Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Holly fro and I'm Tracy we Wilson. Today we
Speaker 1: are talking about a member of one of the royal
Speaker 1: houses of Europe. We had lots of requests to talk
Speaker 1: about royalty all the time. We do, and there's lots
Speaker 1: of fascinating stories there. Uh. Today's subject was an art patron.
Speaker 1: He was a lover of science, he spoke many languages,
Speaker 1: who was also known for having a dark temper and
Speaker 1: being a little bit unstable uh. And his poor decisions
Speaker 1: are as a ruler are credited with leading to the
Speaker 1: Thirty Years War. UH. So we're talking about Rudolph two,
Speaker 1: who was from Austria and he ruled the Holy Roman
Speaker 1: Empire from fifteen seventy six to sixteen twelve, although that
Speaker 1: last year UH largely figurehead, not really ruling status. Uh.
Speaker 1: And while he came to be known for his reclusive
Speaker 1: and gloomy and really a melancholic behavior, this Habsburg ruler
Speaker 1: was also really instrumental in starting an era of scientific
Speaker 1: exploration and discovery, and his reign is considered by many
Speaker 1: to be the Golden Age of Prague. Uh, and today
Speaker 1: we're mostly focusing on will include historical events that were
Speaker 1: happening around him, of course, but most of the focus
Speaker 1: kind of has to do with just his personal goings
Speaker 1: on throughout his life, because it's a very fascinating tail
Speaker 1: as a character. He's a fascinating person. You can't help
Speaker 1: but feel a little sad for him at times. I
Speaker 1: feel like that we feel sad about lots of the royals. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that has been something we haven't You and I haven't
Speaker 1: talked a whole lot about royalty, but that has been
Speaker 1: a favorite theme amongst some of the past hosts, and
Speaker 1: a lot of times they are sad, sad royal stories. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you almost can't help but feel sad for them. It's
Speaker 1: one of those things where it's in many ways a
Speaker 1: place of great privilege, but there is so much weird
Speaker 1: baggage that often comes with it that the actual stories
Speaker 1: behind the portraits are not particularly delightful. No, they are
Speaker 1: unhappy very often. We can start, of course, at the beginning.
Speaker 1: Rudolf was born on July eighteenth, fifty two in Vienna, Austria,
Speaker 1: and he was the oldest male child of his family.
Speaker 1: His father was Emperor Maximilian the Second, and his mother
Speaker 1: was Maria of Spain. Maria really ended up kind of
Speaker 1: having a big impression on his life through her beliefs
Speaker 1: and actions. Uh, not because she was so involved, but
Speaker 1: because of kind of the things that she catalyzed. She
Speaker 1: had a total of sixteen children, but she was not
Speaker 1: known to be an especially warm mother. Uh. And despite
Speaker 1: her marriage to the Austrian ruler Maximilian the second, she
Speaker 1: always really maintained her Spanish identity, and she pressured her
Speaker 1: husband to send their children to Spain uh to study
Speaker 1: under her brother Philip the second, And she felt strongly
Speaker 1: that the children really needed a Catholic influence rather than
Speaker 1: the Protestant ideology that they were largely exposed to in Vienna.
Speaker 1: Religion is a big part of this whole story and
Speaker 1: what was going on in the Holy Roman Empire at
Speaker 1: the time. Rudolph and his brother Ernest traveled to Spain
Speaker 1: in early fifteen sixty four, and there their uncle Philip
Speaker 1: the Second, who was a really somber man compared to
Speaker 1: their father, something on this really rigorous course of study.
Speaker 1: First they went to the monastery at Montserrat and then
Speaker 1: to the Summer Palace, and they studied fencing, language, dance,
Speaker 1: and rhetoric, among all kinds of other scholarly subjects. And
Speaker 1: during this time, Philip the Second, who uh is also
Speaker 1: a fascinating story, was having problems with his own son,
Speaker 1: Don Carlos, who was about seven years older than Rudolph,
Speaker 1: and Rudolph had met him while they were there. Uh.
Speaker 1: Don Carlos had a hunchback and several other physical deformities,
Speaker 1: and historians suspect that he likely suffered brain damage during
Speaker 1: his birth because it was an extremely difficult birth and
Speaker 1: his mother only survived a few days after Don Carlos
Speaker 1: was born, and Don Carlos would experience these fits of
Speaker 1: rage and madness, and he exhibited extremely impulsive and violent behavior,
Speaker 1: and that those sort of personality issues only grew worse
Speaker 1: and worse after he experienced a head injury in the
Speaker 1: early fifteen sixties. In January of fifteen sixty eight, which
Speaker 1: was almost four years after Rudolph and his brother had
Speaker 1: gotten into Spain, Don Carlos was locked away at his
Speaker 1: father's coming in and it became forbidden to ever speak
Speaker 1: of him. Don Carlos wound up dying six months into
Speaker 1: his imprisonment UH. In just a few months after Don
Speaker 1: Carlos died, Philip's third wife, who was Elizabeth of Valvois,
Speaker 1: died after having a miscarriage. And as you can imagine,
Speaker 1: these two events happening close together UH caused the Spanish Court,
Speaker 1: where Rudolph and Ernest were still living and studying, to
Speaker 1: become even more somber than ever. It had always been
Speaker 1: sort of a serious place, but it really hit. There
Speaker 1: was a gloom over the the whole thing, and it
Speaker 1: would still be two more years that they would be
Speaker 1: there before they could return home. In fifteen seventy Rudolph
Speaker 1: and Earnest were joined in Spain by two of their
Speaker 1: other brothers and their sister Anna, and she was to
Speaker 1: become Philip the second's fourth and final wife, and by
Speaker 1: all accounts, that was pretty happy marriage, just f y I.
Speaker 1: So when Rudolph returned with his brother to Vienma in
Speaker 1: early fifteen seventy one, their father, Maximilian the second, immediately
Speaker 1: noticed a significant change in their demeanors. Rudolph had only
Speaker 1: been UH twelve when he left for the Spanish Court,
Speaker 1: and Maximilian was troubled by the darkness of now nineteen
Speaker 1: year old Rudolph's mood and the depth of influence that
Speaker 1: the boy's time was Philip the second had had on them.
Speaker 1: He sort of felt like he sent, you know, young men,
Speaker 1: bright boys away, and he got back really just dour,
Speaker 1: overly serious adults. I'm reluctant to pass judgment on historical
Speaker 1: figures when I really have no idea of of all
Speaker 1: of their internal motivations. But part of me wants to say, Maximilian, honey,
Speaker 1: if you wanted to have a hand in their upbringing,
Speaker 1: maybe should have kept them at home. Yeah, but their
Speaker 1: mom really wanted him to go. His disdain at his
Speaker 1: son's demeanors then caused all kinds of strife with his wife.
Speaker 1: So he really wanted a liberal ideology that was designed
Speaker 1: to avoid religious conflict, and Maria felt strongly that an
Speaker 1: entirely Catholic state was really the ideal, and the more
Speaker 1: serious bearing that the young man had taken was in
Speaker 1: line with this. Yeah, she sort of felt like she
Speaker 1: got back exactly what she wanted, which was serious, very
Speaker 1: um um, you know, catholically educated young men, whereas her
Speaker 1: husband was like, but they're not very fun anymore. Uh,
Speaker 1: And Maximilian was a humanist Christian, but really above all
Speaker 1: he favored open minded compromise among different religious ideologies, and
Speaker 1: his stance on religion, which was really quite liberal, had
Speaker 1: allowed this sort of pocket of peace in the ongoing
Speaker 1: struggle between Protestants and Catholics in the Holy Roman Empire.
Speaker 1: He was not so much about forcing dogma on anybody
Speaker 1: in any way. Yeah, really unusual. Well, and while he
Speaker 1: did try to help his sons move into a less
Speaker 1: somber state of mind, the time in Spain really seemed
Speaker 1: to have just left a permanent gloom on them. And
Speaker 1: to make matters worse, Uh. You know, Maximilian was advancing
Speaker 1: in age, and he was at this time suffering from
Speaker 1: a number of different health issues. He had heart attacks,
Speaker 1: he had gout, he had kidney issues, and there are
Speaker 1: also rumors that he had syphilis at this time. And
Speaker 1: as his health got worse and worse, Uh, he was
Speaker 1: trying to position Rudolph, who was the heir, into a
Speaker 1: position of authority before he died so he would know
Speaker 1: everything was cool. Uh. And he had Rudolph crowned as
Speaker 1: King of Hungary in fifteen seventy two and then King
Speaker 1: of Bohemia in fifteen seventy five, so even there was
Speaker 1: the Holy Roman Empire, there were all these smaller states
Speaker 1: that you could have dominion over. While traveling to Regensburg
Speaker 1: in the summer of fifteen seventy six, Maximilian got sick,
Speaker 1: and once he arrived at his destination, he rallied briefly,
Speaker 1: but then he got even sicker. It became apparent that
Speaker 1: he wasn't going to survive this illness, and he died
Speaker 1: on October twelfth of that year. Maria, his wife, his
Speaker 1: sister Anna, and Rudolph were all at his bedside, and
Speaker 1: just a few weeks later, Rudolph was crowned as the
Speaker 1: Holy Roman Emperor. There was really no debate over whether
Speaker 1: or not he was gonna take the throne. He was
Speaker 1: in his mid twenties at this point. He was smart,
Speaker 1: he was fluent in multiple languages, and you might think
Speaker 1: that he would be kind of on top of the
Speaker 1: world after being crowned emperor. But this gloom that he
Speaker 1: had acquired in Spain just seemed to get worse once
Speaker 1: he ascended to the throne, and the kingdom at this
Speaker 1: time was marked by religious fighting between the Roman Catholics,
Speaker 1: and Protestants. Uh, you know, with the death of Maximilian
Speaker 1: and this very liberal approach to religion and trying to
Speaker 1: everybody to cooperate. Uh, it kind of reignited some some
Speaker 1: issues amongst the different factions, and all of this fighting
Speaker 1: had a really disastrous effect on the empire. Rudolph up
Speaker 1: ended his father's time of religious tolerance initially, and he
Speaker 1: actually downgraded the role that the Protestant Estates could have
Speaker 1: in politics. So a lot of this, while let's quote
Speaker 1: religious ideology, it was really had to do with power
Speaker 1: balance and uh, you know, political ownership of different aspects
Speaker 1: of the government. Rudolph did eventually come around to his
Speaker 1: father's way of thinking and favoring a more tolerant and
Speaker 1: conciliatory approach to religion, but those early decisions really caused
Speaker 1: some problems. In fifteen seventy seven, so just the next
Speaker 1: year after he had ascended to the throne, he had
Speaker 1: his first nervous breakdown. The stress of governing just had
Speaker 1: this intense negative effect on him, both mentally and physically,
Speaker 1: and in fifteen eighty he became extremely ill and lost
Speaker 1: a lot of weight. He eventually he got better, but
Speaker 1: his mood while ruling in Vienna was just always dour.
Speaker 1: So in fifty three Rudolph, who had become obviously weary
Speaker 1: of the pressures of the Court of Vienna both physically
Speaker 1: and mentally, as we had said, decided that he was
Speaker 1: going to move his residence and bust the seat of
Speaker 1: power for the Holy Roman Empire to Prague, which is
Speaker 1: part of Bohemia at this time. Uh and he also
Speaker 1: became deeply interested at this point in astrology and magic
Speaker 1: and alchemy. Rudolphine Prague became this epicenter of art and science. Architects, scientists,
Speaker 1: and philosophers were all welcomed into the city famous Danish
Speaker 1: astronomer ticobra Hay, who we have some stuff on in
Speaker 1: our archive. He had made the most accurate pre telescope
Speaker 1: observations of the heavens, and he advanced our knowledge of
Speaker 1: the solar system significantly. He established an observatory in Prague,
Speaker 1: so did Johannes Kepler, who was recognized as the first
Speaker 1: person to correctly describe planetary motion. Ra Hay was named
Speaker 1: as the Imperial Magnetisiue in a post that was eventually
Speaker 1: assumed by Kepler, who had at one point ben brahe's assistant,
Speaker 1: and Rudolph also wanted to redesign and expand the Palace
Speaker 1: in Prague, as well as several other structures that were
Speaker 1: owned UH by the government, all as part of his
Speaker 1: desire to patronize and reinvigorate the architectural arts in the area. Really,
Speaker 1: though his greatest patronage of artists within painting and sculpture.
Speaker 1: The Imperial Court welcomed artists from all over, and Rudolph
Speaker 1: was especially fond of foreign artists. He amassed this collection
Speaker 1: of thousands of paintings, including works by Da Vinci, Correggio
Speaker 1: and Broiled the Elder. There is also a beautiful painting
Speaker 1: by Giuseppe arcam Bodeaux that listeners will probably recognize when
Speaker 1: they see it if they don't recognize the name of
Speaker 1: the painter of Rudolph as Ratumnus, who was the god
Speaker 1: of seasons and plant growth in Roman mythology. And in
Speaker 1: this painting, which I just love, Rudolph and his features
Speaker 1: are rendered as sort of a mosaic of fruits and
Speaker 1: vegetables where they all together to make his head and face. Uh.
Speaker 1: And we'll hopefully linked to that in the show notes.
Speaker 1: At some point because it's a gorgeous painting. During this time,
Speaker 1: Rudolph also developed what would become quite an impressive coon's
Speaker 1: commer cabinet of curiosities. He collected all these bronze statues
Speaker 1: and stonework, books, drawings, paintings, scientific items. It's also rumored
Speaker 1: that he purchased the Voyage Manuscript at one point as
Speaker 1: part of this collection, although that's a little unclear. With
Speaker 1: many things regarding the Voyage Manuscript, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: question marks and uh, circumstantial evidence without actual solid data
Speaker 1: on it. We have an episode on that in our archives,
Speaker 1: have not heard it. And Rudolph is also rumored to
Speaker 1: have become somewhat obsessed with the occults and as we
Speaker 1: mentioned before, alchemy during this time, which, uh, you have
Speaker 1: to remember that this is a period when the concepts
Speaker 1: of science and magic had a certain fluidity between them.
Speaker 1: So to that he was a man of science and
Speaker 1: also was into the occult was not a particularly disparate concept.
Speaker 1: They were all sort of flowing together because they were
Speaker 1: learning about all of these things. Uh. And this is
Speaker 1: also the period during which Rudolf is associated sort of
Speaker 1: with Rabbi Lev and his goal on which is covered
Speaker 1: in a previous episode with Candice and Katie. So there
Speaker 1: was a lot of sort of uh, you know, scientific
Speaker 1: exploration as we said, and magical investigation going on. Prague
Speaker 1: was just really a hotbed of new ideas and you know,
Speaker 1: freedom to explore and encourage new ways of looking at
Speaker 1: the world. So all of this enthusiasm for art and science,
Speaker 1: it seems to be sort of an attempted antidote that
Speaker 1: Rudolph made to try to counteract the world outside, which
Speaker 1: to him was this ceaseless stream of stressors. The first
Speaker 1: two decades of his rule as emperor were troubled, to
Speaker 1: say the least. There was plague, Turks invaded Vienna, suffered
Speaker 1: a huge earthquake, and he really struggled to meet the
Speaker 1: challenges of his leadership. The long war which Rudolf got
Speaker 1: into with the Turks in would drag on for years
Speaker 1: into the sid hence the name, and it exhausted the
Speaker 1: people as well as Rudolph. When he was bothered to
Speaker 1: be engaged in public affairs and not hiding in solitude
Speaker 1: or having a depressive episode where he didn't want to
Speaker 1: talk about things or to anyone, I ampathize who I
Speaker 1: mean we've all had that, but as a ruler of
Speaker 1: a nation and an empire, you can't really just go
Speaker 1: I don't want to talk to anybody behind. Unfortunately, by
Speaker 1: the late fifteen nineties, his mental state had gotten even
Speaker 1: more unsteady. His melancholic episodes got longer and more intense,
Speaker 1: and his moments of anxiety would lead him to this
Speaker 1: extreme agitation and paranoia. He became really convinced that somebody
Speaker 1: in his family was plotting to murder him. He also
Speaker 1: became fearful that people were attempting to exploit his general
Speaker 1: city and steal from him, so much so that he
Speaker 1: insisted on keeping his gold underlocking key. And this guy
Speaker 1: really crazy. It sounds not crazy, of course, you want
Speaker 1: to protect your wealth, but he did this to the
Speaker 1: point that he would sometimes not even release any money
Speaker 1: for the purchase of needed goods and food stuff for
Speaker 1: the castle, so there would literally be no food in
Speaker 1: the palace for anyone to eat. Uh. Driven by this
Speaker 1: fear and anxiety, he even started to completely decline audiences
Speaker 1: with foreign ambassadors. He was really starting to withdraw from
Speaker 1: his duties at a level that, even though he had
Speaker 1: been sporadic before, it really got bad. Despite his immersion
Speaker 1: and Catholicism while he was studying in Spain, it looks
Speaker 1: like he was ultimately distrustful of the Catholic Church's power structure.
Speaker 1: He also started to refuse to see papal ambassadors, and
Speaker 1: he continued to see Protestant guests, though he really seemed
Speaker 1: not to have any particular affinity for their religion. In
Speaker 1: Rudolph's brother Ernest, who he had been close you and
Speaker 1: studied with in Spain, died and that left their brother
Speaker 1: Matthias as the heir to the throne. Rudolph had never married.
Speaker 1: Despite several attempts to betrothe him to various houses of Europe,
Speaker 1: he had always resisted, and there have been rumors and um,
Speaker 1: you know, some evidences built up by historians throughout the
Speaker 1: years that he was bisexual and had affairs with both
Speaker 1: men and women that we will probably never know with certainty.
Speaker 1: And he also was not particularly fond of his brother Matthias, which, uh,
Speaker 1: it's a seed of some problems that develop. He's said
Speaker 1: to have had six children with a woman named Katina Strata.
Speaker 1: One of them, Julius Caesar was quite a terrifying character,
Speaker 1: and it will probably be the subject of a future episode,
Speaker 1: but generally he seemed pretty disinterested in his children. Yeah,
Speaker 1: his illegitimate brood really had no appeal for him. He
Speaker 1: wasn't very involved in their lives at all. Uh. But
Speaker 1: as his ment continued to swing and he withdrew further
Speaker 1: and further away from court life, his tea minister Wolfgang
Speaker 1: von Lump began to take over more and more of
Speaker 1: the Emperor's duties, and Wolfgang is one of the men
Speaker 1: that Rudolph has been suspected of being romantically involved with
Speaker 1: because the pair were so close, but Rudolph's paranoia eventually
Speaker 1: soured the relationship. Whether it had been romantic or not,
Speaker 1: they had been very good friends, and that fell away
Speaker 1: in Rudolph actually forced von Rumph to resign and they
Speaker 1: made up briefly, but it was a very short lived reunion.
Speaker 1: And there were actually a few of those where they
Speaker 1: would kind of, uh make peace with whatever was between them,
Speaker 1: but then it would fall apart again, and at that
Speaker 1: point Rudolph was just so suspicious I think there was
Speaker 1: no repairing it. Also, in fift Rudolph fired many of
Speaker 1: the palace servants and he retreated even further into isolation.
Speaker 1: An outbreak of plague hit Prague and he fled to
Speaker 1: pills And where he lived for a year. He had
Speaker 1: shortness of breath during the self imposed exile. He was
Speaker 1: likely suffering from undiagnosed panic attacks. Before we get to
Speaker 1: his return to Prague, let's take a moment to talk
Speaker 1: about our sponsor. That sounds grand, and now let's get
Speaker 1: back to talk about what happened after he got back
Speaker 1: to Prague. Yeah, so Rodolf returned to Prague in the
Speaker 1: summer of sixteen d and briefly he seemed okay. People
Speaker 1: really kind of were pleasantly surprised that his demeanor seemed
Speaker 1: a little stable, normal. He was willing to engage with
Speaker 1: people a little bit. But that was extremely short lived,
Speaker 1: because soon his mental state really veered south and he
Speaker 1: was having these frightening fits of hallucinations. His paranoia deepened
Speaker 1: to a point even beyond what it had been at before.
Speaker 1: He believed that he had been bewitched, and he would
Speaker 1: tell people that he thought he had been poisoned, sometimes
Speaker 1: that someone had put a curse on him. He really
Speaker 1: just was not in a stable place mentally. In the
Speaker 1: midst of a series of suicide attempts the government of
Speaker 1: the empire just came to a complete standstill. The emperor
Speaker 1: wouldn't speak with his counsel or delegate any of his duties,
Speaker 1: so nothing could happen. Grid Luck completely one person, grid Luck, Yes,
Speaker 1: unfortunately uh. And he had all of the passages of
Speaker 1: the palace covered so that he could move around without
Speaker 1: anyone seeing him, and he spent basically all of his
Speaker 1: time alone. He would eat alone. He basically did not
Speaker 1: not only did he not want to talk to anybody,
Speaker 1: he didn't want anybody to look at him. He was
Speaker 1: so fearful of all of these poisoning and bewitching suspicions
Speaker 1: that um he even became terrified of the sacraments, so
Speaker 1: he wouldn't have contact with any religious figures at all.
Speaker 1: After years of progressively more unstable and reclusive behavior and
Speaker 1: just terrible political decisions that were depleting the kingdom and
Speaker 1: causing revolts, in sixteen o five, the Habsburg archdukes pressured
Speaker 1: the emperor to just consider handing over power to a
Speaker 1: leader more suited to the position. That, of course, was
Speaker 1: his brother Matthias. In sixteen o six, the arch Duke's
Speaker 1: officially backed Matthias as successor to Rudolph, although it took
Speaker 1: several more years to get him to just acquiesced fully
Speaker 1: and give into this plan. Yeah, once they had officially
Speaker 1: backed Matthias, he kind of started taking over uh these
Speaker 1: leadership roles, even though technically he was not in a
Speaker 1: position to do so. But in June sixteen o eight,
Speaker 1: and much like his ascension into various positions as you know,
Speaker 1: king of Bohemia before he became Holy Roman Emperor, he
Speaker 1: seeded a little at a time. So he seeded Austria
Speaker 1: and Hungary in June eight to his brother, and then
Speaker 1: in May of sixteen eleven, Matthias was finally crowned King
Speaker 1: of Bohemia, although Rudolph did not officially seed until August
Speaker 1: of that year, and Rudolph the Second maintained his emperor's
Speaker 1: crown as Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, but it
Speaker 1: was really in a powerless figurehead thing. It was kind
Speaker 1: of like they were like, let the crazy man have
Speaker 1: the crown, and I think he's still the emperor, but
Speaker 1: really his brother was doing all the work. At that point.
Speaker 1: Matthias moved his brother to Rogston Castle in Prague and
Speaker 1: the basically deposed monarch lived on there with his menagerie
Speaker 1: of exotic animals. When several of his favorite creatures died,
Speaker 1: he developed a drinking problem which really rapidly deteriorated his health,
Speaker 1: and Rudolph died very shortly, really after he had been
Speaker 1: sent away to this castle. It was January twentieth, sixteen twelve,
Speaker 1: and he was buried in the royal vault of St.
Speaker 1: Vitus's Cathedral in Prague Castle. His incredible art collection was
Speaker 1: just broken up and dispersed. There wasn't really much of
Speaker 1: it left in Prague, and during a relatively short eleven
Speaker 1: year reign, Matthias worked towards compromised between the Catholic and
Speaker 1: Protestant states, although it was during that time that the
Speaker 1: Thirty Years War began and so it was still going
Speaker 1: on when he died. But really most people point to
Speaker 1: Rudolph as the cause of it, because he was so
Speaker 1: ineffectual towards the end of his reign that he really
Speaker 1: wasn't addressing any of the problems that could have kept
Speaker 1: things from getting really agitated and out of control. So
Speaker 1: it started after his reign, correct, but he is usually
Speaker 1: um people are happy to point the finger and say
Speaker 1: like you contributed significantly to this thing happening f y.
Speaker 1: I so that is the story of Rodolph the Second,
Speaker 1: who once again has yet another tragic royal character. Yes, uh,
Speaker 1: do you also have some preferably less tragic listener mais
Speaker 1: I have such untragic listener mail? It's adorable to different pieces,
Speaker 1: and they're both super cute. The first one is from
Speaker 1: Kim and says, I've been trying to think of a
Speaker 1: name for my new bird, who is an Indian ringnet parakeet,
Speaker 1: and during the Haunted Mansion podcast you mentioned a guy
Speaker 1: with the coolest name ever, ex Atensio. So I decided
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call my parent Xavier extra short and XC
Speaker 1: I think that's what she means inter pronunciation for not
Speaker 1: quite so short. It's appropriate to since the other Xavier
Speaker 1: I know of, Professor X is a mutant and my
Speaker 1: part is blue, which is caused by mutation. And she
Speaker 1: included photos of her parents as well as as they
Speaker 1: are able. And I mostly wanted to read this because
Speaker 1: I will out myself on my level of dorkatude. I
Speaker 1: have a cat named after Exittencio, and I have another
Speaker 1: cat named after roly gro Uh. They are litter mates. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have a cat named after a form of poetry. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I used to have tea, but now I only have one.
Speaker 1: She's very cute. She's a very speaking of cats. And
Speaker 1: then we got this absolutely delightful and charming letter from
Speaker 1: another listener. Uh. It's written by Sharon, but it is
Speaker 1: on behalf of her daughter Rose. And Sharon says, I
Speaker 1: listen to your podcast while cooking and doing housework, and
Speaker 1: my four year old daughter Rose has become quite a fan.
Speaker 1: She was amazed to hear that you are real, live
Speaker 1: people and wanted to send you a letter. She writes this,
Speaker 1: So this is Rose's letter. Dear history ladies, you must
Speaker 1: be very kind ladies to tell us good history story.
Speaker 1: My favorite one is the pirate one. My least favorite
Speaker 1: one is the Hope Diamond. Do you like cats? I
Speaker 1: like cats? Can you do some history stories about the ocean?
Speaker 1: Your friend Rose? And then she said, it's a really
Speaker 1: cool piece of art that is an askey wing dinghy
Speaker 1: and crayon composition. That is beautiful and we will take
Speaker 1: a picture of it and put it on Facebook. It
Speaker 1: is beautiful. Had we not already gotten this fantastic letter
Speaker 1: from a four year old. Uh. The the other male
Speaker 1: that we got in the same week was a sack
Speaker 1: full of anime and that would have won the prize
Speaker 1: for the most awesome thing that came in the mail.
Speaker 1: But it was pretty good. Male. We it's yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's edged out, I think. Even though the sack full
Speaker 1: of anime is extremely cool. I'm very excited about it,
Speaker 1: but we haven't we haven't watched it yet, and I'm
Speaker 1: sorry I did not know the name of the person
Speaker 1: who sent us the anime before I came in here,
Speaker 1: but I'll do it. We will acknowledge that later after
Speaker 1: we get the chance to actually watch it. So Rose,
Speaker 1: I don't think it's any secret that we do like cats.
Speaker 1: We do. I like all the animals and crazy Animal lady,
Speaker 1: and I'm and we can find some history stories about
Speaker 1: the ocean at some point that not to distent future.
Speaker 1: Shipwreck stories are popular with everybody, so we always want
Speaker 1: to find some new and cool ones of involving that.
Speaker 1: So thank you so much for writing us. And I
Speaker 1: love when we can inspire pet names. That always makes
Speaker 1: it super fun. Uh. If you would like to write us,
Speaker 1: you can do so at history Podcasts at Discovery dot com.
Speaker 1: You can also connect with us on Facebook dot com
Speaker 1: slash history class stuff, on Twitter at missed in History,
Speaker 1: and on Tumbler at missed in History dot tumbler dot com.
Speaker 1: We're also on Pinterests very busily pinning things away of
Speaker 1: historical significance or delight. And if you would like to
Speaker 1: learn a little bit more about what we talked about today,
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