Episode 20: Dear God what is that thing?

We are finally getting to one of the ballad types and topics that made me realize how much potential lay in these old songs…. Monstrous births. Or, to be clear, that's how they were marketed at the time. They were actually an overall mix of true accounts of birth defects and used the idea of deformity as a direct metaphor. Either which way it went, one thing remained the same. The mother was almost always to blame in some way or another.

Prides's Fall
The two inseparable brothers.

Infant Mortality Rates
The Jersey Devil
Colloredo Twins
 Succession to the Crown Act 
Freaks
NIH: Pregnancy test timeline
The Encyclopedia of Superstitions by Richard Webster
The Odd Superstition Behind Birthmarks
Medieval disability glossary. 

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