Divorces with SERIOUS Consequences in Medieval Europe
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Hello everyone, Stuckery here. And I am Gabby. And welcome back to the podcast, my hoes. Welcome back to our divorce episode. I was like, wow, what a way to fly inside me. Can you imagine like just being that peppy and cheery and just introducing it for something? It would sound like a demonic cult of like a family vlogger. They would do something like that. You know what I mean? I feel like.

You'd have to do it. Like that's the only way to break divorce news to your best friend forever.

No, see, here's how we do it, right? It all starts with subtle hints. What ends up happening is that it's like what you do when you're trying to drop a thing for a Christmas gift or some kind of big event, and people notice the shit. It's like every other video is about some aspect of divorce, and it really starts getting people to question, like, wait, hold on. Why do you keep on focusing on this? What is going on? Is it a tax write-off if you make divorce content? I don't know.

I exclusively make divorce content in order to make my my lawyer fees a tax write-off. Oh my god. That actually sounds horrible. Like a horrible experience to have to do. But we already said we couldn't be, even if we were divorced, we'd still be annoyingly attached. So whatever. Yeah, that's kind of how it works. Yeah. Hello, everyone. Yeah. Welcome to the proceedings of this episode.

What did you think I was doing something else when I used the word proceedings? Yeah, that's where your mind is. Enough divorce jokes. Yeah. Wait, why are you saying it like a question? Because it sounds wrong.

Yeah, it was wrong. All right. Despite what it is that we're doing now, everyone really seemed to love the episode from this last week, which is good because when we recorded that, we were passing out as it was. Even now, at the time that we are recording this, it is 12.06. Yeah, it is 12.06 AM. Oh, shit. We gotta wake up to take Joy to school in six hours. He just finished writing this because I started writing it, but

I did not know what I was doing. I'll be honest with you. I got overwhelmed so fast. There was so much because unlike what we have with a lot of the previous stuff where sources are a little bit more

open about things like there was a lot more uncertainty with the previous ancient episode so they had specific examples but not necessarily famous as many famous stories of individuals but with the medieval one it was so much it was so much and there were so many sources and i was like ah i don't know there's a lot it was actually overwhelming also i think writing about certain time periods is easier if you have like the knowledge of the context which you have i i

I was giggling so hard while writing this. Gabby's over there watching her show on there while I'm just writing this. And obviously it's a sitcom. It's going in the background and I have a laugh track going. And I feel like I was echoing the laugh track as I was writing the episode because I was just giggling. Oh my gosh. Anyway, this week is a continuation of that. We are looking at Divorce in the Middle Ages, which I'm going to give you all a heads up right now. This is going to focus on Europe. I

I could have talked about different cases for stuff in Africa, in Asia, in many different places. But there are, as Gabby said, way too many sources, way too many cases to talk about things. So we will probably look at divorce stories from around the world in another episode. Maybe not as related to this part of the series. That'll be a separate thing. Maybe a Patreon one. I like that idea.

This one is specifically going to focus more on Europe. And of course, this is where things get a lot more complicated. So remember today when we were making the promo video for the podcast and I said that history is just...

Gossip about the past. Yes. This is a divorce episode. Oh my God, guys. Did you hear about Eleanor? She like totally couldn't produce a son. Oh my God. Secret lives of medieval wives. Secret lives of medieval wives. I made one secret life of Mormon wives. Um,

On Friday on girls night, he came to pick me up from girls night. We were three bottles of wine deep. Do not recommend. We're both really ill the next day. He comes to pick me up. Keep in mind, girls nights are at 5 p.m. He comes at 930. That was four and a half hours. Three bottles of wine deep. We made him sit on the couch and watch this show. Oh, my God.

I felt like I was about to have an aneurysm at any given moment for multiple reasons. One, the behavior. I generally hate a lot of the stuff around television. Two, both of us were so drunk and like torturing him. And then I'm I'll say this right now. I'm a very judgmental person. He is. I am. And when it comes to people's behaviors and belief systems and how they approach life, I'm.

I have no pity. Wait, we just got way off course. Oh, because I said Secret Lives of Medieval Wives. I would watch that show. Oh, yeah. And also historians are just professional gossips. Basically. Yeah. Yeah. In a way. Yeah. Especially when talking about what we are. Ah, so.

As I said, this is where things get a lot more complicated, because just like in the case of Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, you have Christianity to deal with. Though the actual debate when it comes to a lot of the Mormon historical beliefs are where things get kind of weird on that topic, in the same way that you have a lot of varying different weird medieval heresies. That could be a whole other topic in the future to actually address.

which I remember the one time I did make a whole little video talking about the historical beliefs behind certain aspects within Mormonism, which are no longer part of the church today. But if you look at the church beliefs 50 or 60 years ago, I'm not going to say it right now because that would be a spoiler. But for all of you watching or listening, look at the history of it. You will have a reaction, I will say the least. Anyway, medieval England,

Europe, France, Holy Roman Empire, all this stuff. It gets so juicy. There is so much gossip, as Gabby put it. There's a lot of marital chaos. We're talking about impotence allegations, spousal murder, lying about being related. I love when they're like, I need to divorce her. Why? So I've been trying for years and years and years, and I've never brought it up. But I just found out we're cousins. Oh, wow.

Well, no, because if you were cousins, you would have brought up 20 years ago, bro. Mm hmm.

As though that wasn't a problem for the majority of royals that were already marrying their cousins in the first place. I know, but they weren't supposed to. It was a convenient excuse. And also they weren't supposed to force people to marry other people. Come on, Steve. Yes. People, if they were unhappy in a marriage, they would try to do anything and everything in order to split from their spouses. Yeah, because have you ever been around someone? I don't know. Okay, so here's the gag. Here's the gag. I'm going to be fully transparent with you. We have fought like freaking...

wild animals for like what the past two months while we were moving and so this week we moved into our house and everything is so peaceful and calm and i'm like wow it wasn't the marriage it was just super stressed but could you imagine if that was just your life like you and your spouse just like bickered all the time i want you to imagine this you're a person area right now gabby so you understand this is another little history detail so you all know we're not just going into blind gossip or anything in this gabby you would not survive

As a Mongol wife. I wouldn't survive as any foreign military wife. Be so for real. I know what I can survive and I know what situations to avoid. So before the establishment of permanent capitals, you know how things worked for a lot of ancient kingdoms? I know, but their houses were made to move. Our bed alone takes like five people to disassemble. So then let's consider this here in the first place. Let's look at, say, ancient Japan or a lot of other ancient societies and kingdoms and what happened. Do you know what happened every time a ruler died typically?

What? They would build a whole new capital city. And everyone would have to move? And all the administrators would have to move there. Right. But they would have servants to move their stuff. Where are my servants? I have one and it's you. We paid for movers this time. Yeah, but not like the full service movers that pack you up and unpack you. Oh, God, no. I'm not Richie Rich. Well, that's what I'm saying. You're the servant. I have one servant. I'm the servant.

Yeah. Basically, my wife would not survive as one of those nomads who has to go around every so often traveling. Oh, that's the other thing. Bestie, you were stressed too. This is also, I talked about the capital city. The way that they would hold court is that

The king and the court would typically travel around the country constantly in order to do stuff like taxes, administration and everything else. I know. But what I'm saying is that if they were stuck with a spouse that they absolutely did not get along with, I, too, would try my darndest to get out. You know what I mean? Like, if I didn't like the person I had to live with forever.

Yeah. And back in the medieval world, there was there were a few ways you could do this, but it was definitely way more difficult than when you have today. Like in most cases, when we're talking about this with divorce, it was actually an annulment, not a divorce, as we think, which basically means that the marriage was not a valid marriage from the very beginning.

in medieval England, there were two types of divorces. You had a divorce of matrimony, which is from the bond of marriage, and divorce from bed and board, which to

To explain that, the matrimony was when the church would say, okay, yeah, this marriage, this thing that you've been in for potentially a couple months or maybe like 20 years. I love when they were like 25 years deep into a marriage and they're like, must, must be rid of her immediately. Oh, no. This whole relationship wasn't valid from the very get go. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. If.

I kind of get it, though. But like also not really, because if at any point I'm married for 20 years and somebody is like, oh, I'm done. I'm done with what? My God, because it's been 20 years. So I'm just telling you, you got to get out before 20 years. I'm about to make this so much worse for you. So you understand as to just how bad when something like that was. Oh, God, do it.

All right. So the second type of divorce, which was the the divorce of mensa toro or from bed and board. That was just a separation. It was literally separation. They no longer had to live together, which was usually granted due to adultery or abuse or something like that. The issue with this type of separation, though, is that it didn't allow for remarriage until one of the spouses died.

Then there's no point in separating. Yep. I mean, unless they're being mean. Yeah. That meant that you're basically stuck with that person in a sense, or at least you were legally limited. This type of separation also led to a lot of issues with family lines. Well, because it'd be separated. Technically, they shouldn't be with somebody else. But if they have illegitimate heirs.

they might want to pass on their money and finances to that person, but they can't because they're legally married, which actually I think I brought up last episode. It still happens today. I don't know, y'all. Get a divorce and do not be with men who are married because guess what? If he dies, you're not the one legally married to him. Okay, okay. So get this right. Get this right. The whole thing with the annulment, not a valid marriage from the beginning. Do you know what happens to any children you have in the relationship if your marriage is annulled?

They're bastards. They lose their status as legitimate children. Oh, that's so messed up. And dads did that? Yes. I guess moms might have too, but let's be real. It's medieval times. I would say in almost every case, it would be a man that would initiate that because we're talking about royal marriages in the first place. Nobility. Those darned royal men. That's messed up though. Oh, no. Incredibly is. There are famous cases of like a guy who has

four daughters or so but he doesn't have a son so he divorces his wife in order to get with a woman who he can have a son with and all of those daughters that he have are no longer legally legitimate doesn't the dad pick the gender because y'all got the wife yeah but they didn't know that at the time here and for how it all works and even that it's obviously not a choice it just happens for the way that the cookie crumbles or in this case the way that the the dingleberries dongle

No, it's the way that your sperm swims. Okay, I was just trying to say things without actually saying it, but yeah, you go off. You could use scientific terms. This is an anatomically correct podcast. To explain in intricate detail about medieval sexual practices.

Actually, wait, can we do that podcast episode? Oh, no, we definitely need to do a thing. We've done one on presidential sex scandals. That was a thing that we did before. We definitely need to do one on in general sex scandals or practices that would be interesting, to say the least.

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Yeah, essentially, back in the day, divorce laws were very complex, and it's very difficult to obtain specific divorce rulings because of the church. In these times, it was safe to say that everything was because of the church. In this case, however, they didn't want marriage to become something that wasn't sacred, so they made it incredibly difficult to undo. And while many people wished for easier ways to, you know, split up, it was probably better for the elite to have more hoops to jump through since not being able to get divorced sort of

stabilized family lines. Like, look, look, look. Can you imagine the chaos that would ensue from any of those super... Like, have you ever seen any of the stuff for those medieval dramas or like any historical drama where it's like, why are these people constantly humping one another? Why? Because that's actually kind of what was going down in history anyways. Like, if you were part of the nobility, the chances of you engaging in

additional activities was probably higher. So if you were nobility, would you participate in extra activities? Oh no, I would find something that I would be hyper fixating on because you know me and my hobbies for what I would do. So what would basically be the equivalent of miniature war painting and whatnot? I would probably, as a king, learn how to do something with blacksmithing because I would think it would be really cool to know how to do. Okay, so...

That was really sad. Continue. What? My wife. Ah, yes. You'll have a hobby and not cheat on me. How sad. I mean, you're noble. When else can you bag anyone in your wildest dreams? Okay, no, we're going to need to do a thing. If you were the king or something, you would be like the... Who's a popular man? I've really not put attention to pop culture. Neither do I. You're asking me, of all people? Guys, who's the male Arthur? Oh my God, am I old?

We just don't pay attention to it anymore. Who's the current male heartthrob? Gabby, because the heartthrobs for a lot of what you would follow aren't real. They're from books. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that's the point. That's in general. That's not for a lot of actors nowadays. That's where a lot of things have actually shifted culturally, because the whole thing with book talk is that a lot of people are associating more of these character traits and desires with fictional characters versus real people. OK, I got to stop you right there, Paul. I was a Tumblr girl. I have never associated these traits and characters with real people.

I meant more traits of just like desire, not anything else. Gabby. I know, but I'm saying that genuinely thought I would be Mrs. Dean Winchester. Dean Winchester wasn't real. And also he kept dying. A bit of a problem to establish a relationship. Yeah. How did we get here?

We were talking about nobles and their extramarital activities. Rhetorical question. Which we will need to actually end up doing a whole thing on noble pastimes and what they would do for just a couple months. Noble pastime. Sex. Literally, that would be part of it. Orgies. It's also why I said I would get bored. What? I would get bored. Of the orgies? You're like, oh, another titty.

No, I would get bored. Do you see 50 of them? They all look the same. I will give you a prime example here, Gabby. All right. Remember how one of the big noble pastimes was hunting? Yeah. You know how oftentimes they would hunt?

They would hunt by this. This is a big thing going to like the 16 and 1700s. You go out on your horse with all your men. The men behind you are carrying the weapons and everything else. They trap a bear or something that is already half dead at that point. You then, as the ruler, give the final finishing shot or blow. You are then congratulated, told what a good job you did.

And that's it. Oh, yeah. It's infantile. So it would be better to just have sex with lots of people and hope you don't get French pox. Moving on from that note here, then. I'm just trying to give you good life advice. We are going to have to bring up a whole thing about sexual diseases by the time of the Columbian Exchange and what ends up happening for syphilis and everything. That will actually be a part of divorce for the next episode. Oh, because they would give syphilis to their wives? Yeah. Yeah.

Not that wives didn't cheat, but I'm sure it was mainly the men. Spoiler alert for one of the future episodes in here. A man could give his wife a venereal disease, accuse her of then cheating on him, and then get a divorce. But if he was caught lying, they also threw him into the water, right? Darn it. That was just...

It was one-sided. Fairly. For a lot, most of history, yeah, it was one-sided. The closest we've had for more equal measures for power went back to like ancient Egypt, like we talked about in the previous episode.

Wow. Yep. So, yes, in this time, medieval times, I should specify, because we've been jumping around all over the place, there were very few reasons for divorce or separation that were legitimately accepted. And these were, one of the spouses was already promised to someone else. The couple was related.

either spiritually or by blood, which, you know, a spiritual relation could be a godparent. So that wasn't allowed. Impotence, forced marriage, adultery or criminal activity, being underage, secret marriage or a marriage that was based on falsehoods like false identities or lies with the intent to mislead a spouse. Now, I'm going to tell you this right now because one of these is hilarious because it's a massive contradiction as you're going to learn about for a later case here. Forced marriage. Mm hmm.

Forced marriage. Most of them were forced, weren't they? No, not necessarily. There's a difference of arranged marriage and forced marriage. It's a different kind of thing. There would be actual legitimate cases of forced marriage. And we've talked about this before for how dangerous it was to be a widow back then. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because they can like force themselves on them and then they're legally married. So they take their wealth. Yep. Yep. Because if you had sex with someone like with a woman.

You were her husband at that point because you had consummated the marriage. Yeah, but what about the men who had sex with all of the women? No, because that was just adultery or whatever. I just want to say, you know how people are always like, what would you do if you could travel back in time? If I could travel back in time, I'm infertile. I go back in time. I have sex with all these men, but I accuse all of these powerful men of impotence so I could humble them and also get a divorce so I can go get the next one.

I'd be so powerful. That you do the impotence. They would accuse you first. No, because I in one of the articles I put in the sheet, a woman kept doing like she did that because she accused her husband of impotence and then she got a divorce from him. And then I think married.

His brother did it? No, but here's the problem, Gabby. Here's the problem. There's something crazy. So what you just described is a legitimate thing that could happen. However. Oh, after accusing enough people. Yes. But also they would look at you and go, well, does she have any children after any of these relationships? No. Would you have Julia with you?

And will you be able to prove Joya is your child? Joya is a mixed race child. Joya is a mixed race child between the two of us. They would accuse you of lying. You don't have a child from that that matches your exact tone, meaning there's wiggle room for them to accuse you. But they're white. All right. So that would prove that you are capable if you have her.

Okay, now my head hurts. This hypothetical was supposed to be fun. You're overthinking it. It is fun. But if you have no children, then they can easily accuse you of being barren. Can you travel back in time with me? And then we have... So I'm then part of it? I

Why am I part of this fantasy that you are constructing? You just blow holes in my little fun... It was supposed to be a fun plan. And then you started blowing holes in it. So now you're a part of it too. You got to time travel with me. Your fun plan of going back in time. And humbling some powerful men. They were kind of sexist. They'll be fine. Oh, kind of. Oh, just you wait. Just you wait. Well, now you're going to. Yeah. We're going to figure this plan out together. I'm about to make this so much worse for you here, though. No.

See, the biggest issue with attempting to get out of marriage using any of the reasons that we just listed previously was that some of them were incredibly hard to prove, like impotence.

In addition, just like with marriages today, finances would play a huge role in whether or not a couple was even allowed to pursue a divorce. In 1531, there was a divorce between Elizabeth and Henry Saville that cost fees around 20 pounds, which in today's money is about 7,000 pounds or about $12,000. So people who couldn't really afford to pursue an official divorce would typically just separate on their own.

Remember though, if they hooked up with anyone else after that separation, that was still considered adultery because they were still legally married. And if they married someone in secret after that, they would be accused of bigamy, which was a horrible sin because multiple wives are multiple husbands.

Yeah, so at this point, I figured, hey, why don't we just look at some of the more famous or infamous cases of divorce and what went down as a result of them before we move on to another region for another episode. So, Gabby, I got two examples in here, one from the male perspective and one from the female perspective that I wanted to be able to present to you to tell you these very fun stories.

Fun. Yes, fun. Have you heard of Lothar II of Lotheringia? Yeah, I was researching this, so I did. Oh, shoot. Okay, so this is actually part of it. I'll pretend I have not heard of it. Okay, okay, okay, okay. So to tell the story for anyone who is curious, Lothar II, born in 835, was a Caroligian king who ruled Lotheringia from 855 all the way until his death in 869. 69. Nice. Oh, my God.

Now, a lot of people aren't going to recognize that in the first place. Like, what the hell is Lotharingia? Lotharingia was a region that included parts of modern day Eastern France, Western Germany, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Eastern Belgium and Northern Switzerland. It was pretty much the central kingdom you could have there. But but I say central. They named it after themselves. In his case, it was Lotharingia was Lothar's kingdom.

Because you had West Francia, you had Burgundy eventually was a thing. You had the Kingdom of Italy. All of this was part of the Caroligian Empire, which like Charlemagne.

He is the guy who'd create the Caroligian Empire, and this was the great empire of Europe at the time, but it very quickly ended up dividing amongst his son and sons and descendants after he died because they practiced a type of inheritance called gavelkind. Gavelkind being that when you die, your inheritance gets split equally between your valid heirs.

You just said so many words. None of this is in the research script. No, but that's part of it. Why do you know everything, dear God? How else do you say Carolinian weird? Carolinian? Carolinian? Carolinian? Carolinian? What are you saying? Charlemagne. Carolinian. Lin-gian? Okay. Carolinian. Yeah. Sure.

You're the historian. Honestly, I spend so much time reading this stuff that if something is actually pronounced in a different way, it ends up coming back to bite me. There's Carolinian. Are you thinking of the Swedish Carolians? No, because there's a Carolian. I don't know at this point. And now I'm second guessing myself. Okay. She said, James, you can cut that out. Oh, did you know last week when I said, James, you can cut that out? He didn't cut anything out. I was so informed by my Instagram. No, people were laughing their ass off. It was hilarious. James.

That was a lot of sleep deprivation that you all heard right there. I'm sleep deprived again, so they keep getting it every week. Next week, let's be on time. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistants assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today.

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Well, I'm letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my new contacts in time for this class. I got them delivered free from 1-800-CONTACTS. Oh my gosh, they're so fast. And breathe. Oh, sorry. I almost couldn't breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry. Namaste. Visit 1-800-CONTACTS.com today to save on your first order. 1-800-CONTACTS. So this guy was in charge of Lotharingia and the thing was,

He could not find a way out of his marriage. And so he died still married to the queen that he wanted to divorce the entire time.

The funny part about all this is that over the course of 14 years, literally from the time that he took charge of the country, he basically created a whole new kind of political crisis. It would be something that would end up following all of the kings that would come after him in Europe. But wait, why? I'll explain that because that's part of the story. So here's the thing. When talking about marriage, the church and everything and how it's related.

Earlier great kings like Charlemagne, they were able to remove themselves from unions that were inconvenient or undesirable fairly easy, not without that much issue. They had done this from a position of power and security. There wasn't really anyone that could tell them no per se.

Lothar, at the point that he tried to go and attempt his divorce, he was still a young man. He was fresh to the throne. He did not have a firm grasp on power. And as a result, that was something that could very easily be taken for granted. Like Catherine of Aragon, Lothar II's wife, who I'm going to say this name here. This is going to be something where I butcher it, and I'm sorry right now. Thutberga. What a name.

Thutberga had powerful relatives. This is why he had married her in the first place, because his father ordered him to do so in order to be able to secure a powerful political alliance. And that meant that the king had to tread very carefully if he was going to try and get rid of her so that he could be with his beloved mistress that he was actually in love with, Waldrea, instead. So,

Lothar probably thought that he was being clever when in 858, he orchestrated a massive trial with an ordeal. Now, Gabby, how familiar are you with the legal trials and the way that things would work back in the day?

Not at all. OK, you know how there's the whole thing of a trial by combat and others? Yeah. So trial by ordeal was basically we're going to put you through something horrible and you have to make it out of the other side without dying or suffering harm. And that will prove that you're right because God is protecting you. I like it. I see where their heads at. And there were so many examples of this in history. Like it's.

For most of the time, it does not end well for people, which I always found this hilarious. I know a side note on this, but I have to say this in the first place. One of the core tenets of Christianity is that you are not supposed to test God. Trial by ordeal is literally just testing God. Somebody needs to tell them about Job.

And like the argument that they used against it was like, oh, we're not testing God. We're testing this person and their ability to test God. Right. Right. It was always it was so dumb to me. I always thought it was so incredibly bad. But that's what people would do. And this is why it could be used as a convenient political excuse to pretty much do whatever the hell it is that you actually wanted. So what did he accuse his wife of that having sex with her brother?

Yeah. Did they just accuse everybody of having sex with their relatives or horses? Yeah, pretty much. If you were an enemy, you were accused of unnatural relations. No, if you were a woman.

Well, this was also accused men a lot. Oh, yeah. Well, we expect men to do that. Oh, my God. So, you know what I mean? The men weren't accused of having sex with horses typically or things like that. They were usually accused of either being gay, like having male on male relations, or they were accused of being impotent. And those are the two like big sexual crimes was like sodomy or impotence.

That's it? That's all they got? Pretty much. I mean, you could have a whole thing for adultery, but... Nobody really cared. If the man was in the position of power, yeah. Darn. That's just how it typically ends up working. Okay, new plan. We go back in time and we find new fun ways. Then those three. I don't want to know what that means. You have the historical knowledge to make it more interesting. You must join me on this quest. Uh-huh.

So basically, he starts all these rumors, or I guess advisors under him or officials under him start all these rumors about his wife. And so to test the truthfulness of the rumors, what he does is he organizes a trial by ordeal in which Thutberga, or rather her champion, who has to represent her, is forced to plunge one of his hands into boiling water. We don't know why. We have no proper explanation.

But apparently the champions somehow passed the ordeal completely unscathed. The boiling water did nothing to him, which proved through the trial of ordeal that God was protecting him because she was right. She had not engaged in set relations. I do not know how this whole thing happened. Do not ask. The sources on this are exceptionally murky, and that's the reality. The result, though, was that he was forced to take his wife back.

And you think, OK, that's the end of that. Surely there's no way that this can continue. Oh, oh.

I fear he really wanted to get rid of her. Oh, he really wanted to get rid of her. In response to this setback, the king then turned the matter over to two church councils in 860 in order to get some legitimacy as well as moral authority. He, of course, thought that his bishops, Gunther of Cologne and Suttgad of Trier, would be more reliable than the direct judgment of God in the failed trial.

And so they did, probably because, you know, go figure, they were basically on his payroll in the first place. So they did whatever the hell he wanted. But Berga supposedly confessed during a dubious show trial that the rumors about her were true. The councils would confirm that Lothar was able to leave his queen and marry again. And he did this, making a queen of his mistress, Waldrea.

Who, people suspected, was actually a witch because why the hell was he that obsessed with this lady and continuously trying to divorce his wife in order to be with her? Surely she was some kind of magical hellspawn that had control over him. Or he has poor judgment. Oh yeah, probably that. He was also probably just incredibly horny.

Yeah. But he was married to like Shirley. Yeah. Here's the problem, though. By handing the case over to the bishops, the young king had committed a bit of a whoopsie.

Ultimately, this is what would end up bringing down his kingdom, because effectively, this was an invitation for other powers and entities to get involved. The rulers of the kingdoms on either side of Lothar's were his two uncles, who were also descendants of Charlemagne, and they wanted to unite the lands back together under their control to basically recreate the Caroligian Empire again, with, of course, either one wanting to be in charge.

You had the King of the West Franks, Charles the Bald, and King of the East Franks, Louis the German, who were watching all the difficulties that Lothar was facing. Now, Charles the Bald opposed the annulment. He didn't want this to go through. While Louis the German was totally in favor of it. He supported him. Neither uncle lost sight of the fact that Lothar

didn't have any actual heirs, at least not ones that were legitimate. See, that made succession of the crown a bit of a contentious issue. In fact, Lothar would go and cede some of his lands to Louis the German in exchange for his support in the divorce. So his uncle supported him because he literally got bribed with some land. And that's the whole point. This further complicated things.

And that is where Hinkmar, the great archbishop of Reims and a loyal servant of Lothar's uncle Charles comes in. Because a lot of the information that we're talking about here comes from Hinkmar. He has easily the single most detailed source about the whole thing. An 80,000 word treatise on the case written back in 860 known as Divortio or On the Divorce of King Lothar and Queen Dutberga.

Now, despite the title, Incar's argument was that the councils of Aachen had erred. They were wrong. This wasn't supposed to take place in the first place, the divorce, because Christian marriage, per his rules there or per the rules of Christianity, was indissoluble. The divorce was not possible because once you were legally married to someone in the eyes of the church, you were bound to them forever.

Marriage was permanent. If Lothar and Thutberga were man and wife, they could separate, but they could never remarry. And that if mattered, right? That's really important. Hincar had left a kind of

get out of jail card, I guess you could say that was left in there, but it's a very discreet one. It's a little clause, kind of like when you say that you read the fine print, because he suggested that if the Virgo was guilty of incest, if she actually had done these things, that according to Canon law,

She was incapable of being married legally. That was a crime against humanity itself, so their marriage was never valid in the first place. So while he couldn't get divorced, the annulment, if true, was valid. Oh my god. Yeah, yeah. Problem was, that door, that get out of jail card, that was going to be taken from him. Not by the kings on either side of him, but by Pope Innocent.

Nicholas I because now we get the papacy. It's always the Pope. It's always the Pope. Why did these kings get married in the first place if they're just going to make a big stink about being married? Power. That's literally part of it. Power. In his case, he was forced into that marriage by his father. Oh my gosh. Okay, so grow up. Everybody was being forced into marriages by their parents. Yeah, I know. He's not special. I know. But he could have

kept the mistress or whatever, but no, he was determined to marry that woman. And as a result, he plunged everything into chaos. Did they have kids? Yes. They had a son. I know this story. So like, I know how it ends, but I'm trying to, I'm trying to be like, oh,

Oh, no. Oh, they had a son. An illegitimate son. The illegitimate son of a king who's an idiot. God, he's going to be so happy. So as soon as the Pope heard about the case, Nicholas wanted to figure out what was going on, establish the facts and resolve things. So two synods at Aachen. Oh, my God. Yes. Two synods at Aachen would dissolve the marriage. And in 862, these gave Lothar permission to marry Waldreia.

He would get the permission of the papal legate about this decision, probably because he bribed him. You know, that could very well happen at the synod in Metz, this being in June of 863.

Pope Nicholas I, however, reversed these decisions and then took an unprecedented step of actually deposing the archbishops of Gunther and Duttgad in October of 863. This is so much drama. Oh my God, it's so much. It's political, it's religious, it's marital. There's so much drama that is happening in here.

And in August of 865, another papal legate comes in and forces Lothar to take his wife back. OK, what is the wife in all this? Like, there's no way this woman is willingly going back and forth. Oh, we're getting there. We're getting there. She is because right now she has to in that sense, because this is the only actual security that she has.

Unfortunately, Gabby, it sucks to be a woman at this time here. I'm sorry, but that's the reality is like this is literally all she has. You know, I was no, I was born in the right timeline because I wouldn't even I would not be subject to this. You know how they take away shoelaces and make you use plastic stuff that is blunted to the point that it's useless. It would have to do that to me because there's no way I'm a man's puppet. I will end it all. Yep. All of it.

And so as the king and the pope are going back and forth and back and forth, back and forth, the arguments about this are pissing off the pope so much that he eventually excommunicates Waldrea, the king's mistress, and threatened to do the same thing to the king if he didn't relent. And Lothar, because obviously if you get excommunicated, this means that you are quite literally shunned by your people. Shunned by your people. Because you're not God's chosen leader. You can't be because you're excommunicated. There's also another factor in here.

If a king is excommunicated, anyone in the kingdom under him is also de facto excommunicated. Right. Yeah. Which means this is one of the things that excommunication led to massive revolts. It was a huge power play by the papacy. Like it was a really big deal. But thankfully, this probably ended everything, didn't it? Because if a king was excommunicated.

Priests could not perform the last rites for people, which is what you needed to be able to get to heaven. They couldn't perform communion. They couldn't do anything. Dying during an excommunication period must have been rough. Yeah, that's kind of the point. That's why it was an incentive to get your ass into gear and go apologize to the Pope. Well, it's a good thing the Pope shut this mess down. Thank heavens, right? Well, yeah.

Lothar does give up. He does. He takes back Gutberga as his queen. Poor Gutberga. Yep. But then guess what?

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The Pope dies. The Pope dies. I had to say it. I'm sorry. It's all good because this is where it gets even more dramatic. In 867, Pope Nicholas I gets succeeded by a much more pliable individual called Adrian II. And around the same time this happens, a shining silver star.

glowing light seems to appear before Lothar's eyes because Toothburga herself asks for a divorce. Know your worth, queen. Literally, queen. Yeah. So she now desires an annulment, which I'm guessing, I can only imagine that is after years of this absolute bullshit. She was so tired of it that she just gave up. Dude,

You cannot mean to tell me everybody in the kingdom is watching you get kicked out and then taken back in publicly by your husband. I'm sorry if Instagram existed back then. Oh, I know. This whole thing is some of the most dramatic tea you could possibly like every kingdom, like every kind of tavern would have been talking about this shit. Could you imagine the TikToks that would come from this shit? I'm so pissed. I'm so pissed they didn't have iPhones. I know the tea would be massive.

And so they both, Lothair and Tuberca, travel to Rome where the Pope Adrian II agrees to divorce them in 869. Here's the thing. This divorce had very significant political implications because that allowed Lothair to marry Waldrea and legitimize their son Hugh, his only child son.

he could do this for. Which would be great because then he'll have someone to inherit his kingdom if he dies. Yep, because that's right. This was a son, a child that was not a legitimate one, but it was a son who, if he legitimized, would be able to legally inherit his throne. But,

But guess what? He dies. He dies. Not only does he die. Guess when he dies? On the way back. Literally. I know this story. On the way back home from the divorce. He literally dies on the way back, traveling back home from the papacy to

And as a result, he never gets that divorce and his whole kingdom crumbles. And his uncles were happy. Am I right? Yeah, actually they were because that meant that the lands ended up getting divided between the two of them. This was a really huge milestone for the papacy, I will say, and the papal authority. It was a really long con, like a really long play. Yeah, because after this...

Like the issue was kings pretty much had to now deal with the papacy for divorces from now on because the church was more heavily involved. The kings couldn't just divorce their wives or whatnot anymore. If something happened,

The Pope could say no, and that was a really big problem for some certain characters later on in history, Henry VIII, but we will eventually get to that at some point. It didn't stop them from leaving their wives that they didn't want anymore, but it did make the whole process way more tricky. The bigger immediate issue, though, as I said, was the fate of his kingdom. Lothar and Thuberga didn't have any children, so when he died, his lands were divided between his two uncles, Charles and Louis.

Lothar did have a son with Waldre as I said Hugh who would later put a claim to his father's kingdom but because he was illegitimate no one supported him and as a result he was defeated had his head shaved in the style of a monk I believe the term is that he was tonsured you know where it's like they have the sides of the head have hair but the top of it is shaved so that happened oh and they blinded him yeah

Can't seem shocked. Yeah. His dad kind of really screwed the pooch on that one. Literally. Yeah. So, and did the tale of Lothar.

Finally, then here, we're going to bring things in for a more female perspective. What does screw the pooch mean? Who's screwing a dog? Is this dog a dog, right? I think screw the pooch literally came from when you have like a prized racing hound or something or like hunting hound. And if it gets out and gets impregnated by a random dog that it's like basically destroys the value. We know that for sure. I think. OK, you know what? I'm going to look this up now. OK.

I'm going to look this up. Why do I ask the most unrelated? It was related, though. Screw the... Pooch origin. Pooch origin. The idiom screw the pooch gained widespread popularity thanks to Tom Wolfe's 1979 book and 1983 film adaptation, The Right Stuff.

The phrase is believed to have originated with the Yale graduate, John Rawlings, who worked with the design on astronaut spacesuits. Rawlings used the phrase screw the pooch to refer to making a serious mistake or messing something up. Huh.

Oh, wait, no, I realized what I was thinking of here in the first place. That thing that I just remember that I thought was the origin, I just realized that's a Family Guy episode. Oh, my God. That I saw when I was much younger. Now your brain's crossing history facts and Family Guy. I just described an actual plot from an episode, which I remember correctly is actually titled Screw the Pooch.

You worry me. Yeah. So that happened. Anyway, from this then, the female perspective. Another tale is the story of Eleanor of Aquitaine. Now, my friends, this is one of my favorite female characters in history because her life is very interesting and she was a very powerful and influential figure with a very complicated history, but she is also just

I find her to be one of the really cool ones that a lot of people don't really take as much notice of because they focus on other characters in history. This individual, Duchess of Aquitaine, was by far the richest woman in Europe in the 12th century. She controlled the Duchy of Aquitaine, which had, I think if I remember correctly, the most valuable and productive wine vineyards in the entirety of Europe, which was stupidly wealthy at the time.

So thanks to her role as the head of the House of Platere, which oversaw a huge chunk of the south of the country, she was incredibly influential. She also was the one who would get married to King Louis VII of France for almost 15 years, but that whole thing kind of ended in disaster.

So the issue when we talk about her is that despite her individual power, which again, very impressive considering that she was a woman in the medieval period, the laws of the day basically said that no one could inherit the throne of France or no woman could inherit the throne of France. And unfortunately for Louis VII, the couple only had two daughters and no son, which that and the desire for Louis to actually have a male heir is what led to their divorce in the first place, which...

which was who this day the most expensive divorce in history. And that's why I wanted to talk about it. You will hear of that drama of like when, when billionaires end up splitting with their wives and other kinds of stuff or vice versa, like in the case of Bezos, right now, imagine if Bezos actually controlled, like physically controlled all of California and his wife got most of California, right?

That is the level that we are talking about here. See, Eleanor, born in 1122, she was the daughter and heiress of William X, Duke of Aquitaine and Count of Poitiers, who possessed one of the largest territories in all of France. She inherited the Duchy of Aquitaine after her father's death in 1137 when she was about 15 and was then placed under the protection of the then King of France and soon married Louis, who would become the King of France after his father.

Now, he didn't expect to become king, having been trained as a monk instead. But after his older brother Philip died, this meant that Louis was now heir to the throne and eventually would take it after his father, Louis VI, died in 1137. Here's the thing. Their marriage was what we would call definitely political. Their personalities did not get along at all, according to historians.

According to the writers that would talk about this match at the time, Eleanor was said to have been very high spirited, lively, while Louis was a monk. Like he literally was trained as a monk the whole time and he was very pious. He didn't want to really do anything. He didn't want to engage in parties. He didn't want to engage in much in the way of bedroom activities, we will say.

He wasn't necessarily a very outgoing individual, and this is something that was very negative. Eleanor apparently allegedly stated at one point, I thought I was wed to a king. Now I find I am wed to a monk, which is not great. They did have one child together first, a daughter named Mary, before they went on crusade together. And while they were in Antioch, there were all these rumors that were going around that Eleanor was sleeping with her uncle Raymond. But...

You know, who's to really say how that actually went down? Sources state that she did request a divorce there at the time from him, but Louis refused. On their journey back home, though, they would visit by the pope who tried to help them reconcile with one another to come together as a couple and really get past things.

You know what happens? She gets pregnant. She gets pregnant. That always happens when they're trying to reconcile. They're just trying to make it work, baby. You know what would really help this marriage? A baby. I feel like...

but they probably couldn't avoid it like they probably weren't even planning on it no but here's the funny thing when we say when people talk about that phrase of like oh you know what really doesn't help a marriage trying for a baby but people do that as a way to fix their marriage do people actually that's one of the jokes and or not jokes but it's like one of the statements about people in history that it's like what people would do you get these people who very clearly are not good for one another but they try to fix their marriage by having a baby together to

to have something that terrible idea i know it is and it's one of the things people don't recommend unironically though in medieval times that is actually how you would fix a marriage because we're not talking about one for love this is a political marriage how do you fix the political marriage that is failing you have a son you need that that is the whole point if you don't have that i'm guessing she doesn't have a son nope the second pregnancy is a daughter again

And so their rocky marriage is ruined by two daughters. Yep. Oh, my God. And so when this goes down, either because of his advisors or Louis himself or something, regardless of how it goes down, Louis ends up requesting a divorce. What if their third kid was a boy? Do they not just not keep trying? It was just too much for his delicate. This is after 15 years they've been together.

Are they just not sleeping with each other? That's the whole point. Remember how she said is like he was more of a monk than anything else. Have they considered he's the problem? Yeah. So their lack of compatibility combined with the failure to produce a son. This all caused Louis to believe that apparently God didn't want them to be together. Clearly. Otherwise, they would have a son. Oh, my God. Mm hmm. And so that meant that their union, the way that he was going to get out of this then is that he argued that, oh, yeah,

this isn't working and God doesn't want us to be together because we're too closely related. How closely related were they? They were like third cousins. That's not too closely. No, no. They were third cousins once removed. Don't know what that means. I don't even remember what it means either. I'll be honest. So why had it been there? But it was. This is the whole point. Oh my God.

Do you know how many times listeners of my podcast and your podcast have explained what once removed means? But it's one of those things that my brain will never remember. But get this, right?

Third cousin once removed is way more distant than a lot of marriages for aristocracy in Europe at this time. Like most of these marriages are between like second cousins. I'm so sad having right now. And this is so funny to me. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Everybody was related, but it was at cross for divorce. Mm hmm.

So this decision to divorce would end up costing the French king a shit ton of money. Eleanor as well, remember, she was the wealthiest woman in all of Europe. Easily by far the wealthiest woman. In fact, she was arguably the wealthiest person in all of Europe. I love women in male-dominated fields. And so according to feudal customs, she didn't give that land to the king. She retained full rights and control over Aquitaine.

The most valuable territory in all of France, the largest territory. The only real power that Louis actually had over this divorce then was that he technically had the ability to or not ability. He had the power to to approve any future marriages. Like if she wanted to get married afterwards, he had to give his approval.

That's stupid. But that was the power that he had. He lost everything else, though, by virtue of the ending of his marriage. Ironically, though,

skipping over to him for a little bit we will talk about eleanor did he have a son we'll get to that so i want to talk about him for just a second because i do want to tell his story because otherwise it's kind of moot at that point um he does get married two years later to a woman by the name of constance and they end up having you guess it a son nope two daughters together and uh his wife ends up dying in childbirth or for when producing the second child

What? Yes. Only five weeks, five weeks after his wife died. Because remember, they have been together for a long time. He's getting much older at this point. And there is panic because he has had at this point four daughters. He doesn't have a son. They are his loins are in overdrive to make a son for the kingdom. Obviously not. So five weeks later, he gets married.

after his wife dies in childbirth. Well, good for him. Congrats, my guy. He marries Adela of Champagne and he finally gets the son that he wanted, Philip Augustus, born in 1165, who would eventually end up ruling as king of France after Louis' death in 1180, all the way until 1223. This guy ruled for four years

43 years. He must have been good. Which is a long time. But anyway, I had to tell that part because it's horrible yet funny at the same time. Back to Eleanor.

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Membership required. Subject to terms and conditions. Applies to orders over $35. Eleanor ended up having a very fulfilling and large life that started out very dangerous. Remember that whole little tidbit that we talked about there about how dangerous it was to be a widow or like... Divorced. A single woman with property. Yeah. A single woman with property. If a guy found you and forced himself on you, congratulations, you're married now. But who's going to...

You don't need a witness. Yeah. Well, yeah. Right. Also, it's just his word against hers. So they could just lie about it. And sometimes the people who do this would work as a team. Like there would literally be efforts to try and just lie about it. Right. Yeah. That'd be so shady. Yeah.

I mean, all of it is. Oh, my God. So one of the things that would end up happening is that there were multiple cases. Who made that a rule? It's part of the church, because if you had sexual relations, if you if you had sexual relations and it's more of a consequence than an actual rule. If you had sexual relations with someone, you had to marry them. Think of it like, you know how you hear that phrase about people taking responsibility? Yeah. Think of it like that, but to a much more extreme degree.

So there would be cases of like widows getting kidnapped. And then even if they're not forced upon them, they're basically held hostage until they agree to marry. What the heck? As I told you, it's not a pleasant thing at this time for women.

That's not it's not like me trying to make a social justice argument or anything like that. That's just a brutal reality of history is that it's not pleasant at pretty much any point in history to exist. But there are certain times and with certain positions that even with power and authority, it is very unpleasant to be a woman. In fact, that's one of those things. And that was that was a problem for noble women. You had more freedom if you were poor. Yeah, yeah.

That's rough. Yep. So, yeah, Eleanor runs back to Aqua Teen, escaping multiple attempts to try and capture her and force her into a marriage. The fact that she traveled as quickly as she did shows that she knows she was in danger because wealthiest woman in all of Europe. There are teams of people trying to capture her to wed her, basically. I'm stressed. But she is determined to basically control her own life. Admirable.

Great. And she's a powerful individual. She is a strong, independent woman who doesn't want no man, except she does. But she wants one by her choice at this point.

She should. So that's kind of what happens. In fact, she's so determined to get her own choice in this matter that remember that whole rule about how Louis is supposed to approve her future marriage? Yeah. Yeah. Eight weeks, eight weeks after their divorce or annulment, she goes out on her own and marries Henry, Duke of Normandy herself.

She didn't get her approval. Yeah. This is the grandson of... Wait, wait. I want to know how this went down. Eight weeks after her divorce, she literally called him up like, yo, I'm finally single. Basically. Basically.

Okay, okay. You know how they're like the girl. So a lot of people have a roster, but then there's like a whole genre of like, it's not a roster. It's just the waiting list. Like they're in the waiting room because there's literally, babe, babe. And you know this about some people. I still get messages from people I dated before you being like, oh, you're still married.

I'm just saying. So I'm just saying she must have had that type of situation with the Duke of Normandy. Like he must have been like a long lost lover and he was just waiting. He was just like, Oh my,

He was waiting for his moment to pull up, to slide in. So this guy, Henry, is the grandson of the King of England, Henry I. Henry Plantagenet had the titles of Count of Anjou and Duke of Normandy. And in 1154, he became King Henry II of England, uniting the country, Normandy, and West France all under his rule.

Here's the thing you need to know. Eleanor, of course, by marrying him, became Queen of England. And over the next 13 years, you know what happened? What? She had three daughters and five sons in 13 years. That is eight children in 13 years. It took 15 years to have two children.

She must have liked this one. Yeah, she was not infertile by any means. She just didn't like her man. She just didn't like her man. And her man apparently didn't like her and didn't want to do things to make children. Because I have a feeling that if he just stuck it in, she would start popping out twins. Oh my God. Yeah. Three of those sons actually ended up becoming kings of England.

Yeah. At the same time? Yeah. So keep this in mind. No, not at the same time. Successively. Successively. So I want you to keep this in mind here. Do me a favor and look up the Kingdom of England with Eleanor of Aquitaine. Look at the map of it. If you go for anyone listening to this episode right now and check this out, England owned more of France than actual France did at this time.

Because of this freaking divorce. This is this is why they say it was the most expensive divorce in history because the majority of the country of France was lost in the divorce. Oh, wow. That's funny. That's it.

So the thing is, her story isn't just like all good tidings, though. It gets a little bit more complicated. Her son was also called Henry. He has a major rift within the royal family and organizes a revolt against his father in 1173 because he wants more power. He ends up getting the support of some of his brothers and also everything.

Eleanor, who I guess has a falling out with the king and then goes on to support her son in a revolt against the monarch, but it fails. And King Henry II punishes her for taking part in this revolt by putting her under house arrest for 16 years.

She then doesn't get released until 1889 when Henry II dies and their son, Richard I, ascends the throne. And this is the guy who would be Richard the Lionheart. That's where that whole story comes into play. Like her son is Richard the Lionheart, the guy who hated England so much that he said that he would have sold it if he could have. He was French through and through. So the thing is, when I say that he hated England, he spent decades.

Almost none of his life in it. And he instead left his mother as regent and actual controller of the land while it is that he went off gallivanting and crusading. He was truly a warrior and leader. He was. He just wasn't a king of England, basically, because he didn't give a shit about in the first place. She was the one who actually was the power and in charge of everything.

Ultimately, Richard would end up dying in 1199 after getting hit in the shoulder with a crossbow and he passed away in his mother's arms. So she held her son as he died. In 1202, with her son John on the English throne, she at this point was old enough that she just wanted to retire from public life. She became a nun at the Font de Vraud Abbey in France, where she would die two years later. Ironically, she outlived all but two of her children.

Every single child she had, because remember, she had 10 children. Only two of them outlived her. She saw eight of her 10 children die. And although records are not precise, she was estimated to be about 82 years old, which is very old for the time. And so, yeah, she lived a very full life.

These are the stories that I kind of wanted to talk about. There's other little tidings that we can really give here at the end, like divorce in a more general sense during the time. We focused largely on England and France here, but there were more regional variations of divorce. Like in some areas of Germany and Scandinavia, divorce was more common, like the places that would be further away from the papacy, so there wasn't as much influence. And additionally, the practice of divorce by combat was mentioned multiple times in medieval texts where marriage disputes could

could be settled through combat.

I saw something that was like, it wasn't what we think. Yes, exactly. It's a little bit more complex. This is depicted in one book, Hans Tollhofer's Fectbook, which is the fencing book of 1467, which talks about a judicial duel where a husband and wife would fight to determine the outcome of their dispute with one another. And the husband would stand in a pit with one arm tied behind his back while the wife could move freely and use a bag of rocks as a weapon.

and hit him because, you know, they had to try and make it even between the two. We should do that for fun. Not for divorce, just for fun. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're in on your act. This this practice, this practice, as you said, it wasn't common. It's just more of like one of those famous anecdotes of history of like, hey, at this certain place at this time, this is something that did happen. But more importantly, there was actually a time of the year where divorce did seem to be more common. Can you guess when that was?

Let me ask you this. Yes. Without looking. What is arguably for families and married couples the most stressful time of the year? Winter?

Mm-hmm. Why? Christmas? Merry Christmas. Too much is happening at Christmas? January, even back in the medieval period, was seen as basically divorce season. Why? In York, like in medieval England, there were court records that show the number of marital disputes that they received would spike in January, post-Christmas, because all the family and the activities and everything that would go down

Heading to Christmas, even though it's very different from Christmas nowadays, obviously. But the build up and lead to Christmas and then the fallout and what would come afterwards was a big stressor for families. So they saw a big uptick in marital disputes, not divorces per se, but marital disputes that could end in divorce in January. Yeah.

Well, my friends, that is the end of today's episode. Again, we pretty much focused on just a couple key cases, but I thought that it was really funny. I enjoyed that. We still have to get to Null-Fault Divorce. I know. From here. I know, we do. It is a quest. But luckily, in this case, when we talk about this, we're talking about different things, not just like, oh yeah, here's a nine-part episode or a nine-part series on the French Revolution with the Crusades. Yeah. This is talking about more varied things, and I think it's enjoyable for people because last one was more like,

the actual technicalities and legality of divorce. Whereas here it was, let's talk about some funny ass stories of shit that went down and the drama and tea. Anyway, thank you all for listening. I appreciate it. We will see you all next time. Goodbye, my friends. Bye. I'm so sleepy.

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