October 2, 2025 • 53 mins
In The Crease (ITC) is where history, mystery, and the human condition collide. Hosted by J E DOUBLE F, each episode blends storytelling, analysis, and dark humor to explore the strange, the forgotten, and the unsettlingly relevant.
🎧 New episodes release bi-weekly.
📅 Current Season: ITC Season 4 (Episodes 61–80).
🎧 New episodes release bi-weekly.
📅 Current Season: ITC Season 4 (Episodes 61–80).
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hmm.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
The streshold opens, step through fast, impressive future. We are not.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Alone time time tasns Yes The Crease.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Welcome back to End The Crease, the only show where
medieval heartbreak and political scandal go together like parchment and poison.
I am your host, j E. Double f And Tonight
we aren't just pulling back the veil on history. We're
going to tear it up a little bit, and behind it,
we're gonna see a love affair so incinerary it ends
(02:48):
in blood and silence, a queen so dangerous she had
to be caged, and a question that echoes louder than
any war drum. What survives longer the sword or the pen?
Now tonight we're deep diving into the courts, convents and
(03:10):
castles of twelfth century France. Not to chase crusaders or
count corpses. We've kind of already done that on previous shows.
This time we chase something a little harder to catch, love,
power and the ink stains that refuse to fade. We
begin with Heloise, Philosopher non survivor, and Peter Abillard. I
(03:34):
know it looks like Abe Lard. I'm probably going to
mess that up a little bit, the man who loved her,
taught her, ruined her, and maybe just maybe never really
knew her. Their letters are still read today, seared with
longing rage and brilliance, but before Twitter threads and TikTok
thirst traps. This was the original medieval situationship with consequences
(03:59):
that came well, not in unfollows but I know, I know, guys,
this is gonna hurt, but in castration. From there we
pivot to Eleanor of Aquitaine, queen of two countries and
an awesome character to play in Civilization six, mother of
ten and the most politically dangerous woman of her century.
(04:22):
She outlived two husbands, started a civil war against her
own son, and invented a court where love itself was
put on trial. This woman didn't play the game of throne.
She he wrote the damn rules and then dared to
break them. So tonight, sharpen your mind, soften your heart,
and for God's sake, don't propose to a scholar if
(04:43):
her uncle owns a sword. This is episode seventy one,
Heloise Abillard and Eleanor of Aquitaine. And remember, sometimes history
isn't told by the victors, It's told by women who
refused to disappear.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
So let's get this.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Out of the way upfront. Yes, yes, where all you
politically correct people, I am a man telling this story. Yes,
it's a story about brilliant, rebellious women in medieval Europe.
But I'm an alien, so I'm allowed to talk about this.
And yes, if you've been hanging around for the last
few episodes, a thank you. But b this is a
(05:30):
sharp swear from quantum immortality, exoplanet mining, and alien student
exchange programs. But look, this is the second arc of
season four, Yes, episode seventy one, we're sliding back into
what can best be described as a historical trench run
rate well right where we kind of belong. Blood on
the marble, ink on the robes, and scandal and the
(05:53):
Latin footnotes, and hear me out. The math in is
episode maybe simpler than quantum collapse, but there is some
emotional algebra that is maybe a little bit brutal, So
I apologize for that. So the question is who are
we dealing with? Well, let's start with the dude whose
(06:14):
name was Peter Abillard born in Brittany around ten seventy nine.
He was a philosopher, theologian, mainly considered a genius and
much like some people who will go unnamed, a walking
HR violation. By the time he hit his thirties, Abialard
was the rock star professor of Paris. He challenges mentors
(06:35):
in public debate, trash their logic like a Reddit atheist
and a youth group comment thread, and gathered students from
all across Europe. The man made Aristotle sound a little sexy,
and that's no small feat. Now, inter Heloise. Now you've
heard of women being ahead of their time. Helloise wasn't ahead.
(06:58):
I appreciate already picking up on the in new window.
She was completely off the timeline. She was educated in Latin,
Greek and Hebrew. She quoted philosophy like most nobles, quoted Psalms.
And she was being raised by her uncle Kennon Fulbert
in Paris, a respected household private tutors, and a reputation
(07:19):
among well among others already growing for intellect and independence.
And this is where it all begins. Because at a
large full of ambition and testosterone and zero impulse control,
looks at Heloise and decides to become her tutor, or,
(07:41):
as one modern scholar would put it. He inserted himself
into her household like malware into a monastery network. I
like that scholar. I got those references. Now, let's not
trust this up too much. This was not a meet cute.
This wasn't a Sloan Burn academic rivals to lovers. This
(08:05):
was a scandal from the jump. He wanted her, she
wanted him. They both knew it, and the moment cannon
Falbert looked away, the house turned into a Latin soap opera.
The affair was passionate, dangerous, and probably reckless. They would
meet in secret, exchange letters that would have made Ovid blush, and,
according to Abalard himself, sometimes snuxeology lessons into their pillow talk. Look,
(08:32):
if your idea for play involves arguing the metaphysics of
original sin, you're either a genius or the exact kind
of guy who's about to get castrated by a church
deacon with a grudge. And trust me, we'll get to
that point. But first, let's let's talk about the consequences
(08:52):
of all of this. Because Heloise gets pregnant, the name
the child astrolab, which is roughly the medieval equivalent of
naming your son hyperlink or USB c or x. Now
they send her off to Abilard's sister in Brittany to
give birth in secret. Meanwhile, Albert is losing his ever
(09:18):
loving holy mind. Abilard offers a fix, simple right marry
her secretly to protect her reputation, but Heloise resist, knowing
it would ruin his clerical career. Because she agrees reluctantly,
and the secret marriage happens only Fulbert apparently decides not
(09:43):
to keep that secret. He tells everyone tries to use
it to force Abalard into a career shift, and of
course it will backfire. Heloise will deny it. Ever happen,
Abilard hides her in a convent, not to become a
nun yet just who you know, lay Low. But Favard
thinks this is Avalarche's way of discarding her, so he
(10:06):
decides to retaliate, not with a lawsuit, not with papal summons,
but with a couple of guys breaking into avalarche quarters
a night and castrating him. No euthanism here, no exaggeration.
(10:28):
They cut him, and not in the metaphorical way. One
of the greatest minds of medieval Europe silence, not by
the rival scholars or church censure, but by a blade
to the grind in the dark, over love, over pride,
(10:51):
and over a woman. Well, let's face it, both men
thought they could own now, luckily or unluckily to on
your point of view on this matter. Abalard survived this,
but he withdrew, becomes a monk, withdrawal from public life,
(11:12):
shaves his head, closes his body, and he just writes.
Heloise forcibly veiled, also joined a convent. For years, there
was silence. Then the letters began. Now what survives today
(11:34):
as a string of correspondents so emotionally raw, so well
theologically sharp, and so brutally honest that scholars still argue
was this true love? Or was it just a twelfth
century academic pissing match wrapped in a fling. Because Helloise,
(11:56):
even decades later, doesn't write.
Speaker 4 (11:58):
Like a woman who moved on.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
She writes like a woman on fire. She would accuse
Abilard of using her, of hiding behind God, of sacrificing
their love to save his reputation. She would tell him, plainly,
God knows, I never saw anything in you but yourself.
(12:22):
I looked for no marriage, I wanted no dowry. I
never saw anything from you but love. Now, this is
not your stereotypical hallmark card. It's more of a little
bit of a you know, an emotional nuke an Abilard. Well,
he decided to respond in philosophy and duty and carefully
(12:45):
structured pittance, but it always feels like he was answering
a different question than the one she was asking. So
what do we make of this? What does what does
history say? Most accounts paint Allard as a bit of
a tragic genius, the martyr of passion, But increasingly historians
(13:07):
are recentering around Helloise because she wasn't just the girl
in the tower. She became the Abbess of Peraskleete, a
powerful spiritual and intellectual leader. And her letters they show
a woman wrestling not just with heartbreak, but with identity,
with gender, with power in a world that gave her
(13:31):
intellect new place to stand. And if we're being clear,
even though this is going to bring up some PTSD
for me, if this story had been written by you know, say,
the Ring of Power writers, Heloise would have been a
TikTok noun with the sword. Abillard would have been replaced
by a talking owl and cannon. Pualwards would have fallen
into a pit of feminist metaphors before the opening credits.
(13:56):
But this, this isn't fantasy. This is real, and it's ugly,
and it's the kind of history that still breathes, because
long after kings die and pope's rot and cathedrals crumble,
we're still to this day reading those letters, still hearing
(14:17):
that fire between the lines. And it's not a happy ending,
but it is an honest one. Now, a fact one
(14:39):
was a bit of a slow burn, passion pinned and
candle light, heartbreak pressed between the pages of theology. Then
well back too is going to be a little bit
more of a thunderclap wearing silk. Because where Helloise was
brilliant and brutal behind monastery walls, Eleanora Hacketin stormed through courts, kingdoms,
and chronicles like a force of nature. Wrapped in velvet
(15:02):
and steel. Her name rings like a sharp sword dropped
on marble, and she didn't inherent power. She dragged it
behind her like a royal train, waited with scandal, wit, defiance.
Tonight we're going to talk a little bit about that
trail through marriages, wars, betrayals, and prison walls, because well,
(15:26):
Eleanor didn't play chess. She was the board that set
the rules. So we're gonna rewind a little bit back
to I don't know, let's pick eleven twenty two, Southern France,
the powerful Duchy of Aquitaine, a land of vineyards, troubadours,
(15:46):
and courtly love, but also ambition, strategy, and family bud
lines sharper than any dagger that could be crafted. Eleanor
is born into this world not as a pawn, but
as the Harris. Her father, Duke William the tenth, was
a man of taste. He supported poets, pilgrims, and political
(16:07):
chaos and bits of equal measure. When he died in
eleven thirty seven, young Eleanor became duchess one of the
largest and richest territories in Europe. Now I know, at
this Sunday night, we're allowed to do a little bit
of math an eleven thirty seven. Yes, she was fifteen
years old. She inherits Aquitana, in an age when most
(16:31):
of her contemporaries were busy surviving childbirth or getting married
off to some cousin. In exchange for two goats in
a hill, she got ten thousand square miles of land, troops,
wealth and all the attention that came with it. And
it didn't take long for the vultures, or excuse me,
the kings to circle. King Louis the sixth of France
(16:55):
moved very fast. He arranged for Eleanor to marry his son,
Louis the Younger, and bring her under the protection. In
quotes of the crowns, nice and tidy, that is until
you actually you know, met Louis the seventh or Louis.
I don't like Louis. It's Louis number seven was not,
(17:17):
shall we say, a man of fire. He was raised
for the church, destined to be a monk, maybe a scholar,
but definitely a man of God. But when his older
brother died unexpectedly, he was thrust into the throne room
like a choir boy, before forced to host a battle royale.
He would rule with hesitation, piety, and paralyzing fear of
(17:39):
moral failure. Eleanor, by contrast, was fire in poetry and
raw political instincts, a woman raised in court that believed
love was an art form and ambition was a virtue.
She hunted, debated, and held her own in rooms full
of bishops and generals, Let's face it, she didn't fit Paris.
(17:59):
Paris didn't know what to do with her. In the
French court, already uneasy with uh a woman speaking her mind, well,
they would begin whispering. They called her extravagant, willful, too
opinionated to educate, it too well Aquitanian. Even the chroniclers
(18:24):
couldn't hide her discomfort. One wrote, and I quote she
brought with her the customs of her native land, not
suitable to the modest court of the Franks, which in
modern day speak she refused to shut up and decorate
the house. But then came the Crusade. In eleven forty seven, Louis,
(18:47):
wrecked with guilt and ordering the massacre of a rebellious town,
signed up for the Second Crusade, a chance to redeem
his soul, unite Christendom, and maybe just maybe Fex's marriage.
Eleanor insisted on going, and not just as some arm
candy in the background. She led her own knights, dressed
(19:11):
in armor, flew the banner of Aquitaine, and was hailed
by some as a second Amazon. Others, of course, well
we're not really thrilled about this. When the French army
reached Antioch, Eleanor reunited with her uncle, Raymond of Hoiters,
Prince of the city. Now he was charming, handsome, fluent
(19:34):
in politics and courtly banter. The two spent long hours together, strategizing, laughing,
and maybe just maybe rekilling a familiar bond, but look
a well, a little too cozy for comfort, and of
course the rumors would sweep Paris before the ships even returned.
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Louis was livid.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
He accused her of adulterery. She accused him of being
a sanctimonious asshole. Okay, I mean, she may have said
sanctimonious bore, but I'm allowed to, you know, embellish a little,
I think. And of course the crusade ended in a disaster,
their poor logistics, disease, shockingly infighting, and a complete failure
(20:17):
to retake Odessa, the whole reason they had it actually
gone there in the first place. When they limped home,
the two were done with no male hair, no patience,
and no illusions. They got an annulment in eleven fifty
two on the grounds of consang jenuity that they were
too closely related. No fun fact, practically everyone was related
(20:43):
in medieval Europe. That excuse was basically the twelfth century
version of honey, honey, it's not you, it's it's it's
it's me. I mean, we all know it's you, but
I gotta say this to look good. So it's not you,
it's it's me. But yeah, it's totally you. So the course,
(21:04):
the marriage ends, Eleanor leaves the court, and then two
months later she marries again. Now who did she marry
this time? Well, she marries Harry Plantagenets, the Duke of Normandy,
a man ten years her junior, ambitious, ruthless, brilliant and
all just you know, little nuggets. Soon to be Henry,
(21:27):
the Second of England. Now if this feels fast, but
it was, and honestly it was strategic. Henry was a
rising power. He his claim to the English drone was strong,
and Eleanor saw what Louis never offered, power shared, not stifled.
(21:49):
Now together Eleanor and Henry became a medieval power couple.
Between their combined holdings England, Normandy and jou On Aquitaine,
they ruled more land than the King of France, and
it worked for her, you know, a while. They would
end up having eight children, including Richard the Lionheart, and yes,
King John, the same John from robin Hood fame, who
(22:11):
somehow always ended up play being played by bald British
actors with permanent frowns. I've never did under quick stand
that now Eleanor ruled Aquitaine with autonomy, she sponsored troupidour,
she refined the culture of courtly love. She well reigned,
But beneath the surface, the same tension that doomed her
first marriage began to boil. Henry was not a man
(22:34):
inclined to share. He had mistresses, illegitimate children. He centralized power,
overruled local nobles, marginalized Eleanor even in her own duchy.
So she would decide to push back, and they would fight,
sometimes publicly. Then in eleven seventy three, everything would shadow.
(23:00):
Their sons rebelled, young lions raised in a royal cage,
clung for freedom. Henry, the young King, Richard, Geoffrey John
each won a titles, lands and autonomy, and behind the scenes,
guess who was quietly and well maybe not so quietly
backing them, Yes, Eleanor. Was it revenge, a strategy, a
(23:26):
mother's loyalty? Hmm, maybe a bit of all three. But
Henry found out and the punishment came fast. She was
captured while attempting to fre Aquitane, disguised as a man.
But when Eleanor went down, she went down swinging. Henry
decided to imprison her, not for a week, not for
(23:48):
a season, for sixteen years. Let's let's pause a little one.
This sixteen years underguard in castles, kept from her sons,
denied political access for the crime of choosing autonomy over obedience.
(24:08):
Now granted, most women of this time would have faded
from the story right about now, but not Eleanor. She waited,
she plotted, She survived. Then, in eleven eighty nine, Henry
the Second died, and who would become king, well, her son,
Richard the lion Heart. Now what did Richard the Lionheart
(24:33):
do on the very first notion of being king? He
he freed his mother. Just like that, Eleanor re emerged, older, wiser,
but still dangerous. At nearly seventy years old. She resumed
court life. She negotiated royal marriages, ran the kingdom while
Richard when crusading. She even journeyed across hostile territories to
(24:55):
ransom Richard when he was captured on the way back
from Jerusalem. To picture this, an elderly queen on horseback
riding through war zones to pay her son's bail, like
she was some sort of medieval Liam Nissan trying to
recover his daughter. But she wasn't done. When Richard died,
(25:15):
she backed John, her least likable but most viable son,
for the throne, and when John began unraveling everything she
had helped build, she stepped back only because her body
could no longer keep up with her mind, and she
would die in twelve o four in the abbey of Fontraval,
buried beside Henry Richard and appropriately in the heart of Aquitaine.
(25:41):
So what's the legacy. What did Eleanor leave behind? Well,
for one, her bloodline would define European royalty for centuries.
She is the grandmother of the Plantagenets, great grandmother of
the Tudors, and a distant ancestor to half the crowned
heads of Europe. More than that, she.
Speaker 4 (26:00):
Would actually would break the mold.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
She was a queen in the world of kings, not
because she necessarily wore a crown, but because she commanded it.
She refused to be boxed in by tradition, by church
and by marriage. She was intelligent, witty, sharp tongue, and
quite unapologetic. She inspired troubadours and terrified bishops. She lived
(26:24):
as sparcely in prison as she did on the throne.
And then the time when the most dangerous thing a
woman could do was think Eleanor, that wasn't enough, she ruled.
So here we are two stories. Hallowe is cloistered by force,
Eleanor caged by politics. One gave the world letters, the
other legacy, but both defied the role written for them,
(26:47):
and both still echo across the centuries. Well, coming up
after the break, we're going to step back and look
and how these women were remembered, what the scribes race,
what the poets embellished, and what their stories. Well, maybe
still teach us about memory, about power and the wars
that happened off the battlefield. To grab something in the drink,
(27:08):
stretch your legs. We will return in a little over
for minutes.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
M.
Speaker 4 (30:01):
Ump, and welcome back.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
We've seen Helloise break the rules of love, and we've
seen Eleanor break the rules of power. But now we
ask the question that haunts every life, every scandal, every
storm wrapped name the whispered throughout the centuries. Who gets
to be remembered, Because, let's face it, survival is one thing,
(32:30):
but legacy, legacy is a whole different game. And here's
the bitter twist of history. Sometimes the people who make
the biggest impact don't get to hold the pin. They
become the subject, not the author, a character, and not
the narrator. So for Act three, we're gonna grab the
(32:53):
quill and we look at how Hellowese and Eleanor are Aquitaine,
two of the sharpest minds, the strongest women of the
twelfth centin were carved, softened, or twisted into whatever shape
the storytellers needed. Let's begin with Heloise once again. After
the castration the convent, in the silence would come the letters. Now,
(33:19):
if you've never read any of the letters of Heloise
and Ablaird eres Or, warning, don't read them right after
a breakup unless you want to go off. You know,
full twelfth century emo. These aren't sweet, flirty notes past
than secret. These are essays in agony, philosophical treaties framed
in fire, emotional gun punch is written in Latin and theology,
(33:43):
and they are undeniably some of the most personal, raw,
intellectually complicated exchanges ever in medieval literature. But there are
a few problems here. We do not know for sure
if she wrote them. We do not know for sure
(34:05):
if the collection is complete, or if some may actually
be fabricated. Some scholars argue that the letters, particularly halloise As,
might have been altered or even gross written by Abelard
to craft a tidy redemption arc. You know, something pious
monks could not belong to while sipping wine, and you know,
(34:26):
sighing about the dangers of women with opinions. But if
the letters are authentic, they are nothing short of revolutionary.
Because Heloise doesn't just love Abelarde. She challenged him. She
accused him of cowardice, of sacrificing their bond for the
sake of public piety, and she wrote, at one point,
(34:46):
you were always more concerned with what pleased your own
heart than what was right or wrong. That's not a
woman reminiscing as someone who's gotten letters from two ex wives.
But yeah, this is a woman cross examining her ax
from the stand of memory. She would also openly challenge
church doctrine. She asked, why is marriage a solution to sin?
(35:13):
Why is obedience considered love. Why are women only honored
when they suffer quietly? And it's like if you give
a ted talk Mike to the smartest nun in the monastery,
and she said, you know, before we start today's reading,
I like to dismantle eight hundred years of institutional patriarchy
Page one Fellows. And I remember this wasn't Twitter. This
(35:38):
was parchment, every word written by hand, with full awareness
it might outlive the author by centuries, which it did.
The letters were copied, debated, and whispered about across Europe.
But over time, Halloweys must have been a redhead because,
much like every Disney cast, she was recast. She went
(36:02):
from fierce philosopher to tragic victim. Medieval biographers softened her,
made her into a a footnote into Abialard's story. The
brilliant abbess became the weeping woman in the tower, the
ink of her intellect blurred beneath the tears men imagined
for her. But then fast forward to the nineteenth century,
(36:24):
the Romantic era, as it was some reason called Hellouise,
and Abilard became the medieval Romeo and Juliet. Their story
gets retold in plays novels and poetry, always tragic, always sweetened,
and always stripped of the sharpness it carried. I forget
her critiques of marriage, forget her defiance of you know,
(36:45):
the classical power. Let's just focus on the heartbreak, the
love loss, the eternal sigh. Because it turns out, even
the eighteen Hunters it was more convenient to remember Halloise
as a symbol of love than as a mind that
could dismantled the architecture of medieval patriarch archy from inside
a cloister. This is part of the danger of legacy.
(37:11):
When you're the one not rating it, someone else will
sand down your edges and reshape your story. So let's
swing back to Eleanor. Unlike Hallouis, she had chroniclers in
real time. Problem is, most of them were men she
(37:31):
pissed off, and when you're a woman ruling in the
twelfth century, pissing off powerful men is well kind of
a job requirement. At that point, some would call her
manipulat if some accuse her of adultery, trees and heresy.
Some even whispered that she had a hand in Beckett's assassination,
just you know, for the drama of it. Chroniclers would
paint her with thick, shadowy strokes, sensual, dangerous, clever, and rebellious.
(37:56):
They actually would fear her more than they actually understood her.
But here's the twist, that fear actually ended up keeping
her interesting. While most queens became generic entries in royal
annal's name, marriage number of hairs, Eleanor's would become legend.
(38:16):
By the time Shakespeare rolled around, she was still in
the background, a presence lurking behind English royalty, like smoke
behind stained glass. And then in the twentieth century, something
something strange happened. Eleanor was reborn in the theater. In
(38:36):
nineteen sixty six, playwright James Goldman wrote The Lion in Winter,
a dramatic, biting portrayal of Eleanor and Henry the Second
in their later years, trading barbes and treats like a
Renaissance version of the War of the Roses. Catherine Hepburn
played her in the film I DaShan At adaptation and
(38:56):
would win an oscar for it. Yes, sorrdy he never
did make the finally poem. Suddenly, Eleanor wasn't just a
historical figure. She was a character, a glamorous, dagger tongued,
aging queen with a wit sharpened up to break stained
glass and stare that well could kill a bishop at
about fifty paces. But again, something, something was lost. She
(39:21):
was remembered for the personality, not the policy, for the quips,
and not the governance. And beneath the awards and acclaim
the real Eleanor, the diplomat, the regent, and the administrator,
the power broker. Well, that Eleanor faded a little more.
Once again history remembers her boldness, but never her brains.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
So what do we make of this?
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Two women, one in a convent, one on a thrown
both brilliant, both strategic, both in the centuries that followed,
heavily edited and redacted. This is not what we do
that makes a legacy. It's the people who decide to
remember it and what gets cut, who gets credited. Like
years from now, all my shows I do will probably
(40:09):
get edited in some form and twisted by AI, and
God only knows what you know my future show's played
or my past shows played in the future will sound like.
But when we look back at the versions of Halloween's
and Eleanor that got passed down through monasteries, monarchs, manuscripts
and movies. We have to ask who is holding the
(40:32):
pen now. Fortunately, in the last fifty years or so,
something has shifted. Yes, well, I know increase of women
in schools. You know, feminist historians and colars have begun
trying to reclaiming these women. And I'll be honest with you,
(40:52):
I'm not sure that is actually to the benefit of
these women. But hey, they are at least going back
to the sources. They're reading the Latin, questioning the umptions,
and what they found is admittedly a little staggering. Helluise
wasn't just a philosopher. She may have been the first
female scholastic thinker whose works survive in Western history. She
(41:15):
challenged Augustine, Jerome and Aristotle, not with rebellion, but with reason.
She became the abbess of a hub of scholarship and
female theological leadership. She wrote sermons, ran a scriptatory, and
managed lands correspondent with bishops, and she did it while mourning.
Speaker 4 (41:39):
Like Eleanor has.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Been evaluated not just be a queen, but as more
of a political engineer. Eleanor was brokering marriage that shaped
the map of Europe, held together coalitions governed Aquitaine like
a sovereign state within a kingdom, and if by two
of the most powerful men in Western Europe her husbands
and live to tell the tale. Modern historians have stopped
(42:03):
asking whether Eleanor was manipulative and started asking was she effective?
And the answer seems to be a resounding yes. So
why did it take centuries to rediscover what always was true?
Why do we romanticize strategy and downplay intellect? Why does
(42:26):
a castration eclipse a conversation? Why is the queen remembered
for her sarcasm but not her survival? Why is the
love letter easier to reprint than the life it came
for him? Once again, legacy isn't neutral.
Speaker 4 (42:42):
It is a battle.
Speaker 3 (42:47):
So what does that mean for us? No, let me
ask you a question, if I may, when you maybe
at night, whether you you know, roasting something by the campfire,
smoking a little funny weed, or you know, having a
good drink and laughter among friends, do you ever think
(43:11):
about your own story, your name, your voice, your life.
Who is going to write it and will they even
get it right? Or will you be folded into someone
else's art, trimming the parts that made them uncomfortable turn
(43:32):
your rage into poetry and your brilliance into the background.
Because that's what happened to Halluise, That's what happened to
Eleanor until someone generations later dusted off pages and said, wait,
there's more. And the truth is there always seems to
(43:55):
be more. So here we are Halloween silence but not subdued, Eleanor,
caged but not broken. Two women on two very different
paths with one thing in common. They didn't get the
ending that they always wanted, but they did choose the
one they could live.
Speaker 2 (44:14):
With in the end.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
The only real power we have is the power to
choose which scars we carry and which ones we turned
into our shields.
Speaker 4 (44:26):
So let's begin with Halloweise.
Speaker 3 (44:28):
Here. When we last left her, she was writing letters
to a man who shattered her heart and then buried
her behind a veil of regret than God. But she
didn't spend her life writing love poems to ghosts.
Speaker 4 (44:39):
She led.
Speaker 3 (44:41):
The abbey wasn't just a convent, it was a cultural outpost.
There's a place of female scholarship in a world where
women weren't supposed to read, let alone question authority. Under Hallowise,
it would end up flourishing. She would recruit brilliant women.
She mentored younger nuns. She wrote sermons, she challenged the
and letters so sharp they may as well have been
(45:01):
forged in the same fire as or grief. And yes,
she never remarried, not because she was necessarily a romantic martyr,
but because, in her own words, she loved Abelard completely
and what was left after him was purpose, not revenge,
(45:21):
not pity. Purpose. She easily could have faded. She could
have clung to the tragedy. Instead, she built something, And
that maybe more than all the theology, all the philosophy,
all the sad music written about her, is the part
worth remembering. Heloise took that wound and turned it into architecture. Now,
(45:48):
Eleanor she chose a different kind of scar. When Hellowe
sacrificed romance for leadership, Eleanor sacrificed peace or control. She
could have lived out her years quietly after Henry the
Second locked her up. She could have begged for mercy,
(46:08):
made apology, kissed the ring, and kissed the king's ass. Instead,
she waited, and when the crown passed to Richard, she
stepped back into the court like she'd never left, not
with bitterness, but with strategy. Eleanor didn't just outlive her enemy,
(46:28):
she out maneuvered them. She would make herself indispensable. And
when Richard died, she pulled the next son into place,
not because he was ideal, but because he was viable.
She understood something even modern politicians forget. Legacy isn't about
(46:50):
being loved. It's about being remembered with weight. And she
bore that way all the way to her grave. Now,
it is important to note the thing here. Neither women
got to escape the system. Heloise was still, you know,
she still had to wear the habit. Eleanor still had
(47:12):
to role through men. They made their moves inside a
game they didn't invent, but.
Speaker 4 (47:16):
They did still move it.
Speaker 3 (47:21):
And I think that's where this whole purpose of this
episode is about, is where the story lands.
Speaker 4 (47:30):
Let's face it, it's easy.
Speaker 3 (47:31):
To admire rebels who burned down the world. It's harder
to admire the ones who kept playing the games eyes
wide open and still leave their fingerprints on the board.
But those are the ones who changed things slowly, quietly, permanently.
Hell Eventually, some other people in Kala Ren will eventually
(47:53):
get to phase three, I just anyway sidetrack there. But
let's pull back even further. What are we really talking
about from here? What makes these stories from nine hundred
years ago still feel a bit raw? And it's not
just the drama. It's not the romance, it's not the
(48:13):
betrayal or even the royal intrigue. It's that these women
were fighting battles. Well, many of us still recognize who
gets to define you? What do you give up to
be taken seriously? How do you choose between what you
want and what the world demands? And most of all,
how do you live with the choices you didn't get
(48:36):
to make. They knew a secret that not many pick
up on the world will scar you one way or another.
(48:56):
If you love boldly, you're going to get burned. If
you lead openly, you're going to get attacked. If you
speak your mind, someone will call.
Speaker 4 (49:07):
It a mistake.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
But you can choose which scar has become part of
the story. You can choose not to disappear, and whether
your name is stitched into royal banners or buried in
a letter no one was supposed to read, you can
still leave a mark. Because legacy doesn't start with monuments.
(49:33):
It does start with a bit of defiance. So they
were not saints, they were not villains. They were just
real complex, inconvenient, brilliant and one thing to remember. They
(49:59):
didn't win every fight, but they fault and they did
it with the words, with choices, with the every inch
of space the world was giving willing to give them
end a little more. So it's not just legacy in
this sense, since there's also a bit of resistance. So
(50:22):
I want to thank you for walking with me through
their lives tonight, for opening the letters, unrolling the scrolls,
and listening to the part's history. We'll tried to whisper
away because it's important to remember sometimes the lattice echoes
come from the voices we were never meant to hear.
(50:53):
So next time on end the crease, we're gonna well,
we're gonna lighten the moodle little bit. In two weeks
sort of. Yes, I can't believe we're here. The next episode,
episode seventy two, it'll be our sixth annual Nobel Prize show,
(51:19):
the one night of the year where we pit groundbreaking science,
some global piece of efforts depending on what year, and
the very confused economics again with my my professional judgment
and questionable metaphors being thrown around vastly, and as usual,
we'll go back and revisit one hundred years and fifty years,
(51:40):
and then we'll break down this year's winners in the
style that only I apparently do. Maybe who deserved it?
Were these stupid choices? And how exactly did someone win
for inventing a molecular machine that looks like a misbehaving
proteen rumba. But that said, it is serious science, it's
a little bit of deep insight. And yeah, we're probably
(52:03):
going to make fun of at least one of the
Peace Prizes. I mean, that's probably guaranteed. Right, So on
October twelfth, foot on your lab coats, you might want
to grab something, you know, a glass of something sweetish,
and tune in for perhaps one of our smartest episodes
with the dumbest jokes. I am J. E. Double Leaf
(52:26):
and this has been episode seventy one of Indcrees. Until
next time, remember, carry your scars like armor, speak like
they haven't taken your voice, and never ever let history
forget you were here.
Speaker 2 (53:01):
The no Less
Hmm.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
The streshold opens, step through fast, impressive future. We are not.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
Alone time time tasns Yes The Crease.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Welcome back to End The Crease, the only show where
medieval heartbreak and political scandal go together like parchment and poison.
I am your host, j E. Double f And Tonight
we aren't just pulling back the veil on history. We're
going to tear it up a little bit, and behind it,
we're gonna see a love affair so incinerary it ends
(02:48):
in blood and silence, a queen so dangerous she had
to be caged, and a question that echoes louder than
any war drum. What survives longer the sword or the pen?
Now tonight we're deep diving into the courts, convents and
(03:10):
castles of twelfth century France. Not to chase crusaders or
count corpses. We've kind of already done that on previous shows.
This time we chase something a little harder to catch, love,
power and the ink stains that refuse to fade. We
begin with Heloise, Philosopher non survivor, and Peter Abillard. I
(03:34):
know it looks like Abe Lard. I'm probably going to
mess that up a little bit, the man who loved her,
taught her, ruined her, and maybe just maybe never really
knew her. Their letters are still read today, seared with
longing rage and brilliance, but before Twitter threads and TikTok
thirst traps. This was the original medieval situationship with consequences
(03:59):
that came well, not in unfollows but I know, I know, guys,
this is gonna hurt, but in castration. From there we
pivot to Eleanor of Aquitaine, queen of two countries and
an awesome character to play in Civilization six, mother of
ten and the most politically dangerous woman of her century.
(04:22):
She outlived two husbands, started a civil war against her
own son, and invented a court where love itself was
put on trial. This woman didn't play the game of throne.
She he wrote the damn rules and then dared to
break them. So tonight, sharpen your mind, soften your heart,
and for God's sake, don't propose to a scholar if
(04:43):
her uncle owns a sword. This is episode seventy one,
Heloise Abillard and Eleanor of Aquitaine. And remember, sometimes history
isn't told by the victors, It's told by women who
refused to disappear.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
So let's get this.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Out of the way upfront. Yes, yes, where all you
politically correct people, I am a man telling this story. Yes,
it's a story about brilliant, rebellious women in medieval Europe.
But I'm an alien, so I'm allowed to talk about this.
And yes, if you've been hanging around for the last
few episodes, a thank you. But b this is a
(05:30):
sharp swear from quantum immortality, exoplanet mining, and alien student
exchange programs. But look, this is the second arc of
season four, Yes, episode seventy one, we're sliding back into
what can best be described as a historical trench run
rate well right where we kind of belong. Blood on
the marble, ink on the robes, and scandal and the
(05:53):
Latin footnotes, and hear me out. The math in is
episode maybe simpler than quantum collapse, but there is some
emotional algebra that is maybe a little bit brutal, So
I apologize for that. So the question is who are
we dealing with? Well, let's start with the dude whose
(06:14):
name was Peter Abillard born in Brittany around ten seventy nine.
He was a philosopher, theologian, mainly considered a genius and
much like some people who will go unnamed, a walking
HR violation. By the time he hit his thirties, Abialard
was the rock star professor of Paris. He challenges mentors
(06:35):
in public debate, trash their logic like a Reddit atheist
and a youth group comment thread, and gathered students from
all across Europe. The man made Aristotle sound a little sexy,
and that's no small feat. Now, inter Heloise. Now you've
heard of women being ahead of their time. Helloise wasn't ahead.
(06:58):
I appreciate already picking up on the in new window.
She was completely off the timeline. She was educated in Latin,
Greek and Hebrew. She quoted philosophy like most nobles, quoted Psalms.
And she was being raised by her uncle Kennon Fulbert
in Paris, a respected household private tutors, and a reputation
(07:19):
among well among others already growing for intellect and independence.
And this is where it all begins. Because at a
large full of ambition and testosterone and zero impulse control,
looks at Heloise and decides to become her tutor, or,
(07:41):
as one modern scholar would put it. He inserted himself
into her household like malware into a monastery network. I
like that scholar. I got those references. Now, let's not
trust this up too much. This was not a meet cute.
This wasn't a Sloan Burn academic rivals to lovers. This
(08:05):
was a scandal from the jump. He wanted her, she
wanted him. They both knew it, and the moment cannon
Falbert looked away, the house turned into a Latin soap opera.
The affair was passionate, dangerous, and probably reckless. They would
meet in secret, exchange letters that would have made Ovid blush, and,
according to Abalard himself, sometimes snuxeology lessons into their pillow talk. Look,
(08:32):
if your idea for play involves arguing the metaphysics of
original sin, you're either a genius or the exact kind
of guy who's about to get castrated by a church
deacon with a grudge. And trust me, we'll get to
that point. But first, let's let's talk about the consequences
(08:52):
of all of this. Because Heloise gets pregnant, the name
the child astrolab, which is roughly the medieval equivalent of
naming your son hyperlink or USB c or x. Now
they send her off to Abilard's sister in Brittany to
give birth in secret. Meanwhile, Albert is losing his ever
(09:18):
loving holy mind. Abilard offers a fix, simple right marry
her secretly to protect her reputation, but Heloise resist, knowing
it would ruin his clerical career. Because she agrees reluctantly,
and the secret marriage happens only Fulbert apparently decides not
(09:43):
to keep that secret. He tells everyone tries to use
it to force Abalard into a career shift, and of
course it will backfire. Heloise will deny it. Ever happen,
Abilard hides her in a convent, not to become a
nun yet just who you know, lay Low. But Favard
thinks this is Avalarche's way of discarding her, so he
(10:06):
decides to retaliate, not with a lawsuit, not with papal summons,
but with a couple of guys breaking into avalarche quarters
a night and castrating him. No euthanism here, no exaggeration.
(10:28):
They cut him, and not in the metaphorical way. One
of the greatest minds of medieval Europe silence, not by
the rival scholars or church censure, but by a blade
to the grind in the dark, over love, over pride,
(10:51):
and over a woman. Well, let's face it, both men
thought they could own now, luckily or unluckily to on
your point of view on this matter. Abalard survived this,
but he withdrew, becomes a monk, withdrawal from public life,
(11:12):
shaves his head, closes his body, and he just writes.
Heloise forcibly veiled, also joined a convent. For years, there
was silence. Then the letters began. Now what survives today
(11:34):
as a string of correspondents so emotionally raw, so well
theologically sharp, and so brutally honest that scholars still argue
was this true love? Or was it just a twelfth
century academic pissing match wrapped in a fling. Because Helloise,
(11:56):
even decades later, doesn't write.
Speaker 4 (11:58):
Like a woman who moved on.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
She writes like a woman on fire. She would accuse
Abilard of using her, of hiding behind God, of sacrificing
their love to save his reputation. She would tell him, plainly,
God knows, I never saw anything in you but yourself.
(12:22):
I looked for no marriage, I wanted no dowry. I
never saw anything from you but love. Now, this is
not your stereotypical hallmark card. It's more of a little
bit of a you know, an emotional nuke an Abilard. Well,
he decided to respond in philosophy and duty and carefully
(12:45):
structured pittance, but it always feels like he was answering
a different question than the one she was asking. So
what do we make of this? What does what does
history say? Most accounts paint Allard as a bit of
a tragic genius, the martyr of passion, But increasingly historians
(13:07):
are recentering around Helloise because she wasn't just the girl
in the tower. She became the Abbess of Peraskleete, a
powerful spiritual and intellectual leader. And her letters they show
a woman wrestling not just with heartbreak, but with identity,
with gender, with power in a world that gave her
(13:31):
intellect new place to stand. And if we're being clear,
even though this is going to bring up some PTSD
for me, if this story had been written by you know, say,
the Ring of Power writers, Heloise would have been a
TikTok noun with the sword. Abillard would have been replaced
by a talking owl and cannon. Pualwards would have fallen
into a pit of feminist metaphors before the opening credits.
(13:56):
But this, this isn't fantasy. This is real, and it's ugly,
and it's the kind of history that still breathes, because
long after kings die and pope's rot and cathedrals crumble,
we're still to this day reading those letters, still hearing
(14:17):
that fire between the lines. And it's not a happy ending,
but it is an honest one. Now, a fact one
(14:39):
was a bit of a slow burn, passion pinned and
candle light, heartbreak pressed between the pages of theology. Then
well back too is going to be a little bit
more of a thunderclap wearing silk. Because where Helloise was
brilliant and brutal behind monastery walls, Eleanora Hacketin stormed through courts, kingdoms,
and chronicles like a force of nature. Wrapped in velvet
(15:02):
and steel. Her name rings like a sharp sword dropped
on marble, and she didn't inherent power. She dragged it
behind her like a royal train, waited with scandal, wit, defiance.
Tonight we're going to talk a little bit about that
trail through marriages, wars, betrayals, and prison walls, because well,
(15:26):
Eleanor didn't play chess. She was the board that set
the rules. So we're gonna rewind a little bit back
to I don't know, let's pick eleven twenty two, Southern France,
the powerful Duchy of Aquitaine, a land of vineyards, troubadours,
(15:46):
and courtly love, but also ambition, strategy, and family bud
lines sharper than any dagger that could be crafted. Eleanor
is born into this world not as a pawn, but
as the Harris. Her father, Duke William the tenth, was
a man of taste. He supported poets, pilgrims, and political
(16:07):
chaos and bits of equal measure. When he died in
eleven thirty seven, young Eleanor became duchess one of the
largest and richest territories in Europe. Now I know, at
this Sunday night, we're allowed to do a little bit
of math an eleven thirty seven. Yes, she was fifteen
years old. She inherits Aquitana, in an age when most
(16:31):
of her contemporaries were busy surviving childbirth or getting married
off to some cousin. In exchange for two goats in
a hill, she got ten thousand square miles of land, troops,
wealth and all the attention that came with it. And
it didn't take long for the vultures, or excuse me,
the kings to circle. King Louis the sixth of France
(16:55):
moved very fast. He arranged for Eleanor to marry his son,
Louis the Younger, and bring her under the protection. In
quotes of the crowns, nice and tidy, that is until
you actually you know, met Louis the seventh or Louis.
I don't like Louis. It's Louis number seven was not,
(17:17):
shall we say, a man of fire. He was raised
for the church, destined to be a monk, maybe a scholar,
but definitely a man of God. But when his older
brother died unexpectedly, he was thrust into the throne room
like a choir boy, before forced to host a battle royale.
He would rule with hesitation, piety, and paralyzing fear of
(17:39):
moral failure. Eleanor, by contrast, was fire in poetry and
raw political instincts, a woman raised in court that believed
love was an art form and ambition was a virtue.
She hunted, debated, and held her own in rooms full
of bishops and generals, Let's face it, she didn't fit Paris.
(17:59):
Paris didn't know what to do with her. In the
French court, already uneasy with uh a woman speaking her mind, well,
they would begin whispering. They called her extravagant, willful, too
opinionated to educate, it too well Aquitanian. Even the chroniclers
(18:24):
couldn't hide her discomfort. One wrote, and I quote she
brought with her the customs of her native land, not
suitable to the modest court of the Franks, which in
modern day speak she refused to shut up and decorate
the house. But then came the Crusade. In eleven forty seven, Louis,
(18:47):
wrecked with guilt and ordering the massacre of a rebellious town,
signed up for the Second Crusade, a chance to redeem
his soul, unite Christendom, and maybe just maybe Fex's marriage.
Eleanor insisted on going, and not just as some arm
candy in the background. She led her own knights, dressed
(19:11):
in armor, flew the banner of Aquitaine, and was hailed
by some as a second Amazon. Others, of course, well
we're not really thrilled about this. When the French army
reached Antioch, Eleanor reunited with her uncle, Raymond of Hoiters,
Prince of the city. Now he was charming, handsome, fluent
(19:34):
in politics and courtly banter. The two spent long hours together, strategizing, laughing,
and maybe just maybe rekilling a familiar bond, but look
a well, a little too cozy for comfort, and of
course the rumors would sweep Paris before the ships even returned.
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Louis was livid.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
He accused her of adulterery. She accused him of being
a sanctimonious asshole. Okay, I mean, she may have said
sanctimonious bore, but I'm allowed to, you know, embellish a little,
I think. And of course the crusade ended in a disaster,
their poor logistics, disease, shockingly infighting, and a complete failure
(20:17):
to retake Odessa, the whole reason they had it actually
gone there in the first place. When they limped home,
the two were done with no male hair, no patience,
and no illusions. They got an annulment in eleven fifty
two on the grounds of consang jenuity that they were
too closely related. No fun fact, practically everyone was related
(20:43):
in medieval Europe. That excuse was basically the twelfth century
version of honey, honey, it's not you, it's it's it's
it's me. I mean, we all know it's you, but
I gotta say this to look good. So it's not you,
it's it's me. But yeah, it's totally you. So the course,
(21:04):
the marriage ends, Eleanor leaves the court, and then two
months later she marries again. Now who did she marry
this time? Well, she marries Harry Plantagenets, the Duke of Normandy,
a man ten years her junior, ambitious, ruthless, brilliant and
all just you know, little nuggets. Soon to be Henry,
(21:27):
the Second of England. Now if this feels fast, but
it was, and honestly it was strategic. Henry was a
rising power. He his claim to the English drone was strong,
and Eleanor saw what Louis never offered, power shared, not stifled.
(21:49):
Now together Eleanor and Henry became a medieval power couple.
Between their combined holdings England, Normandy and jou On Aquitaine,
they ruled more land than the King of France, and
it worked for her, you know, a while. They would
end up having eight children, including Richard the Lionheart, and yes,
King John, the same John from robin Hood fame, who
(22:11):
somehow always ended up play being played by bald British
actors with permanent frowns. I've never did under quick stand
that now Eleanor ruled Aquitaine with autonomy, she sponsored troupidour,
she refined the culture of courtly love. She well reigned,
But beneath the surface, the same tension that doomed her
first marriage began to boil. Henry was not a man
(22:34):
inclined to share. He had mistresses, illegitimate children. He centralized power,
overruled local nobles, marginalized Eleanor even in her own duchy.
So she would decide to push back, and they would fight,
sometimes publicly. Then in eleven seventy three, everything would shadow.
(23:00):
Their sons rebelled, young lions raised in a royal cage,
clung for freedom. Henry, the young King, Richard, Geoffrey John
each won a titles, lands and autonomy, and behind the scenes,
guess who was quietly and well maybe not so quietly
backing them, Yes, Eleanor. Was it revenge, a strategy, a
(23:26):
mother's loyalty? Hmm, maybe a bit of all three. But
Henry found out and the punishment came fast. She was
captured while attempting to fre Aquitane, disguised as a man.
But when Eleanor went down, she went down swinging. Henry
decided to imprison her, not for a week, not for
(23:48):
a season, for sixteen years. Let's let's pause a little one.
This sixteen years underguard in castles, kept from her sons,
denied political access for the crime of choosing autonomy over obedience.
(24:08):
Now granted, most women of this time would have faded
from the story right about now, but not Eleanor. She waited,
she plotted, She survived. Then, in eleven eighty nine, Henry
the Second died, and who would become king, well, her son,
Richard the lion Heart. Now what did Richard the Lionheart
(24:33):
do on the very first notion of being king? He
he freed his mother. Just like that, Eleanor re emerged, older, wiser,
but still dangerous. At nearly seventy years old. She resumed
court life. She negotiated royal marriages, ran the kingdom while
Richard when crusading. She even journeyed across hostile territories to
(24:55):
ransom Richard when he was captured on the way back
from Jerusalem. To picture this, an elderly queen on horseback
riding through war zones to pay her son's bail, like
she was some sort of medieval Liam Nissan trying to
recover his daughter. But she wasn't done. When Richard died,
(25:15):
she backed John, her least likable but most viable son,
for the throne, and when John began unraveling everything she
had helped build, she stepped back only because her body
could no longer keep up with her mind, and she
would die in twelve o four in the abbey of Fontraval,
buried beside Henry Richard and appropriately in the heart of Aquitaine.
(25:41):
So what's the legacy. What did Eleanor leave behind? Well,
for one, her bloodline would define European royalty for centuries.
She is the grandmother of the Plantagenets, great grandmother of
the Tudors, and a distant ancestor to half the crowned
heads of Europe. More than that, she.
Speaker 4 (26:00):
Would actually would break the mold.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
She was a queen in the world of kings, not
because she necessarily wore a crown, but because she commanded it.
She refused to be boxed in by tradition, by church
and by marriage. She was intelligent, witty, sharp tongue, and
quite unapologetic. She inspired troubadours and terrified bishops. She lived
(26:24):
as sparcely in prison as she did on the throne.
And then the time when the most dangerous thing a
woman could do was think Eleanor, that wasn't enough, she ruled.
So here we are two stories. Hallowe is cloistered by force,
Eleanor caged by politics. One gave the world letters, the
other legacy, but both defied the role written for them,
(26:47):
and both still echo across the centuries. Well, coming up
after the break, we're going to step back and look
and how these women were remembered, what the scribes race,
what the poets embellished, and what their stories. Well, maybe
still teach us about memory, about power and the wars
that happened off the battlefield. To grab something in the drink,
(27:08):
stretch your legs. We will return in a little over
for minutes.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
M.
Speaker 4 (30:01):
Ump, and welcome back.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
We've seen Helloise break the rules of love, and we've
seen Eleanor break the rules of power. But now we
ask the question that haunts every life, every scandal, every
storm wrapped name the whispered throughout the centuries. Who gets
to be remembered, Because, let's face it, survival is one thing,
(32:30):
but legacy, legacy is a whole different game. And here's
the bitter twist of history. Sometimes the people who make
the biggest impact don't get to hold the pin. They
become the subject, not the author, a character, and not
the narrator. So for Act three, we're gonna grab the
(32:53):
quill and we look at how Hellowese and Eleanor are Aquitaine,
two of the sharpest minds, the strongest women of the
twelfth centin were carved, softened, or twisted into whatever shape
the storytellers needed. Let's begin with Heloise once again. After
the castration the convent, in the silence would come the letters. Now,
(33:19):
if you've never read any of the letters of Heloise
and Ablaird eres Or, warning, don't read them right after
a breakup unless you want to go off. You know,
full twelfth century emo. These aren't sweet, flirty notes past
than secret. These are essays in agony, philosophical treaties framed
in fire, emotional gun punch is written in Latin and theology,
(33:43):
and they are undeniably some of the most personal, raw,
intellectually complicated exchanges ever in medieval literature. But there are
a few problems here. We do not know for sure
if she wrote them. We do not know for sure
(34:05):
if the collection is complete, or if some may actually
be fabricated. Some scholars argue that the letters, particularly halloise As,
might have been altered or even gross written by Abelard
to craft a tidy redemption arc. You know, something pious
monks could not belong to while sipping wine, and you know,
(34:26):
sighing about the dangers of women with opinions. But if
the letters are authentic, they are nothing short of revolutionary.
Because Heloise doesn't just love Abelarde. She challenged him. She
accused him of cowardice, of sacrificing their bond for the
sake of public piety, and she wrote, at one point,
(34:46):
you were always more concerned with what pleased your own
heart than what was right or wrong. That's not a
woman reminiscing as someone who's gotten letters from two ex wives.
But yeah, this is a woman cross examining her ax
from the stand of memory. She would also openly challenge
church doctrine. She asked, why is marriage a solution to sin?
(35:13):
Why is obedience considered love. Why are women only honored
when they suffer quietly? And it's like if you give
a ted talk Mike to the smartest nun in the monastery,
and she said, you know, before we start today's reading,
I like to dismantle eight hundred years of institutional patriarchy
Page one Fellows. And I remember this wasn't Twitter. This
(35:38):
was parchment, every word written by hand, with full awareness
it might outlive the author by centuries, which it did.
The letters were copied, debated, and whispered about across Europe.
But over time, Halloweys must have been a redhead because,
much like every Disney cast, she was recast. She went
(36:02):
from fierce philosopher to tragic victim. Medieval biographers softened her,
made her into a a footnote into Abialard's story. The
brilliant abbess became the weeping woman in the tower, the
ink of her intellect blurred beneath the tears men imagined
for her. But then fast forward to the nineteenth century,
(36:24):
the Romantic era, as it was some reason called Hellouise,
and Abilard became the medieval Romeo and Juliet. Their story
gets retold in plays novels and poetry, always tragic, always sweetened,
and always stripped of the sharpness it carried. I forget
her critiques of marriage, forget her defiance of you know,
(36:45):
the classical power. Let's just focus on the heartbreak, the
love loss, the eternal sigh. Because it turns out, even
the eighteen Hunters it was more convenient to remember Halloise
as a symbol of love than as a mind that
could dismantled the architecture of medieval patriarch archy from inside
a cloister. This is part of the danger of legacy.
(37:11):
When you're the one not rating it, someone else will
sand down your edges and reshape your story. So let's
swing back to Eleanor. Unlike Hallouis, she had chroniclers in
real time. Problem is, most of them were men she
(37:31):
pissed off, and when you're a woman ruling in the
twelfth century, pissing off powerful men is well kind of
a job requirement. At that point, some would call her
manipulat if some accuse her of adultery, trees and heresy.
Some even whispered that she had a hand in Beckett's assassination,
just you know, for the drama of it. Chroniclers would
paint her with thick, shadowy strokes, sensual, dangerous, clever, and rebellious.
(37:56):
They actually would fear her more than they actually understood her.
But here's the twist, that fear actually ended up keeping
her interesting. While most queens became generic entries in royal
annal's name, marriage number of hairs, Eleanor's would become legend.
(38:16):
By the time Shakespeare rolled around, she was still in
the background, a presence lurking behind English royalty, like smoke
behind stained glass. And then in the twentieth century, something
something strange happened. Eleanor was reborn in the theater. In
(38:36):
nineteen sixty six, playwright James Goldman wrote The Lion in Winter,
a dramatic, biting portrayal of Eleanor and Henry the Second
in their later years, trading barbes and treats like a
Renaissance version of the War of the Roses. Catherine Hepburn
played her in the film I DaShan At adaptation and
(38:56):
would win an oscar for it. Yes, sorrdy he never
did make the finally poem. Suddenly, Eleanor wasn't just a
historical figure. She was a character, a glamorous, dagger tongued,
aging queen with a wit sharpened up to break stained
glass and stare that well could kill a bishop at
about fifty paces. But again, something, something was lost. She
(39:21):
was remembered for the personality, not the policy, for the quips,
and not the governance. And beneath the awards and acclaim
the real Eleanor, the diplomat, the regent, and the administrator,
the power broker. Well, that Eleanor faded a little more.
Once again history remembers her boldness, but never her brains.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
So what do we make of this?
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Two women, one in a convent, one on a thrown
both brilliant, both strategic, both in the centuries that followed,
heavily edited and redacted. This is not what we do
that makes a legacy. It's the people who decide to
remember it and what gets cut, who gets credited. Like
years from now, all my shows I do will probably
(40:09):
get edited in some form and twisted by AI, and
God only knows what you know my future show's played
or my past shows played in the future will sound like.
But when we look back at the versions of Halloween's
and Eleanor that got passed down through monasteries, monarchs, manuscripts
and movies. We have to ask who is holding the
(40:32):
pen now. Fortunately, in the last fifty years or so,
something has shifted. Yes, well, I know increase of women
in schools. You know, feminist historians and colars have begun
trying to reclaiming these women. And I'll be honest with you,
(40:52):
I'm not sure that is actually to the benefit of
these women. But hey, they are at least going back
to the sources. They're reading the Latin, questioning the umptions,
and what they found is admittedly a little staggering. Helluise
wasn't just a philosopher. She may have been the first
female scholastic thinker whose works survive in Western history. She
(41:15):
challenged Augustine, Jerome and Aristotle, not with rebellion, but with reason.
She became the abbess of a hub of scholarship and
female theological leadership. She wrote sermons, ran a scriptatory, and
managed lands correspondent with bishops, and she did it while mourning.
Speaker 4 (41:39):
Like Eleanor has.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Been evaluated not just be a queen, but as more
of a political engineer. Eleanor was brokering marriage that shaped
the map of Europe, held together coalitions governed Aquitaine like
a sovereign state within a kingdom, and if by two
of the most powerful men in Western Europe her husbands
and live to tell the tale. Modern historians have stopped
(42:03):
asking whether Eleanor was manipulative and started asking was she effective?
And the answer seems to be a resounding yes. So
why did it take centuries to rediscover what always was true?
Why do we romanticize strategy and downplay intellect? Why does
(42:26):
a castration eclipse a conversation? Why is the queen remembered
for her sarcasm but not her survival? Why is the
love letter easier to reprint than the life it came
for him? Once again, legacy isn't neutral.
Speaker 4 (42:42):
It is a battle.
Speaker 3 (42:47):
So what does that mean for us? No, let me
ask you a question, if I may, when you maybe
at night, whether you you know, roasting something by the campfire,
smoking a little funny weed, or you know, having a
good drink and laughter among friends, do you ever think
(43:11):
about your own story, your name, your voice, your life.
Who is going to write it and will they even
get it right? Or will you be folded into someone
else's art, trimming the parts that made them uncomfortable turn
(43:32):
your rage into poetry and your brilliance into the background.
Because that's what happened to Halluise, That's what happened to
Eleanor until someone generations later dusted off pages and said, wait,
there's more. And the truth is there always seems to
(43:55):
be more. So here we are Halloween silence but not subdued, Eleanor,
caged but not broken. Two women on two very different
paths with one thing in common. They didn't get the
ending that they always wanted, but they did choose the
one they could live.
Speaker 2 (44:14):
With in the end.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
The only real power we have is the power to
choose which scars we carry and which ones we turned
into our shields.
Speaker 4 (44:26):
So let's begin with Halloweise.
Speaker 3 (44:28):
Here. When we last left her, she was writing letters
to a man who shattered her heart and then buried
her behind a veil of regret than God. But she
didn't spend her life writing love poems to ghosts.
Speaker 4 (44:39):
She led.
Speaker 3 (44:41):
The abbey wasn't just a convent, it was a cultural outpost.
There's a place of female scholarship in a world where
women weren't supposed to read, let alone question authority. Under Hallowise,
it would end up flourishing. She would recruit brilliant women.
She mentored younger nuns. She wrote sermons, she challenged the
and letters so sharp they may as well have been
(45:01):
forged in the same fire as or grief. And yes,
she never remarried, not because she was necessarily a romantic martyr,
but because, in her own words, she loved Abelard completely
and what was left after him was purpose, not revenge,
(45:21):
not pity. Purpose. She easily could have faded. She could
have clung to the tragedy. Instead, she built something, And
that maybe more than all the theology, all the philosophy,
all the sad music written about her, is the part
worth remembering. Heloise took that wound and turned it into architecture. Now,
(45:48):
Eleanor she chose a different kind of scar. When Hellowe
sacrificed romance for leadership, Eleanor sacrificed peace or control. She
could have lived out her years quietly after Henry the
Second locked her up. She could have begged for mercy,
(46:08):
made apology, kissed the ring, and kissed the king's ass. Instead,
she waited, and when the crown passed to Richard, she
stepped back into the court like she'd never left, not
with bitterness, but with strategy. Eleanor didn't just outlive her enemy,
(46:28):
she out maneuvered them. She would make herself indispensable. And
when Richard died, she pulled the next son into place,
not because he was ideal, but because he was viable.
She understood something even modern politicians forget. Legacy isn't about
(46:50):
being loved. It's about being remembered with weight. And she
bore that way all the way to her grave. Now,
it is important to note the thing here. Neither women
got to escape the system. Heloise was still, you know,
she still had to wear the habit. Eleanor still had
(47:12):
to role through men. They made their moves inside a
game they didn't invent, but.
Speaker 4 (47:16):
They did still move it.
Speaker 3 (47:21):
And I think that's where this whole purpose of this
episode is about, is where the story lands.
Speaker 4 (47:30):
Let's face it, it's easy.
Speaker 3 (47:31):
To admire rebels who burned down the world. It's harder
to admire the ones who kept playing the games eyes
wide open and still leave their fingerprints on the board.
But those are the ones who changed things slowly, quietly, permanently.
Hell Eventually, some other people in Kala Ren will eventually
(47:53):
get to phase three, I just anyway sidetrack there. But
let's pull back even further. What are we really talking
about from here? What makes these stories from nine hundred
years ago still feel a bit raw? And it's not
just the drama. It's not the romance, it's not the
(48:13):
betrayal or even the royal intrigue. It's that these women
were fighting battles. Well, many of us still recognize who
gets to define you? What do you give up to
be taken seriously? How do you choose between what you
want and what the world demands? And most of all,
how do you live with the choices you didn't get
(48:36):
to make. They knew a secret that not many pick
up on the world will scar you one way or another.
(48:56):
If you love boldly, you're going to get burned. If
you lead openly, you're going to get attacked. If you
speak your mind, someone will call.
Speaker 4 (49:07):
It a mistake.
Speaker 3 (49:10):
But you can choose which scar has become part of
the story. You can choose not to disappear, and whether
your name is stitched into royal banners or buried in
a letter no one was supposed to read, you can
still leave a mark. Because legacy doesn't start with monuments.
(49:33):
It does start with a bit of defiance. So they
were not saints, they were not villains. They were just
real complex, inconvenient, brilliant and one thing to remember. They
(49:59):
didn't win every fight, but they fault and they did
it with the words, with choices, with the every inch
of space the world was giving willing to give them
end a little more. So it's not just legacy in
this sense, since there's also a bit of resistance. So
(50:22):
I want to thank you for walking with me through
their lives tonight, for opening the letters, unrolling the scrolls,
and listening to the part's history. We'll tried to whisper
away because it's important to remember sometimes the lattice echoes
come from the voices we were never meant to hear.
(50:53):
So next time on end the crease, we're gonna well,
we're gonna lighten the moodle little bit. In two weeks
sort of. Yes, I can't believe we're here. The next episode,
episode seventy two, it'll be our sixth annual Nobel Prize show,
(51:19):
the one night of the year where we pit groundbreaking science,
some global piece of efforts depending on what year, and
the very confused economics again with my my professional judgment
and questionable metaphors being thrown around vastly, and as usual,
we'll go back and revisit one hundred years and fifty years,
(51:40):
and then we'll break down this year's winners in the
style that only I apparently do. Maybe who deserved it?
Were these stupid choices? And how exactly did someone win
for inventing a molecular machine that looks like a misbehaving
proteen rumba. But that said, it is serious science, it's
a little bit of deep insight. And yeah, we're probably
(52:03):
going to make fun of at least one of the
Peace Prizes. I mean, that's probably guaranteed. Right, So on
October twelfth, foot on your lab coats, you might want
to grab something, you know, a glass of something sweetish,
and tune in for perhaps one of our smartest episodes
with the dumbest jokes. I am J. E. Double Leaf
(52:26):
and this has been episode seventy one of Indcrees. Until
next time, remember, carry your scars like armor, speak like
they haven't taken your voice, and never ever let history
forget you were here.
Speaker 2 (53:01):
The no Less
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