History's Most Insane Rulers: From Emperor Caligula to Muammar Gaddafi
By: No Author Indicated
BUZZ NOTE: This is a podcast and I cannot open it. In order to listen to it please click on the "SEEDED CONTENT" link just below this message to open the source article in order to open and listen to the podcast.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
History's Most Insane Rulers: From Emperor Caligula to Muammar Gaddafi
Few mixtures are as toxic as absolute power and insanity that comes from megalomania or severe mental illness. When nothing stands between a leader's delusional whims and seeing them carried them out, all sorts of bizarre outcomes are possible.
Whether it is Ottoman Sultan Ibrahim I practicing archery on palace servants and sending out his advisers to find the heaviest woman in the empire for his wife or Turkmenistan President Turkmenbashi renaming the days of the week after himself and constructing an 80-foot golden statue that revolves to face the sun, crazed leaders have plagued society for millenia.
In this episode we look mentally unbalance rulers who made the lives of their subjects miserable. Some suffered from genetic disorders that led to schizophrenia, such as French King Charles VI, who thought he was made of glass. Others believed themselves to be God's greatest prophet and wrote religious writings that they guaranteed to the reader would get them into heaven, even if these "prophets" were barely literate.
Whatever their background, these rulers show that dynastic politics made sure that a rightful heir always got on the throne - despite that heir's mental condition - and that power can destroy a mind worse than any mental illness.
RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
History's Most Insane Rulers: Lunatics, Eccentrics, and Megalomaniacs From Emperor Caligula to Kim Jong Il
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Rank, Michael. History's Most Insane Rulers: Lunatics, Eccentrics, and Megalomaniacs From Emperor Caligula to Kim Jong Il. Five Minute Books, 2013.
"Was the Roman Emperor Caligula as Crazy as They Say?" The Straight Dope, June 10, 2003. https://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2102/was-the-roman-emperor-caligula-as-crazy-as-they-say/.
Wells, Colin. Sailing from Byzantium. Random House Publishing Group, 2008.
PODCAST: HISTORY UNPLUGGEDThe Rise and Fall of 1970s Mob-Run Chicago
The administrator of this group reserves the right, along with the site moderators, to moderate all and any postings to this group, including the right to enforce the ToS, the CoC, and also including anything that the administrator deems within his sole discretion to be offensive, including and not limited to off topic or 'no value' comments, with the power to delete in exercising those rights.
It would be best, therefore, to be civil in posting on this group.
By now it should be well known that I am unable to open certain sources, videos and pictures. If I cannot, I will ask that they be described and explained. If the poster refuses to comply, their comment will be deleted. Instagrams are banned.
Tags
Who is online
126 visitors