S1 Ep17: Episode 17: Eighth Century Sweet Treats and Mysterious Retreats

Episode 17: Eighth Century Sweet Treats and Mysterious Retreats

In this week’s Stuff in the News, Ashley discusses a new database of searchable information about medieval murders…go waste time. Right now! Tracey’s stuff in the news concerns the ongoing plight of the Uighurs in the Xinjiang province of China, where over a million of them are thought to be kept in prison camps making cheap manufactured goods for Western markets. Both of our pieces of stuff this week coincidentally ended up being from our bailiwick period - the eighth century. Ashley introduces us to an Aztec statue of a merchant holding a cocoa pod, and we talk about chocolate with a lot of glee and giggles. Tracey’s piece of stuff is a clay alien mothman door knocker, not really, but that’s what it looks like. It is from a very remote, very mysterious Siberian island, where a complex was built taking up almost the entirety of the island's surface and immediately abandoned before occupation. The mystery is solved…but no spoilers here!

Ashley’s Stuff in the News:

Isabella Kwai, “Who Killed the Innkeeper with a Sword in 1315?” New York Times, November 2, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/02/world/europe/historical-murder-map-england.html?searchResultPosition=1.

Medieval Murder Maps, University of Cambridge, accessed November 5, 2023, https://medievalmurdermap.co.uk/.

Slave Voyages Database, Slave Voyages Consortium, accessed November 5, 2023, https://www.slavevoyages.org/.

Tracey’s Stuff in the News:

Joel Gunter, “China has created a hellscape in Xinjiang. Amnesty report says,” BBC, June 10, 202. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-57386625

Ted Regencia, “What you should know about China’s minority Uighurs,” Al Jazeera, July 8, 202. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/7/8/uighurs-timeline

Lily Kuo, “Chinese foreign minister is in Washington. This counts as progress.” Washington Post, October 26, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/26/china-united-states-wang-yi-washington/

Sheridan Prasso, “Temu sells products in US linked to forced labor in China’s Uighur region, Analysis shows,” Bloomberg, July 13, 2022. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-13/temu-sells-products-in-us-linked-to-forced-labor-in-china-s-uyghur-region

“China/Uyghurs,” Jewish World Watch. https://jww.org/site/uyghurs-china/

Michael Walsh, “China’s still building detention camps in Xinjiang - and they're getting bigger,” Australian Broadcasting Corporation, September 24, 2020. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-09-24/china-building-bigger-uyghur-detention-camps-in-xinjiang/12693338


Ashley’s Piece of Stuff:

“Man Carrying a Cacao Pod,” Brooklyn Museum, accessed November 5, 2023, https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/50010.

MIT Laboratory for Chocolate Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, accessed November 5, 2023, https://chocolate.mit.edu/.

John Oliver, “Last Week Tonight: Chocolate,” HBO, October 30, 2023, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwHMDjc7qJ8.

Cook, L. Russell and R. Paul Singh. "Cocoa." Encyclopedia Britannica, October 28, 2023. https://www.britannica.com/topic/cocoa-food.

Watson, Traci. “Earliest Evidence of Chocolate in North America,” Science, January 22, 2013, https://www.science.org/content/article/earliest-evidence-chocolate-north-america.

Washburn, Dorothy K., William N. Washburn, and Petia A. Shipkova. “Cacao Consumption during the 8th Century at Alkali Ridge, Southeastern Utah.” Journal of Archaeological Science 40, no. 4 (2013): 2007-13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2012.12.017.

Tracey’s Piece of Stuff:

Markus Milligan, “Por-Bazhyn - The Mysterious Island Fortress in Siberia,” Heritage Daily, March 21, 2021. https://www.heritagedaily.com/2021/03/por-bazhyn-the-mysterious-island-fortress-in-siberia/138434

“Radiocarbon Dating Pins Construction of Por-Bajin Island Fortress to 777AD,” Ancient Origins. June 9, 2020 https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/por-bajin-0013834

Lauren Dillion, “What was Por-Bazhyn and Why was it Built?” Historic Mysteries, July 8, 2022.
https://www.historicmysteries.com/por-bazhyn/

Qingyuan Zhang et al, “Modeling cosmic radiation events in the tree ring radiocarbon record,” Proceedings of the Royal Society, October 26, 2022. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspa.2022.0497

“Miyake Event,” Wikipedia. Accessed November 11, 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miyake_event

A.V. Panin et al, “Radio-carbon based approach capable of subannual precision resolves the origins of the site of Por-Bajin,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (117), June 2020. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342040721_Radiocarbon-based_approach_capable_of_subannual_precision_resolves_the_origins_of_the_site_of_Por-Bajin/citations