What Was The Wickedest Book In History? | QI

This clip is from QI Series M, Episode 12, 'Medieval Macabre' with Stephen Fry, Alan Davies, Matt Lucas, David Mitchell and Julia Zemiro.

[Trovor]

I love the way Stephen always exuded such a simple joy in the sharing of knowledge. He really should have been a teacher.

[wfly]

Stephen giving David a lesson in Latin grammar reminds me so much of the scene in "The Life of Brian" when John Cleese as the Roman guard gives Graham Chapman as Brian the Latin grammar lesson.

[MrShs]

I like how Stephen trying to breakdown the books name was like that scene from “Life of Brian” but with 4 people instead of 1

[stevesmith]

I am AMAZED that David didn't instantly come up with the Malleus Maleficarum.

[sudanemamimikiki]

i have that book. an interesting read.

the dude starts the book by saying "yeah okay all of the authority figures, including the pope, disagree with me about the existence of witches but i assure you they are totally true and here is my 5 page explanation on how"

and then he spends the majority of the book talking about female witches making people impotent or making their seed weak.

a real barrel of laughs that one.

[dizzy_derps]

I do miss Mr. Fry on the show. Just getting to hear him explain stuff was the best.

[simonatford]

Yes. Although many people associate witch burning (or hanging in the case of England) with the Middle Ages it was really a phenomenon of the Early Modern era.

[davdsmth]

I think Alan may have figured out the etymology of "Pecker".

[NewMessage]

Well. That's a mental image that will pop into my head around 3 AM, and stay 'till morning.

[splinky]

Amazing that none of them had even heard of that book!

[kevinbennett]

You can't just translate Latin, you have to translate the translation.

[TheSmart-CasualGamer]

Wait, is this why the Ordo Malleus are called that?

[AdmiralJaneway]

Every German, especially every German who had Latin in school knows that book or has at least heard of it

[hiltonian_]

The church originally ruled that people who thought they had interacted with the devil were just dreaming. Then, during religious and social upheavals of the 1500s, the pursuit of witches became a tool of social conformity.

[paulcollyer]

I think Alan may have been onto the etymological origins of a slang name for the male member

[davismartin]

Can you make captions available, please?

[howardmctroy]

As I understand it, the witch hunts were a Protestant phenomenon. The Catholic Church had little to no patience for people who came to them talking about witchcraft.

[Skipper.]

I can see a life of Brian sketch here. Lol

[brianm]

The witches made Archie from Red Dwarf?

[Hawkathon]

Ian McKellen mentions the Malleus Maleficarum in the movie The Da Vinci Code but I don’t know if it’s in the book. I think they covered it on QI before where they mention Dan Brown writing in the Da Vinci Code that it led to the deaths of several million women as accusers of witchcraft, which it didn’t. To be fair, a character might’ve been saying this rather than Dan Brown as an author but I’ve never read the book. During this time period, of all people accused of witchcraft, about 25% were men and most people were acquitted. Public officials disliked witch trials even back then and considered them founded on nothing more than superstition and with the potential for large scale destruction.