May 29, 2019 • 56 mins
Located in Staffordshire, England, the Shepherd's Monument is a bas-relief recreation of Nicolas Poussin's painting “Shepherds of Arcadia”. However, the sculpture has several key differences -- one of which has baffled historians, experts and others for centuries: What's that mysterious inscription? What on Earth could it mean? Tune in to learn more.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Welcome back
(00:24):
to the show. My name is Matt, my name is
They called me Ben. We are joined as always with
our super producer Paul Mission controlled decade. Most importantly, you
are you, You are here, and that makes this stuff
they don't want you to know. How's how's everybody feeling
back for another week? I'm feeling awesome. Can I tell
you a quick story? Please? Okay? So my son is
(00:45):
aware of Star Wars. We haven't watched any of the
movies yet, but he has a couple of these of
the paper or the cardboard books of Star Wars stories,
and he knows what a lightsaber is, and he's real
hyped about lightsabers. So does he say it? He says
lightsaber yeah, lightsabers, yeah. He loves it, and he makes
this sound. He goes, who. Well, So I realized that
(01:06):
my wife and I had an old stash of glow sticks,
because you know, everybody's just got some glow sticks hanging
around that are still packaged from you know, back in
your twenties, Ruth bro cool. Okay, so I realized that
we had some I found, like a green one and
a red one. So I get to play dartha Daddy
and he gets to and he pretends that he's Yoda,
always Yoda, and we have lightsaber battles with glow sticks
(01:28):
now almost nightly. You think it's because Yoda is like
around his height and he recognizes super agile. Yeah, that's
gotta be it. That's gotta be a mind control powers.
That's that's a selling point. Yeah. And he does forced
tornado on me all the time and it's it's debilitated. Yeah.
Where is that in the lexicon? Though? Forced tornadoes? That?
Did he make that up? Or is that canon? Pretty
(01:49):
sure the next episode is going to have a forced tornado. Okay,
I mean you heard it here first. Okay, all right,
well we look forward to seeing this franchise development. Thanks. Yeah,
I think it's Star Wars things going places. Yeah, yeah,
you know, I my spiders sense tells me, how are
you doing, Noll? How's it? How's how's it going? I'm
doing well? Speaking of spider sense, did you guys see
uh the end game. The end of the end game,
(02:10):
did I haven't okay, no, no, no discussion, then no, no,
I kind of want discussion. Well, I mean, this isn't
really the place I can save me three hours victory lap.
It's it's a but it's a really really expensive victory lap,
and and and and it has some very satisfying conclusions.
It has a few things that are kind of like WTF.
And it has a few things that are kind of
(02:31):
a little bit glossed over, and then sort of like
wait what happened to that thread? They sort of left it?
But all in all, what a what a feat, What
a treat? What a feat? Though, Like just organizational skills,
right to give all those characters their due and no
one's expecting that wolverine cameo like that is wild. Is
there ever any point in the movie where all of
(02:53):
those A list like actors are in one place or
not like complete like you can older and not green
screened in or whatever. I can't comment that's too much though, Okay, Well,
I mean they're they're the Avengers plus all the others. Yeah. Well,
I mean it's a payoff people waiting for, and I
think it's well worth the price of a ticket. You know,
(03:13):
that's the kind of film that's good to see in theaters,
good to see on the Imax. If you have that availability.
For sure, I I will die on this hill. To
quote Ben Bolan, screw three D not worth the price.
I'd pay that price just to see it on the
bigger screen with a better sound system. Did you watch
it in three No? I don't. I just I some
one time, Black Panther I saw in three D because
someone invited me, having already bought the tickets, and then
(03:35):
popped it on me once I got there that it
was three D and the tickets were like forty bucks.
A don't like three D. See It's like it's give
me a headache. It wasn't fun. And I had my
kid with me, so that was like eighty dollars of
movie it was. I mean, I'm probably exaggerating a little bit,
but I don't know, man, what's your factor in popcorn?
I just don't like three D. I don't find it
immersive or fun. We're already in three D, you know
(03:56):
what I mean? Album? Yeah, fully, it's like advertising a
movie with sound. I had this this, How do I
you don't I have an interesting story for you about
Avengers that has nothing to do with the film. Really,
I won't spoil anything because I know a lot of
us listening feel very strongly about spoilers. I love them.
(04:19):
Most people hate them. Anyway. So I'm watching this I'm
watching this thing, and it is a long journey, and
it's long film, and there are ups and there downs,
and I think overall it's very well made, but there's
really there's a really, really really sad part that gets
a lot of people. And as I was watching the
sad part in the theater, I heard someone uh kind
(04:42):
of behind me and I thought, oh, I guess, I
guess got a cold or something. It shouldn't really be
outside if you're contagious. And then I heard more people
like and everybody get ahold of I thought. People, I
was like, wow, it's really go and around you know
this is and I've never encountered measles in the wild,
(05:03):
so it was like, do people have measles or whatever?
And then Uh, the people I was at the movie
with uh, I like. I asked him about it afterwards
and they said, no, you've I don't want to use
the strong language they used, but they said no, dude,
don't be a robot. They were crying. So I think
I just am missing that emotional switch. One feeling a
(05:26):
year would possibly have fallen on the Avengers. I would
have put that bet down to three three. Yeah, I'm
going one of your one of your guys, you could
have reserved for the Avengers because you you genuinely did
grow up with these characters. I don't know. I guess
we all did. Yeah, but out of a lot of
people that I know, you're probably one of Yeah, you
know the characters in the story, and you know the
(05:47):
comics too, you know. That's what I'm saying that the
original comics, not to degree, so many of these characters
were not big flagship characters, at least for me, you know. Yeah. Yeah.
But but be that as it may, I think we
did a really great job talking about the Avengers without
giving anything away totally. So if if you haven't seen
it yet, uh, do check it out. They're not paying
(06:10):
us to say this. Just think of and Matt. I
can't wait till you see it so we can hang
out and talk about it. I can't wait to finally
see ant Man get crushed by the boot of some
other character that's actually his nemesis as a supervillain called
the Boot. No, it's not, it's it's like kntly don't know.
Paul Paul is uh. Paul is a huge film buff
(06:31):
Mission Control over here, and he enjoyed the film as well.
So if you can't take Nolan eyed Co sign as
as as worth worth it, take Paul's. But what about
Game of Game of Thrones, Joe Game of Thrones? What
about the Game of Thrones? Hey, did you did you
guys love that cup cameo? The cup cameo made my day? Yeah? Yeah,
(06:53):
I mean I get it because cup story is super
complicated in the books and it's like a pivotal point.
You just can't do it us this on the screen,
you know. C Tirion is like giving it the side eye.
They see g eided out though. That's one of the beauty,
beautiful things. As far as the network concerned of streaming is,
you know, if it's printed and it's in the theater,
is they're not gonna pull all those prints out of
(07:14):
every theater in the in the country. But for this
they just go in there, blip, re upload, yep. It's
like it was never there. How except the internet never
forgets how many people got fired? Do you think just one? One? Uh?
One best boy one best boy with the best dream. Well,
that guy became a legend. If we'll get to the
point of the show in just a second, we guys
(07:36):
owe us a little bit of a rambling in sure.
I think we've been keeping it pretty tight. Yeah. Yeah,
And we want to hear directly from you your opinions
about this this intro, or your your opinions about any
old thing on your mind from previous episodes, or suggestions
for a future episode. Uh, Matt, our friend and cohort,
(07:57):
Matt has been on this amazing seeing journey listening to voicemails. Yeah,
I gotta tell you I haven't. I haven't been off
of this journey in a while. Now we need to
take up the mantle man. It's so great. It's such
a roller coaster because it gets really dark sometimes and
then it is the funniest thing I've heard all week
(08:17):
sometimes and then it just happens again. But the best
thing is that everything that gets put on that the
voicemail message machine is genuine and awesome, and everyone every
if you're hearing this, you are awesome. Give us a
call again. You can call one eight three three st
(08:38):
d W I T K right now. Leave us a message.
Any suggestions, even on the format of the show. Just
tell us, tell us what you want us to do.
We're listening. Get weird with it. And also, speaking of
the phones, shout out to our formerly anonymous caller Steven B.
Who hipped us to Canada's Shag Harbor incident as an episode.
(09:01):
Thanks so much for tuning in. Stephen. Uh. Stephen reached out,
reached out to us, and I hope you don't get
mad at us for say this, Stephen, But he said, guys,
I don't know why I didn't say my name, but
I'm the one who called about Shag Harbor incident, so
it's we I I especially get it. It's tough when
(09:22):
you're when you're working live and you only got three minutes,
but call us. Try it for yourself. Don't take my
word or Steven's word for it. Today we're off to
England and as they say in Staffordshire, those yes, yes, yes,
what the heck are we talking about. We'll tell you
a journey with us, and if you are a listener
(09:44):
on the other side of the Atlantic, if you are
located in Europe, if you are located in the United Kingdom,
if you are located in Staffordshire, or you've ever been there,
we want to hear from you. Here's here's the thing
about Staffordshire. It's a county in the West Midlands of England.
It's landlocked, right, it's it's not one of the coastal areas.
It has a pretty healthy population of just over one
(10:08):
million people. And like most places in the United Kingdom,
it's home to a storied past, numerous historical buildings, monuments
and so on. You know that thing that you probably
here thrown around all the time. In Europe, two hundred
miles is a long way and in the US two
(10:30):
hundred years is a long time. Yeah, So this this
place does have a lot of history. However, most people
outside of the United Kingdom and Europe haven't really heard
of the place, unless that is there into the world
of fringe research and conspiracies. That's right. Straffordshire is actually
(10:50):
a little bit famous in those realms because there's this
tiny little thing relatively to the rest of Straffordshire, tiny
tiny little thing. It's a monument called the Shepherd's monument,
And on this monument there's an engraving. It's got one
of the most enigmatic, as of yet unbroken ciphers that
you heard us say, or at least phonetically attempt to
(11:11):
say earlier. You backwards masking a guy. That's what we're
going to talk progressively in backwards masking. Nice episode. Yeah,
it was Paul's idea. Yeah, it's true. It's true. We
are phonetically pronouncing this very weird cipher. It's literally eight
(11:31):
characters and then two more little characters and an exclamation mark. No, no,
you know. It made me think of, um, do you guys?
You know I don't have time to play a lot
of video games, but I'm in this somewhat monogamous video
game relationship with a thing called sky Rim, And I
(11:52):
went back and started playing it again. I'm different now,
I'm an Argonian. They're the lizard people. Wasn't people you were? Yeah?
Were you? Were you a mage? I know you love
that was an Argonian made you should have been a thief? Why?
I don't know. Argonians are awesome with that. That's the stereotype.
They have a lot of good attributes for. It's all
(12:13):
I'm saying, oh god, that sounds awful, but it's so
true because you literally pick your like species or your race. Yeah, yeah,
it's it's it's it's a great game and you can
go back and you can do all the stuff you
want to do. Anyway. Anyway, it reminds me of the
Dragon Shouts where they're all, you know, it's got really
dope music in that game, and they're like, Doverkin, Dolverkin.
That's right, you know, it totally doesn't that's intense stuff,
(12:39):
you know. But anyhow, this weird Dovikin esque code came
to be sometime between well, the monument came to be
sometime between seventeen forty eight and seventeen sixty three, when
this British parliament member named Thomas Anson commissioned a monument
to be built at a place called sugar Barro Hall
(13:01):
in Staffordshire. And we may be mispronouncing that. We talked
a little bit about that before we went on the
Sugar bro and no, you said it feels like an
Australian It does kind of, Yeah, Sugar sugar Barro a
little bit, I think, Yeah, I don't know why shug
just the word shug. You know feels Australia. Seems like
(13:25):
the name of some kind of Australian implement, you know,
a shug, dear dear Rossie's. I don't know, like a shiv,
but it's more blunt, you know. I'm so into Australian slang.
Calling McDonald's Macca's has like just it's changed my world.
I say that, yeah, m A C C A. I
don't know if it'll actually get me to go to
(13:47):
a McDonald's, but I like to drive by in St Marcas.
I feel like a shug would be some kind of club.
It's not like a club where you party, like a
club like a cudge club. Someone with yeah, yeah, So
this this play is sugar Barow Hall in Staffordshire is
the location of this monument and Thomas Anson. Although he
(14:07):
commissions this monument, the Shepherd's Monument, his brother George, who
was an admiral, actually pays for it. And a Flemish
sculptor named Peter Shemakers with two ease is the guy
who actually builds the thing. But what does it look like? Well,
the sculpture is comprised of a mirror image, or what's
(14:27):
known as a boss relief of a painting by Nicolas
Poussin that's called The Shepherds of Arcadia and uh, it's
also known as Okay, I'm gonna give this the world. Um.
I think this is Latin. Yes, yeah, at in Arcadia Ego,
les Burgers d Arcady or the Arcadian Shepherds, and it
was painted in sixties seven or between sixty seven to
(14:49):
sixteen thirty eight, and it's it's this, it's this fascinating
iconic work. You can it's more than worth your time
to check it out. And I think some of us
listening will be familiar with this painting and know where
this is going because it's shepherds that are around a tomb, right,
and then they have very specific hand gestures that they're doing,
and it's check it out. So there are four figures
(15:13):
in the in the painting, there are three shepherds, there's
a female figure gathered around this tomb, as you said, Matt,
and two of the shepherds are pointing at the tomb
in a in a real sketchy way, you know what
I mean. Uh. And on this tomb there's this Latin
text at in Arcadia Ego, which translates to I am
even in Arcadia, or I am also in Arcadia. We'll
(15:37):
hear other versions with like even in Arcadia am I
whatever it's Latin. Uh, it's really it's really cool phrase,
very famous phrase in literature. Uh. But let's let's bracket that.
Just know that that exists right now, and let's let's
go back to this sculpture, this boss relief. It looks
(15:59):
like the painting, but it's got some key differences. The
first big thing you'll notice if you're looking at the monument,
the sugar bur monument, is that there's an extra sarcophagus
that's sitting on top of a tomb inside the original painting,
which you go, Okay, I wonder what that could mean.
An extra tomb. Maybe there are two people in tomb
(16:19):
that we need to be thinking about in this Who
knows it could be more cryptic than that. Let's move
on because the other thing is that there are two
stone heads above the image from the painting. Okay, so
he got one that's uh this mirthful uh, mirthful fellow.
The look on his face is the way to tell
the mirth Uh. The other, though, is horned in, bearing
(16:47):
a marketing resemblance to that old Greek god Pan that
you might remember that they literally the old goat Pan
that is both fun in in like whimsical, but also
extremely creepy. Yeah. It has some some representations, some some
symbolical representations of other things, the goat being one of them.
(17:12):
You might remember from other things we've talked about on
the show with the uh the old battlement. Ah, that's right, yes, yes,
And while the sculpture itself is impressive, most people are
are kind of over the sculpture. They're more fascinated by
this inscription carved below it. At first glance, it seems simple.
(17:34):
It's as you said, bad, It's a scant two lines
of text. Yes, and it looks very confusing. It looks
like the worst wheel of fortune. Clue Ever, I'm gonna
do a version of your skyriom of how I would
do it. Wow, that was great because that did bow
out like crazy try okay, alright, cool, we got protections
(17:57):
against that, against the dark arts. I would do it
more as like father. That's great because the double V
at the end gives you a yeah, um, how do
you how do you add in the D and the
M though? Yeah, yeah, so this is that's the top
line O U O S V A v V, and
(18:18):
it's encapsulated or bookended by these letters at the bottom line.
So if you look at the sec at the second line,
the line below O U O S V A v V,
there is a letter D below and to the left
of the first oh, if you're looking at it, if
you're looking straight at it, and there's an M below
and to the right of the last V. So when
(18:39):
you put it all together, that's what it looks like.
It looks like that, that agglomeration of vowels and vs
and one s, and then below it there's the D
N D M. And we keep adding the exclamation mark
just because it feels like something you should shout. But
appearing simple is not the same thing as being simple, right, yeah, exactly,
(19:00):
because a lot of people have been trying to figure
out since this thing was put up what exactly it means,
and nobody has, let's say, sufficiently come up with an answer.
But again, even if you think you completely got the answer,
there's a matter of proving it, because who's going to
prove it to you anyway. We'll get into that right now,
(19:22):
because let's go through some of the people who have
actually attempted several Charles in here. It's very Charles heavy.
Charles Dickens. Uh. We may be familiar with some of
his work. He wrote a ton of things that are
popular in western Cannon and he was defeated by this
series of letters. Had tried and he failed. And we
(19:43):
have another important British Charles also with a D for
her last name, Darwin, who apparently ate every animal that
he documented. True story was that was him, wasn't it. Yeah,
you're telling me he was out there in the Galapagos
and he was just going to town. Yeah, I mean,
I guess when you're in the Galapagos. Well, he he
(20:06):
apparently had a history. He was in some kind of
club of exotic meats at Cambridge or whatever, where he
would eat like albatrosses and egrets and weird, you know,
stringy gamey meats and he kept he carried that spirit
right into his research. That is like one of the
most elite clubs I've ever heard of. He called he
apparently defended We learned this from Jack O'Brien. Apparently he defended. Uh,
(20:32):
he defended this practice by say it was for science.
But he ate like twenty tortoises or something to the
point where I think he threatened their very existence Onset
Islands because he's thought of was this like great conservationist.
That really was not his bag at all. He was mortiscist, scientist, researcher,
documentary and a devourer. There we go. Yet he he
(20:53):
mastered the tortoise, he discovered the secret of evolution, and
yet he could not surmount these letters. Wow, neither could
a man named Josiah Wedgewood. He was one of the
godfathers of industrialization, and oh man, he he got out
all the steam works. He like figured out, Okay, we're
gonna do this whole thing. We're gonna uh, we're gonna
(21:14):
get an assembly line and figure out how to do this.
And guess what. Nope, Nope, he couldn't. Even though he
uh industrialized the manufacturer of of pottery, which you know,
that's important. It sounds it sounds weird now, but it was.
To take our word for it, he was a big deal.
Maybe a subject for a different episode, but here we are.
(21:36):
It's twenty nineteen and those old ants and bros Are
long since gone to dust and death. The guys who
actually made the thing, Yeah, well, the guys who commissioned it. Well, yes, okay,
you're right, But the ones who commissioned are generally the
ones who have the meaning right because the person who
sculpted it and chiseled it just knew all that goes there. Yeah,
(21:58):
I got his marching orders. Good call. So here we
are and people, everyone still wonders what unearthed this code
could mean, And just as importantly, everyone is still wondering
whether someone has finally solved it. What are we talking about.
We'll tell you after a word from our sponsor, and
(22:26):
we're back. And I just have to say, Paul. Paul
was trying to get us to go to ad break
for like ten minutes there, and it was so much
fun to uh, to to watch Paul and continually not
to him like, oh yes, of course, but when I
could see where exactly we were going. Oh, toying with you,
Paul is one of my greatest excitements. Here's where it
(22:47):
gets crazy. So over the past few centuries, numerous people
have made varying claims about this inscription that includes conjecture
about the intense an he's some kind of explanation or
origin story, and most importantly, the meaning. So let's look
at the theories, uh, in no particular order. Some are
(23:10):
a little out there, some may seem more mundane, but
we want to see which one sound the most reasonable
to you. So there's an author named Dave Ramston. In book,
he references manuscript evidence from the local record office and
he says that based on what he found, Thomas Anson's
(23:30):
peers thought the monument was a funereal structure and that
was dedicated to some figure known just as the shepherd s.
So from his take that DM stands for dismanibus, and
the eight letter inscription is a cipher concealing the name
of the person being memorialized. So in his book he
(23:55):
he walks through a pretty thoroughed decryption effort and he
argues that through the use of a poly alphabetic cipher,
he has found that the name, the name they're referring
to is Magdalene. Dude. By the way, that dismanibus that
you heard is talking about, it's in reference to roman
(24:17):
Um spirits likes or goat, not ghosts, but spirits of
people who have died. It's kind of really interesting because
it has actually uh further back or it has pagan
roots as well. So just an interesting thing in when
you connected up with what Ben is just talking about there.
I don't know, But what's the difference in a spirit
and a ghost man? Well, isn't it the same thing?
(24:43):
But the ghost get is trapped and caught behind right
they cannot Maybe I like that behind that, okay? And
also but having that name Magdalen, I mean, come on,
we all know that might be referring to right old
Mary Mary Magdalen. M it's the plot thickens. But that's
(25:06):
not the only thing. Just spoiler alert. People disagree with
this author. In another book called Anson's gold Fellow named
George Edmund says that we have to remember George Anson
was a naval man. He was an admiral, and George
Edmond argues that Anson created this cipher to hide the
(25:29):
latitude and longitude of an island where he had buried
or discovered a huge Spanish treasure. Oh, it's a treasure map,
of course it is. M yeah, and that he mounted
his secret expedition in the eighteenth century to recover this treasure,
which was located, but due to unforeseen circumstances, left where
(25:54):
it was found. Man, do you think it's in that one?
That one giant whole, you know, the one I'm talking
about oak Island film Man, do you think they're really
finding stuff at oak Island or do you think that
the production team is slipping the whole feathers and room.
I mean, I I don't know, I don't know. I
(26:16):
had heard that, but I don't have a ton of experience.
I've never been there, So it would certainly make for
a good TV to have things discovered, That's all I
would say. Good point, good point. So the idea here
is that letters in code were sent back to Lord
(26:36):
Anson by the expedition leader, and that these validate and
include part of the cipher, and that this proves what
the cipher is for. So George Edmund isn't necessarily saying
that the cipher is solved, but he's saying that's the
right direction to look into. And then we have a
returning school of thought from a previous episode. The authors
(27:00):
of a book called The Holy Blood and the Holy
Grail speculated that the painter you had mentioned earlier, nol
U Poussin, was a member of what's called the Priory
of Psion with an s yeah, and were we interviewed
uh the the daughter of one of the authors. What
was her last name, I believe, Yeah, that was a
(27:22):
great interview. Uh, fascinating story. Um. But the and the
whole idea here, right, is that perhaps the Shepherds of
Arcadia they are in this monument, are actually pointing to
something very specific, not necessarily anything to do with the tomb,
but where to find the Holy Grail, don't don't do.
(27:50):
And then there's this whole other thing where as part
of the promotion of the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail,
they had these experts or there I guess their form
early codebreakers, right, who came through and they tried to
to figure out what the heck this thing is um,
and they specifically we're looking at this connection here with
the priority of Scion, connection with the shepherd's pointing to
(28:14):
the Holy Grail, and get a little more on that.
So it's Sheila and Oliver Lawn to the people involved here.
They proposed that the letters actually encode a specific phrase,
a phrase Jesus H DEFFI d e f y Yeah,
where the H supposedly stands for Christos um and this
(28:36):
is a Greek word meaning Messiah, and the references to
a Jesus bloodline or uh, the bloodline of Jesus H. Christ.
I don't, I honestly don't know what that comes from
Jesus H. Christ. What what is that? Do we know?
Somebody somebody call us right right? Uh? Yeah, it's it's
(28:59):
this idea, you right, that that Jesus Christ, the historical
Jesus Christ, did actually have children or issue as they
would be called. And you know, this is very Dan Brown.
Dan Brown leans very heavily on this in one of
his books, at least in The Da Vinci Code. And
the idea is that this bloodline was secreted away and
(29:22):
we'll read about it being secreted away in different parts
of the world, often France. Um. So that that idea
is really interesting because these code breakers, Sheila Lawn and
Oliver Lawn are no joke. They are the legit, true blue,
real deal. They were working on Enigma in World War Two.
(29:46):
So they're not just They're not just some couple who
happened by, you know what I mean. They're breaking Nazi
codes and then they I think that that's what happened, right,
or that they think that that's what the meaning could be. Right,
And she La Lawn said that she believes it may
also be kind of a love letter of some steel. Well,
(30:06):
the other thing you have to remember here is that
they're having ideas, uh put out there for them to
look for in a way, you know, with the way
it was shaped, with the promotion for the Holy Blood
and the Holy Grail, and for what it could mean.
You just, um, just keep that in mind. You're the
little skeptic part of the back of your mind that
they're being led a little bit. So already this is
(30:29):
this is getting weird, right. We've got we've got someone
saying it's the one of the key clues to the
secret story of Jesus Christ. We've got someone else saying
it's buried treasure. And we've got someone else saying that
Anson was in love drafts with someone and needed for
(30:50):
some reason to keep their identity a secret. Yeah. So
how does this shake out in the modern day? Yeah,
most of the modern theories approached this for um sort
of across stick kind of perspective or like, you know,
think about any kind of word patterned patterned word art,
I guess where various letters line up, almost like a
crossword puzzle. But when across the specific form of this meaning,
(31:14):
they interpret each letter um as the initial letter of
a larger word, so like M A T T for example,
not to pick on you, like make uh, make Alice
take tile at all or whatever absolutely, so sort of
like a mnemonic device of like the way to remember
something or it's They're also very popular in like presentations
(31:34):
are kind of like self help, touchy feeling kind of
you know, office power points, you know about things like
synergy and you know thing you know S would stand
for super cool and e with Anyway, it's not good.
I love that I've fall into making up those. They're
fun when you make them absurd on purpose, but like
as an actual motivational device, it's sort of Elicits an
(31:55):
instant i rol because it's sort of like cliche, right,
you know what I mean, Right, But it's it's just
a flad mental exercise. It is tough to take it
seriously though. Well it's also tough to do it well.
And that's the joke too, right, is a lot of
times they end up people run out of ideas and
they just kind of become either redundant or just absurd.
If you're ever in a knife fight, remember to stop
(32:15):
that stands for stab to other people there you go,
very very good, very very helpful. Um. But yeah, so
in nineteen one, um more charred bishop or more card
and I'm gonna go with the hard c. H speculated
that the letters might be an initialism for the Latin
phrase optimate oxaurus optima sororis va deus amontissi mouse. I
(32:41):
want to sing this in like a choir ways soro
sees v dues montisi mouse vo vi veritui boo. That great,
But the big question is what does that mean for
those of us who don't speak Latin. Best of wives,
best of sisters, A most devoted widower dedicates parentheses this
(33:05):
to your virtues. Oh that's nice. See now that's really
really nice. So that's that's specifically about George Anson, right,
And that would mean, if this is correct, that those
eight letters are actually just a coded dedication to his
wife after she passed away, which is interesting because why
would you have to put that in code? Well, it's
(33:26):
I think it's less of in code and more of
fitting it on the monument perhaps, right, And this would
be my opinion. His his spouse, by the way, Lady
Elizabeth Yorke, daughter of Philip York first Earl of Hardwick.
They did not have any children. But I could see
that if it's just um, a person who spouse died
(33:50):
and had the means to give some kind of dedication
to her that only maybe even had meaning to him.
Uh maybe, okay, maybe it's maybe it's a private thing. Yeah,
I just like it. To me, Alan's surface, it seems
it seems very strange and a little bit chuckleworthy that
(34:12):
this guy would say, all right, I really love my
wife and I think all these wonderful nice things about her,
but no one can know. Well, yeah, well, guys, I
love my wife. Everyone keep it a secret. The other
don't tell anyone. Just the other thing that you could
say here, just before we move on, is that maybe
it was a backhanded thing or like a cruel joke
(34:35):
in uh in her memory because maybe she wasn't devoted,
Why she wasn't the best of wives and sisters and
devoted uh at tongue in the cheek. This is before
that forward slash s yeah stand ford sarcasm and what
I need to be I need to use that. But see,
but that way, only he knows that he's being a
(34:56):
dick to his wife. Oh good, good, This is this terrible?
I hope that's not the case. Other people don't think
it is. Though. There's a guy named Steve regend Ball
who interprets the letters as standing for a new Latin
translation of the following phrase vanity, Oh vanities saith the
preacher all his vanity oh Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes twelve eight. Uh.
(35:25):
He speculates that this this phrase, orator omnia sunt vanitas
vanitas vanitatum, would I feel like I just cast a spell?
He thinks it may be the source of an earlier
inscription on Nia vanitas, which might have been carved on
(35:45):
an alcove at the estate by one of Thomas Anson's pals,
George Littleton. Interesting, then keep an eye on that, maybe
though that might and that maybe again the one this
is one of the ones that, um, yeah, I guess
I just don't I need to know more about that,
(36:06):
because I vanity of vanity is saith the preacher all
is vanity, all is vanity. All worldly things and actions
are vanity. It's just like carving a giant monument for anything. Yeah. Well, yeah,
you know, this reminds me of It reminds me of
(36:27):
the Georgia guidestones. That whole idea of like give a
little thought to what's important, you know what I mean.
It's sort of like but at least the Georgia guidestones
intent was to be understood, right, you know, it's not
really very cool if you have like a message for
the world and no one can understand it, or if
they're just wildly speculating about what it means. That's a
(36:48):
good point. So it maybe a personal thing, you know
what I mean of personal significance. The ants and brothers,
if they are indeed the people who inscribed this. Uh.
The N s A also got involved, so did U S. Intelligence.
And there a guy named Keith Massey. In modern times
you'll read some press about him claiming to have solved
(37:10):
the letters. He interprets them as an initialism for the
Latin phrase or omnes sequant vmum vitam I pray that
all may follow the way to true life. Is this
biblical again? Yeah? Yeah? Johnny four sixteen, John John, Yeah,
(37:35):
that's really good reference to that verse. Reading John four
sixteen read I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.
He goes some via at veritas et vita, and that's
the one that Stone called Steve Austin had printed on
the back of his sleeveless leather jacket was three sixteen.
(37:55):
That's the one that's the go to as a child.
I never understood at that. Oh, I have way too
many of those rattling around in my brain that I
could probably I'm not even going to wrest trivia, just
versus and wrestler trivia. They kind of I thought the
Undertaker was the coolest, but that's very un brand for me,
(38:15):
staying man, three sixteen is just for God's so love
the world. Yeah, I didn't realize that. That's a very
nice message that stone Cold has on his That's very
counter to his tuble stone cold image. You know, so
love the world that he made me. And then what
does he do? He does the stunner stunner. It reminds
(38:38):
me of like jewels and pulp fiction doing that Biblical verse,
only that one gets scary though, that one gets I
will strike down upon the and all that. You don't
think anyway, but which wasn't an actual Bible verse? Kidding, no, what, no,
really this whole time, man, Sorry, it's an interpretation. Let's
(38:59):
put it that way. Maybe it's just vanity. Maybe all
is vanity, but these are just some of the most
popular concepts. Now it's time to ask whether any of
this checks out. And we'll do just that after a
word from our sponsor, and we're back, And Matt, you
(39:22):
direcked my childhood. That Tarantino line isn't from the Bible.
It's a much more elaborated version. The real verse is
actually just and I will execute great vengeance upon them
with furious rebukes, and they shall know I am the
Lord when I shall lay my vengeance upon them. So obviously,
well that there's so many different ones, but vulgate versions
(39:42):
and whatnot. I like the word rebuke. Let's bring rebuke back.
I want to rebuke some stuff. Isn't that as when
you like call someone out you take them to task.
It's sort of like a rebuttal, but it's a little stronger.
It's a little it's like it implies shaming of some
sort of finger wagging, right, criticizing someone, So it's it's
not quite rejecting. It's kind of admonishing, but in a
(40:04):
very strong way, kind of like how contempt is worse
than just like it's a really good white instant for
a pretty low manecoust just so you know you have
made so many people's day. It was just that sentence.
I don't think I understand the references MTG magic together. Yes, yes, anytime,
every anytime you say something that I don't understand, I
(40:25):
should always assume that it's magic. Even when you say MTG,
I have to make Madison Square gardens, We're making it acrostic,
move them giblets. I don't know. I'm working live here,
but literally all of my vocabulary comes from middle school magic.
The gathering play. We should get together and play play
magic at some point, all of us. Yeah, everyone, like,
(40:50):
even even you the listener. Yeah, yeah, come hang out,
let's play. Let's do it. Let's do it. We'll sneak
everyone in. I think it's more fun if we feel
like it's a heist. We'll do an MTG meet up
MTG conspiracy meet up sounds epic, and meet the group
MTG or the gang or the guys. Now, but it's
(41:10):
not in a across stick and an acronym aren't the
same thing, right, I mean, they're sort of they're they're
kind of no, because it doesn't the down word has
to be a word in and of itself. Right. So MTG,
even if it's spelled MTG and Magic the Gathering, it's
not in across because MTG is meaningless without that representing something. Yeah,
an acronym would be the abbreviation made out of the
(41:31):
first letters of the words. So our MTG thing is
an acronym. But an across stick would be uh, some
kind of poem or form of writing like you described,
where the first letter or syllable or word of each
line or spells out a word. So we've got to
ask yourselves, does any of this stuff check out? Not?
(41:53):
Not our not our plans to invite everyone to play
Magic the Gathering with us, uh and have Matt roundly
kick kick the snot out of all of us. I
would go easy, very good at that game. You are lying.
You're one of my favorite people, but I can tell
when you're lying. Oh no, Matt, Matt is really really
(42:14):
good at this. So I'm not talking about that stuff,
but talking about this concept. Uh. The one that I
think really stuck out to us and to a lot
of us listening now is the idea of this priory
of psion. I think this is definitely where the mystery
heightens right, yeah, yeah, this is this is a wild one.
(42:35):
So this is a fringe I guess secret society. Maybe
a fraternal order is a good way to describe it.
It was founded, you know, the official stories it was
founded and then dissolved in ninetifty six by a guy
named Pierre Plantart as part of a hoax. But people
(42:57):
who buy into the idea think it dates back much
much further, you know, back to of course the time
of the living historical Jesus Christ. This was considered, uh,
this was not taken very well or very seriously by
a lot of people in the Academy with a capital A.
(43:19):
But the the concept existed for a long time, some
people saying it was a hoax, and some people taking
it very seriously, and some people even claiming to be
members of the Priory of Zion. And then boom, it
went mainstream when Dan Brown leveraged this concept for the
basis of the Da Vinci Code, which is um I
(43:39):
I still think a solid, solid film, and I enjoyed
the book. I would say I have not read the book,
but the film I was happier than a lot of
the critics about it. You enjoyed it, did you see
the subsequent film The Angels and Demons and Infernos, and
I did not see it. Was there a third one
that was an inferno? Inferno was the third one? Angels
(44:01):
and Demons is the second? Is that correct? Well? Did
this do well? I mean they made three of them.
They must have done relatively sure. Yeah, they had to
coast off the blockbuster status expensive. Oh yeah, okay, so
Paul just off Mike or in our ears and at
last you will never hear the voice of Paul because
if you did, it would melt your insides. It was
(44:21):
much like hearing the voice of the archangel Gabriel or
something like. Um. But yeah, he says, Inferno was apparently
quite bad. I haven't seen any of them. But the
reason I asked did they do well? Is because I
just don't really have much of a memory of them existing.
I just remember the lure of you guys are great
at French. I'm not even gonna try it. Uh yeah, yes,
(44:42):
so this also this book, by the way, the da
Vinci Code. Just to be fair, we should say that
he did receive criticism from other authors and people familiar
with the theory, because you know, the authors of Holy
Blood and Holy Grail felt to a large degree that
he drives their work and that he was essentially using
(45:04):
their research to sell a novel. So that that's the moment, though,
that is the moment where this stuff hit the zeitgeist.
And the idea here is that the ants and brothers
were both members of the Priory of Science, and the
original painter of the Arcadian Shepherd painting was also a
(45:27):
member of the Priory of Zion, and that the Holy
Grail is not really a cup a goblet, you know,
the um what's the Indiana Jones line? The cup of
a carpenter yours Indian, My face is melting, he choose,
(45:48):
he also should have moisturized. Okay, So if it's not
that cup, then has dastardly powers. What is it? It's
a symbol, it's a co would phrase. It's describing the
physical descendants of Jesus Christ. If this were true, if
(46:08):
this were proven, this would be one of the most
significant moments in human history. And we found approvable living
descendant of the historical figure known as Jesus Christ. So
if that's such an amazing thing, why hide it because
it would upend everything? Right? Yeah? Yeah, I mean for
(46:31):
most of the last two thousand years. The idea of
Jesus Christ having children at all was very heretical, and
the Catholic Church worked arduously to control its um, its message,
and it splinter groups or dissident schools of thought were
brutally suppressed, murdered wholesale, you know what I mean. Uh, ironically,
(46:53):
of course, this is exactly what happened to the first Christians,
the predecessors of the Catholics. New ideas banish the and
also torture. Well, it's you know, when you think about it,
they wanted to control a message because they didn't have
the cost of communication is so high that when people
are in isolation, you know, like in an island off
(47:14):
the coast of France or somewhere in North Africa, they
can begin to make their own saints, for instance. That's
a huge thing even now, right dude, the more we
look at it, it seems, in at least in my
opinion right now, the brutality of the control mechanisms throughout
history do seem eerily necessary in a lot of ways,
and that scares me a little bit. It's a real
(47:35):
politic kind of move. But but this, this is the
idea So it would make sense then for this to
be kept a secret because the ideas that the Catholic
Church doesn't want this truth to get out. And we
know that why While we don't know for sure whether
this is true or whether it's all you know, speculation,
(47:57):
bluff and bluster, we do know that the Catholic Church
has in the past run very, very large and ambitious
information control campaigns like four centuries. But is this too weird?
It might be too weird for some of us. There's
(48:17):
another mundane theory that came from the telegraph. I like
this one too. This is interesting, way late on it. Well,
I guess if this is what it is, then it
makes so many other things hilarious that have happened with
the n s A getting involved in other high profile
people trying to solve this thing when an actuality, Perhaps
it's just some some graffiti left left by people who
(48:41):
lived in the house or the estate after the money
was put there. So okay, So this this historian A. J. Morton,
and he thinks that the inscription is just was put
there in the ninete century by residents George Adams and
his wife Mary Vernon Venables last name Vernon Venables. Now
(49:02):
what were the two bottom letters D and M D
and M M All right? In my head, I was
like I was for some reason connecting G or making
it G N M for a moment they're thinking George
and Mary. But no, that doesn't make sense. But Vernon Ventables,
that's two vs. That's at least two of them, and
there are a lot of those. So Morton, who is
(49:25):
an expert in graves and monuments, he said that the
letters can be matched to this couple Adams and Vernon Ventables,
because they were relations of Thomas Anson, and there doesn't
appear to be any reference to the curious letters until
the nineteen century. To Morton, this suggests that they were
added later. Nothing in Thomas Anson's life fits the letters
(49:49):
in the inscription, except the family of his nephew, George Adams.
So the idea is that, regardless of all our speculation
and these concepts of conspiracy spanning centuries, someone just did
some graffiti. Which is also it always reminds me of
that story about the runic inscriptions and the guest Sophia.
(50:10):
Do we talk about this on air? I don't know
that we have, maybe as a casual mention so so
there's this there's this thing in the guest Sofia. The
used to blow people's minds. It is a runic description
called the half Dan inscription and was discovered in nineteen
sixty four. And for a while, people, you know, not
(50:32):
naturally being prone to reading rooms. For a while people thought, whoa,
this is amazing. Vikings got all the way down here
and and the history is hidden and it goes so
much deeper and found uh when when they translated it,
when they translated it and they still couldn't read all
(50:54):
of it, it turned out that it said like half
Dan carved these rooms. So it's the historical equivalent of
you know, Paul was here, So a lot of graffiti happens.
This This answer might not satisfy a lot of us,
but anyway you look at it, the truth is this.
(51:15):
At this point, no one really agrees on what this
inscription means. We've outlined some of the main theories, and
each of these theories have their proponents. Some of us
listening now probably found one that particularly calls to us.
And I will say the the theory of a priory
of scion is a fascinating read. We just don't know
(51:36):
if it is connected to this inscription. But residents of
Staffordshire encounter new theories continually, like all the time. Yeah,
we're quote here and says we get five or six
people a week who believe they have solved a code,
so we're a bit wary of them. Now. Christis exhausted,
(52:01):
stratford Shire and shy and strat stratford Shire. Maybe sheer
Stratford sheer, Well, it's Lancashire, Lancashire, I've always heard Lancashire. Well,
if you want, if the Beatles the Day in the
Life of is to be believed, it's uh ten thousand
holes in Blackford, Lancashire. Yeah, but they were just trying
(52:25):
to make it fit. The song didn't wasn't a rhymestid.
So so we would ask you, which do you believe
to do? Any of these theories sound particularly convincing to you.
Do you have your own theory that you think your
fellow listeners should know? Let us know about it. You
can find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Oh and
(52:45):
here's one for the Facebook group. Here's where it gets crazy.
It's interesting. I don't know if the mods are going
to get mad at us for opening this door. Nothing
worse than a mad mod. Nothing worse than a mad mod.
We've got super moods. They're they're real Avengers, team of
moderate Uh. But we want to ask you, if you
had a chance, what sort of mystery would you like
(53:06):
to leave behind for future humans and future civilization, specifically
for trolling purposes. Just to make him go. This is
so important, but really it just says Alfred wrote this,
I would I would want a huge cartoonish sculpture of
(53:27):
something very mundane on a mountain because stone would last
so long, and I wanted to be towards the top
of the mountain, and I would want it to be.
When I say mundane, I mean like like a like
a bass relief of a taco or burrito and it's
hundreds and hundreds of yards long, and then it's at
(53:48):
the bottom. It just says like okay, nice. Uh, yeah, dude,
that sounds great. I think huge granite carving of a
cat and it's like sitting down, but it's also got
wings uh, and it's got some jewelry on it. Uh.
This is all carved of course, um, and it's got
(54:09):
like the tale of some other creature. Right, So like
a chimera looking creature, but make it huge and put
it somewhere where everybody who comes after thinks that there
was an actual being that looks like that. Nice like
the Sphinx. Yeah, I'm describing the Sphinx. You are, but
without it took me a second. I was I was
(54:31):
so umbord, and it's like, you know what, I bet
that's crazy enough to work. And it appears that you
are correct by friends, So yes, let us know. You
can follow us where Conspiracy Stuff show on Instagram. Follow
us to see our episode updates. You can also follow
some of our individual misadventures. If you are so inclined,
(54:52):
you can hit me up at Embryonic Insider. I mainly
plush travel picks and pictures of my kid doing the dab,
which is the thing that kids do still early. It's
not uncool quite yet, although when I do it it
is uncool. Yeah, it's called the Dad Dad. You can
find me at Ben Bullen And actually started on an
(55:12):
Instagram page specifically to share out on this show, but
I don't have it ready right now to tell you
what it is, so you can find me. I do
exist now. It's something Matt Frederick and my heart all right,
all right, this is news to me. Did you know
about this? Now? What Matt's new Instagram presence? Yeah? Made
(55:34):
a new one? Well? Uh, well will you accept my follow?
Is it private? It's not private? All right? Well, I
guess you have no choice in the matter. Should I
private it? Should I privatize? I'm not going to tell
you what to do with you. I don't know how
to use Instagram? What do I do? Would you put
things on there? I don't Know's gotta help me? If
you have Instagram advice for our good friend Matt, you
(55:55):
can also call us directly. We mentioned top of the show,
but our number is one eight three three st d
w y t K. But what if that doesn't work either,
then send us an evenmail. We are conspiracy at iHeart
radio dot com. Stuff they Don't Want you to Know
(56:34):
is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For
more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Welcome back
(00:24):
to the show. My name is Matt, my name is
They called me Ben. We are joined as always with
our super producer Paul Mission controlled decade. Most importantly, you
are you, You are here, and that makes this stuff
they don't want you to know. How's how's everybody feeling
back for another week? I'm feeling awesome. Can I tell
you a quick story? Please? Okay? So my son is
(00:45):
aware of Star Wars. We haven't watched any of the
movies yet, but he has a couple of these of
the paper or the cardboard books of Star Wars stories,
and he knows what a lightsaber is, and he's real
hyped about lightsabers. So does he say it? He says
lightsaber yeah, lightsabers, yeah. He loves it, and he makes
this sound. He goes, who. Well, So I realized that
(01:06):
my wife and I had an old stash of glow sticks,
because you know, everybody's just got some glow sticks hanging
around that are still packaged from you know, back in
your twenties, Ruth bro cool. Okay, so I realized that
we had some I found, like a green one and
a red one. So I get to play dartha Daddy
and he gets to and he pretends that he's Yoda,
always Yoda, and we have lightsaber battles with glow sticks
(01:28):
now almost nightly. You think it's because Yoda is like
around his height and he recognizes super agile. Yeah, that's
gotta be it. That's gotta be a mind control powers.
That's that's a selling point. Yeah. And he does forced
tornado on me all the time and it's it's debilitated. Yeah.
Where is that in the lexicon? Though? Forced tornadoes? That?
Did he make that up? Or is that canon? Pretty
(01:49):
sure the next episode is going to have a forced tornado. Okay,
I mean you heard it here first. Okay, all right,
well we look forward to seeing this franchise development. Thanks. Yeah,
I think it's Star Wars things going places. Yeah, yeah,
you know, I my spiders sense tells me, how are
you doing, Noll? How's it? How's how's it going? I'm
doing well? Speaking of spider sense, did you guys see
uh the end game. The end of the end game,
(02:10):
did I haven't okay, no, no, no discussion, then no, no,
I kind of want discussion. Well, I mean, this isn't
really the place I can save me three hours victory lap.
It's it's a but it's a really really expensive victory lap,
and and and and it has some very satisfying conclusions.
It has a few things that are kind of like WTF.
And it has a few things that are kind of
(02:31):
a little bit glossed over, and then sort of like
wait what happened to that thread? They sort of left it?
But all in all, what a what a feat, What
a treat? What a feat? Though, Like just organizational skills,
right to give all those characters their due and no
one's expecting that wolverine cameo like that is wild. Is
there ever any point in the movie where all of
(02:53):
those A list like actors are in one place or
not like complete like you can older and not green
screened in or whatever. I can't comment that's too much though, Okay, Well,
I mean they're they're the Avengers plus all the others. Yeah. Well,
I mean it's a payoff people waiting for, and I
think it's well worth the price of a ticket. You know,
(03:13):
that's the kind of film that's good to see in theaters,
good to see on the Imax. If you have that availability.
For sure, I I will die on this hill. To
quote Ben Bolan, screw three D not worth the price.
I'd pay that price just to see it on the
bigger screen with a better sound system. Did you watch
it in three No? I don't. I just I some
one time, Black Panther I saw in three D because
someone invited me, having already bought the tickets, and then
(03:35):
popped it on me once I got there that it
was three D and the tickets were like forty bucks.
A don't like three D. See It's like it's give
me a headache. It wasn't fun. And I had my
kid with me, so that was like eighty dollars of
movie it was. I mean, I'm probably exaggerating a little bit,
but I don't know, man, what's your factor in popcorn?
I just don't like three D. I don't find it
immersive or fun. We're already in three D, you know
(03:56):
what I mean? Album? Yeah, fully, it's like advertising a
movie with sound. I had this this, How do I
you don't I have an interesting story for you about
Avengers that has nothing to do with the film. Really,
I won't spoil anything because I know a lot of
us listening feel very strongly about spoilers. I love them.
(04:19):
Most people hate them. Anyway. So I'm watching this I'm
watching this thing, and it is a long journey, and
it's long film, and there are ups and there downs,
and I think overall it's very well made, but there's
really there's a really, really really sad part that gets
a lot of people. And as I was watching the
sad part in the theater, I heard someone uh kind
(04:42):
of behind me and I thought, oh, I guess, I
guess got a cold or something. It shouldn't really be
outside if you're contagious. And then I heard more people
like and everybody get ahold of I thought. People, I
was like, wow, it's really go and around you know
this is and I've never encountered measles in the wild,
(05:03):
so it was like, do people have measles or whatever?
And then Uh, the people I was at the movie
with uh, I like. I asked him about it afterwards
and they said, no, you've I don't want to use
the strong language they used, but they said no, dude,
don't be a robot. They were crying. So I think
I just am missing that emotional switch. One feeling a
(05:26):
year would possibly have fallen on the Avengers. I would
have put that bet down to three three. Yeah, I'm
going one of your one of your guys, you could
have reserved for the Avengers because you you genuinely did
grow up with these characters. I don't know. I guess
we all did. Yeah, but out of a lot of
people that I know, you're probably one of Yeah, you
know the characters in the story, and you know the
(05:47):
comics too, you know. That's what I'm saying that the
original comics, not to degree, so many of these characters
were not big flagship characters, at least for me, you know. Yeah. Yeah.
But but be that as it may, I think we
did a really great job talking about the Avengers without
giving anything away totally. So if if you haven't seen
it yet, uh, do check it out. They're not paying
(06:10):
us to say this. Just think of and Matt. I
can't wait till you see it so we can hang
out and talk about it. I can't wait to finally
see ant Man get crushed by the boot of some
other character that's actually his nemesis as a supervillain called
the Boot. No, it's not, it's it's like kntly don't know.
Paul Paul is uh. Paul is a huge film buff
(06:31):
Mission Control over here, and he enjoyed the film as well.
So if you can't take Nolan eyed Co sign as
as as worth worth it, take Paul's. But what about
Game of Game of Thrones, Joe Game of Thrones? What
about the Game of Thrones? Hey, did you did you
guys love that cup cameo? The cup cameo made my day? Yeah? Yeah,
(06:53):
I mean I get it because cup story is super
complicated in the books and it's like a pivotal point.
You just can't do it us this on the screen,
you know. C Tirion is like giving it the side eye.
They see g eided out though. That's one of the beauty,
beautiful things. As far as the network concerned of streaming is,
you know, if it's printed and it's in the theater,
is they're not gonna pull all those prints out of
(07:14):
every theater in the in the country. But for this
they just go in there, blip, re upload, yep. It's
like it was never there. How except the internet never
forgets how many people got fired? Do you think just one? One? Uh?
One best boy one best boy with the best dream. Well,
that guy became a legend. If we'll get to the
point of the show in just a second, we guys
(07:36):
owe us a little bit of a rambling in sure.
I think we've been keeping it pretty tight. Yeah. Yeah,
And we want to hear directly from you your opinions
about this this intro, or your your opinions about any
old thing on your mind from previous episodes, or suggestions
for a future episode. Uh, Matt, our friend and cohort,
(07:57):
Matt has been on this amazing seeing journey listening to voicemails. Yeah,
I gotta tell you I haven't. I haven't been off
of this journey in a while. Now we need to
take up the mantle man. It's so great. It's such
a roller coaster because it gets really dark sometimes and
then it is the funniest thing I've heard all week
(08:17):
sometimes and then it just happens again. But the best
thing is that everything that gets put on that the
voicemail message machine is genuine and awesome, and everyone every
if you're hearing this, you are awesome. Give us a
call again. You can call one eight three three st
(08:38):
d W I T K right now. Leave us a message.
Any suggestions, even on the format of the show. Just
tell us, tell us what you want us to do.
We're listening. Get weird with it. And also, speaking of
the phones, shout out to our formerly anonymous caller Steven B.
Who hipped us to Canada's Shag Harbor incident as an episode.
(09:01):
Thanks so much for tuning in. Stephen. Uh. Stephen reached out,
reached out to us, and I hope you don't get
mad at us for say this, Stephen, But he said, guys,
I don't know why I didn't say my name, but
I'm the one who called about Shag Harbor incident, so
it's we I I especially get it. It's tough when
(09:22):
you're when you're working live and you only got three minutes,
but call us. Try it for yourself. Don't take my
word or Steven's word for it. Today we're off to
England and as they say in Staffordshire, those yes, yes, yes,
what the heck are we talking about. We'll tell you
a journey with us, and if you are a listener
(09:44):
on the other side of the Atlantic, if you are
located in Europe, if you are located in the United Kingdom,
if you are located in Staffordshire, or you've ever been there,
we want to hear from you. Here's here's the thing
about Staffordshire. It's a county in the West Midlands of England.
It's landlocked, right, it's it's not one of the coastal areas.
It has a pretty healthy population of just over one
(10:08):
million people. And like most places in the United Kingdom,
it's home to a storied past, numerous historical buildings, monuments
and so on. You know that thing that you probably
here thrown around all the time. In Europe, two hundred
miles is a long way and in the US two
(10:30):
hundred years is a long time. Yeah, So this this
place does have a lot of history. However, most people
outside of the United Kingdom and Europe haven't really heard
of the place, unless that is there into the world
of fringe research and conspiracies. That's right. Straffordshire is actually
(10:50):
a little bit famous in those realms because there's this
tiny little thing relatively to the rest of Straffordshire, tiny
tiny little thing. It's a monument called the Shepherd's monument,
And on this monument there's an engraving. It's got one
of the most enigmatic, as of yet unbroken ciphers that
you heard us say, or at least phonetically attempt to
(11:11):
say earlier. You backwards masking a guy. That's what we're
going to talk progressively in backwards masking. Nice episode. Yeah,
it was Paul's idea. Yeah, it's true. It's true. We
are phonetically pronouncing this very weird cipher. It's literally eight
(11:31):
characters and then two more little characters and an exclamation mark. No, no,
you know. It made me think of, um, do you guys?
You know I don't have time to play a lot
of video games, but I'm in this somewhat monogamous video
game relationship with a thing called sky Rim, And I
(11:52):
went back and started playing it again. I'm different now,
I'm an Argonian. They're the lizard people. Wasn't people you were? Yeah?
Were you? Were you a mage? I know you love
that was an Argonian made you should have been a thief? Why?
I don't know. Argonians are awesome with that. That's the stereotype.
They have a lot of good attributes for. It's all
(12:13):
I'm saying, oh god, that sounds awful, but it's so
true because you literally pick your like species or your race. Yeah, yeah,
it's it's it's it's a great game and you can
go back and you can do all the stuff you
want to do. Anyway. Anyway, it reminds me of the
Dragon Shouts where they're all, you know, it's got really
dope music in that game, and they're like, Doverkin, Dolverkin.
That's right, you know, it totally doesn't that's intense stuff,
(12:39):
you know. But anyhow, this weird Dovikin esque code came
to be sometime between well, the monument came to be
sometime between seventeen forty eight and seventeen sixty three, when
this British parliament member named Thomas Anson commissioned a monument
to be built at a place called sugar Barro Hall
(13:01):
in Staffordshire. And we may be mispronouncing that. We talked
a little bit about that before we went on the
Sugar bro and no, you said it feels like an
Australian It does kind of, Yeah, Sugar sugar Barro a
little bit, I think, Yeah, I don't know why shug
just the word shug. You know feels Australia. Seems like
(13:25):
the name of some kind of Australian implement, you know,
a shug, dear dear Rossie's. I don't know, like a shiv,
but it's more blunt, you know. I'm so into Australian slang.
Calling McDonald's Macca's has like just it's changed my world.
I say that, yeah, m A C C A. I
don't know if it'll actually get me to go to
(13:47):
a McDonald's, but I like to drive by in St Marcas.
I feel like a shug would be some kind of club.
It's not like a club where you party, like a
club like a cudge club. Someone with yeah, yeah, So
this this play is sugar Barow Hall in Staffordshire is
the location of this monument and Thomas Anson. Although he
(14:07):
commissions this monument, the Shepherd's Monument, his brother George, who
was an admiral, actually pays for it. And a Flemish
sculptor named Peter Shemakers with two ease is the guy
who actually builds the thing. But what does it look like? Well,
the sculpture is comprised of a mirror image, or what's
(14:27):
known as a boss relief of a painting by Nicolas
Poussin that's called The Shepherds of Arcadia and uh, it's
also known as Okay, I'm gonna give this the world. Um.
I think this is Latin. Yes, yeah, at in Arcadia Ego,
les Burgers d Arcady or the Arcadian Shepherds, and it
was painted in sixties seven or between sixty seven to
(14:49):
sixteen thirty eight, and it's it's this, it's this fascinating
iconic work. You can it's more than worth your time
to check it out. And I think some of us
listening will be familiar with this painting and know where
this is going because it's shepherds that are around a tomb, right,
and then they have very specific hand gestures that they're doing,
and it's check it out. So there are four figures
(15:13):
in the in the painting, there are three shepherds, there's
a female figure gathered around this tomb, as you said, Matt,
and two of the shepherds are pointing at the tomb
in a in a real sketchy way, you know what
I mean. Uh. And on this tomb there's this Latin
text at in Arcadia Ego, which translates to I am
even in Arcadia, or I am also in Arcadia. We'll
(15:37):
hear other versions with like even in Arcadia am I
whatever it's Latin. Uh, it's really it's really cool phrase,
very famous phrase in literature. Uh. But let's let's bracket that.
Just know that that exists right now, and let's let's
go back to this sculpture, this boss relief. It looks
(15:59):
like the painting, but it's got some key differences. The
first big thing you'll notice if you're looking at the monument,
the sugar bur monument, is that there's an extra sarcophagus
that's sitting on top of a tomb inside the original painting,
which you go, Okay, I wonder what that could mean.
An extra tomb. Maybe there are two people in tomb
(16:19):
that we need to be thinking about in this Who
knows it could be more cryptic than that. Let's move
on because the other thing is that there are two
stone heads above the image from the painting. Okay, so
he got one that's uh this mirthful uh, mirthful fellow.
The look on his face is the way to tell
the mirth Uh. The other, though, is horned in, bearing
(16:47):
a marketing resemblance to that old Greek god Pan that
you might remember that they literally the old goat Pan
that is both fun in in like whimsical, but also
extremely creepy. Yeah. It has some some representations, some some
symbolical representations of other things, the goat being one of them.
(17:12):
You might remember from other things we've talked about on
the show with the uh the old battlement. Ah, that's right, yes, yes,
And while the sculpture itself is impressive, most people are
are kind of over the sculpture. They're more fascinated by
this inscription carved below it. At first glance, it seems simple.
(17:34):
It's as you said, bad, It's a scant two lines
of text. Yes, and it looks very confusing. It looks
like the worst wheel of fortune. Clue Ever, I'm gonna
do a version of your skyriom of how I would
do it. Wow, that was great because that did bow
out like crazy try okay, alright, cool, we got protections
(17:57):
against that, against the dark arts. I would do it
more as like father. That's great because the double V
at the end gives you a yeah, um, how do
you how do you add in the D and the
M though? Yeah, yeah, so this is that's the top
line O U O S V A v V, and
(18:18):
it's encapsulated or bookended by these letters at the bottom line.
So if you look at the sec at the second line,
the line below O U O S V A v V,
there is a letter D below and to the left
of the first oh, if you're looking at it, if
you're looking straight at it, and there's an M below
and to the right of the last V. So when
(18:39):
you put it all together, that's what it looks like.
It looks like that, that agglomeration of vowels and vs
and one s, and then below it there's the D
N D M. And we keep adding the exclamation mark
just because it feels like something you should shout. But
appearing simple is not the same thing as being simple, right, yeah, exactly,
(19:00):
because a lot of people have been trying to figure
out since this thing was put up what exactly it means,
and nobody has, let's say, sufficiently come up with an answer.
But again, even if you think you completely got the answer,
there's a matter of proving it, because who's going to
prove it to you anyway. We'll get into that right now,
(19:22):
because let's go through some of the people who have
actually attempted several Charles in here. It's very Charles heavy.
Charles Dickens. Uh. We may be familiar with some of
his work. He wrote a ton of things that are
popular in western Cannon and he was defeated by this
series of letters. Had tried and he failed. And we
(19:43):
have another important British Charles also with a D for
her last name, Darwin, who apparently ate every animal that
he documented. True story was that was him, wasn't it. Yeah,
you're telling me he was out there in the Galapagos
and he was just going to town. Yeah, I mean,
I guess when you're in the Galapagos. Well, he he
(20:06):
apparently had a history. He was in some kind of
club of exotic meats at Cambridge or whatever, where he
would eat like albatrosses and egrets and weird, you know,
stringy gamey meats and he kept he carried that spirit
right into his research. That is like one of the
most elite clubs I've ever heard of. He called he
apparently defended We learned this from Jack O'Brien. Apparently he defended. Uh,
(20:32):
he defended this practice by say it was for science.
But he ate like twenty tortoises or something to the
point where I think he threatened their very existence Onset
Islands because he's thought of was this like great conservationist.
That really was not his bag at all. He was mortiscist, scientist, researcher,
documentary and a devourer. There we go. Yet he he
(20:53):
mastered the tortoise, he discovered the secret of evolution, and
yet he could not surmount these letters. Wow, neither could
a man named Josiah Wedgewood. He was one of the
godfathers of industrialization, and oh man, he he got out
all the steam works. He like figured out, Okay, we're
gonna do this whole thing. We're gonna uh, we're gonna
(21:14):
get an assembly line and figure out how to do this.
And guess what. Nope, Nope, he couldn't. Even though he
uh industrialized the manufacturer of of pottery, which you know,
that's important. It sounds it sounds weird now, but it was.
To take our word for it, he was a big deal.
Maybe a subject for a different episode, but here we are.
(21:36):
It's twenty nineteen and those old ants and bros Are
long since gone to dust and death. The guys who
actually made the thing, Yeah, well, the guys who commissioned it. Well, yes, okay,
you're right, But the ones who commissioned are generally the
ones who have the meaning right because the person who
sculpted it and chiseled it just knew all that goes there. Yeah,
(21:58):
I got his marching orders. Good call. So here we
are and people, everyone still wonders what unearthed this code
could mean, And just as importantly, everyone is still wondering
whether someone has finally solved it. What are we talking about.
We'll tell you after a word from our sponsor, and
(22:26):
we're back. And I just have to say, Paul. Paul
was trying to get us to go to ad break
for like ten minutes there, and it was so much
fun to uh, to to watch Paul and continually not
to him like, oh yes, of course, but when I
could see where exactly we were going. Oh, toying with you,
Paul is one of my greatest excitements. Here's where it
(22:47):
gets crazy. So over the past few centuries, numerous people
have made varying claims about this inscription that includes conjecture
about the intense an he's some kind of explanation or
origin story, and most importantly, the meaning. So let's look
at the theories, uh, in no particular order. Some are
(23:10):
a little out there, some may seem more mundane, but
we want to see which one sound the most reasonable
to you. So there's an author named Dave Ramston. In book,
he references manuscript evidence from the local record office and
he says that based on what he found, Thomas Anson's
(23:30):
peers thought the monument was a funereal structure and that
was dedicated to some figure known just as the shepherd s.
So from his take that DM stands for dismanibus, and
the eight letter inscription is a cipher concealing the name
of the person being memorialized. So in his book he
(23:55):
he walks through a pretty thoroughed decryption effort and he
argues that through the use of a poly alphabetic cipher,
he has found that the name, the name they're referring
to is Magdalene. Dude. By the way, that dismanibus that
you heard is talking about, it's in reference to roman
(24:17):
Um spirits likes or goat, not ghosts, but spirits of
people who have died. It's kind of really interesting because
it has actually uh further back or it has pagan
roots as well. So just an interesting thing in when
you connected up with what Ben is just talking about there.
I don't know, But what's the difference in a spirit
and a ghost man? Well, isn't it the same thing?
(24:43):
But the ghost get is trapped and caught behind right
they cannot Maybe I like that behind that, okay? And
also but having that name Magdalen, I mean, come on,
we all know that might be referring to right old
Mary Mary Magdalen. M it's the plot thickens. But that's
(25:06):
not the only thing. Just spoiler alert. People disagree with
this author. In another book called Anson's gold Fellow named
George Edmund says that we have to remember George Anson
was a naval man. He was an admiral, and George
Edmond argues that Anson created this cipher to hide the
(25:29):
latitude and longitude of an island where he had buried
or discovered a huge Spanish treasure. Oh, it's a treasure map,
of course it is. M yeah, and that he mounted
his secret expedition in the eighteenth century to recover this treasure,
which was located, but due to unforeseen circumstances, left where
(25:54):
it was found. Man, do you think it's in that one?
That one giant whole, you know, the one I'm talking
about oak Island film Man, do you think they're really
finding stuff at oak Island or do you think that
the production team is slipping the whole feathers and room.
I mean, I I don't know, I don't know. I
(26:16):
had heard that, but I don't have a ton of experience.
I've never been there, So it would certainly make for
a good TV to have things discovered, That's all I
would say. Good point, good point. So the idea here
is that letters in code were sent back to Lord
(26:36):
Anson by the expedition leader, and that these validate and
include part of the cipher, and that this proves what
the cipher is for. So George Edmund isn't necessarily saying
that the cipher is solved, but he's saying that's the
right direction to look into. And then we have a
returning school of thought from a previous episode. The authors
(27:00):
of a book called The Holy Blood and the Holy
Grail speculated that the painter you had mentioned earlier, nol
U Poussin, was a member of what's called the Priory
of Psion with an s yeah, and were we interviewed
uh the the daughter of one of the authors. What
was her last name, I believe, Yeah, that was a
(27:22):
great interview. Uh, fascinating story. Um. But the and the
whole idea here, right, is that perhaps the Shepherds of
Arcadia they are in this monument, are actually pointing to
something very specific, not necessarily anything to do with the tomb,
but where to find the Holy Grail, don't don't do.
(27:50):
And then there's this whole other thing where as part
of the promotion of the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail,
they had these experts or there I guess their form
early codebreakers, right, who came through and they tried to
to figure out what the heck this thing is um,
and they specifically we're looking at this connection here with
the priority of Scion, connection with the shepherd's pointing to
(28:14):
the Holy Grail, and get a little more on that.
So it's Sheila and Oliver Lawn to the people involved here.
They proposed that the letters actually encode a specific phrase,
a phrase Jesus H DEFFI d e f y Yeah,
where the H supposedly stands for Christos um and this
(28:36):
is a Greek word meaning Messiah, and the references to
a Jesus bloodline or uh, the bloodline of Jesus H. Christ.
I don't, I honestly don't know what that comes from
Jesus H. Christ. What what is that? Do we know?
Somebody somebody call us right right? Uh? Yeah, it's it's
(28:59):
this idea, you right, that that Jesus Christ, the historical
Jesus Christ, did actually have children or issue as they
would be called. And you know, this is very Dan Brown.
Dan Brown leans very heavily on this in one of
his books, at least in The Da Vinci Code. And
the idea is that this bloodline was secreted away and
(29:22):
we'll read about it being secreted away in different parts
of the world, often France. Um. So that that idea
is really interesting because these code breakers, Sheila Lawn and
Oliver Lawn are no joke. They are the legit, true blue,
real deal. They were working on Enigma in World War Two.
(29:46):
So they're not just They're not just some couple who
happened by, you know what I mean. They're breaking Nazi
codes and then they I think that that's what happened, right,
or that they think that that's what the meaning could be. Right,
And she La Lawn said that she believes it may
also be kind of a love letter of some steel. Well,
(30:06):
the other thing you have to remember here is that
they're having ideas, uh put out there for them to
look for in a way, you know, with the way
it was shaped, with the promotion for the Holy Blood
and the Holy Grail, and for what it could mean.
You just, um, just keep that in mind. You're the
little skeptic part of the back of your mind that
they're being led a little bit. So already this is
(30:29):
this is getting weird, right. We've got we've got someone
saying it's the one of the key clues to the
secret story of Jesus Christ. We've got someone else saying
it's buried treasure. And we've got someone else saying that
Anson was in love drafts with someone and needed for
(30:50):
some reason to keep their identity a secret. Yeah. So
how does this shake out in the modern day? Yeah,
most of the modern theories approached this for um sort
of across stick kind of perspective or like, you know,
think about any kind of word patterned patterned word art,
I guess where various letters line up, almost like a
crossword puzzle. But when across the specific form of this meaning,
(31:14):
they interpret each letter um as the initial letter of
a larger word, so like M A T T for example,
not to pick on you, like make uh, make Alice
take tile at all or whatever absolutely, so sort of
like a mnemonic device of like the way to remember
something or it's They're also very popular in like presentations
(31:34):
are kind of like self help, touchy feeling kind of
you know, office power points, you know about things like
synergy and you know thing you know S would stand
for super cool and e with Anyway, it's not good.
I love that I've fall into making up those. They're
fun when you make them absurd on purpose, but like
as an actual motivational device, it's sort of Elicits an
(31:55):
instant i rol because it's sort of like cliche, right,
you know what I mean, Right, But it's it's just
a flad mental exercise. It is tough to take it
seriously though. Well it's also tough to do it well.
And that's the joke too, right, is a lot of
times they end up people run out of ideas and
they just kind of become either redundant or just absurd.
If you're ever in a knife fight, remember to stop
(32:15):
that stands for stab to other people there you go,
very very good, very very helpful. Um. But yeah, so
in nineteen one, um more charred bishop or more card
and I'm gonna go with the hard c. H speculated
that the letters might be an initialism for the Latin
phrase optimate oxaurus optima sororis va deus amontissi mouse. I
(32:41):
want to sing this in like a choir ways soro
sees v dues montisi mouse vo vi veritui boo. That great,
But the big question is what does that mean for
those of us who don't speak Latin. Best of wives,
best of sisters, A most devoted widower dedicates parentheses this
(33:05):
to your virtues. Oh that's nice. See now that's really
really nice. So that's that's specifically about George Anson, right,
And that would mean, if this is correct, that those
eight letters are actually just a coded dedication to his
wife after she passed away, which is interesting because why
would you have to put that in code? Well, it's
(33:26):
I think it's less of in code and more of
fitting it on the monument perhaps, right, And this would
be my opinion. His his spouse, by the way, Lady
Elizabeth Yorke, daughter of Philip York first Earl of Hardwick.
They did not have any children. But I could see
that if it's just um, a person who spouse died
(33:50):
and had the means to give some kind of dedication
to her that only maybe even had meaning to him.
Uh maybe, okay, maybe it's maybe it's a private thing. Yeah,
I just like it. To me, Alan's surface, it seems
it seems very strange and a little bit chuckleworthy that
(34:12):
this guy would say, all right, I really love my
wife and I think all these wonderful nice things about her,
but no one can know. Well, yeah, well, guys, I
love my wife. Everyone keep it a secret. The other
don't tell anyone. Just the other thing that you could
say here, just before we move on, is that maybe
it was a backhanded thing or like a cruel joke
(34:35):
in uh in her memory because maybe she wasn't devoted,
Why she wasn't the best of wives and sisters and
devoted uh at tongue in the cheek. This is before
that forward slash s yeah stand ford sarcasm and what
I need to be I need to use that. But see,
but that way, only he knows that he's being a
(34:56):
dick to his wife. Oh good, good, This is this terrible?
I hope that's not the case. Other people don't think
it is. Though. There's a guy named Steve regend Ball
who interprets the letters as standing for a new Latin
translation of the following phrase vanity, Oh vanities saith the
preacher all his vanity oh Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes twelve eight. Uh.
(35:25):
He speculates that this this phrase, orator omnia sunt vanitas
vanitas vanitatum, would I feel like I just cast a spell?
He thinks it may be the source of an earlier
inscription on Nia vanitas, which might have been carved on
(35:45):
an alcove at the estate by one of Thomas Anson's pals,
George Littleton. Interesting, then keep an eye on that, maybe
though that might and that maybe again the one this
is one of the ones that, um, yeah, I guess
I just don't I need to know more about that,
(36:06):
because I vanity of vanity is saith the preacher all
is vanity, all is vanity. All worldly things and actions
are vanity. It's just like carving a giant monument for anything. Yeah. Well, yeah,
you know, this reminds me of It reminds me of
(36:27):
the Georgia guidestones. That whole idea of like give a
little thought to what's important, you know what I mean.
It's sort of like but at least the Georgia guidestones
intent was to be understood, right, you know, it's not
really very cool if you have like a message for
the world and no one can understand it, or if
they're just wildly speculating about what it means. That's a
(36:48):
good point. So it maybe a personal thing, you know
what I mean of personal significance. The ants and brothers,
if they are indeed the people who inscribed this. Uh.
The N s A also got involved, so did U S. Intelligence.
And there a guy named Keith Massey. In modern times
you'll read some press about him claiming to have solved
(37:10):
the letters. He interprets them as an initialism for the
Latin phrase or omnes sequant vmum vitam I pray that
all may follow the way to true life. Is this
biblical again? Yeah? Yeah? Johnny four sixteen, John John, Yeah,
(37:35):
that's really good reference to that verse. Reading John four
sixteen read I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.
He goes some via at veritas et vita, and that's
the one that Stone called Steve Austin had printed on
the back of his sleeveless leather jacket was three sixteen.
(37:55):
That's the one that's the go to as a child.
I never understood at that. Oh, I have way too
many of those rattling around in my brain that I
could probably I'm not even going to wrest trivia, just
versus and wrestler trivia. They kind of I thought the
Undertaker was the coolest, but that's very un brand for me,
(38:15):
staying man, three sixteen is just for God's so love
the world. Yeah, I didn't realize that. That's a very
nice message that stone Cold has on his That's very
counter to his tuble stone cold image. You know, so
love the world that he made me. And then what
does he do? He does the stunner stunner. It reminds
(38:38):
me of like jewels and pulp fiction doing that Biblical verse,
only that one gets scary though, that one gets I
will strike down upon the and all that. You don't
think anyway, but which wasn't an actual Bible verse? Kidding, no, what, no,
really this whole time, man, Sorry, it's an interpretation. Let's
(38:59):
put it that way. Maybe it's just vanity. Maybe all
is vanity, but these are just some of the most
popular concepts. Now it's time to ask whether any of
this checks out. And we'll do just that after a
word from our sponsor, and we're back, And Matt, you
(39:22):
direcked my childhood. That Tarantino line isn't from the Bible.
It's a much more elaborated version. The real verse is
actually just and I will execute great vengeance upon them
with furious rebukes, and they shall know I am the
Lord when I shall lay my vengeance upon them. So obviously,
well that there's so many different ones, but vulgate versions
(39:42):
and whatnot. I like the word rebuke. Let's bring rebuke back.
I want to rebuke some stuff. Isn't that as when
you like call someone out you take them to task.
It's sort of like a rebuttal, but it's a little stronger.
It's a little it's like it implies shaming of some
sort of finger wagging, right, criticizing someone, So it's it's
not quite rejecting. It's kind of admonishing, but in a
(40:04):
very strong way, kind of like how contempt is worse
than just like it's a really good white instant for
a pretty low manecoust just so you know you have
made so many people's day. It was just that sentence.
I don't think I understand the references MTG magic together. Yes, yes, anytime,
every anytime you say something that I don't understand, I
(40:25):
should always assume that it's magic. Even when you say MTG,
I have to make Madison Square gardens, We're making it acrostic,
move them giblets. I don't know. I'm working live here,
but literally all of my vocabulary comes from middle school magic.
The gathering play. We should get together and play play
magic at some point, all of us. Yeah, everyone, like,
(40:50):
even even you the listener. Yeah, yeah, come hang out,
let's play. Let's do it. Let's do it. We'll sneak
everyone in. I think it's more fun if we feel
like it's a heist. We'll do an MTG meet up
MTG conspiracy meet up sounds epic, and meet the group
MTG or the gang or the guys. Now, but it's
(41:10):
not in a across stick and an acronym aren't the
same thing, right, I mean, they're sort of they're they're
kind of no, because it doesn't the down word has
to be a word in and of itself. Right. So MTG,
even if it's spelled MTG and Magic the Gathering, it's
not in across because MTG is meaningless without that representing something. Yeah,
an acronym would be the abbreviation made out of the
(41:31):
first letters of the words. So our MTG thing is
an acronym. But an across stick would be uh, some
kind of poem or form of writing like you described,
where the first letter or syllable or word of each
line or spells out a word. So we've got to
ask yourselves, does any of this stuff check out? Not?
(41:53):
Not our not our plans to invite everyone to play
Magic the Gathering with us, uh and have Matt roundly
kick kick the snot out of all of us. I
would go easy, very good at that game. You are lying.
You're one of my favorite people, but I can tell
when you're lying. Oh no, Matt, Matt is really really
(42:14):
good at this. So I'm not talking about that stuff,
but talking about this concept. Uh. The one that I
think really stuck out to us and to a lot
of us listening now is the idea of this priory
of psion. I think this is definitely where the mystery
heightens right, yeah, yeah, this is this is a wild one.
(42:35):
So this is a fringe I guess secret society. Maybe
a fraternal order is a good way to describe it.
It was founded, you know, the official stories it was
founded and then dissolved in ninetifty six by a guy
named Pierre Plantart as part of a hoax. But people
(42:57):
who buy into the idea think it dates back much
much further, you know, back to of course the time
of the living historical Jesus Christ. This was considered, uh,
this was not taken very well or very seriously by
a lot of people in the Academy with a capital A.
(43:19):
But the the concept existed for a long time, some
people saying it was a hoax, and some people taking
it very seriously, and some people even claiming to be
members of the Priory of Zion. And then boom, it
went mainstream when Dan Brown leveraged this concept for the
basis of the Da Vinci Code, which is um I
(43:39):
I still think a solid, solid film, and I enjoyed
the book. I would say I have not read the book,
but the film I was happier than a lot of
the critics about it. You enjoyed it, did you see
the subsequent film The Angels and Demons and Infernos, and
I did not see it. Was there a third one
that was an inferno? Inferno was the third one? Angels
(44:01):
and Demons is the second? Is that correct? Well? Did
this do well? I mean they made three of them.
They must have done relatively sure. Yeah, they had to
coast off the blockbuster status expensive. Oh yeah, okay, so
Paul just off Mike or in our ears and at
last you will never hear the voice of Paul because
if you did, it would melt your insides. It was
(44:21):
much like hearing the voice of the archangel Gabriel or
something like. Um. But yeah, he says, Inferno was apparently
quite bad. I haven't seen any of them. But the
reason I asked did they do well? Is because I
just don't really have much of a memory of them existing.
I just remember the lure of you guys are great
at French. I'm not even gonna try it. Uh yeah, yes,
(44:42):
so this also this book, by the way, the da
Vinci Code. Just to be fair, we should say that
he did receive criticism from other authors and people familiar
with the theory, because you know, the authors of Holy
Blood and Holy Grail felt to a large degree that
he drives their work and that he was essentially using
(45:04):
their research to sell a novel. So that that's the moment, though,
that is the moment where this stuff hit the zeitgeist.
And the idea here is that the ants and brothers
were both members of the Priory of Science, and the
original painter of the Arcadian Shepherd painting was also a
(45:27):
member of the Priory of Zion, and that the Holy
Grail is not really a cup a goblet, you know,
the um what's the Indiana Jones line? The cup of
a carpenter yours Indian, My face is melting, he choose,
(45:48):
he also should have moisturized. Okay, So if it's not
that cup, then has dastardly powers. What is it? It's
a symbol, it's a co would phrase. It's describing the
physical descendants of Jesus Christ. If this were true, if
(46:08):
this were proven, this would be one of the most
significant moments in human history. And we found approvable living
descendant of the historical figure known as Jesus Christ. So
if that's such an amazing thing, why hide it because
it would upend everything? Right? Yeah? Yeah, I mean for
(46:31):
most of the last two thousand years. The idea of
Jesus Christ having children at all was very heretical, and
the Catholic Church worked arduously to control its um, its message,
and it splinter groups or dissident schools of thought were
brutally suppressed, murdered wholesale, you know what I mean. Uh, ironically,
(46:53):
of course, this is exactly what happened to the first Christians,
the predecessors of the Catholics. New ideas banish the and
also torture. Well, it's you know, when you think about it,
they wanted to control a message because they didn't have
the cost of communication is so high that when people
are in isolation, you know, like in an island off
(47:14):
the coast of France or somewhere in North Africa, they
can begin to make their own saints, for instance. That's
a huge thing even now, right dude, the more we
look at it, it seems, in at least in my
opinion right now, the brutality of the control mechanisms throughout
history do seem eerily necessary in a lot of ways,
and that scares me a little bit. It's a real
(47:35):
politic kind of move. But but this, this is the
idea So it would make sense then for this to
be kept a secret because the ideas that the Catholic
Church doesn't want this truth to get out. And we
know that why While we don't know for sure whether
this is true or whether it's all you know, speculation,
(47:57):
bluff and bluster, we do know that the Catholic Church
has in the past run very, very large and ambitious
information control campaigns like four centuries. But is this too weird?
It might be too weird for some of us. There's
(48:17):
another mundane theory that came from the telegraph. I like
this one too. This is interesting, way late on it. Well,
I guess if this is what it is, then it
makes so many other things hilarious that have happened with
the n s A getting involved in other high profile
people trying to solve this thing when an actuality, Perhaps
it's just some some graffiti left left by people who
(48:41):
lived in the house or the estate after the money
was put there. So okay, So this this historian A. J. Morton,
and he thinks that the inscription is just was put
there in the ninete century by residents George Adams and
his wife Mary Vernon Venables last name Vernon Venables. Now
(49:02):
what were the two bottom letters D and M D
and M M All right? In my head, I was
like I was for some reason connecting G or making
it G N M for a moment they're thinking George
and Mary. But no, that doesn't make sense. But Vernon Ventables,
that's two vs. That's at least two of them, and
there are a lot of those. So Morton, who is
(49:25):
an expert in graves and monuments, he said that the
letters can be matched to this couple Adams and Vernon Ventables,
because they were relations of Thomas Anson, and there doesn't
appear to be any reference to the curious letters until
the nineteen century. To Morton, this suggests that they were
added later. Nothing in Thomas Anson's life fits the letters
(49:49):
in the inscription, except the family of his nephew, George Adams.
So the idea is that, regardless of all our speculation
and these concepts of conspiracy spanning centuries, someone just did
some graffiti. Which is also it always reminds me of
that story about the runic inscriptions and the guest Sophia.
(50:10):
Do we talk about this on air? I don't know
that we have, maybe as a casual mention so so
there's this there's this thing in the guest Sofia. The
used to blow people's minds. It is a runic description
called the half Dan inscription and was discovered in nineteen
sixty four. And for a while, people, you know, not
(50:32):
naturally being prone to reading rooms. For a while people thought, whoa,
this is amazing. Vikings got all the way down here
and and the history is hidden and it goes so
much deeper and found uh when when they translated it,
when they translated it and they still couldn't read all
(50:54):
of it, it turned out that it said like half
Dan carved these rooms. So it's the historical equivalent of
you know, Paul was here, So a lot of graffiti happens.
This This answer might not satisfy a lot of us,
but anyway you look at it, the truth is this.
(51:15):
At this point, no one really agrees on what this
inscription means. We've outlined some of the main theories, and
each of these theories have their proponents. Some of us
listening now probably found one that particularly calls to us.
And I will say the the theory of a priory
of scion is a fascinating read. We just don't know
(51:36):
if it is connected to this inscription. But residents of
Staffordshire encounter new theories continually, like all the time. Yeah,
we're quote here and says we get five or six
people a week who believe they have solved a code,
so we're a bit wary of them. Now. Christis exhausted,
(52:01):
stratford Shire and shy and strat stratford Shire. Maybe sheer
Stratford sheer, Well, it's Lancashire, Lancashire, I've always heard Lancashire. Well,
if you want, if the Beatles the Day in the
Life of is to be believed, it's uh ten thousand
holes in Blackford, Lancashire. Yeah, but they were just trying
(52:25):
to make it fit. The song didn't wasn't a rhymestid.
So so we would ask you, which do you believe
to do? Any of these theories sound particularly convincing to you.
Do you have your own theory that you think your
fellow listeners should know? Let us know about it. You
can find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Oh and
(52:45):
here's one for the Facebook group. Here's where it gets crazy.
It's interesting. I don't know if the mods are going
to get mad at us for opening this door. Nothing
worse than a mad mod. Nothing worse than a mad mod.
We've got super moods. They're they're real Avengers, team of
moderate Uh. But we want to ask you, if you
had a chance, what sort of mystery would you like
(53:06):
to leave behind for future humans and future civilization, specifically
for trolling purposes. Just to make him go. This is
so important, but really it just says Alfred wrote this,
I would I would want a huge cartoonish sculpture of
(53:27):
something very mundane on a mountain because stone would last
so long, and I wanted to be towards the top
of the mountain, and I would want it to be.
When I say mundane, I mean like like a like
a bass relief of a taco or burrito and it's
hundreds and hundreds of yards long, and then it's at
(53:48):
the bottom. It just says like okay, nice. Uh, yeah, dude,
that sounds great. I think huge granite carving of a
cat and it's like sitting down, but it's also got
wings uh, and it's got some jewelry on it. Uh.
This is all carved of course, um, and it's got
(54:09):
like the tale of some other creature. Right, So like
a chimera looking creature, but make it huge and put
it somewhere where everybody who comes after thinks that there
was an actual being that looks like that. Nice like
the Sphinx. Yeah, I'm describing the Sphinx. You are, but
without it took me a second. I was I was
(54:31):
so umbord, and it's like, you know what, I bet
that's crazy enough to work. And it appears that you
are correct by friends, So yes, let us know. You
can follow us where Conspiracy Stuff show on Instagram. Follow
us to see our episode updates. You can also follow
some of our individual misadventures. If you are so inclined,
(54:52):
you can hit me up at Embryonic Insider. I mainly
plush travel picks and pictures of my kid doing the dab,
which is the thing that kids do still early. It's
not uncool quite yet, although when I do it it
is uncool. Yeah, it's called the Dad Dad. You can
find me at Ben Bullen And actually started on an
(55:12):
Instagram page specifically to share out on this show, but
I don't have it ready right now to tell you
what it is, so you can find me. I do
exist now. It's something Matt Frederick and my heart all right,
all right, this is news to me. Did you know
about this? Now? What Matt's new Instagram presence? Yeah? Made
(55:34):
a new one? Well? Uh, well will you accept my follow?
Is it private? It's not private? All right? Well, I
guess you have no choice in the matter. Should I
private it? Should I privatize? I'm not going to tell
you what to do with you. I don't know how
to use Instagram? What do I do? Would you put
things on there? I don't Know's gotta help me? If
you have Instagram advice for our good friend Matt, you
(55:55):
can also call us directly. We mentioned top of the show,
but our number is one eight three three st d
w y t K. But what if that doesn't work either,
then send us an evenmail. We are conspiracy at iHeart
radio dot com. Stuff they Don't Want you to Know
(56:34):
is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For
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Noel Brown
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