- 4 hours ago
First broadcast 6th December 2013.
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Sue Perkins
Richard Coles (as Rev Richard Coles)
Victoria Coren Mitchell
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Sue Perkins
Richard Coles (as Rev Richard Coles)
Victoria Coren Mitchell
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00Good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, and welcome to QI, where tonight we'll be
00:06sorting out the knights from the knaves. Strapping on the breastplate of interestingness, we have a goodly knight, Sue Perkins.
00:18A knight to remember, Victoria Coran. A very platter, gentle priest, the Reverend Richard Coles. And the long, dark knight
00:37of the soul, Alan Davies.
00:43And, er, to knightly noises all come from knaves. Sue goes...
00:53Lovely, then, Victoria goes...
01:02Richard goes...
01:06And Alan goes...
01:08Fruity, fruity...
01:09Fruity, fruity...
01:12Fruity, fruity...
01:13Fruity, fruity...
01:15So...
01:15Fruity, fruity...
01:16Yes, sir...
01:18Fruity, fruity...
01:20Fruity, fruity...
01:21Fruity, fruity...
01:21Fruity, fruity...
01:21Fruity, fruity...
01:22Fruity, fruity...
01:23You have been warned.
01:25Let's head straight to the lists. Why was the black prince so called?
01:32Reverend Richard.
01:33Well, if my Lady Bird Book of Princes is to be trusted, it's because he had black armour.
01:39Aye!
01:41So one of the things where the inestimable Lady Bird series has let you down.
01:45There is...
01:46Is it like Reservoir Dogs, where basically they weren't allowed to use their first names and they've got to sign
01:49it.
01:49So you're the black knight, you're the white knight, you're the orange knight, you're the pink knight.
01:52Why do I have to be the pink knight?
01:53I don't want to be the pink knight.
01:55You might as well be, Fruity.
01:58Yes.
01:58Was he black?
02:00No.
02:03Oddly enough, his mother was perhaps of Moorish descent.
02:10Oh.
02:10Philippa of Hainault, which is a tube line, isn't it?
02:13Hainault is very near where I grew up.
02:15Oh, there you are.
02:16No, anal.
02:17Anal.
02:17Do you like anal?
02:19Anal.
02:20Silly.
02:22Is anal good?
02:24It's...
02:26What happened?
02:27I don't know.
02:27Did something happen there?
02:30I...
02:32I find, at the end of every tube line, you do get a good answer.
02:37I think it calls to me to rescue us somehow.
02:39Yes, I think you should, yes.
02:41Did you know that the oldest British door comes from Hainault?
02:44No!
02:45Well, the wood is in Westminster Abbey.
02:47It's a door which connects a cloister to the abbey and the canons of Westminster that live behind it.
02:52And they dated their door and they found that the wood it was made from was growing in Hainault in
02:58the 10th century.
03:00Wow!
03:01Are you proud?
03:02I am very proud of the door.
03:05The sign painters are getting busy right now, going home of the oldest door.
03:09It's a reason to get off at Hainault, finally.
03:12It's the wood that grew there a thousand years ago.
03:15Well, Philippa of Hainault was perhaps of Moorish descent, so that may be the reason he was called the Black
03:20Prince.
03:21We just don't know.
03:21I'm wondering, do you think the Black Prince might have been called the Black Prince because his sins were as
03:26black as pitch?
03:27Yes.
03:28I mean, although he was known as the master of chivalry, he almost destroyed the entire population of Limoges and
03:33Cannes.
03:34Yeah.
03:34He doesn't look like he's capable of it.
03:36No, he doesn't, does he?
03:37I know a fact about the Black Prince.
03:39You do?
03:39I don't know if it's definitely a fact, but this is something my husband told me.
03:43David Mitchell told you something and you believed it.
03:48You know those sort of early dates when you're just talking about, you know, whether you were happy at school
03:53and heraldry?
03:54Oh, I thought you meant 30 years.
03:57Is this true that, wait now, he stole something off a corpse?
04:01I just, I remember the romance of the moment.
04:03I'm thinking of Ich Deen.
04:06Yes, Ich Deen, which the Prince of Wales wears now.
04:08The Prince of Bohemia, yeah.
04:09That was stolen by the Black Prince off a corpse on a battlefield.
04:12That's right.
04:13And it was the feathers as well, the three feathers that are the symbol of the Prince of Wales.
04:17And it was the King of Bohemia.
04:19And he had a very serious disability, but he still rode into battle.
04:23He was blind.
04:25Okay.
04:26That explain is appalling make-up.
04:30That was the King of Bohemia who went into battle against him.
04:33Ah.
04:34And he defeated him and took his colours, which were the three Prince of Wales feathers,
04:38and the motto, I serve Ich Deen.
04:41Do you know, stealing from dead people was quite a big...
04:43Do you know St Hugh of Lincoln, the great St Hugh of Lincoln?
04:46I think we're all pretty much, yeah, up to speed on St Hugh of Lincoln.
04:50Yeah.
04:50He was one of the great saints of the Middle Ages, but he was staying with some monk friends.
04:55Oh, yeah.
04:56And they had, they had the relic, the preserved arm of Mary Magdalene.
05:00And St Hugh...
05:01I thought I'd got that!
05:02You got the other one!
05:0325 quid I paid for that!
05:05Yeah, and?
05:06But, well, he bent down to venerate it, and while he was down there, he bit off her finger.
05:10It's true!
05:11It's true, you took it back to...
05:12When you say, it's true, I happen to know you've written a book on rather obscure saints.
05:17I have, yes.
05:17And are you suggesting that everything about all of them is true?
05:20I'm suggesting that very little about them is true.
05:23The biting off the finger of Mary Magdalene is true.
05:27His friendship with a swan is doubtful.
05:29But the biting off a finger is...
05:31When you say friendship with a swan, are you being euphemistic about...
05:33No, his best friend was a swan.
05:36And it's depicted in one of his symbolism in his portraits is that he walks around with a swan.
05:42But if you look at Lincoln Cathedral, it has a vault which is all wonky, which he built, which is
05:46said to suggest the flight of a swan's wing.
05:49That's great if builders do something wrong.
05:51They can just say, I'm trying to evoke a swan's wing.
05:54Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
05:56That's right.
05:56Yeah, no, that is a symbol of me being crap at building.
06:01We did bite off the finger.
06:03There was a huge, huge trade in bitten off relics.
06:06Right.
06:06Yeah, you weren't on the ecclesiastical map until you had a good dead bit of someone.
06:11So he was notorious for stuffing his mouth with bitten off members of one kind.
06:17The Black Prince, of course, was, as I say, the leader of chivalry.
06:20And chivalry was all about jousting.
06:22So can you tell me anything about jousting?
06:24What the rules were of jousting?
06:26In the lists, as they were called.
06:28Er, you had to...
06:29Now, there's the big, massive cotton bud and you have to...
06:32Hit the shield, isn't it?
06:33The cotton bud, yes.
06:34You have to...
06:34You get a point if you hit their shield or their breastplate.
06:37You're absolutely right.
06:38I mean, the rules vary, but one set of rules we have is that you win the joust if you
06:42get three points.
06:43That's how we did it in Croydon.
06:44That's quite specific.
06:46You get three points and you get a point for knocking someone straight on the breastplate so that it shatters
06:50the lance.
06:51Oh.
06:51A glancing blow doesn't count.
06:53But in the dinner show at the Excalibur Casino in Las Vegas, the winner is the last one to jump
06:58off their horse.
07:00Do they really have that?
07:01Yes, it's a brilliant show because they've got King Arthur and he fights against his long-lost son, Prince Christopher.
07:09I think the people that put the show together don't know that there's other people in the story apart from
07:14King Arthur.
07:15They thought, well, we can't have a story. There only seems to be one person in the story, so we'll
07:19just invent Prince Christopher.
07:21Christopher?
07:21Yeah, and he wins because he gets off his horse last and then you all have a big piece of
07:25chicken.
07:25But there's no Game of Thrones with those noises and heads coming off and blood spurting out.
07:31Well, no heads coming off. I mean, they're real people, so...
07:33Oh, right.
07:34You can do that. There are ways of doing that.
07:36Do you have to dress as a wench?
07:37You say, have to.
07:40I think I've got the gear, I'm just waiting.
07:42Yeah, they give you some plaits to put on.
07:44It's just a bit Bavarian.
07:46It's quite fake.
07:47This is the Excalibur English-themed Casino.
07:49Right.
07:50It's sort of Harry Potter, Robin Hood, King Arthur and the Queen, all roughly the same vintage.
07:57It's true.
07:58You can find them to be in all of the same shop.
08:00How many people are sitting down for dinner at this event?
08:02Oh, at 200?
08:04Oh, yeah, that's huge.
08:04It's much like this room, actually.
08:06If Richard and I now gallop towards each other on horseback with lances, as I very much hope
08:10we will later, that's exactly what it would be like.
08:13It's just the people who have buckets of chicken.
08:15Don't they get a bit, I mean, getting a horse into a casino is a fairly elaborate thing,
08:19isn't it?
08:20They're like tigers.
08:22They have Siegfried and Roy, but they're white horses.
08:24They do, I mean, they don't really have Siegfried and Roy anymore.
08:25No, they got bitten.
08:26They did, didn't they?
08:27There was a terrible mauling.
08:28Yes.
08:29And actually, I really respected Siegfried and Roy a lot more after that, because for
08:33years people thought they were all cheesy and mainstream, and then one of them had his
08:35head bitten off by a tiger.
08:36It showed that every night they were actually taking a risk.
08:39They really were.
08:40The vicar of Stiffke, he was bitten by a lion.
08:43He was, Roger something or other.
08:45Harold Davidson, I think it was, yeah.
08:46You're right.
08:49He was in the 30s, I think it was.
08:50He was the vicar of Stiffke, but he used to try and reform prostitutes in a very, what
08:54we'd say, a hands-on ministry kind of way.
08:58That's what a prostitute needs, really.
09:00Yeah.
09:00Just a bit more prostituting.
09:02With a goodly hand.
09:03He was tireless in his dedication to his flock, and rather got in the soup.
09:09And he ended up, I'm not kidding, he ended up as a lion tamer.
09:11I think it was Skegness.
09:12It went horribly wrong, and he was bitten by his lion.
09:17Yeah.
09:17And that was the end of the vicar of Stiffke.
09:19Are you sure you're not accidentally recounting the plot of a limerick?
09:25Anyway, so here we are.
09:28Now, what is the first rule of nightclub?
09:31Yeah.
09:33Well...
09:34The first rule of nightclub?
09:38Well...
09:41You don't talk about nightclub.
09:44No way!
09:49Somebody had to.
09:51Well done.
09:53Well, yeah, exactly.
09:54Fell on my sword.
09:55Seems appropriate.
09:56It was, exactly.
09:57Is it an existing club, or a club from the olden times?
10:00No, it's a very, very...
10:00It's a very olden times club of knights.
10:03The most famous group of knights.
10:05Templar.
10:06The Knights Templar.
10:08There are still people who think they still exist,
10:09and, you know, the sort of Dan Brownie kind of way.
10:11But they actually folded up in 1314.
10:14But they were very powerful.
10:16It was after the first crusade they were formed in Jerusalem.
10:18And they were allowed to do almost anything.
10:20The law didn't apply to them in Jerusalem,
10:22which annoyed a lot of other people,
10:23but there were certain things they weren't allowed to do.
10:25They weren't allowed to breed ferrets.
10:29To breed ferrets?
10:30Oh.
10:31Do you know anything else you know about the...
10:32Well, you know they look like that.
10:33Chew gum.
10:34I know about ley lines.
10:36Go on then.
10:37They made them.
10:38They made...
10:38You see, you've been reading these stupid books.
10:42Apparently, they are responsible for laying ley lines.
10:46Well...
10:46No.
10:47They know where they are, anyway.
10:48Yes, they do.
10:48They've got them all hidden.
10:49No sex?
10:51Well...
10:52Yeah, they were allowed to marry,
10:53but if they married they weren't allowed to wear the white and red uniform.
10:56There was no hunting except lions.
10:59Quite specific.
11:00That would actually be a brilliant rule for now.
11:02Would it?
11:03There's so much debate about whether you should hunt or not.
11:05Please, everyone.
11:05Okay, hunting is allowed.
11:06But only lions.
11:09That's very true.
11:10There is only one squire each.
11:12No telling tales.
11:13No lockable purses.
11:15Oh.
11:15Yeah.
11:16I suppose they have to show their trust or something like that.
11:18But their last and most important rule was no kissing.
11:21Oh.
11:22Yeah.
11:22Lastly, we held it dangerous to all religion to gaze too much on the countenance of women.
11:26And therefore, no brother shall presume to kiss neither widow nor virgin nor mother nor sister nor aunt nor any
11:31other woman.
11:32But anal's alright.
11:36Well...
11:41It's very funny you should say that.
11:43Because one of the reasons they were closed down is there was a charge against them.
11:47Too much buggery.
11:48Yeah.
11:49There was a charge against them.
12:01The accusation was they kissed one another on the mouth, on the navel, the bare belly, the anus, or the
12:10backbone.
12:10Well, they were thorough.
12:11They weren't.
12:11They weren't.
12:14They weren't.
12:16They weren't.
12:16They weren't.
12:17They weren't.
12:18They weren't.
12:19They weren't coming out of his arse.
12:22I'll have a look.
12:24Right, that's enough.
12:25That's enough, Templars.
12:28Did you know that the Temple Church in London, which was founded by the Knights Templar,
12:33and there's still some Knights Templar lying around.
12:35Dead ones.
12:35There's a unique title for if you're the priest in charge there.
12:38You're the Reverend and Valiant Master of the Temple.
12:42Oh, that's very good.
12:43It sounds like something from a Star Wars.
12:45The Reverend and Valiant.
12:45The Reverend and Valiant Master of the Temple.
12:47In that picture is he going, show me on the cross where he kissed you?
12:55APPLAUSE
13:00You've done that.
13:01Yes, thanks.
13:02But my arms are much too long.
13:05Yes.
13:05I'm not going to fit on this.
13:07Yes.
13:07You're going to nail me against the air.
13:11It's true.
13:11You're going to have to just nail my ears to it.
13:14There you go.
13:15Kissing, of course, has long been a controversial thing.
13:18And in the 20th century, there were anti-kissing leagues.
13:22Really?
13:23What do you think they objected to?
13:24There you are.
13:25Transmission of disease?
13:27Yes, you're right.
13:27It was a hygiene issue.
13:29Oh.
13:29I read a signal so that when trains first began, women travelling on their own in capacity
13:33were supposed to put pins in their mouths, lest when they went through a tunnel someone
13:37tried to kiss them.
13:39It's hilarious.
13:40It's a nail gun there, man.
13:42A mouse full of pins.
13:42With a pin facing outwards.
13:44So someone just went,
13:44I have to.
13:46They went into a rude surprise.
13:49Yeah.
13:49I do that.
13:50In tunnels.
13:51Just in case.
13:52I can set myself warm.
13:54I keep a pin in my anus.
13:59Oh, dear.
14:00Yeah.
14:00In case there aren't any night's temper.
14:02Temper.
14:02Oh, you bad person.
14:06Okay, moving on.
14:07What makes you think this knight is a total bastard?
14:11Oh, he looks like a mean hat.
14:13His hat.
14:14Oh.
14:14Not his hat.
14:15Richard.
14:16He's got a diagonal white stripe across his lions, which means he's been naughty.
14:21No, he hasn't been naughty at all.
14:23Is he?
14:23Oh, is he legitimate?
14:24Has his father been naughty?
14:25His father's been naughty.
14:26It's what's known as the bend sinister.
14:30Oh, we've all had bend sinister.
14:32It starts at the bottom left and goes up to the top right, which can indicate you are
14:37a bastard.
14:37And in his case, there's more information just on that simple coat of arms.
14:41The three lions.
14:42Uh, he's...
14:43No, he's not the bastard son of...
14:45Is that Wayne Rooney?
14:48That's what he told me in the end of the day.
14:51It's the red significance.
14:52It's the royal family.
14:53It's a royal coat of arms.
14:54So he's a royal bastard.
14:55So he's a Fitz John or something.
14:57A Fitz...
14:57Fitz...
14:58Fitz...
14:58Fitz Roy.
15:00Fitz Roy.
15:01His name would be Fitz Roy.
15:03Fitz is the son of and Roy Roy is king.
15:05And, um, one particular king had five Fitz Roys from his mistress.
15:12Uh...
15:13Who would that be?
15:14One of the Georges?
15:15No.
15:16Go back a bit.
15:16Rewind.
15:18Charles II.
15:19Henry VII.
15:20No, Charles II.
15:21We got there.
15:21We got there without you.
15:23Charles II.
15:23Nats and kings.
15:25Very good.
15:26She was called Barbara Palmer and she bought him five...
15:29Babs.
15:29Five Babs Palmer.
15:31She was a Babs, didn't I?
15:32She would have been a Babs, I suspect.
15:34Queen Babs.
15:34Yeah.
15:35He fixed me up again.
15:36He fixed me up.
15:37We have a Henry.
15:42If the one with the stripe then marries and has a legitimate son, can they take the stripe away?
15:48That would be very good.
15:49No, I think you keep it, I think, in your coat of arms.
15:50In fact, there are certain things which indicate something very extraordinary about your shield.
15:54What do you think they are?
15:56Er, okay.
15:57They have a particular meaning.
15:59This line?
16:00Yeah.
16:01Is it visible panty line?
16:07That's terrible.
16:09It's really, they get terrible VPL.
16:11It's not visible panty line.
16:13It's the colours actually are indicative of...
16:16Status?
16:17Sin.
16:18Of a mistake, an error.
16:20They're known as abatements.
16:22It's also as stains, as in a stain on the family name, or a stain on the escutcheon.
16:26So, er, what can stain be?
16:28It's got to be very serious, it's going on your coat of arms.
16:30I know.
16:31Well, the first is called the point of champagne tenet, and it's for killing a prisoner who
16:35has demanded quarter or mercy.
16:38Which is really ungentlemanly.
16:40Yeah.
16:40And how would anybody know that you'd done that?
16:42Well, I suppose you'd have to have a witness.
16:43It's a very good point.
16:44Well, they'd have to have something on their own shield, wouldn't they?
16:46Witnessing someone killing someone who's asked for quarter, you've got to have something
16:50on the shield.
16:50With...
16:50And not intervening.
16:51And not intervening.
16:52Yeah, you're right.
16:53But how would you know that they'd done that?
16:55Oh, don't know!
16:57They'd definitely need something on the shield.
17:00Yeah, well, they'd get whistleblower, they'd have massive whistles and say, you'd grasp
17:03me up.
17:04And then your shield would just be full of stuff.
17:06A shield within a shield within a...
17:08Yeah.
17:08Well, you don't clean the toilet properly.
17:10Well, you've got a toilet brush, you don't do it, you get one of those.
17:12I mean, it's...
17:13It's a bit like...
17:14It's a bit like points on a driving license, isn't it?
17:16It is!
17:17It's the points on the shield.
17:19Yeah.
17:19Exactly.
17:20And the next one, here, which we'll have a look at.
17:23Needs dusting.
17:25And this is called the Delft Tenet, and that's for issuing a challenge and then bottling
17:29out.
17:30Coward.
17:31Yeah.
17:31It's a big old yellow smudge on that.
17:33Exactly.
17:33Very much a smudge on the clotheslines.
17:35And then we have a gusset, a gusset-sanguine sinister.
17:38A gusset-sanguine?
17:40Yeah.
17:40On a night, really?
17:43Absurd, isn't it?
17:44Gusset-sanguine.
17:45Well, the sanguine is the colour.
17:46It's blood colour.
17:47Okay.
17:47It's for being drunk.
17:49And you have a gusset-sanguine Dexter.
17:52On the right, that's a big...
17:55Being an adulterer.
17:56Oh, right.
17:57Okay.
17:57And there you are.
17:57Now we have one that you have to guess.
17:59So tell me what this is.
18:01You're a drunken adulterer.
18:03There you are, you see?
18:04Points for listening.
18:06So that's the whole world of heraldry.
18:08It's sort of a nicer design for the drunken adulterer.
18:11It is, isn't it?
18:12I feel like it's too rewarding.
18:13Is it two gussets or a wine glass?
18:17Well, that's the choice facing the drunken adulterer, isn't it?
18:19Yes, exactly.
18:20Exactly.
18:20I feel like they knew what they were doing.
18:29Did you know that if you're a clergyman, you can't have a helmet on your coat of arms?
18:34Oh, thank God.
18:35Phew.
18:38You can't have a helmet because you can't be in a...
18:40No, you can't do anything which is...
18:41Did you know that if you're a clergyman, if you go to a black-tie do, you can't have a
18:45stripe down your trousers?
18:46No.
18:47No, because it's a military insignia.
18:49Oh.
18:49And you can't have that.
18:50And you can't have a helmet because it's a martial sign.
18:53So you have to have this sort of...
18:55It's a lovely sort of...
18:56Remember Bill and Ben?
18:57Yes.
18:57It's like that.
18:58It's called a galero.
18:59Oh, fantastic.
19:00And it's black if you're a priest and red if you're a cardinal.
19:02And if you're the Pope, you get a pointy one with three tiaras.
19:06Oh!
19:06Oh!
19:07I want to be Pope.
19:10They think you'd look good in that.
19:12Oh, you've got to have it.
19:13Who decides?
19:14There are people you apply to and they decide, isn't it, the College of Arms?
19:18Yeah.
19:18And you have to pay.
19:19Yeah, but how do you become one of the people who decide?
19:21How do you become a herald?
19:22If you go to Garter Day at Windsor Castle, they turn out for that.
19:27I need to see photos of Garter Day.
19:30It's very exciting because it's a big do and if they install new knights of the Garter Day, you're in
19:35there for hours.
19:36Then you hear sort of tramping from miles away.
19:38Then all of a sudden the Beefeaters come in.
19:39All done up.
19:41And then you get the College of Heralds coming in there.
19:42It's like a gay tsunami.
19:45And they're carrying things.
19:46They have special big t-shirts.
19:48Saying war, what is it good for?
19:52So that's our knights with their shields.
19:56You also find knights on a chessboard, of course.
19:58So what I want to know is this very strange conundrum.
20:01What's the maximum number of knights you can have on a chessboard, such that none of them can take another
20:05one?
20:05Oh, multiples of eight.
20:07I'll give you, you can try it out.
20:09Look, none, six...
20:11Maximum number.
20:13What you have to do is understand what a knight's move is.
20:15Steven, I don't understand the question.
20:17It's the maximum...
20:19It's the maximum number of knights you would have on a chessboard, such that none can take the other.
20:24Have you noticed something in common with the ones you're putting down?
20:27They're all the same.
20:28Same...
20:29Okay, the same colour, so...
20:30Yes, because a knight move must take a different colour.
20:33Oh.
20:33So 32.
20:3432 is the right answer!
20:35Oh.
20:35It's really very simple when you think about it, isn't it?
20:40It's one of those things that sounds incredibly complicated that you have to work out for ages, but there you
20:44are.
20:45I still don't understand it at all.
20:47Well, none of these knights can take another knight.
20:50But isn't that rather more knights than we used to?
20:51Yes!
20:54It's a problem, it's not a real chess situation.
20:57It's if you add...
20:58Because they move, because the way they move, which is diagonal and up one, they move to the alternate colour.
21:02Yes.
21:02So if you've got all the knights in the same colour, they cannot take...
21:05Exactly right.
21:06That's how...
21:07In the centre of the board, you're controlling eight different squares there, but they're all the different colour.
21:12The knights on a black square.
21:13So what you have to do is put them all on a black square.
21:15When you move your knight, do you make a little horsey noise?
21:19That's you!
21:20That's so sweet!
21:23And when you move your...
21:24Ah!
21:25Ah!
21:26Bishop!
21:27When you do your...
21:28Hello!
21:30Hello!
21:31Hello!
21:32That's your Bishop!
21:34You're having such trouble!
21:40You're going to trouble from both sides.
21:42Oh, you are awful.
21:43I like you.
21:44You're going to trouble from both sides, I would say.
21:46If the Bishop of Peterborough is watching this evening, you'll have my resignation.
21:52He confirmed me, not the present one.
21:54Oh, which one?
21:55I don't...
21:55Was it Bishop Fever, the rudest bishop in the Church of England?
21:58It could have been.
21:58He just gave me a piece of the host and moved on to the next line.
22:02He gave you a piece of the host?
22:04Yes.
22:04What the hell kind of party was it?
22:07That's what we call a bread and wine as well, you know.
22:10You secret religious you.
22:12I don't know.
22:13It might have been Bishop Westwood.
22:15The Bishop of Peterborough, who interestingly is the father of Tim Westwood, the hip-hop DJ.
22:19Good gracious.
22:20Does he speak like him?
22:23Does he have a particular way of speaking?
22:24Tim Westwood talks like a hip-hop star from the west coast.
22:27Oh, does he?
22:28False American accent.
22:29Very effective.
22:30Ali G is sort of based on Tim Westwood.
22:31Oh, really?
22:32Yeah.
22:32But his father was the Bishop of Peterborough, who was famous for knitting.
22:35For knitting?
22:37For knitting?
22:39Knitting?
22:39He was famous for knitting.
22:40Knitting?
22:41Knitting?
22:54Knitting?
23:05Knitting?
23:06Yeah.
23:07Yeah.
23:08Yeah.
23:15Yeah.
23:16The most part of chess is its limitations.
23:18Yes.
23:18It's all about the strictness.
23:20So you know, but hang on, hang on, Mrs. Poker player, Victoria Corran Mitchell.
23:24Aren't there versions of poker where they kind of introduce wild cards and stuff to kind
23:27of get it, it's the same sort of thing.
23:29Yeah, poker's different.
23:29As Martin Amos once said, in chess, the properties of a bishop are fixed.
23:33In poker, it's all wobbled through the prism of personality.
23:37Well, obviously.
23:38Beautiful quote.
23:39Beautiful quote.
23:39But he was in the joy of...
23:41Although, even chess players will say the best chess move to play is not the best chess
23:44move, it's the move your opponent would least like you to play.
23:47So in that sense, it's very light poker.
23:49Well, anybody who played, so Kasparov for example, will say that the moment he sat down
23:52at the table, you felt beaten.
23:54He was so virile, so big, he had like a, you know, five o'clock shadow at ten in the
23:58morning and he hunched over the morning.
24:00But what nobody ever tried with Kasparov was just grabbing the queen and shouting, I'm
24:03playing fairy chess.
24:07Exactly right.
24:08You can put your boards away now, children.
24:11There you go.
24:1232.
24:13Brilliantly deduced by so brilliant Perkins.
24:16Kasparov wouldn't have liked it if he'd gone...
24:17every time.
24:18No, he wouldn't.
24:19You'd have liked it even less if he did it when he moved in.
24:24That would have been a brilliant strategy.
24:26Every time he moved his night, you know if it was true.
24:30Put him back in the stable.
24:33And if it was very chess, he could go, nay!
24:36Yes, nay!
24:39Bishop, exactly.
24:40Victoria, what was that line, that Martin Amis line again?
24:42Oh, it's beautiful.
24:43In chess, the properties and powers of a bishop are fixed.
24:46In poker, it's wobbled through the prism of personality.
24:50But do you know when he said that, Stephen?
24:52It was after a poker game that you and I and him all played.
24:55Yes, I remember in Wales.
24:56Many years ago.
24:56With the then unknown Ricky Gervais.
24:58Ricky Gervais, who was knocked out, got up and said, what am I supposed to do now?
25:01And you said, there's a shotgun in the drawer.
25:13Very good title for a book.
25:17So, now, name a place where a knight can be buried.
25:21The ground.
25:30You must be astonished to know that isn't true.
25:32Do they have to be buried above the ground?
25:34No, I'm saying that they can be buried, but where can they be buried?
25:37Um, in a tomb.
25:40A vault.
25:41A hole.
25:44A pyramid.
25:45A pyramid.
25:46The fact is, is the moment you are dead, you are no longer a knight.
25:50You're not a knight anymore.
25:52Right.
25:53Because everyone was shouting about how Julius Savile's knight had taken away,
25:56but they'd have had to give it back to him in order to take it away.
25:59You're no longer a member of the order the moment you die.
26:01So, the moment you die, you're not a knight.
26:02So, you can't bury a knight anywhere.
26:04Unless you're very mean and bury them alive.
26:07Do you know who has the record?
26:09For turning down the most knighthoods?
26:12No.
26:12It's L.S. Lowry.
26:14He turned down more honours than anybody else.
26:17Good lord.
26:17Mr. Pinman.
26:18Mr. Stickdroyer.
26:19Max Stickman.
26:19Yeah, yeah.
26:20Alan Bennett certainly turned one down.
26:23Who else do we know?
26:23The art, isn't it, is turning one down so everybody knows.
26:26So everybody knows without you being the one who tells them.
26:29Which I refuse to do.
26:29I turned one down.
26:30Yeah.
26:31We all, that's a very...
26:32I haven't quite grasped this, Alan.
26:35So, A-law.
26:36Oh!
26:38I'll tell you a minute, but if you're a clergyman...
26:41...and you're knighted, you can't call yourself sir.
26:44Whoa!
26:45Unless you are knighted before you're ordained.
26:48And then you can be the reverend sir or lady.
26:50What a swiz?
26:50The thing about you can't be...
26:51Because it's a civil recorder, you can't be...
26:54It's military, didn't you?
26:55Exactly.
26:55You can't do that if you're a vicar.
26:56You can't bear arms.
26:58You can bear legs though, can't you?
27:04So...
27:06There are no dead knights, only dead former knights.
27:09Which knight's luggage included cannabis, bladders, shark intestines, strychnine, chilli pepper, cocaine, heroin and Kendall mint cake?
27:17Yes, Sir Wogan.
27:19Yes, Sir Wogan.
27:19I say to get him through Eurovision, Terry Wogan.
27:24We've got that.
27:26We've got that.
27:28Oh, you've got them all.
27:31When we thought of all the heroic endurance struggles, yes.
27:36Was it Sir Edmund Hillary?
27:38It wasn't Sir Edmund Hillary, although Sir Edmund Hillary did take Kendall mint cake right up the Everest.
27:45Really?
27:46I didn't know that was a serving suggestion.
27:49We're all going to go home and try it now, though.
27:51It was one of the many things that made Kendall mint cake famous, in its day when it was famous.
27:55Perhaps some people view it.
27:56Was it Ranulph Fiennes?
27:57You're in exactly the right area.
27:59Shackleton?
28:00Shackleton.
28:00So, Ernest Shackleton is the answer.
28:02The Antarctic explorer.
28:04It's him in the darker pole of the neck.
28:06Really fun job, isn't it?
28:08The endurance, I mean, was astonishing.
28:10They all look like Captain Birdseye.
28:12They do.
28:13They don't look happy.
28:14I actually can't open his eyes anymore.
28:17Oh, it's true that you used to take strychnine as a tonic.
28:21Yes, that's right.
28:22I've been to Shackleton's hut.
28:23I don't remember what was there.
28:25Well, this was his first aid kit.
28:26It had Isinglass, which is from the swim bladders of sturgeons, for use as a wound dressing.
28:32Tonics of iron and strychnine.
28:33Completely correct, Richard.
28:35And iron and arsenic, which the wrong doses of either could cause horrible lingering deaths.
28:40So we need to get that right.
28:41A colic treatment based on cannabis and chilli pepper.
28:45Ginger carminative, an anti-flatulence preparation.
28:49Um.
28:51Cocaine solution, which was, in fact, it's eye drops.
28:56For what problem?
28:57Well, tired eyes.
28:58It would certainly poke them up.
28:59Let's do it poke them up.
29:00It's actually snow blindness.
29:02Oh.
29:03Chalk and opium against our ears.
29:05Like kale and morphine.
29:07And Kendall mint cake.
29:08Have you ever had Kendall mint cake?
29:09Yeah.
29:09Yeah, it's lovely.
29:10I find it quite plain.
29:12I would have taken a crunch eat.
29:16It's nice to see that picture because it explains what that man gave me at Skippel Airport.
29:21It's a simple mint cake.
29:23If you go to Shackleton's hut, you're followed all the way there by a New Zealand official.
29:28And if you eat anything at all, like a packet of crisps, he walks looking around you to make sure
29:32you haven't dropped any crumbs.
29:33I should hope so.
29:35And is it worth a visit?
29:36Where is Shackleton's hut?
29:37Is it?
29:37It's not...
29:38It's on Antarctica.
29:39It's actually down in...
29:41Where did you go there?
29:42How exciting?
29:4310 or 15 years ago.
29:44But it was a very exciting opportunity to see somewhere I would never normally go.
29:48And was this from New Zealand?
29:50Yes, from New Zealand.
29:51You go up from Christchurch.
29:53I went to an exhibition about Scott in Christchurch.
29:56Yeah.
29:57And they talk about what Amundsen took and a completely different plan.
30:01Yes.
30:02Where Scott's plan was to go with ponies and horses and things.
30:05Amundsen was from Norway and they just went with dogs.
30:0855 dogs, I think on the other hand.
30:09Yeah.
30:10I mean, they were really much better at it.
30:12Dogs can go very far.
30:13Have you ever been dogs there?
30:14I have been.
30:14I have in Wyoming.
30:15It was one of the most thrilling things I've ever done.
30:17Yeah.
30:17How do you know if a friend of mine did that?
30:18And she said that the thing is, is that the dogs can't stop when nature calls.
30:23And that if you get pelted.
30:24Yes, you do.
30:25Pelted by stropping.
30:26I see stropping.
30:27I see stropping.
30:27I see stropping.
30:27I see stropping.
30:29Pebble dashed by huskies.
30:30It's basically husky cat.
30:32Liquid husky cat.
30:33Flying.
30:35What Amundsen's dogs didn't know was that they would be eaten by the men and by the other
30:40dogs.
30:41Is that what happened?
30:42Yeah.
30:42It was very carefully worked out very precisely.
30:44You can't carry all that dog food.
30:46You can't feed all those dogs.
30:48No.
30:48All the way there and all the way back.
30:50This is the program that Paul O'Grady must never make.
30:55For the death of dogs.
30:57I see.
30:59I think it was a bit unkind of Amundsen to put null point under the flesh.
31:04Now to knaves.
31:06What's the best way to stop your car from being stoned?
31:10Never park it.
31:11Just drive it around and around and around and around.
31:15What you've cunningly done is avoid the obvious trap of saying you have a car alarm.
31:19Because it seems that car alarms are worse than useless.
31:21In fact, we know that instinctively, don't we?
31:23Yeah, because you ignore them.
31:24You ignore them.
31:25Yeah.
31:25Exactly.
31:26In fact, not only that.
31:271% of people when asked said that they would actually call the police if they had a car
31:31alarm and 60% said that they would call up to complain about it.
31:35You'd actually make a phone call but not to say that someone's car was being stoned.
31:38Just to say what a bloody nuisance is.
31:39So if that's the worst thing to do, then what's the best thing to do?
31:42Well, put in an old-fashioned lock.
31:43Or have a rubbish car.
31:44Or have a terrible car.
31:46I've got a terrible car with loads of graffiti on it.
31:49Someone drew a penis on the front bonnet.
31:52A friend of mine who's married to a vicar, she came out one morning and found someone who'd
31:56have written Monk Whore.
32:03Extraordinary.
32:04Monk Whore.
32:06And now on BBC One, Monk Whore.
32:09Off screen.
32:11Is Monk Whore.
32:13Did you know that actually Carl Thieving is almost never a female occupation?
32:17That's like a challenge.
32:18Yeah.
32:18Yeah.
32:19Tonight.
32:20The pair of us.
32:22I'm sure you know who that is.
32:24That's Bonnie.
32:25Bonnie.
32:25As in Bonnie and Clyde, yes.
32:27But apparently the confraternity of Carl Thieves don't think women should be allowed.
32:32So if a woman steals a car, they can't set it on.
32:34They go, no, I'm not having it off you.
32:36You don't know what it's about.
32:37So what you're saying is there's very little divide between Carl Thieves and Carl Salesman.
32:43He's a sexist bastion.
32:45I saw this brilliant documentary about crime and they interviewed these two young car criminals
32:49who were in jail.
32:50And they talked about what pride they took in their work and one of them turned to the
32:53camera and said, some car criminals unfortunately give the rest of us a bad name.
32:59Fantastic.
33:00A bit of pride in his work.
33:01Now, explain the effect of Stockholm Syndrome.
33:04Oh, wasn't that when you identify it?
33:08Yes.
33:10But you identify, if you're a victim of kidnap, you identify with your kidnappers and you
33:15sort of become weird friends.
33:17Yeah.
33:17I mean, that is what they say.
33:18What's from the Patty Hearst kidnapping?
33:20Is that where it starts?
33:21No, because she was nothing to do with Stockholm.
33:23There was a 73 kidnapping in Stockholm.
33:27After which it was named.
33:29That's the Stockholm Four.
33:31And they defended the robbers after the event and so on.
33:34Because they become so inured to the system.
33:36Right.
33:36And the most famous one, as you rightly say, was the heiress of William Randolph Hearst,
33:40Patty Hearst, who was kidnapped by a strange group called the Symbionese Liberation Army.
33:46Unusually, unusually for a clergyman of the Church of England, I've had dinner with Patty Hearst.
33:51You have?
33:51Have you?
33:52How was she?
33:53How was she?
33:53She's back to normal.
33:54I didn't know who she was until someone said who she was.
33:56At the time they had coffee, if you wanted to be a vicar.
34:01She'd sort of become a kind of bohemian socialite in Los Angeles in the 1980s when I used to go
34:06there in a previous incarnation.
34:08And I met her one.
34:08And when you were a rock star, a rock god.
34:11Yeah.
34:13And I met her there.
34:15Those sort of dinners that you would go to where everyone would be weirdly famous and have no other reason
34:19to be there at all.
34:20So you'd have Patty Hearst and, I don't know, Andy Warhol and Eddie the Eagle, you know.
34:27Oh, that's the thing you'd want to go to.
34:29Definitely.
34:29Definitely.
34:30But the fact is, it seems to be an aberration.
34:32It's very rare.
34:33Most people, when they're kidnapped, have nothing but feelings of complete hostility towards their captors, as you would expect.
34:39I would feel as a clergyman, sort of bound to sort of...
34:42Are you a clergyman?
34:43I would sort of feel obliged to kind of be nice to them and establish some rapport.
34:47I do understand your point.
34:49Exactly.
34:50Yes.
34:50And people face as good in parts.
34:53Yes, exactly.
34:55So, there was a famous figure in history, one of the most famous in history, who did certainly not have
35:00Stockholm Syndrome,
35:01who was kidnapped by pirates and...
35:04Johnny Depp.
35:05No, he...
35:07This is a great figure in history.
35:09Kidnapped by pirates?
35:10He was kidnapped by pirates, was held hostage and the ransom was paid.
35:13Give us some clues.
35:13What sort of era?
35:14He then pursued them with a small fleet or a number of boats, a flotilla.
35:18Francis Drake?
35:20No.
35:21Raleigh.
35:21Nelson.
35:22Had them all crucified.
35:24Oh!
35:24How is Julius Caesar?
35:25Julius Caesar is the writer.
35:27Yeah.
35:28And the thing is, he told them while he was held hostage, when I get out, I will come back
35:32and I will crucify you.
35:32And they apparently thought it was a joke.
35:36It was a laughing part.
35:38They didn't know their Caesar.
35:41So, tough cookie.
35:42How do you crucify someone if they've got hooks for hands?
35:54They have magnets.
35:55Massive magnets.
35:56Magnets.
35:57They've got one wooden leg, haven't they?
35:58So that's not so difficult.
36:01How are Julius Caesar kidnapped by pirates?
36:04Under what circumstances?
36:04Yeah, it was a ransom simply.
36:05It was a business.
36:07They didn't kill him.
36:08It sounds like he was home.
36:09Yeah.
36:10He went after them and had them crucified.
36:11He was not a man to be trifled with, Julie.
36:15Especially called him Julie, I imagine.
36:16Yeah, no, he didn't like that.
36:17The worst thing you could do to Julius Caesar.
36:18Called him Julius.
36:20There is a suggestion that Stockholm Syndrome could be a sort of psychological thing in the
36:26same way that women throughout history have had to put up with being taken and seized,
36:31and that the human being is conditioned to make the best of a bad job.
36:33Well, we've all been there.
36:35That's just a relationship, Stephen.
36:38It's sort of logical.
36:39I mean, if you thought you were being kidnapped long term, it makes sense to try and see it
36:42from the other person's point of view.
36:44Absolutely right.
36:44Just to maintain sanity.
36:46And in fact, to get the syndrome to work on them rather than you, for them to be so fond
36:49of you, they no longer want to kill you.
36:51Which would be handy.
36:53Now, what's a good reason for faking your own kidnapping?
36:57Oh.
36:58Are you bored on holiday?
37:01That would do it.
37:02You're trying to get out of a relationship.
37:03That's why I always do it.
37:06There was an American man who pretended to be kidnapped just so that he had an excuse as
37:11to why he hadn't called his girlfriend for two weeks.
37:14LAUGHTER
37:16He was terrified of her reaction.
37:18And the police realised it because he had duct tape round his wrists, but the real,
37:23the spool of it was still connected.
37:25LAUGHTER
37:26You can't imagine the girlfriend saying, you could still have texted.
37:29Yeah, exactly.
37:31Yeah.
37:32Exactly.
37:33You could have done.
37:34There was Jennifer Wilbanks of Duluth, who faked a kidnapping to get out of attending
37:38her own wedding.
37:39LAUGHTER
37:41But the weirdest thing is the 2008 case of another Spaniard, Josefa Sanchez Vargas,
37:47who convinced her husband to pay more than half a million pounds to secure the release
37:50of their children.
37:51It's a faked kidnapping, which you say, well, let's expect that.
37:54Except she did that six times over five years.
37:58LAUGHTER
37:58She didn't twig.
38:00It's not a nest egg.
38:00Every time she needed a new hat.
38:03LAUGHTER
38:04Some people get kidnapped just for the thrill of it.
38:06Can you imagine how that would work?
38:07So they pay for kidnappers to kidnap them so they can experience the visceral thrill
38:11of, you know, being in a car boot with a load of duct tape running around.
38:13Absolutely that.
38:14People are weird.
38:15LAUGHTER
38:17BBC does it to you too, if you're going into a hostile zone,
38:19you have hostile zone training where you're driving your Land Rover and chaps
38:23come out with ski masks and put bags over your head and bundle you into the back of a...
38:26Or what's that?
38:27Oh, this is for BBC reporters.
38:29I was just thinking, why sort of presenting Lou Peter?
38:32LAUGHTER
38:34Hostile zone is in people who aren't very nice to you.
38:37Sounds like a Top Gear sex park.
38:39LAUGHTER
38:40It's just kicks of a weekend.
38:42One of those funny phrases, isn't it?
38:43When you put in the back of a van, you're always bundled.
38:46Bundled?
38:46That's the only word for it.
38:48That's true.
38:49Don't get bundled onto a bus.
38:51LAUGHTER
38:52Anyway, there's a French company that, for 900 euros,
38:55gives you your basic kidnapping, which is being shoved into a car boot
38:58and held up, blindfolded and things like that.
39:00And then for a little extra money, you can have helicopter chases
39:02and really quite sort of sexy stuff.
39:04And then they'll cut your ear off and send it to your mum.
39:07Yes.
39:08LAUGHTER
39:09So, now it's time for me to hold you all hostage.
39:12There's no escape from general ignorance.
39:14Fingers on the buzzers, please.
39:16How long should you wait before reporting a missing person to the police?
39:20Yes.
39:21Well, certainly until they're missing.
39:23LAUGHTER
39:25Very good.
39:26Turn out of sight.
39:26Yeah.
39:27When they've left the road.
39:29When is it too soon?
39:31Just going to make a cup of tea?
39:33Right, I'm ready.
39:36What's...24 hours?
39:37Oh!
39:39No.
39:39I don't think...
39:41I don't think you should wait at all if you're convinced someone...
39:43Absolutely right.
39:44If you take your child into a supermarket, you'd be 20 minutes, wouldn't it?
39:47I mean, do you know that they're gone?
39:49Yeah.
39:4920 seconds, really.
39:50You just check they're not there.
39:51I'm going to wait 24 hours.
39:54LAUGHTER
39:54Go home to my wife.
39:55I don't know where she is.
39:57LAUGHTER
39:58I'm going to wait till tomorrow.
40:01You might as well go out, cos you don't have to go late.
40:04LAUGHTER
40:07Just go out and have a curry and some wine and a boner in the morning.
40:11You're absolutely right.
40:12And of course if it's an adult, it doesn't matter,
40:13because the police are very likely just to say,
40:15that's not our business.
40:16Unless they have a particular problem.
40:19But the fact is, yeah, there is no set time.
40:21The police use their own skill and judgement, as it were.
40:23If it's a child, it's obviously...
40:25LAUGHTER
40:29That's a recipe.
40:29There's three words you've done here in the same sentence.
40:31Just hope you're not burgled soon.
40:35LAUGHTER
40:35I've burgled so many times in the 90s,
40:38that one time they came round,
40:40it was like the fifth time I've been burgled,
40:41they came round, my cat came in,
40:43and this constable goes,
40:45if only you could talk.
40:47LAUGHTER
40:49That's fantastic.
40:51Oh, brilliant.
40:52Is that how we get into it?
40:53Is that the extent of the investigation?
40:57Willing the animal to kill the kid.
40:59Now, what did Parliament pay for
41:01to put in Sir Peter Vigasi's garden?
41:04Yes.
41:05The notorious Duck House.
41:07Oh!
41:09You're in the Duck House there.
41:11And the fact is, the Duck House
41:12was one of the ones that they turned down.
41:14Oh!
41:14Yeah, he put in claims for 32,000 pounds for gardening,
41:19500 pounds for 28 tonnes of manure,
41:231,645 pounds for the Duck Island,
41:25but that was turned down
41:26by the eagle-eyed guardians of the national purse.
41:29Yeah.
41:30It's probably worse at mentioning that,
41:32at the same time,
41:33is that 8 billion pounds were spent
41:34to bailing out the banks.
41:35It was just that was too big a sum
41:36for anyone to get their heads round,
41:37so they went,
41:38what?
41:3810 pounds for a sandwich?
41:40Yeah.
41:40I know!
41:42It's fascinating, isn't it?
41:43Sir Peter Vigas later commented
41:45that the Duck House was never liked by the ducks.
41:47Um,
41:48and is now in storage.
41:50Oh, look, there they are.
41:51They don't need an island.
41:52I love ducks, don't you?
41:53Mmm.
41:54You never see that sort of thing on a coat of arms,
41:57do you?
41:57All the sort of lions and dragons.
41:58You never see something nice,
41:59like a duck,
42:00or a, you know,
42:01Eggs Benedict,
42:02or some sort of friendly...
42:04A friendly thing.
42:05Yeah, sort of a hamster,
42:07or a guinea pig, or something.
42:08Yeah.
42:08It's true, a furry bearing.
42:10Anyway,
42:11the famous Duck House
42:12didn't cost the taxpayer a penny.
42:14And with that last tilt at our old friend,
42:17General Ignorance,
42:17we reached the end of tonight's performance.
42:19And I can tell you that it is incredibly exciting.
42:22We have leaders,
42:24two leaders,
42:25with plus three,
42:26Richard and Victoria.
42:28Greater.
42:33In third place,
42:35with minus seven,
42:37Alan Davis.
42:38Highly commendable.
42:40Highly commendable.
42:43And with a fantastic minus 24,
42:46is Sue Perkins.
42:54And it only remains for me to thank my family's Victoria Sue,
42:58Richard and Alan.
42:59Thank you,
43:00and good night.
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