together. All we know about this enduring figure, if you aren't familiar with the visual, the grim Reaper is usually shown as a tall slender hooded figure. Usually we get like some glimpses maybe of his limbs or his face, which are clearly skeletal bones, your bones hidden by a black hood. Um, and his signature weapon is a huge site that he uses to tear your soul from your body to reap it. So to speak.
Speaker 3:Yeah, sure. Like, like, um, corn,
Speaker 2:Exactly. Like corn. Yes. There are very strong harvest in agriculture connections to the figures.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry. You don't use a safe on corn. What do you use it on? Yeah, exactly. Grassland things
Speaker 2:And exactly what we're saying. The idea right of the grim Reaper is that he is here to harvest what was sewn and that is now ready to be reaped. Can you use a slice on corn to paying attention? Seems to be sick.
Speaker 3:Oh boy. Okay. So I just Google this and you don't use a SIFE for harvesting corn. The closest you would do would be a hand sickle to chop the stock. And I know what the difference between a handcycle
Speaker 2:And a
Speaker 3:Glad you asked. So a Saif is picture with the grim Reaper has a two handed weapon. It's actually not a weapon at all.
Speaker 2:Oh, I picture him with a one handed weapon. Oh, you, you mean like a blue, the long staff or you're saying, Oh, I think he's strong enough to hold it with one hand.
Speaker 3:Yes. Yes. That's true. Uh, Saif is also, it's like curved and it has handles on it. Cause you hold it sideways. They have like little handles sticking out of the side for like sweeping, you know, in motions. Um, where the grim Reaper one is a pole with the sight blade. Yeah. Anyways, uh, sickle is a simple hand tool. So, you know, it's got a handle, does a size for one hand and then it has like a half-moon Crescent. Yeah. And so you can like hook it around things and just chop little stocks. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So which one do you use on corn? A cycle a second.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because it's, it's a much more, it's a much more controlled thing. You're just chopping one stock at a time.
Speaker 2:And which one is the grim Reaper holding a scythe with a double hand that handle.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah. A scythe is a two handed instrument. Thank you. Thank you for that. A traditional Saif is not even what you're really picturing. It's not a straight handle.
Speaker 2:It's not what I'm picturing. I'm picturing a straight handle with the half moon thing on top, like a straight, long staff like him.
Speaker 3:Yeah. There's no staff it's curvy and then it has handles poke and out of the curvy bit. The curvy bit. Yeah. So it's a long curvy bit, right. With some handles on it and you put your hands on the handles and then you swing it in horizontal fash. That's a SIFE
Speaker 2:I don't think he's depicted as carrying that.
Speaker 3:What we're saying. Yeah. Is that the grim reapers Saif is not a historically accurate depiction of a crop harvesting site. Okay. I'm with you now. Great. Now you're probably thinking, well, Alan wouldn't he probably just be using a war site.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly. My thought. Right.
Speaker 3:Well, that's not really a thing. They did have war sites, which was similar to, you know, you just kind of take a poll and you put the scythe blade at the end, but they would remove the blade and turn it 90 degrees. So look more like a spear. Those were meant for war a traditional crop harvesting site is actually a very poor weapon.
Speaker 2:Well, why wouldn't they just use a bayonet?
Speaker 3:Well, we're talking when farmers have to fight.
Speaker 2:Got it. So what we actually see in the imagery and the iconic imagery of the grim Reaper does not exist. Got it. That's interesting.
Speaker 3:Or, I mean it does, but it was never a practical tool. Yep. Pure ornamentation. Got it.
Speaker 2:So I hope, I hope we've now cleared up the visual of the grim Reaper, but hopefully everybody is pretty familiar. Many ancient cultures believe death to be a God in ancient Greece, we have Thanatos which translates to death directly
Speaker 3:Donotos was the guy that came and harvested your soul when it was time for you to die. Unless you were super important. If you were super important than Hermes would come himself, he was like the, uh, VIP grimmer. Yeah.
Speaker 2:What would, what would be the distinction?
Speaker 3:Excellent question. So I know if it's, um, somebody that like the gods really wanted dead than sometimes Hermes will do it, you know, just as like, I'm going to make sure we get that soul, you know, or if it's just like someone of a crazy prestigious honor, Thanatos, there's a bunch of myths about him. My personal favorite is actually the M uh, is tied into the myth of Sisyphus. Do you remember? CSFs no, uh, the story of Sisyphus is really cool because it's all about cheating death and it's about, you know, outsmarting the grim Reaper, if you will. Uh, and if, because if he can't come steal your soul, then you don't die. Right. Right. He actually, I mean, the, the myth has kind of long, so I'll, I'll, uh, I'll kinda summarize it pretty quick. King Sisyphus. Right. I don't remember if he was a good guy or a bad guy, but he was really crafty. And so when it came time to die, Thanatos shows up, you know, he's, he's in his bed. He's he's, uh, he's about to pass on. Then there Thanatos comes in. He's got his chains. He's all right. He's all rattling, you know? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Like, like from a Christmas Carol.
Speaker 3:Exactly. Um, and he's actually, he's, he's trying to intimidate him cause like, you know, this is his moment. Uh, and he's got these manacles that were forged by[inaudible].
Speaker 2:Who's not even going to get into what Amanda call is.
Speaker 3:You don't know Amanda cause uh, handcuffs. Okay. But anti Ken cuffs, man cuffs. Sure. Ma ma manacles. So man being hand isn't in like manual and shaky. Well
Speaker 2:Echo like shack shackle, sorry. Yeah. Hand shackles. Nickels. Yeah. Right. Great.
Speaker 3:These were forged by her feistiness, the Smith of the gods. They can't be undone except by anyone, but Haiti's himself. Okay.
Speaker 2:So they can be undone, but everybody except Hades or they can only be on them by Haiti. Like that's
Speaker 3:Again, I'm getting my myth, a little kerfuffle here, but Hades didn't like this guy, nobody liked this guy. Um, and he really wanted to make sure that they go get a soul. So he sent him with these special manacles that only Haiti's can open himself. And so there you have set as a Fez in bed, all, you know, looking feeble Thanatos is coming jangling, his manacles, you know, trying to intimidate him. And he says, if gets all sassy with him being like, you know, scary, don't even try, you got your stupid little handcuffs and they're there's, I'm not impressed and fan until it's he's, you know, he's, he's jangling more. And then he basically says if his basically says, uh, well, you know, your, your handcuffs are so stupid. I could get out of those in like 30 seconds. Just like, go, go ahead. Watch. If you put on your wrists, it's all you have to do is like, do this.
Speaker 2:It's so stupid. Well, it says
Speaker 3:It is it's it's classic. He basically Scooby-Doo the villain. And so obviously Thanatos gets shackled and immediately realizes his mistake. Sisyphus just takes him and he throws them in a closet.
Speaker 2:It just locks the door. It's like what I would do.
Speaker 3:So now you have death locked up in a door. Yeah. Right. Great. And then things just go on. And like for like a couple of weeks, nobody knows no too many people on earth. Well, uh, you know, th the, the, the big giveaway, um, was like, when Aries got super, you know, God, a war, people are fighting. People are stabbing. People are getting eviscerated. Nobody that dying God of war size. Yeah. He's, he's, he's a little upset when farmers and farmers fight, but war has no meaning if you can't kill people.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I mean, yeah. Then it's not war. And it's just what mud wrestling.
Speaker 3:Yeah. God of mud wrestling doesn't have the same ring to it. No, but anyways, uh, so you know, they, they do, they, they all convene in there, like what the happened? And they're like, uh, last time we saw Thanatos he was going to get[inaudible] and so they go, they check it out and there, they find them in the closet and they're like, Oh, Jesus Christ, man. And so they bring them back to Haiti's. Cause that's the only place you can get the manacles on done. Right. So he gets the manacles on done, then Antone's so embarrassed, you know? And so he goes to Hades and such, gee, I got this guy, let me go get him. He will not, he will not trick me at all. And so he was like, okay, fine. One more time. So Thanatos goes and says, you know, he had, he had a hunch that death was coming for him. Right. So he, he tells his wife, um, okay. So listen, when I die, don't give me any funeral rights. Literally just stripped me naked and throw my body in the street to the dogs. Cool. And she's like, and she was like, what? And he's like, yeah, don't, don't, don't try me just do it. And so she's like, all right. And so sanitize shows up and he's like, no tricks. His time. He's like no tricks. And so he, uh, he gets brought down to Hades. Uh, he gets to the river sticks and you know, no funeral rights. He doesn't even have the two goals on his eyes to pay the ferryman. Yeah. So the ferry just pushes them into the river. And the river sticks is like, acid. It just burns. You're terribly. But you know,[inaudible] strong swimmer. Right. And he gets across and he's all, he's all, he's all messed up. And so he's looking real bad, you know, like he's got bits hanging off him. He's all burned to. Yeah. And so he's like, excuse me, other souls. Ah, where's the throne room peanut. I was like, I would like to file a grievance. And they all are like, Whoa, okay, dude, you look pretty messed up, uh, that way. And so he goes in and there's[inaudible] cause it's her time in the underworld. Yeah. And then presenting, he takes one, look at this guy who's bare naked. You know, limbs fallen off, uh, skin, burned his. And she's like, what's your deal? And he's like, you will not believe what happened. My wife, Nope. He throws the wife under the bus, such a jerk. Oh boy. I was laying on my funeral bed, you know? And I was laying in my death bed almost dead. And even before I was dead, I, I overheard her saying, we're not going to spend a dime on funeral rights. U h, the gods of death and Hades and Persephone, a ny a re nothing we're g oing t o eat. T hey're sacrificial things, you know, c ause screw t hem. And she's like, Oh, I don't like that. He says, Oh, you know, it'd be, you know how we get her back? You, you send me back and I will just torment her for the rest of her days. You know what if I just like pop up and maybe I'm like all healthy and strong and young again and can't die until she dies of a natural death or something like that. And I can just I'll shame her the whole time. A nd p er s atiny being all vindictive, it's like, yeah, sure. Let's do that. So s ends o r sends i t, sends h im back. He pops up. H e w as like, ha ha. And the wife is elated and he's like, sorry, w e g ot a deal here. You know? Sorry. I got to torment you. So torments the wife for the rest of her days. Um, many, many years go by, right? No one can, no one can touch the Sufis. He's basically a mortal because of the deal with[inaudible] and you, cause you can't mess with another guy's deal. Right. That's one of the rules. Yeah. And then finally, it's time for him to die. Thanatos shows up and he says, Hey, no tricks. He says some tricks go. He goes down. Oh no, I'm sorry. Back up this time Thanatos does not come for him. They send Hermes because he's a VIP at this point, all the gods are just like, Ooh, this guy, we're going to get them good. And so they sent Hermes because Hermes is not going to mess this one up. And Hermes does not mess this up. He gets him, he brings him right down to Hades, but the gods are, they want a little bit of justice, you know, heard a little bit of engines if you will. And so that gives us a fist, a choice. He was like, you're the year you're clever determined, man. You can either go to the fields of Elysium right now, guaranteed, uh, and live out the rest of, you know, and just live out eternity. Or you can do this one thing where all you have to do is this one task. And you'll have a shot at coming back to life as an immortal. And he's like, Oh, well tell me more. Did they say you see this rock, all you have to do is roll this rock to the top of the Hill. If you roll the rock, the top of the Hill, see that window up there. It's going to get big enough for you to crawl out and then you can leave. But if you decide to roll the rock, then you have to, you're committed. You can't, you can't go back on your deal. And so he's like, well, I can either go to heaven and live with all the boring people or be immortal on earth with all the sending into battery and clever schemes. And so he chooses that. And so he starts rolling his rock and he gets really close to the top. And just when he's about the top, you know, it rolls back and that's where the, the whole, you know, this, this is an image. I'm sure you're familiar with the guy who was trying to assess a fist. The guy was trying to roll the rock up to the top of the Hill. Yep. Uh, and just this moment. Oh yeah. And just as he gets the top, it is too heavy and rolls back down. And so the gods will loop him in it, in eternal torment that way.
Speaker 2:Oh, that just is happening in a GIF.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Well still going on.
Speaker 2:Wow. So right now it's happening. Yeah. He deserves it. Honestly. He sounds so annoying.
Speaker 3:He he's, I mean, he was quite conniving.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Got it. So what a schemer
Speaker 3:Does a man a cheated death?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean to some degree,
Speaker 3:I mean he cheated death twice,
Speaker 2:I guess. You're right. He's still alive. You're right. Well, no, he's, he's in the underworld, but he's okay. All right. He's perpetually dying. Okay.
Speaker 3:Well, I mean, that's just the existence of th that's that's, that's exactly the existence, the existence of Sisyphus.
Speaker 2:So do you know this though? Alan? Let's see if I can stump you. Okay. Did you know that fan Atos started off obviously as a winged man, right? Depicted as carrying a sword, but he later evolved into a winged boy, similar to Cupid who carries a torch that is upside down symbolizing that, you know, the, the fire of your life has gone out.
Speaker 3:I did not know that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Stumped the Greek expert in ancient Egypt. Of course we have a new bus, a new best represents death. Mummification the afterlife embalming, tombs cemeteries and the underworld.
Speaker 3:So a new bus is the one. I mean, my, my Egypt mythology a little rusty, little, little nonexistent. So a new bus was the one with the dog head, right? Yes, that's right. Is there any connection between a dog guarding the underworld in Egypt to like Subarus the dog that guards, the underworld in Greek myth
Speaker 2:There totally could be. I don't know the answer to it, but I think there's a strong parallel there for sure. Dog guard, dogs, guard, dogs. I mean a new, I don't know if he guards the afterlife in the same way, but I think the dog imagery is interesting in East Asia, the Hindu and Buddhist believed in King Yama. He is thought to be a wrathful God that presides over hell and purgatory and judges souls, the Hindu version of King Yama inspired the Buddhist version, which has totally unique characteristics from the original. So all of these, there's a, there's a bunch of different iterations through Buddhism. Yama has become rooted and believers across most of Eastern Asia, including Vietnam, Korea, Japan, Sri Lanka, Mayan, Mar Mongolia, China, and, and pretty much all the other countries in that region. And all of these different belief systems and King Yama have slightly evolved from each other. So in China, for example, he's known as King Yan and in Japan, King Emma,
Speaker 3:Well, King Yama originate. Well, I guess this is where things get a little convoluted. So in the series Dragonball, we have King Yama, Gar, you know, he is the guy that sits at the bureaucracy desk as the souls come in and judges them. Right. Um, but, uh, you know, Japanese show, but based on Chinese mythology, sorta it just, sorry, not based on,
Speaker 2:I would say based on East Asian mythology, because this has sort of penetrated all of these different,
Speaker 3:What I mean by that is like the main character, uh, who is, uh, kind of like a little monkey boy, uh, who flies around in a cloud is based on soon Kong who the, uh, the good China, Chinese, uh, uh, mischief guy.
Speaker 2:Gotcha. Gotcha. So that's the theme of the whole show. What's the name of it again?
Speaker 3:That's I mean, that's dragon ball, dragon ball. Got it. Didn't didn't expect that one to come up today. There you go.
Speaker 2:The Aztecs actually had a female goddess of death who reigned over the afterlife and then Korea, there's a figure called the netherworld Emissary nicknamed Sajah. He is a stern figure who decides on good and evil in service of King Yama. So he sort of like King Gamma's go getter. You know, he does the dirty work. He escorts good and evil people to the afterlife. And of course there's Kyron or the ferryman of Haiti's that Alan just talked about from Greek mythology, who is scorched the debt across the river sticks, which divides the world of the living from the world of the dead. Sometimes ancient Greeks would be buried with a coin in their mouth. Again, just like Alan referenced
Speaker 3:The eyes, but dental, it is you're right. It was the mouth. The eyes is Irish.
Speaker 2:Mm. So that they can pay Kyron when they make it to the world. Both Kira and Sajah are psycho pumps. Did you know that what's a psycho pump? And I just learned this, but now I'm obsessed with the terminology. The psychopomp is a creature or a spirit that's tasked with ushering recently deceased souls from earth to the land of the dead. Yes.
Speaker 3:This did know this term. Actually
Speaker 2:This classification spans many countries, cultures and years psychopomp can also be depicted as animals, many birds like Ravens, owls, crows, vultures, or horses, deer, and dogs.
Speaker 3:So the term psychopomp I originally learned from the anime series bleach. Wow. It's because a character is killed, right, right. Episode or issue one, whatever. And, uh, he's met by a soul Reaper. And we find out that there's a whole society of these people, that their sole job, their sole job, that their only job is making sure that souls pass on correctly. And that's why they have like, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a big battle shown. And so, you know, they, they fight monsters and whatnot because, you know, if a soul is in the, it goes to wrong down the dark path, it becomes a big,
Speaker 2:Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. There you go. Pumps. We can see an early North American cave paintings figures that look to be escorting the dead from the earthly plane. So sort of like these, these figures floating above dead bodies, we have the angel of death or Israel in the Bible as real kills people hover. And the grim Reaper only collects souls when their time is up. Some people theorize that the grim Reaper is actually one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. One of whom is called Thanatos, which of course is the name of the Greek God of death that we just talked about. And here's a fun fact for you, Alan?
Speaker 3:No, I that's. Well, I've never heard one of the four horsemen referred to as Thanatos. Yeah. Just being, you know, uh,
Speaker 2:Death. Yeah. Well, if you're in Greece, yeah, there we go. Same word, fun fact. You ready? Yep. Santa Tobia is commonly referred to as the fear of death. More specifically, it can be a fear of death or a fear of the dying process,
Speaker 3:Just as long as we're just jotting around the world, talking about cycle pumps. Yeah. Uh, there's also the Valkyries from North Smith who would fly over the battlefield, just watching. And then as soon as someone died an honorable death, they would swap them in and bring them to the, the halls of Valor.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I mean, it's similar to the Morgan Wright, who is the Irish goddess of war and death and all of these other things and kind of had a similar job of, of collecting the dead bodies, collecting the dead spirits. I like to use Valkyries as my preferred warrior and clash of clans. Yes. Yes. However, despite all of this history around similar figures that personified death or represent death to different cultures, the grim Reaper himself has a much more modern origin story. Let's first talk about similar figures from different areas of Europe. We're triangulating now over the continent of Europe. Okay. First we have the Margarie Hein or sometimes just called Hein from the Netherlands. This translates to bone man bone man, visually, he looks very similar to the grim Reaper that we know in love. He has a skeleton body, dark hooded robe, and a scythe,
Speaker 3:A safe cycle. No. Well, w w what's he depicted as he holding? Is it a two handed weapon or a single and a weapon? And my notes, it's probably a SIFE
Speaker 2:The hood is depicted as empty. Meaning no skeleton body below like a D mentor
Speaker 3:It's
Speaker 2:Meant to represent shadow and darkness. We also have the UNCW from Celtic folklore. The Encore is a servant of death, specifically from Cornish Welsh in Normandy, France,
Speaker 3:Like the hens, the hens Cornish hens
Speaker 2:On Kusa skeleton and wears a dark robe, but he also wears a big brimmed hat that covers most of his face. Sometimes he is represented by a mere shadow. He also uses a site and sits on top of a car or wagon, or sometimes a black coach pulled by four black horses and flanked by some ghostly figures on foot. Some believed he was the first child of Adam and Eve. In other variations, he is believed to be the first dead person of the year. So it's like a rotating job. Yeah. Whoever dies that year, but he's always show, I think it's cool too, but he's always shown as a man. So it would have to really been an adult. So it would have to be like really the first adult man that dies that year. Well, that's
Speaker 3:Why they always, that's why women always outlive men
Speaker 2:Every year. And his job is to collect souls and also to guard graveyards. Here's a little, a quote from Wikipedia and an alternate origin. He was a cruel Prince who met death during a hunting trip and challenged him to see who could kill a black stag. First death won the contest and the Prince was cursed to roam the earth as a ghoul for all eternity. Sometimes he is depicted as the King of the dead whose subjects have their own particular paths along, which their sacred processions move, quoting Anatoli, Libras, and legends of death. The Encore is the henchmen of death, and he is also known as the graveyard watcher. They said that he protects the graveyard and the souls around it for some unknown reason. And he collects lost souls on his land. The last debt of the year in each parish becomes the Encore of his parish for all of the following years. So this is another variation when there has been in a year more deaths than usual. One says about the ANC who, Oh, my faith, this one is a nasty ankle. That's
Speaker 3:The quote, that's the quote that made the cut that, that perfect. You know, that's, I don't personally have an on cue quote. So that is my number one on cue quote from here forward,
Speaker 2:We can see the incredibly obvious ties between the mockery Heine and the[inaudible] and how they are both precursors of the grim Reaper. So now we're going to get into the pandemic talk. This is your second and final warning to exit the episode. Can I leave? Sure. Good. The grim Reaper makes his debut in the 14th century in Europe, around the time of the bubonic plague also known as black death in 1347, 12 ships from the black sea arrived in Europe and Dr. Messina, Italy, locals gathered along the docks, excited for the return of the fleet. Only to find that the majority of sailors had died during their journey. Oh, those who are alive were covered in black boils that were filled with pus and blood and were near death. The ships were quickly removed from the Harbor, but it was too late. The virus had already started to spread less talked about in Western history books, is that the black death impacted Syria, Egypt, Persia, India, and other non-European countries, which I honestly didn't know. And in fact, rumors of the devastation had reached Europe before the disease itself.
Speaker 3:My one fun black death fact. Yeah. It's not even a fact. It's just a meme. I saw something that's posted saying how we got through the black death without a vaccine. And they were just like trying to make a point. And then the counterpoint was like, yeah, but it killed one third of the population.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly. Recent research has uncovered the fact that though many people historically believe that the virus started in Asia 2000 years ago, the pathogen actually existed in Europe 3000 years ago. And was then brought to Asia by European trade ships.
Speaker 3:Oh, it traveled via rats.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly. So it's the rats that were aboard the ships that caused it to spread. And as the ships went to port town to port town, it spread incredibly fast. Yeah. Europeans also spread this plate to Northern parts of Africa, specifically through the port of Tunis, even back then thousands of years ago, the rumors were, Oh, this started in Asia. When in fact it started in Europe and Europeans actually infected people across all continents. Right. Like as white people do. Right. So, you know, it's kind of like insane. The parallels not insane, right? Like we, we should expect it at this point, but the parallels to what's happening now, are there, you know,
Speaker 3:Well, if there's one thing we've learned, it's that when infected by a deadly pandemic, the number one symptom of white people is the need to travel.
Speaker 2:God. Yeah. Uh, man, Italian poet, Giovanni Boccaccio described the symptoms as I'm quoting here and men and women alike at the beginning of the malady, certain swellings, either on the groin or under the armpits wax to the bigness of a common Apple, others to the size of an egg, some more and some less. And these, the vulgar named plagued boils in addition to the infamous boils, no longer quoting and the swelling that attacks the lymph nodes, the black death also comes with fever, chills, diarrhea, vomiting, aches, and pains. And of course, a high chance of death,
Speaker 3:Basically all of your fluids leave your body and you get these big nasty boils. Yeah. That's awful filled with blood. Yup.
Speaker 2:Some reports claim that one-third of Europeans died due to the bubonic plague. Other texts I read stay as much as 40 to 60% of the population was killed in only a few years time. So imagine 60% of the European population wiped out in a few years. So there you really get the importance of a vaccine, right? The plague first started in 1347 and spanned until 1351 and its first wave though. It had several outbreaks in the following years because it was so devastating and seemingly unbeatable Europeans started to live in constant fear of death for themselves and their loved ones. You also have to understand how quickly the disease could escalate. In some cases, a person could go to bed healthy and never wake up.
Speaker 3:Really? Yes.
Speaker 2:So it could attack in like under 12 hours.
Speaker 3:Wow. Yeah. How did it spread so fast?
Speaker 2:Well, it was also thought to spread incredibly easy between people, the bubonic plague was caused by a[inaudible] meaning bacteria called you're seeing a pestis, which was discovered by a French scientist named Alexander years in, at the end of the 19th century, this bacteria could be transferred via air molecules or by rats and fleas, the rats and flees ran fairly rampant on medieval ships, which spread the disease from port to port across the continent and then across
Speaker 3:Got it. So right. Cause people aren't as hygienic. So the fleas, which don't die from the disease, they just spread it. So it kills the people really quick, but that's not how it's spreading. It's spreading via
Speaker 2:Ma mice, rats, fleas ticks. Yes. Pests. Exactly. But it's also spread through the air. So it's also like you could cough on somebody and get them sick. So there's just, you know, you kind of have to like paint the picture, right? Like this time is really, really horrifying. There's literally dead bodies are aligning this
Speaker 3:And no understanding of medicine. Yeah. It just seems like people die in that stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. Many people thought that the black death was the start of the end times. And um, and that's, you know, a capital E capital T there. Sure. Because there was a lack of scientific understanding. People started to think that the plague was sent by God as punishment, you know, like it was a great flood type of event to punish humanity for their sins.
Speaker 3:It's right. We, we it's Canon that, you know, God with a capital G sent the grim Reaper, the capital gr as a plague. Yeah. If anyone remembers the story of Passover,
Speaker 2:I don't actually know that. Well, the story of Passover. Wow.
Speaker 3:It's pretty long. I mean, it takes a whole night to tell, okay, that's the point. But the one bit, uh, that is notable is that one of the plagues of Egypt is that God sends the angel of death to slay everyone's first born. Gotcha. Pretty, pretty, pretty hefty. Yeah. And that's why, uh, all the Hebrews take the lamb spot and Mark their doors so that the angel of death passes them over Passover. Yeah. Hey,
Speaker 2:I knew that part of it. Yep. Another horrifying part of this plague that I don't believe is taught in most history classes. It wasn't taught in mind at least is that because of this belief, right? Because people started to think that this was a punishment from God. People started to try and purge their communities in towns of anyone that they thought were causing trouble or committing sins. As a result, many thousands of Jewish people were massacred in the late 1340s. It also triggered a mass Exodus of Jews from central Europe and they moved to Eastern Europe away from the mobs within major cities, groups of upperclassmen started to lead public pre-sessions of flatulence in order to encourage not only themselves, but everyone else to repent.
Speaker 3:So one fun fact about this fueling the religious fervor, that this was some kind of divine punishment, right? The people in the community that were very angry and frustrated and feeling helpless could also notice that the Jewish population was not as effected by the plague, better hygiene, better hygiene, because you know, all, a lot of the rituals involve washing before meals and really simple things, you know, cleaning the home in certain ways. Um, and these protected against the very things that caused the bubonic plague, but it led to a lot of, uh, antisemitism. Yeah,
Speaker 2:Really awful. Right. And I don't know if that that's really broadly known, is this like a chaotic time? Like it literally smells like death everywhere you go. There's bodies everywhere. They're being carted out into mass graves because there's no time. Like there's nowhere for them to go. It's horrifying. And then on top of that, people are starting to kind of crack of course, right. We are all kind of familiar with that. They're starting to crack it in a more extreme way though, because a, they there's no rhyme or reason to how the plague is striking. Right. People are within hours can be, can be dead, like can be dead. And it's, it's spreading the first wave of this play glass for four years. And then over and over again for years and years and years after their second, third waves. Right. So it's goes on for so long. It's this horrifying, horrifying thing, right? So we really have to like sit with that for a second. The black death impacted the world globally scholars estimate that it reduced the world population at the time from 450 million to 350 million. So a quarter of the world's population. So you said Alan, like a third of Europe or whatever, a quarter of the entire world, that's too many people way too many people because death was everywhere. We start to see common themes emerge in different art forms, literature fine, our painting, poetry, themes of skeletons, death, and dying from this. We are introduced to the dance of death or dance. McCobb quoting from Wikipedia. The dance McCobb consists of the dead or a personification of death, summoning representatives from all walks of life to dance along the grave, typically with a Pope emperor King child and laborer boots
Speaker 3:Like symbolically or those actual people had to do the dance
Speaker 2:Symbol is his paintings. Oh, I see, I see it was produced as a memento Mori to remind people of the fragility of their lives and how vain or the glories of earthly life its origins are postulated from illustrated sermon texts. The earliest recorded visual scheme was a now last mural at Holy innocent cemetery in Paris stating from 1424 to 1425. So again, this is literally paintings of people dancing with skeleton figures that are meant to represent death. And there are like many, many, many, many examples of this over the years. And like I said, there's a Pope emperor King child, right in the idea is like, no one is immune. Death is coming for everybody. You know, that's what the black death drove home was that anybody can die. It doesn't matter if you are the richest most powerful King in the world. Like you cannot still got fleas. That's right. So we also see this emerging musical themes plays and written works. So just speaks to the fact, right? That, that everybody is terrified of death. And, and we see the themes of death being brought out as a type of overlord, so to speak, right. Death now becomes a human. He becomes personified in this. You know, he, he is the one who is right. Who's doing this. Humans have always searched for a way to understand or make sense of death. So if we look back to some of the historic figures across that represent or personified death, we are led to the ANC who in the Maddrey Hein in Europe, which introduced the harvest theme of the SIFE or the sequel
Speaker 3:Always it's always the site, the sickle was only used for.
Speaker 2:Okay. And then the black death hits and destroys everything. We see themes of death, not just emerge, but take over are in literature of the time. All of this becomes homogenized into one central figure. The grim Reaper, the grim Reaper is a tangible figure. Something that comes to mind when humans think of death and the mystery of what comes next, it allows us to visualize this incredibly heavy uncertainty and fear. And I wanted to end this episode with a very horrifying fact already we're ending the episode. Well, this is the end of the history portion. There are still around 3000 cases of the plague every year, according to the world health organization,
Speaker 3:I am aware of this. I it's wild that this plague wasn't. I mean, you, you, you think of it as something of antiquity, you know, lost to the ages or at least vaccine, you know, they came up with a vaccine, but it's not true. It's still just as deadly as it always was.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It was not, it's not been eradicated since I, yeah, that's a lot of, I mean, I know obviously there's billions of people in the world, 10 billion people, but like thousands of cases a year is still horrifying. This is not, this episode was not meant to be like an allegory about COVID, but it sort of serves as that. I think it's a really good reminder. A how important vaccination is science has come a long way and we have the opportunity, right? To not end up in this really dark gray, like we're already in a dark, grim situation, but to try to protect as many people around us as we can, it's just really important to wear your mask, to wash your hands, to think about your neighbors and your community in these times, because you know, we've been there before and we'll probably be there again, well said. Thanks. So before we officially get into the pop culture section and how the grim Reaper is represented in modern art and literature. Yes. I want to talk quickly about a book that I'm currently reading, actually that my therapist recommended called smoke gets in your eyes and other lessons from the crematory by Kaitlin Daughtry or Dotty, uh, I'll leave a link to it, but smoke gets in your eyes in, in you'll find it. Okay. She is somebody who sort of life work is to destigmatize death. She had like a, she, she watched like a horrifying example of death when she was young and it kind of shaped her whole life, made her super afraid of death. And now she's Rosen from the ashes, right. To reclaim that. And so kind of that's her whole brand she's on Twitter. She, you know, makes content she's on YouTube, but she also this book and she also has experience working in crematories and funeral homes, things like that. And the book is really, really good and kind of like randomly timed that I read it for this episode, but the central themes are, you know, understanding that our fear of death, I guess, you know, it really hasn't always been that way, especially even in the research that we just talked about. If you look back at ancient times, like there's this celebration of the afterlife and, uh, preparing for death and the trials of that, right. I've seen Coco. Yeah. And if you look now, I mean, I think Coco's are a really good example of, uh, of a film that does celebrate death and ancestry and things like that. But there is this kind of like lack of understanding and not, I'm not talking about like the afterlife and those things, but kind of like how death works. So in the book she talks about, you know, like what happens to your body? What is embalming? What happens in a crematorium machine? Um, how to, how, you know, how they actually did, you know, they blend your ashes after, and it has to be that way because there can't be big bone fragments in it. Like there's a lot of interesting things didn't know that I, and she's very funny, you know, it's, it's a very fun, like quick read. So like in a blender. Yeah. It's, it's, it depends on the state actually. There's like a handful of States where it's required. And I think it was like California, New York and some other big ones. So when the body is cremated, it reduces to, to Ash mostly, but there's still bone fragments. And if you have other things actually like, she talks about how they have to remove pacemakers before and all of these, like things that you just don't think about when it comes to processing bodies and why we do certain things, uh, and some things that are outdated. So anyway, it's just been really fascinating. And, uh, I recommend that to anybody who's looking to kind of start questioning and becoming more comfortable with the idea of death
Speaker 3:I recommend. And I know it's not for the first time on this podcast, but I'm a big proponent of the Tibet and sky burial. Here we go again, Alan talking about the Tibetans sky burial, uh, they just, they bring the body up to the top of the mountain and they just leave it for the vultures. And it's just a big swarm of carrion birds, uh, come and just rip up the body, take every little bit, you know, bones at all. And it basically, you just fly, fly away.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's beautiful. I like that. You're kind of feeding the earth again. It's the same thing of in Oregon now, how they we've talked about this too, they have the ability to turn your body into soil, right?
Speaker 3:So they put the little seed in it and you become a tree.
Speaker 2:You become a Venus fly trap tree, or a rosebush yeah. Or food to grow, you know, to help people live. So I think there's a lot of fig strangler. Yeah. There's a lot of, uh, very progressive options out there. Now, if you're looking for a different way, a different way to honor your body, I guess, or use your body post-mortem
Speaker 3:They can put you into such crazy pressure that you become a diamond carbon based life form. What can't we do? There you go.
Speaker 2:She actually, in this book kind of like makes a list of like, so it's supposed to be funny things to do with bodies after it's worth reading. Are there some notable ones? Confetti cannon? That was good. Uh, okay, here we go. Let's get into the movies. Probably one of the most famous movies about the grim Reaper, the seventh seal from 1957, a classic Karicare Salwa a classic director, classic director. It's a slog of a film. Let's be honest.
Speaker 3:Aye. Aye. Aye. I like it. Oh yeah. Yeah. You don't think it's slow. I mean, by modern standards, all of his films are, have a very patient pace I'll say. Uh, but they're meant to be taken in as the whole. Yep. So, so I, I won't say it's a slow film in that. It's a well paced film. All right. Fair enough. Uh, very slowly well paced.
Speaker 2:We also have the Frighteners from 1996, which is on Hulu, meet Joe Black from 1998, which is on Hulu, but more modern. I suppose we have trick or treat from 2007, which is available on Hulu.
Speaker 3:Hang on. We're given all these streaming recommendations, but streaming changes like every other week
Speaker 2:At the time of recording, I don't at the time of this episode coming out. So don't hold us to it. Don't hold us to it. Oh yeah. So trigger tree, I would say is kind of like the, the horror film that is often, you know, I didn't know that
Speaker 3:The grim Reaper, I always pictured as the Halloween movie.
Speaker 2:I mean, honestly, there's so many films that so many horror films that have either the grim Reaper or grim Reaper clothed villains, right? Like I'm even thinking of scream, obviously go spaces a little bit different, but the hood, all of these things are, um, you know, th they're kind of like nods to, to this culture that has come out of the black death TV shows. We have dead like me, which aired from 2003 to 2004 and soul eater, which aired from 2008 to 2009. What is soul leader? So soul eater is a Monga series and I've seen this and dead like me is actually about two women who are grim reapers. So kind of fun shows there.
Speaker 3:So, uh, grim reaping or cycle cycle pumps in general are a huge trope in Japanese anime. Yeah. Sole leader. Uh, there is a Academy run by the grim Reaper and it's just training a little new grim reapers to eventually, you know, take up the mantle. Very cute. It is. It's even more cute because you have to pair up with people. One person becomes like the Reaper and the other person becomes the weapon and you have to become like a little, little, little, little, little teamwork. Yeah.
Speaker 2:That's cute. There's also a death note.
Speaker 3:Def no is a very good example of this because, um, in that, uh, they have a whole race of Reaper beings. One of them named rebuke, you know, he has his notebook in the way that he reaps his soles is he just writes the name down and then the ed and how the person dies as like a log. But he does it before they die and that's how they die. And so when he drops his notebook to earth, just cause he's bored, honestly, and just wants to see cause a little trouble and someone picks it up. It become, he basically has the tools of the grim Reaper. Well, it becomes a, a big psychological thriller as like the police try to outsmart this crazy serial killer. Yeah. But, um, yeah, rebuke is a, the word that they use in, uh, Japanese is Sheena gummy. And that literally means soul Reaper.
Speaker 2:Interesting. There's also some notable books, a dirty job in secondhand souls by Christopher Moore and repairman and Mort by Terry Pratchett.
Speaker 3:My second favorite personification of death, it actually comes from a video game. So we are once again, going to stomach me going on a tangent for Diablo and Diablo three,
Speaker 2:I'm rolling my eyes dramatically
Speaker 3:Expansion, Reaper of souls. Hmm.
Speaker 2:The main antagonist
Speaker 3:Is the grim Reaper. And you basically have to fight against death itself, cheat death G well, in this case, there's no cheating. It's just, you have to do battle, you know what
Speaker 2:Sephora's[inaudible].
Speaker 3:Yeah. Um, and there's just some like talk about, you know, feeling empowered when you literally have the ability to use your might to conquer death. It just mentioned in a video game. Yeah. Yeah. It just makes you feel like such a bad-ass.
Speaker 2:Sure. Okay. What's your first favorite first
Speaker 3:And I think best incarnation of death in pop in pop fiction, pop fiction, pop fiction with pop culture, pop culture fiction. I don't know, but not pop culture. Non-fiction the Sandman. Yes. Sandman by Neil Gaiman. So this, uh, primarily being the graphic novel, one of the endless is named death and capital D capital D sister of, you know, dream, the main character. And she did you just get to see so many different, you just get to see so many different faces of death through her. You know, whether that's her just going on her day to day of harvesting souls as the grim Reaper would, whether it's, uh, her being the, the, the one to like, you know, uh, comfort, uh, a soul that was unexpectedly taken from the world and just, you know, be there for them as they transition on. Also, you get to see just how dangerous death can be when a personified version of her gets angered. You know how I am, uh, the whole series starts because they were, uh, some, some people were dabbling in black magic and they were trying to trap death to do exactly what happened in Greek myth of trapping Thanatos. And when death is removed from the world, no one can die.
Speaker 2:The thing is though, when Deb has a woman, she's a little bit smarter, well, she can't get locked in a closet with some manacles.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, men ran the experiment, men it up. They didn't trap death. They trap dream bad boys. And well dream says very little has entire his entire imprisonment. But one thing he does says does say, when they determined that he's not death is like, just be thankful. You didn't get my sister.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Oh, well, a lot worse than that. So something that certain people just can't seem to understand is that there are fates worse than death look at at you Lord Voldemort.
Speaker 2:Yes. Splitting your soul is a tricky business. Indeed.
Speaker 3:I think death being all like grim Reaper worry and scary is a very Western philosophy.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 3:I think during the black death was the dark ages for, for Europe and we call it the dark ages, imagining it as a global wide era. Right. But it wasn't, it was just Europe, everywhere else in the world was thriving in different ways, whether that was, you know, certain civilizations developing, uh, huge complex road systems or, uh, agriculture technologies, or, you know, not aqueducts, but irrigation systems like huge technological innovations. But meanwhile, Europe, which is just plagued by the well play plagued by the black death, uh, has just, it's completely their entire society. Everything about that time is consumed by day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, totally. It is. And I think it's not a leap to say that that sentiment has endured in Western society to this day, a hundred percent. You know, again, you look at some of the early histories we talked about in different cultures and, you know, death was scary, but also celebrated and actually to give away a little bit of a spoiler for an upcoming theme, there's, there's certain fear in certain religions, right. And in Christianity, there's this sense of death as punishment, death sent by God. And that happens across, across cultures. Right. But when you, you think that you have this concrete example of, of like literally God's hell fires raining down around you, like it's very, very like dramatic and intense, uh, and really a horrifying way to live. When, you know, people are all around, you just dropping like flies, you know, it's like, it's like being in the most horrific type of like apocalyptic movie.
Speaker 3:And, but we do, we do get to walk away with some like truly chilling, uh, bits of fiction because of these ideologies, just like, look at the grim adventures of Billy and Mandy.
Speaker 2:What the hell is that?
Speaker 3:Okay, well, that's, that's going to be your homework is to check to check that out. It's a great time.
Speaker 2:The grim adventures of Billy and Mandy. Yes. Okay. I'll check it out. Two kids are friends with the grim Reaper. That's cute. It's really cute. Well, that is my death homework, but everybody, please go read a Sandman. It gets in your eyes and say a man. And so many of the things we talked about,
Speaker 3:And if you don't, if you want to listen to it instead, they last year released a full radio drama version on audible. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Recommend 10 out of 10. Well, thank you all so much for listening. I really enjoyed researching this one and learning a little bit more about this very scary plague and also feeling strong enough to do so because a few months ago I wouldn't have been able to. So thank you all so much for listening. Hopefully it wasn't too traumatic with, with the state of the world right now, but I appreciate you all for being here very much. And until next time,
Speaker 1:Bye.