⁠⁠⁠⁠Help keep our podcast going by contributing to our Patreon! When we think of large Roman slave rebellions, we usually think of Spartacus. But what if we told you that Spartacus was only the third in a 30-year cycle of slave rebellions that happened twice before?

The wars that came before Spartacus were larger, more all-encompassing, and maybe more violent—sweeping up hundreds of thousands of people before the rebellions were done. And their leaders—one a very salty birthday magician, the other a skilled astrologer —were just as epic.  

We’re on hiatus until April 9. Until then, enjoy our episodes on the First and Second Servile Wars, all in one place.

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Hundreds of years before European contact, the biggest city in North America was located along the Mississippi River. At its peak, perhaps 15,000 people lived there—and over 30,000 in the surrounding suburbs. Today, we call it Cahokia.

Nobody knows what the original name of this city was. But there was a time when everybody knew its name—from the Great Lakes to the Eastern Seaboard, and from the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico. What was that name, and why was it lost to time and memory? That’s just one of the many mysteries of Cahokia.

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We're on hiatus until April 9. Until then, please enjoy our entire Boudicca series, all in one place. 

The story of Boudicca’s revolt is as epic as you can get. It’s got murder and pillage, Romans behaving badly, cities on fire, and a layer of destruction that was scorched into the earth. But it's also the story of a people on a precipice of great change.

Who was Boudicca? Who was this iron-age warrior queen who stood up to the Romans—and whose name was so revered and feared that stories of her are still being spun almost 2,000 years later? In these episodes, we’re going to find out.

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It is the End of Season 14--a brief but intense season! Big changes have come in our lives over the past year, and in this episode we take you behind the scenes and discuss the past year and our upcoming plans!

Find Jenny's book, ⁠Enemy of My Dreams⁠, Here! (And preorder the sequel, Game of Thieves!)

Get Genn's most recent book, the ⁠Official Lore Olympus Cookbook⁠, here!

Find our book Women of Myth here!

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This podcast is a member of Airwave Media podcast network. Want to advertise on our show? Please direct advertising inquiries to [email protected].

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Janus is the two-faced god of the Roman pantheon. He was the god of beginnings and endings, of dual natures, of passageways and passage through time. He’s the god of thresholds and doorways and gates, and the god of change, both concrete and abstract. He’s constantly in motion; he’s the god who’s always just passing through.

Janus may not be very well-known. But in his time, he was considered one of the most important gods—perhaps more important than Jupiter himself. Today, we’re going to tell you all about him.

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Wish you had a holiday all about feasting, drinking, the upending of the social order, blood sacrifices, the harvest, pranks, novelty gifts, honouring a god who devoured his kids, and the returning sun? Don’t we all??? Welcome to Saturnalia.

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This year, we decided that the holiday season wouldn’t be complete without a mythological foray into one of the most famous characters of the season: The Krampus.

And some of you might be saying: wait a minute, Krampus isn’t ancient; he’s modern. Also, everyone knows about Krampus, the festive demon of Christmas. Why are you covering this well-trodden topic?

Wait until you hear the wild things we uncovered about him and his history, and then make your judgements about how old and well-trodden this topic is.

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What do you know about Yule? Maybe a lot. The holiday is widely celebrated in Scandinavian countries, and it's an important part of Wiccan and Pagan tradition. But for many of us, the version that's come down through history is strongly associated with Christmas--and heavily sanitized.

When we scratched the surface, however, we found that the origins of Yule were older and darker and weirder than we ever imagined.

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Ah, Christmas—it's a time of cheer, of gift-giving and generosity; and a time to eat yer babies.

This year, we’re focusing on two different cannibalistic monsters from Christmas folklore: Père Fouettard and Hans Trapp. Because it turns out that child cannibalism really is the reason for the season—and perhaps Santa Claus is the biggest cannibal of all.

What is Santa hiding under those jolly cheeks and that big white beard? Strap in, pour yourself your favorite holiday beverage, and get ready for a wild ride into the dark side of Christmas.

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This podcast is a member of Airwave Media podcast network. Want to advertise on our show? Please direct advertising inquiries to [email protected].

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For thousands of years, horses have been essential to human civilization from warfare to trade and empire-building. All over the world, people have captured horses, tamed horses, mythologized horses, and trained them to be ideal companions in the project of human advancement.

How has the relationship between human and horse changed over time? When did people start treating their horses as individuals and companions, rather than just livestock? How far back does the human-horse partnership go, and are there any truly wild horses left in the world today?

Today we’re joined by David Chaffetz, author of Raiders, Rulers, and Traders: The Horse and the Rise of Empires, to answer some of these questions.

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In our last episode, we detailed the rise of the Beast of the Gevaudan, some of its most gruesome attacks, and the doomed efforts of professional hunters to take it down. In this one, we’ll discuss how the Beast finally died—and the theories that arose after its death about what exactly just happened in the Gevaudan.

 The thing is, even with a body—and a detailed autopsy—we’re still not sure what the Beast of the Gevaudan was. Theories and legends abound, from practical to mythological. In this episode, we unpack it all and try to come to a conclusion.

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