Horrific History Podcast Horrific History with Eric Slyter and Jordan Watney

After a long absence we’re happy to report the Horrific History Podcast isn’t dead yet! We’re not just a footnote in the history of podcasts you used to be able to download but left you “starvening” for more; a new season is getting ready to rise one more time!







You can look forward to a lot of brand new exciting content this upcoming season, after we pick up where Season 2 dropped into our unexpected hiatus. A listener mail episode, podcast interview cross-overs about which Eric will only vague-cast the teasing details and a Patron-suggested episode will bring us into Season 3 with a lot of fun squeamish delight.







So enjoy a snack while you listen to this new Horrific History Podcast teaser episode for Season 3 through one of your favorite podcast services (iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn and more). Just remember, no squeam allowed! Watch you podcatcher for our upcoming release when we’ll get back on track and discuss religious relics!







If you’d like to hear the commercial-free version of this episode and receive other great perks, become a patron of our podcast on Patreon!Become a Patron!







Click here if you’d like a chance to win a FREE copy of Dead but Dreaming’s Mockingbird EP!















Commercial break music by Dead but Dreaming.







Slideshow Image by Sarah Richter from Pixabay







Blog Image by cyanidekiss from Pixabay

 

While trying to work on our upcoming new episode (with a special guest), Eric and Jordan discovered that our technology is having some issues (Jordan blames poltergeists, because that makes about as much sense to her as computers)! Since we need a bit more time to fix our problems so we can have a two-way conversation with our interviewee, we’re resurrecting another one of our Season 1 episodes (now with a new intro) from the Horrific History Podcast Crypt for your squeamish delight!

 

The Waking Nightmare: Sleep Paralysis

Have you ever had the experience of waking up but being unable to move? Did you feel the sensation of “the intruder” in your room restraining you? At least 40% of the population has had this experience and people from different times and places have had different explanations for it. Eric Slyter and Curtis Bender, your co-hosts, explore folklore and the paranormal as they dig into the history of sleep paralysis through the ages.

 

Discover how these “waking hallucinations” have taken the form of witches, demons, vampires, fairies, ghost children and more (as well as which new theme only appeared after the space race)! Nightmares such as these have been connected (usually erroneously) to all sorts of things in the waking hours, from the Salem witch trials to UFOs and alien abductions! It all depends upon which dream interpretation (or doctor!) you choose! But, if you see in your life the expected result after such an encounter in your waking dreams, would it be a case of causation or correlation?

 

When people from all parts of the world from all across time have similar experiences but see or interpret it differently depending upon their cultural background and time in history, could it be that it’s all the same thing? If you’re religious you’re likely to experience demons or possession. If you like horror movies, sci-fi or conspiracy theories it might be aliens or monsters. And, those with exposure to fantasy or fairy folklore may see goblins or similar fanciful creatures. Depending upon the dream, it wouldn’t be at all uncommon to even have an erotic angle (though we’re not sure if that is more or less traumatic if you’re dreaming of aliens, demons or monsters). Hopefully, you would take to it like Tina Belcher from Bob’s Burgers and her dreams of zombies.

 

Gastric distress, raccoon scrotums, and house spirits, this episode has it all! Whether you’re interested in things that go bump in the night or how cultural influences can impact your dreams, you’ll find it in this brand new Horrific History Podcast episode! And if this edition inspires a dream, we hope you’ll tell us about it!

 

So sit back and enjoy this episode through one of your favorite podcast services (iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn and more)!

 

If you’d like to hear the commercial-free version of this episode and receive other great perks, become a patron of our podcast on Patreon!

Become a Patron!

 

 

What makes a man a man? Join all three of Horrific History’s co-hosts for this new special Halloween episode as we go back in history to look at one of the times scholars and religious leaders asked this very question! When unexpected visitors come knocking and ask for a fright, Curtis regales us with his cryptid and folklore knowledge with historical impact from the middle ages. A creature from legend, reported to fight knights, bears, wolves and dragons captured the imagination of scholars who asked themselves, “What does it mean to be human?” Going through the centuries, a recurring theme shows up in artwork and literature- even in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight! Emulating this creature caused disaster for French royalty and nobles at a very special masquerade, called the Ball of Savages, when their celebration went up in flames and at least one guest was barbequed. The woodwose stay safely confined to legend until the late 16th Century, when in 1547 a boy with congenital hypertrichosis is given as a gift for King Henry II’s coronation; his name was Petrus Gonsalvus.

 

From Europe to the Americas, how are the ideas of woodwoses and Sasquatch related, if at all? How do our myths and legends, or even our moral questions and quandaries, have to change and adapt once confronted with reality? What’s more scary, truth or fiction? So sit back and enjoy this episode through one of your favorite podcast services (iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn and more) while traveling to your next Halloween costume party; just remember, no squeam allowed. Join us again in two weeks when we release our next episode, trick or treat!

 

Some of our favorite resources:



* Academia

* The Portalist

* NY Folklore Society

* Barbara Tuchman; A Distant Mirror, 1978, Alfred A Knopf Ltd, p504



 

Slideshow Photo Credit: This file has been provided by the British Library from its digital collections. It is also made available on a British Library website.

Catalogue entry: Harley 4380 This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the a class="extiw" title="w:List of countries' copyright len...

Have you ever wondered about the awful, bloody and sometimes downright scary history of a town you’re passing through? Take a trip with our co-hosts and join us for our first live interview recorded at Central City Comic Con in this Horrific History Podcast episode as we explore the macabre history of Ellensburg, Washington with a local expert, Museum Director Sadie Thayer of the Kittitas County Historical Museum!

 

Shootings, hangings and serial killers, this episode has a lot of local history along with some local lore or ghost stories which just don’t stand up to scrutiny. So sit back, relax and beware of strangers as you listen to this new episode through one of your favorite podcast services (iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn and more); just remember, no squeam allowed! Join us again in two weeks when we release our next episode!

 

If you’re passing through Ellensburg, Washington and would like to sign up for one of their walking tours, you can sign up here!

 

Slideshow Photo Credit: © Steven Pavlov / http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Senapa / CC BY-SA 3.0

Would you like to squeam live? Check out this special announcement about our first-ever live podcast recording with a special guest interview and find out how you can be there!

 

If you’d like to hear the commercial-free version of our episodes and receive other great perks, become a patron of our podcast on Patreon!

Become a Patron!

 

Click here if you’d like a chance to win a FREE copy of Dead but Dreaming’s Mockingbird EP!

 



 

Commercial break music by Dead but Dreaming.

Slideshow photo credit: Toolstotal Microphone – Credit to https://toolstotal.com/ via photopin (license)

Blog photo credit: Skakerman Headset & mic via photopin (license)

How have people through history thought of and approached reproduction and family planning? Would you trust their birth control methods or consider it another case of the fallacy of ancient wisdom? Join our co-hosts, Eric Slyter and Jordan Watney, as they explore the history of documented birth control methods in ancient Egypt and the evolution of reproductive theory from antiquity to modern history. How do the solutions they devised fit into the context of the culture and their understanding of how conception worked; were their ideas a result of causation or correlation? Why was crocodile dung so significant in ancient Egypt? What does modern science indicate about how effective their methods likely were?

 

Join us as we examine how people’s overall ideas on how reproduction worked changed as technology developed and in what ways that impacted cultural and social approaches to reproduction and birth control. Before the advent of modern understanding, how was contraception approached in ancient Egypt according to the Kahun medical papyrus and what role- if any- did the deity Seth play in their approach? How did they believe their vaginal suppositories and fumigation techniques worked? And, as technology became more sophisticated, in what way did that lead to the theory of preformationism? How did they mix up sperm and gonorrheal puss?

 

From a homunculus to the anti-masturbation craze, crocodile poo to bitter apples, this episode has a lot of early methods of birth control which may make you feel the “terror of the womb”. Before you get to the end of the episode, you might decide some of these methods involve too much of a good thing and you’re glad for more regulation. So sit down and watch out for wandering wombs while you listen to this new Horrific History Podcast episode through one of your favorite podcast services (iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn and more). Just remember, no squeam allowed! Join us again in two weeks when we’ll discuss religious relics!

 

If you’d like to hear the commercial-free version of this episode and receive other great perks, become a patron of our podcast on Patreon!

Become a Patron!

 

Click here if you’d like a chance to win a FREE copy of Dead but Dreaming’s Mockingbird EP!

 

Some of our favorite resources from this week’s episode:



* Wiley

* Atlas Obscura

* a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.