Apocalyptic Cults and the Early-Modern Information Explosion

This is the story of the first great information explosion and the cults and radicals that powered it forwards. The massive growth in literacy following the invention of the printing press led to artistic and intellectual ferment, as well as political turmoil, extremism, and political polarisation. No longer was mass communication dominated by popes, kings, and priests, but was joined by the voices of countless thousands of everyday people, who were sick of the corruption and hypocrisy of the elites.

This flood of these new voices in the form of books and then pamphlets disturbed the mind of whole populations, in exposing them to perspectives and possibilities beforehand inconceivable. It was a time of society-wide confusion — from the Latin *confusionem* meaning to mingle and muddle together — of different theological perspectives at first, then more and more fragments of news, rumour and scaremongering from across Christendom and the expanding world.

Suddenly the seemingly eternal certainties of Church doctrine began to crumble, leading to peasant rebellions, uprisings, and civil wars. As the legitimacy of popes, kings and statesmen imploded and wars and schisms multiplied, there came to be a growing sense that the world was falling apart and that a new one was on the cusp of being born.

Amidst this turbulence, prophecies went viral — with whole swathes of the population coming to the belief that the reason for the chaos was the imminence of Christ’s return to establish His eternal kingdom. Radical movements appeared from nowhere and came to guide the fates of cities and nations, transforming the history of Europe and ultimately reshaping culture and human cognition.

00:00 - Intro
01:47 - The Third Age (1159 - 1260 AD)
05:37 - Before The Flood (1200 - 1435 AD)
10:06 - The Last Flame That Shines Before The Extinction of the World (1440 - 1524 AD)
15:55 - The Siege of New Jerusalem (1524 - 1535 AD)
26:45 - A Vast Confusion (1534 - 1649 AD)
37:17 - Rule of the Saints (1649 - 1661 AD)
44:10 - Conclusion

Part V: A Vast Confusion, features artist Mark Rathmell as the voice of Robert Burton