Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
Speaker 1: to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: tuning in. Uh, we have an elephant in the zoom
Speaker 1: call today, or I would say several elephants as we
Speaker 1: record this on a beautiful Friday here in the fair
Speaker 1: metropolis of Atlanta, Georgia. Uh. And that's fitting for us
Speaker 1: to have a lot of elephants in today's conversation, because
Speaker 1: today's conversation is in fact about an elephant. Hi, I'm Ben, Ben,
Speaker 1: I'm Noel. I have to say, I feel as though
Speaker 1: you missed a golden opportunity. Why not just an elephant
Speaker 1: in the zoom baby, That's what I said. But you
Speaker 1: said the zoom call. Oh yeah, well earlier I did
Speaker 1: you heard me do this joke earlier? I don't know
Speaker 1: what you're talking and I did say, oh man, this
Speaker 1: is you guys are getting us at our absolute best lately. Uh.
Speaker 1: The end of the day Friday, you know, election time,
Speaker 1: very tense, you know, tensions running high. Not gonna get
Speaker 1: into any of that, but I think we're probably both
Speaker 1: on the extra punchy side for today's recordings. But that's
Speaker 1: really the best version of ourselves. You're gonna get folks. Hey,
Speaker 1: I did a little self care. I took a power
Speaker 1: nap in my car. I'm bunker down in the office today.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, we're We're enjoying it. We're in a
Speaker 1: good mood. The weekends on the way are super Producer
Speaker 1: Casey Pagro has what I what I think of as
Speaker 1: his um For some reason, case I think of this
Speaker 1: as your second most optimistic backgrounds. I still the Eats background,
Speaker 1: and still I think takes has a place in my heart.
Speaker 1: Eats is a mainstay local meeting three situation here in Atlanta.
Speaker 1: Any visitors passing through, they are doing pick up or
Speaker 1: some some form of yes, tell us all about Eats. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've been fortunate to um have seen Eats in person
Speaker 1: again after several months of of not so um uh. Yeah.
Speaker 1: If you're ever in Atlanta on PONSTI Leon, go by
Speaker 1: checkout Eats. Get the jerk chicken. It's very good. I
Speaker 1: hear they did away with the pasta bar though, or
Speaker 1: maybe that's only temporary. But yeah, I wouldn't you know
Speaker 1: about that. I get literally the same thing every time,
Speaker 1: jerk chicken, mac and cheese and sweet potato. You don't
Speaker 1: do the broccoli cast role cast role, No, no, how
Speaker 1: dare you this is going to be I can't even
Speaker 1: look at you anymore. Yeah, next time you find yourself
Speaker 1: in Atlanta, do try out Eats. The menu is literally
Speaker 1: not changed in decades until the Pande where they halted
Speaker 1: the pasta bar. But you always felt sorry for the
Speaker 1: people working the pasta bar. There's always this huge line
Speaker 1: for everything else. It's true, it's so what about us? Hey,
Speaker 1: you know what else hasn't changed much in decades? The Vatican.
Speaker 1: There we go segue, so uh yeah, today's episode is
Speaker 1: not just about elephants. It's about white elephants in very
Speaker 1: literal sense, and it's about the Vaticans. So this is weird.
Speaker 1: If you go to the Vatican, you're gonna see a
Speaker 1: lot of unique things, right, we're talking off air. You'll
Speaker 1: see the only place in the world where the A T.
Speaker 1: M s are also available in latin um. You'll see
Speaker 1: some of the most influential architecture in European history. Uh
Speaker 1: nol You and I haven't been to the Vatican, but
Speaker 1: but Casey, you have right. Yeah, I was there in
Speaker 1: twenty eleven and I did not know about the thing
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about in today's show. When I was there,
Speaker 1: I wish I had known, But um, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it's a very very impressive place. You don't really have
Speaker 1: to be remotely religious to to still find it. The
Speaker 1: opulence of it and and just the I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's a it's an overwhelming place. Everywhere you go, it's
Speaker 1: like impressive. And I hung out in Vatican Square for
Speaker 1: a while, got very lucky somehow I managed to like
Speaker 1: skip the huge line because I just glombed onto some
Speaker 1: weird tour group and like went right in there. There's
Speaker 1: there's not much you can say like that. The Sistine
Speaker 1: chap bowl and and everything is just pretty pretty mind
Speaker 1: blowing place. Did you hav to come across any elephant
Speaker 1: bones while you were wandering around Vatican City? You know?
Speaker 1: I saw some and I didn't think anything of it
Speaker 1: at the time, And now you're doing this episode, I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I should have probably, Uh, it's been a little more
Speaker 1: time there. You should have carbon carbon dated those bad boys.
Speaker 1: At the very least, you carry that kid around with
Speaker 1: you at all times. We all do that, and you
Speaker 1: gotta I think you were telling me one of your
Speaker 1: main regrets is not understanding the hierarchy of hats in
Speaker 1: the Vatican, which are very important, very true. Yeah, a
Speaker 1: lot of a lot of potential faux pads you can
Speaker 1: make there if you're not on top of it. Doesn't
Speaker 1: the hierarchy literally have to do with the height of
Speaker 1: your hat? Or what are you talking about here? That's
Speaker 1: a good that's a good question. I think maybe that's
Speaker 1: an episode if we could dig up enough stuff on that.
Speaker 1: On the weird, uh, the weird hierarchy of hats, maybe
Speaker 1: we shouldn't call it weird. It's it's just unique to itself.
Speaker 1: But we're dancing around. We're dancing around like elephants scared
Speaker 1: of proverbial mice. The story starts here. It goes all
Speaker 1: the way back to sixteenth century. There's a guy named
Speaker 1: Giovanni de Lorenzo de Medici. He becomes Pope Leo the tenth.
Speaker 1: Do you know how when you're famous you get all
Speaker 1: kinds of weird swag from people who kind of like
Speaker 1: want stuff from you, or they want you to do
Speaker 1: something and they want you to think kindly of them.
Speaker 1: That is magnified by one million. When you're the pope.
Speaker 1: At this time, Christian rulers were always plying the Vatican
Speaker 1: with these gifts, and they would be like, hey, Pope Leo,
Speaker 1: we're cool, right, Like I'm the king of so and so,
Speaker 1: I want you to favor me if anything happens down
Speaker 1: the line. And there was one guy, the king of
Speaker 1: Portugal at the time, Manual the First, in fifteen thirteen,
Speaker 1: he said, I'm gonna go all out. I'm gonna outdo
Speaker 1: every gift the pope has ever gotten. Well, surely, ben
Speaker 1: papal favor cannot be carried by mere mortals. But that
Speaker 1: being said, this is a pretty good attempt um. He
Speaker 1: Manuel in particular wanted to um exercise some political swagger
Speaker 1: with this relationship and expand Portugal's shipping routes to India,
Speaker 1: which were at the time being threatened by Egypt. Um.
Speaker 1: Egypt had essentially the makings of a monopoly on these
Speaker 1: trade routes. So in order to to get Leo, I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna called Leo X because that sounds badass um,
Speaker 1: but we all know, excess the tenth uh to get
Speaker 1: him on board and to help, you know, flex some
Speaker 1: papal muscle in this whole dispute, he decided to um
Speaker 1: gift the pope with a freaking Indian elephant, and not
Speaker 1: just any Indian elephant, an albino elephant um named ann
Speaker 1: A and then O n e Um and then it
Speaker 1: was anglicized to Hanno, which is excusing to me. And
Speaker 1: what's wrong with ann I can say that, that's easy enough.
Speaker 1: What's the what's the problem? You know, people get weird
Speaker 1: about names. They think it's an ownership thing, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. So they probably just wanted to uh,
Speaker 1: you know what, maybe it was just a pet name,
Speaker 1: which is weird because Hannah was definitely not a pet.
Speaker 1: He was he was part of a transaction manual paid
Speaker 1: to get better shipping routes to India. Right, and this,
Speaker 1: uh I almost said, this guy, this elephant, this white elephants.
Speaker 1: Hanno became a fundamental part of the politics of Portuguese
Speaker 1: expansion here. He made a cameo in the Protestant Reformation,
Speaker 1: and he was so popular. I mean, like people would
Speaker 1: you know this is this is in the time before
Speaker 1: widespread zoos, right, so this is people's one chance to
Speaker 1: see a near mythical creature that they've yeah for some
Speaker 1: reason decide to call Hannah. Uh, it makes you wonder
Speaker 1: what Harambie's real name was. Story for another day. It
Speaker 1: is a story for another day, but it is interesting.
Speaker 1: The whole idea of anglicization of names in and of itself,
Speaker 1: I think could be a cool one. But names aside, Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a beloved elephant by the Pope and an
Speaker 1: important kind of almost like diplomatic chess piece in some ways. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's exactly right. And then check this out. History forgot
Speaker 1: about it that we got. We got all the way
Speaker 1: to like nineteen sixty two. Uh, some folks were digging
Speaker 1: up the Vatican's Belvidere courtyard. They wanted to modernize the
Speaker 1: h v A c true story. That's acceptable, that's an
Speaker 1: acceptable modification of the Vatican. But they probably don't do
Speaker 1: too much remodeling typically, right, Yeah, you can imagine it
Speaker 1: gets a little bit tricky for them, given the age
Speaker 1: and the whole you know, the fact that this is
Speaker 1: these are sanctuaries and so on. But they managed to
Speaker 1: get together. It was considered a worthwhile operation. And while
Speaker 1: they were digging, these Italian construction workers where you know,
Speaker 1: they're like s sunk and they hit bone. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know why I'm phrased it that way of
Speaker 1: picturing like the Beverly Hillbillies going bone, bone, black gold,
Speaker 1: dino bricks, white gold, whatever you wanna call. Yeah, it's bone,
Speaker 1: and it was elephant, mom. But they didn't know that
Speaker 1: at the time. Um, they were like, I was about
Speaker 1: to say, socrate blow. These weren't frenchmen. What am I
Speaker 1: doing here? One of them could have said socre blue?
Speaker 1: What would what would be Italian? Like a very stupid
Speaker 1: stereotypically the bone. Here we go, we get, there, we go. Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't even know. I don't. I am not familiar
Speaker 1: with any of the music of Abba except for Dancing Queen.
Speaker 1: Somebody played me a song of theirs the other night
Speaker 1: that sounded like a like a poker or something, and
Speaker 1: I really liked it, but I can't remember what it
Speaker 1: was called irrelevant, completely unrelated to anything we're discussing. But
Speaker 1: it's true they found these bones and then um, history
Speaker 1: forgot about it again. That's right, that's right. The well
Speaker 1: they did go so far as to realize it was
Speaker 1: not like a dinosaur, and it was dated to some degree.
Speaker 1: They didn't have I don't think they had carbon dating
Speaker 1: at this point, did they know? They probably did, They
Speaker 1: would have had carbon dating, radio carbon dating maybe, like
Speaker 1: it's a thing that existed, but I don't know if
Speaker 1: it would have been widespread because this was first proposed
Speaker 1: in right. Um. But they did to some degree of
Speaker 1: accuracy date the bones, of course, again after realizing that
Speaker 1: they were not, in fact, like dinosaur bones or something, um,
Speaker 1: that it was the bones of an elephants. And then,
Speaker 1: as I said, history promptly forgot about it again until
Speaker 1: like the early nineteen eighties. Um, we're we're pushing up
Speaker 1: close to our cutoff for this story. But it's it
Speaker 1: started a long time ago. Storry. Well that's okay, we
Speaker 1: we get a pass. So in the eighties, Um, this
Speaker 1: is there's a period between the late eighties and the
Speaker 1: early to mid nineties where this was becoming a thing. Um.
Speaker 1: No one asked any questions about it up until that point.
Speaker 1: So you know, I think it's fair to say history
Speaker 1: sort of forgot it again. It was odd, to say
Speaker 1: the least, that no one would have inquired as to
Speaker 1: why there was an elephant buried in Vatican City. Um,
Speaker 1: and no one thought to ask that question until Uh
Speaker 1: the Smithsonians historian emeritus, a gentleman by the name of
Speaker 1: Silvio Bedini, it caught wind of this story and he
Speaker 1: did some exhaustive research and actually published a paper in
Speaker 1: called the Pope's Elephants, and it was there's a great
Speaker 1: as obscure article that refers to this work as the
Speaker 1: most thorough study to date of the elephant that lived
Speaker 1: in the cortill de Belvidere. Right, and this is you know,
Speaker 1: it almost goes without saying rarefied niche in the world
Speaker 1: of publishing. Uh. But he did solve the mystery. And
Speaker 1: we owe Silvio an enormous debt for this. He's the
Speaker 1: one who figured out how these elephant bones got under
Speaker 1: the court of Belvidere. Uh. He He's the one who
Speaker 1: did this research and discovered, like we said at the top,
Speaker 1: that the Portuguese monarchy was attempting to expand its control
Speaker 1: of trade routes, not just trade with India but the
Speaker 1: East Indies as well, and they wanted to how like
Speaker 1: Frank Herbert Dune is this They wanted to control the
Speaker 1: spice trade. Yeah, they wanted to let that spice flow.
Speaker 1: And as part of the operations and all these distant
Speaker 1: parts of the world. They were also collecting animals that
Speaker 1: you wouldn't normally see in Mediterranean Europe, and so there
Speaker 1: was lead up to this elephant things that happened before.
Speaker 1: Portugal had already sent different popes, parrots, man drills, leopards, monkeys, galore.
Speaker 1: I gotta say, though, I feel like sending someone a
Speaker 1: man drill as a as a gift feels kind of threatening.
Speaker 1: Are you guys very familiar with man drills? They're freaking terrifying,
Speaker 1: aren't they. They're like kind of looked like what you
Speaker 1: would think of as a baboon, with like the blue
Speaker 1: and red noses and like the butts and stuff, enormous fangs,
Speaker 1: massive things, and they apparently will like rip your face off,
Speaker 1: you know, if provoked. Yeah, no hesitation and okay. So anyway,
Speaker 1: they're sending them animals, right and at the time that
Speaker 1: they're gearing up to send this, uh, to send this elephant,
Speaker 1: the Portuguese king is, as we said, his name is
Speaker 1: Manuel first. Uh. He has a problem because he knows
Speaker 1: that he's starting to to get beefy with Egypt. Because
Speaker 1: Portugal's maritime trade routes are becoming a threat to Egypt's
Speaker 1: overland trade routes. Egypt has a monopoly on the trade there,
Speaker 1: and so Egypt is pushing the pope and they're saying, look,
Speaker 1: you gotta pull the leash on these guys in Portugal.
Speaker 1: They're eating our lunch or whatever they would have whatever
Speaker 1: the equivalent of that would have been in the fifteen hundreds.
Speaker 1: And the Egyptian leaders the thing is they have leverage.
Speaker 1: They controlled Jerusalem at this time. They can destroy someone
Speaker 1: the most holy sites in the Christian religion if the
Speaker 1: Pope gets on their bad side. Yeah. It's interesting. I always,
Speaker 1: um think of you know, the Vatican as being this
Speaker 1: sort of like isolated a political thing. But that's not
Speaker 1: true at all, is it. It very much held political
Speaker 1: sway and was you know, not hesitant to to flex
Speaker 1: it when needed. Um. And yeah, like you know, out
Speaker 1: of fealthy or something along the lines. Christian leaders, because
Speaker 1: religion was such a huge part of of all of
Speaker 1: these forms of government, Um, it was customary for them
Speaker 1: to send the new pope these gifts. And it was
Speaker 1: seen by the savvyest of them, I suppose, as an
Speaker 1: opportunity to you know, get in good with someone that
Speaker 1: could help provide some political support. If he got in
Speaker 1: good with the Pope, he could potentially ask for him
Speaker 1: to help finance his expansion efforts. And when we're saying
Speaker 1: expanding his trade routes, I mean we're literally saying like
Speaker 1: expanding his fleet, like getting more vehicles, getting more ships,
Speaker 1: um weapons, all of that stuff. If he got the
Speaker 1: Pope's you know, holy blessing um for this, you know,
Speaker 1: essentially like manifest destiny situation, this idea of expanding as
Speaker 1: a nation, the Portuguese trading system, and so he had
Speaker 1: he knew what kind of the go to gifts were,
Speaker 1: um things like gold or you know, spices or fine
Speaker 1: you know linen's and a pimp cup. Uh, something called
Speaker 1: a brocade altar cover. Is that like a type of
Speaker 1: weave perhaps, Yeah, it's a uh it's like brocaded silk
Speaker 1: or something would have a raised pattern me by pressure
Speaker 1: or embroidery. So a very fancy tablecloth for an altar
Speaker 1: got it. So he did send all these things, like
Speaker 1: even though there maybe like we're a little more on
Speaker 1: the obvious side, he he wanted to like really like
Speaker 1: go go hard and go large. So he sent all
Speaker 1: of these things in addition to gold and jewels and
Speaker 1: crusted you know, with rubies and find neck necklaces and
Speaker 1: what have you. And uh, then he sent these weird
Speaker 1: exotic animals like cheetahs and leopards and dogs like what's
Speaker 1: described in this Amazing Else obscure article as strange dogs.
Speaker 1: And I want to know more about these strange dogs.
Speaker 1: I imagine it maybe means like weirdly selectively bred dogs
Speaker 1: that we wouldn't see anymore today. That's that's my guess.
Speaker 1: Also sent a fancy Persian horse and then Hannah the elephant,
Speaker 1: Which doesn't that seem like a homework assignment? All that stuff.
Speaker 1: It's like, Okay, I appreciate where you're coming from, man,
Speaker 1: but you've literally given me, like a a flock of
Speaker 1: creatures to have to deal with. But you know, I
Speaker 1: guess they've got people to take care of that stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's the pope. There'll be things he occasionally looks at,
Speaker 1: if he looks at them more than once. With strange
Speaker 1: dogs that really stuck out to me too, I think
Speaker 1: it's probably it could be, uh, something like a shizu.
Speaker 1: That's what I was thinking initially, for instance, because that
Speaker 1: would be from China, but it could also be something
Speaker 1: that's just dog like and maybe not actually a caneid
Speaker 1: like a hyena for instance, which is not near as
Speaker 1: related to dogs as they may seem. Or maybe like
Speaker 1: it's abettan fox, you know what I mean. Foxes are
Speaker 1: probably best described I didn't write this, but foxes are
Speaker 1: probably best described as dogs running cats software. So that's
Speaker 1: that's like a strange dog to look that makes sense,
Speaker 1: That makes sense. I'm picturing some sort of like innubius,
Speaker 1: like you know, mutant dog who situation, but who knows.
Speaker 1: We weren't there, um. But the thing about elephants that
Speaker 1: was neat is like they weren't you know, it wasn't calm.
Speaker 1: I mean Italians were aware of elephants, which is a
Speaker 1: funny thing to say because you know, um, the Great
Speaker 1: uh War I guess, conquering hero Hannibal across the Alps
Speaker 1: using elephants outfitted for battle, um and also uh there
Speaker 1: they were known to have been kept by Roman Um
Speaker 1: officials like high level consoles and you know, when the
Speaker 1: empire was flourishing. Yeah, so the it's like something we
Speaker 1: knew existed if we're Italians in that time but there
Speaker 1: hasn't been an actual elephant in Europe for people to see,
Speaker 1: especially in Italy, for centuries. So this is uh the
Speaker 1: event of the year. Possibly you know the Well caveat
Speaker 1: because a lot of stuff happened, but this is a
Speaker 1: huge deal. There was no David Attenborough documentary to depict
Speaker 1: that elephants in the wild. There were no photographs because
Speaker 1: the camera wasn't invented in till eighteen thirty nine, so
Speaker 1: we didn't have any real depictions of these creatures. Additionally,
Speaker 1: most people didn't known paintings or sculptures. Those are pretty
Speaker 1: expensive and even if you could buy one, most of
Speaker 1: the artists or sculptors who would create that art for
Speaker 1: you had never traveled to Asia or Africa where they
Speaker 1: might see a live elephants. So what you're what you're
Speaker 1: seeing when you get these paintings is like this game
Speaker 1: of telephone that's lasted for centuries and that and that
Speaker 1: means that most people in Italy at this time have
Speaker 1: never even seen a picture of an elephant when this
Speaker 1: gift arrives courtesy of Portugal. So when Manuel brought these
Speaker 1: elephants back, he was also creating kind of a potential
Speaker 1: Elephant trade operation who was demanding a tribute of ten
Speaker 1: elephants each year from his various vassals on the trade route.
Speaker 1: So he could. So it's not like they hunted down
Speaker 1: one elephant. He just thought this would be a move.
Speaker 1: Like that scene in American Psycho when everybody's comparing their
Speaker 1: business cards, Hanno was his super cool business card. That's
Speaker 1: a terrible comparison because the thing about that in the
Speaker 1: film and in the novel is that the business cards
Speaker 1: are identical and therefore somewhat anonymous. Right. But it's also
Speaker 1: appropriate then because if I'm not mistaken, the material or
Speaker 1: the shade of the business card in American Psycho is
Speaker 1: called bone with a watermark, watermark raised printing with sweating.
Speaker 1: As he's talking about this, I love when he drops it.
Speaker 1: You can't see it because we're doing the We're not
Speaker 1: on your podcast, but okay, maybe we'll watch that one.
Speaker 1: Hanno is unusual, even amid elephants because of Hanno's pigment,
Speaker 1: so it is it is still a special gift. Amid
Speaker 1: special gifts. They run into some logistical problems. Heado is taken,
Speaker 1: you know, buy ship to this port in Italy and
Speaker 1: then they have to get him to the papal Palace.
Speaker 1: And again he's an elephant for some reason. You know,
Speaker 1: when I when I hear when I hear albino elephant
Speaker 1: named Hannah, I picture a tiny elephant. And I don't
Speaker 1: know why that is. I don't think if there is
Speaker 1: a tiny elephant, they certainly don't stay tiny long. But
Speaker 1: what would be the rough size of a full grown
Speaker 1: Indian elephant? Ben uh, The size is gonna be somewhere
Speaker 1: between six and a half feet to eleven and a
Speaker 1: half feet from the shoulder height, and they can weigh
Speaker 1: up to eleven thousand pounds five thousand kilograms. For the
Speaker 1: rest of the worlds. That's crazy. And how would they
Speaker 1: even like, how is such a beast on a ship?
Speaker 1: I would think you would fall right through the floor
Speaker 1: the deck. Well, he wasn't grown. He was four years old.
Speaker 1: He was only four years old. Okay, okay, got it.
Speaker 1: Thank you for for checking me on that them. But
Speaker 1: it's true. It was kind of like a logistical fiasco
Speaker 1: making this happen. It was a seventy mile journey from
Speaker 1: the port of hercules Um to Rome and this is
Speaker 1: coming from Bedini's fantastic paper. So, like you said, he
Speaker 1: wasn't a full grown elephant. He arrived um in an
Speaker 1: Italian port and then would have to be like walked
Speaker 1: to the you know ship would would house this thing,
Speaker 1: but even a small one, it's not like you can
Speaker 1: carry it on a litter or something like that. So
Speaker 1: they had to like walk it and kind of you
Speaker 1: know what ended up being a almost ceremonial procession, kind
Speaker 1: of like a wicker parade. Um. And so he got
Speaker 1: to Italy from India via Portugal in the winter of
Speaker 1: fifteen fourteen, and um, he apparently did you know what
Speaker 1: do they say when elephants fight, only the grass suffers?
Speaker 1: Did I make that up? How's that? How's that? Especially
Speaker 1: that that's a here a paraphrase? Yeah, okay, so that's
Speaker 1: what it is, and that's what has happened. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of grass suffering. Um. More so, even it was
Speaker 1: described as leaving a path of destruction in his wake. Um.
Speaker 1: He obviously wasn't full grown, but he was about four
Speaker 1: ft tall, um, and you know, pretty plotting animal. And
Speaker 1: it wasn't a particularly pleasant trip because the Italian you
Speaker 1: know roads were like really hard and he was very um,
Speaker 1: you know, painful on his little elephant. And he wasn't
Speaker 1: the cause of most of the of the destruction, to
Speaker 1: be absolutely clear, The cause of most of the destruction
Speaker 1: were the all through human Italians who were like clamoring
Speaker 1: from all areas to come watch him walk those seventy
Speaker 1: miles from the Porter Hercules to Rome. Like they were rioting,
Speaker 1: and they were trampling fields, they were crashing in roofs.
Speaker 1: When everybody in the village would try to stand up
Speaker 1: and watch the elephant, and a caravan started following behind him.
Speaker 1: Every day, this caravan got bigger and bigger and bigger.
Speaker 1: All socioeconomic status is are involved, like nobles say, hey,
Speaker 1: let's follow the elephant, Peasants say, hey, let's follow the elephant,
Speaker 1: and workers are saying the same thing. They want to
Speaker 1: check this out. The elephant does come accompany with his
Speaker 1: support staff. They notice there are strangers speaking a language
Speaker 1: they don't recognize to the elephant and kind of guiding it.
Speaker 1: And the elephant had to spend the night in places
Speaker 1: that would keep it secure and hidden away from the curious,
Speaker 1: and all along the way, like every single day, almost
Speaker 1: there would be a wealthy Italian nobleman who was like
Speaker 1: elephant handlers, why don't you just take a quick detour
Speaker 1: to my castle so I can entertain you and your elephant.
Speaker 1: And they had to say no because this was an
Speaker 1: express delivery to the Pope, or at least most times
Speaker 1: if the detour was too long. Uh. They arrived I
Speaker 1: think right on time, like they were skirting it. They
Speaker 1: were rushing in just before the Portuguese ambassador was scheduled
Speaker 1: to appear before the Pope, and they decked Hanno out
Speaker 1: like they gave him a catwalk treatment. Boy did they
Speaker 1: ever again. Back to our friends at Alice Obscura, I
Speaker 1: just really good turns of phrase, these writers, Uh, adorned
Speaker 1: with handsome vestments and with a silver tower on his back.
Speaker 1: A silver tower sounds impressive. Um. And you know that
Speaker 1: cool trick elephants to where they get down on one
Speaker 1: knee and like jenuflect like in the Lion King. Uh,
Speaker 1: he did that when he got to the Pope. They
Speaker 1: must have taught him that. They that's so cool. And
Speaker 1: then he lifted back up and blew his little horn
Speaker 1: trumpet was a trunk trunk trumpet three times like in
Speaker 1: celebration and then then he does kind of a super
Speaker 1: soaker thing, you know what I mean. Like, if this
Speaker 1: elephant had a T shirt gun, he would have been
Speaker 1: firing it, but instead he sucked water into his trunk
Speaker 1: and it was just like just just spraying water on
Speaker 1: everybody in the crowd. Classic elephant move, including the Pope.
Speaker 1: Now keep in mind, this is a guy who could
Speaker 1: have people killed for just like not showing him enough deference.
Speaker 1: And the Pope loves this. Leo the tenth is like, yeah,
Speaker 1: his little pope hands you know, Oh yeah, he found
Speaker 1: it absolutely charming. Um. It's a pretty big gamble though,
Speaker 1: Soaking the Pope. Pope soak Pope soaks are a dangerous games.
Speaker 1: It's really it's a fine line. Um. How how much
Speaker 1: is too much? Is the question? And apparently this was
Speaker 1: just enough because Hanno would go on to become the
Speaker 1: Pope's favorite pet. But hold the phones, surprise, surprise, We're
Speaker 1: gonna do it another preemptive two parter. Sorry, guys, you
Speaker 1: gotta take vacation at some point, you get it. Um,
Speaker 1: there's a lot more to this story, surprisingly, um, and
Speaker 1: a lot of really cool history involved in a lot
Speaker 1: of cute elephant hijinks, a lot of crazy political dealings. Uh,
Speaker 1: just wait, folks, just wait, it's coming your way next
Speaker 1: time on Ridiculous History Gold animals who will be mentioned
Speaker 1: in part two. I also want to be completely honest,
Speaker 1: it's been very difficult for me to hold off on
Speaker 1: sharing facts about the cognitive abilities of one of my
Speaker 1: favorite animals. So maybe we'll get to that as well.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, let me tell us some of your
Speaker 1: favorite obscure facts about the Vatican. Uh, some of your
Speaker 1: favorite weird facts about elephants, or you know, anything that
Speaker 1: comes to mind. You can find us. We're all over
Speaker 1: the internet on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram, not just
Speaker 1: as a show, but as individuals. Oh it's true, man.
Speaker 1: You can find me on Instagram at how now Noel Brown,
Speaker 1: where you can see me posing with my baby albino
Speaker 1: elephant that hopefully we'll never grow up. How about you, Ben?
Speaker 1: Where can they find you? You can find me at
Speaker 1: Ben Bolan hs W on Twitter. You can also learn
Speaker 1: more strange adventures at Ben Bolan on Instagram. Do give
Speaker 1: it a look. Thanks as always to the uh, the
Speaker 1: Pope of our podcast, our super Pope, do Sir of
Speaker 1: this podcast casey Pegram, Casey Pokegram. No, it's too far.
Speaker 1: Let's a step too far, an elephant step too far. Yes,
Speaker 1: And of course to Alex Williams who composed this banging track. Uh,
Speaker 1: to Jonathan Strickland, who sends his his love to you
Speaker 1: ridiculous historians and his just like aggressive disregard to the
Speaker 1: three of us totally. I think we're due for a
Speaker 1: drop in pretty soon. Um, but it would be weird
Speaker 1: to have him on the second part of the two parters,
Speaker 1: so it'll probably be on the next week's epond. What
Speaker 1: am I saying? I can't spoil the surprise? Who all
Speaker 1: love the surprise? Quister visits so much? Um. Yeah. In
Speaker 1: the meantime, do all those things that we're saying hit
Speaker 1: us up. You can find our Facebook grew Ridiculous Historians,
Speaker 1: where memes of plenty are shared. You know, topics are discussed,
Speaker 1: friendships are made, romances, marriages. There's been a few ridiculous
Speaker 1: Historian marriages. I can only assume we'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.