SPILLED.

Human sacrifice gets a bad rap in the history books, and we're here to spill the tea. This week we're digging into who was really practicing ritual sacrifice across history. From Mesopotamia's royal tombs to Aztec blood debts, Celtic wicker men to Japanese seppuku and why the "savage civilization" narrative doesn't hold up.

Sources:
General / Context:
Caldararo, Niccolo. "Human Sacrifice, Capital Punishment, Prisons & Justice." Historical Social Research 41, no. 4 (2016): 322–46.
Løvschal et al. "Human Sacrifice and Value." Antiquity 93, no. 370 (2019).
Schwartz, Glenn M. "The Archaeological Study of Sacrifice." Annual Review of Anthropology 46 (2017): 223–240.
Mesopotamia / Ur:
Recht, Laerke. "Human Sacrifice in the Ancient Near East and Egypt." The Ancient Near East Today 8, no. 2 (2020).
Egypt:
Campbell, Roselyn Anne. Kill Thy Neighbor: Violence, Power, and Human Sacrifice in Ancient Egypt. PhD diss., UCLA, 2019.
Nielsen, Nicky. "In Ancient Egypt, Human Sacrifice and Shabti Figures Ensured an Afterlife of Servitude." Atlas Obscura, October 17, 2023.
Celtic / Druid / Greco-Roman:
Caesar, Julius. The Conquest of Gaul. Translated by F. P. Long, 2005.
Allen, Stephen. Celtic Warrior — 300 BC–AD 100. Osprey Publishing, 2001.
Davies, John. The Celts: Prehistory to Present Day. Sterling Publishing, 2005.
"Human Sacrifice." Digital Medievalist, Opinionated Celtic FAQs. digitalmedievalist.com
Aztec:
Pennock, Caroline Dodds. "Mass Murder or Religious Homicide?" Historical Social Research 37, no. 3 (2012): 276–302.
Neiburger, E. J. "The American Ball Game Court." Central States Archaeological Journal 62, no. 2 (2015): 74–77.
Japan:
Roberts, Michael, and Arthur Saniotis. "Introduction: Empowering the Body and 'Noble Death.'" Social Analysis 50, no. 1 (2006): 7–24.
India:
BBC News. "India Outrage after Man Acquitted over Wife's Sati Death." September 10, 2024.
Chakravorty, Ranes C. "British Abolish Suttee in India." EBSCO Research Starters, 2023.
Dhungel, Suraj. "Sati System in Hinduism." Academic Voices 8 (2018): 95–99.
The New York Times. "Suttee in India Still Occurs Despite British Prohibition." January 1, 1928.

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Paul Revere gets all the glory, but he wasn't the only one riding through the night to save the American Revolution. This Fourth of July, Delaney and Kendyl are spilling the tea on the women history left out of the story: 16-year-old Sybil Ludington, who rode twice as far as Paul Revere through a rainstorm to warn the Continental Army; Deborah Sampson, who disguised herself as a man to fight in combat and removed a musket ball from her own leg; and Abigail Adams, the original "Mrs. President," who ran the family finances, advised a president, and told her husband to "remember the ladies." In honor of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, we're giving America's founding mothers the credit — and the chaos — they deserve. Happy Fourth of July, besties.

Sources:

Sybil Ludington:

Hunt, Paula D. "Sybil Ludington, the Female Paul Revere: The Making of a Revolutionary War Heroine." The New England Quarterly 88, no. 2 (2015): 187–222. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24718670
American Battlefield Trust. "Sybil Ludington." https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/sybil-ludington
Smithsonian Magazine. "Did the Midnight Ride of Sibyl Ludington Ever Happen?" March 2022. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/did-midnight-ride-sibyl-ludington-ever-happen-180979557/
Deborah Sampson:

Young, Alfred F. Masquerade: The Life and Times of Deborah Sampson, Continental Soldier. New York: Vintage Books, 2004. [Definitive scholarly biography]
Mann, Herman. The Female Review: Life of Deborah Sampson, the Female Soldier in the War of Revolution. 1797. [Primary source, published during her lifetime]
Massachusetts Historical Society. Letter from Paul Revere to William Eustis, February 20, 1804. https://www.masshist.org/database/326
National Women’s History Museum. "Deborah Sampson." Michals, Debra. 2015. https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/deborah-sampson
Museum of the American Revolution. "Biography of Deborah Sampson." https://www.amrevmuseum.org/collection/biography-of-deborah-sampson
George Washington’s Mount Vernon. "Deborah Sampson." https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/deborah-sampson
American Battlefield Trust. "Deborah Sampson." https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/deborah-sampson
Paul Revere House. "Quitting The Male Habit: Paul Revere and Deborah Sampson’s Appeal for a Military Pension." https://www.paulreverehouse.org/quitting-the-male-habit-paul-revere-and-deborah-sampsons-appeal-for-a-military-pension/
Abigail Adams:

Shields, David S. and Fredrika J. Teute. "The Court of Abigail Adams." Journal of the Early Republic 35, no. 2 (2015): 227–35. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24486730
Britannica. "Abigail Adams." https://www.britannica.com/biography/Abigail-Adams
Miller Center. "Abigail Adams." https://millercenter.org/president/adams/adams-1797-abigail-firstlady
National Women’s History Museum. "Abigail Smith Adams." https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/abigail-adams
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You've been lied to by Lucky Charms. The leprechaun you know — jolly, green, guarding gold at the end of a rainbow — is about 150 years old. The leprechaun from Irish folklore is about 1,300 years old, and they are not the same creature.
This week we're tracing how the original lucharpán went from a fearsome red-coated water sprite who'd drag a sleeping king into the sea, to the cereal-box mascot Americans invented in the 1840s. We get into the medieval Celtic oral tradition, the professional storytellers who kept it alive, the pot of gold as a lesson about human greed, and how Irish immigration during the potato blight turned a misunderstood trickster into a symbol of Irish pride.

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Academic & Institutional Sources:
EBSCO Research Starter: "Leprechauns."
Oí Giolláin, Diarmuid. "The Leipreachán and Fairies, Dwarfs and the Household Familiar: A Comparative Study." Béaloideas 52 (1984): 75–150. https://doi.org/10.2307/20522237
Winberry, John J. "The Elusive Elf: Some Thoughts on the Nature and Origin of the Irish Leprechaun." 1976.
Mulligan, William H., Jr. "Review: Alive and Well: New Perspectives on Irish America." 2012.
National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin (UNESCO Memory of the World Register). Primary source accounts. https://www.duchas.ie
Primary Sources Referenced:
"The Adventure of Fergus Son of Léti" (8th century). Earliest known reference to the luchorpán.
"The Death of Fergus" (13th–14th century). Lupracan civilization account.
Lover, Samuel. Legends and Stories of Ireland. 1831.
Croker, Thomas Crofton. Fairy Legends and Traditions of The South of Ireland. 1825.
Hardy, Philip Dixon. 1837 description. Referenced via Oí Giolláin (1984).
Mr and Mrs Hall. 1843 account. Referenced via Oí Giolláin (1984).
O’Donnell, Edward T. 1001 Things Everyone Should Know About Irish American History.
Yeats, W.B. Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry. [Referenced for solitary vs trooping fairy color distinction]
General Reference:
"The Jolly Leprechaun’s Sinister Origins." History.com.
"Leprechaun: From Gold-Loving Cobbler to Cultural Icon." PBS.
The Pale Horse Substack: "In Red Caps and Green Coats" and "The Leprechaun: From Trickster to Icon." Note: not peer-reviewed. Used for thematic framing only, not factual claims.
Wikipedia: "Slieve Foy" entry. Used to verify EU protection date (2009).

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She was eleven years old when the English arrived. Disney made her twenty-something with a love story. History gave her a name that wasn't hers. This week we're spilling the real story of Pocahontas — or Amonute, as she was actually named — and it's nothing like what you were taught.
We're breaking down the Powhatan Confederacy (one of the most powerful empires on the eastern seaboard), what John Smith actually wrote versus what he claimed seventeen years later, and the kidnapping, forced conversion, and suspected poisoning that the Disney movie conveniently left out.
Spoiler: she didn't save him. She was sent there. And the love story was invented by men who needed a myth more than they needed the truth.
If you've ever wanted to understand Native American history, Indigenous women, or colonization in the Americas beyond what you learned in school — this one's for you.

Want more? Check our our book reccomendations: https://bookshop.org/shop/SPILLED

Sources:
Aron, Paul. "Pocahontas & John Smith: The Love Story Was Fiction...But Loved." Trend & Tradition Magazine (Colonial Williamsburg), July 2, 2025. https://www.colonialwilliamsburg.org/discover/resource-hub/trend-tradition-magazine/trend-tradition-summer-2025/pocahontas-and-john-smith/
Historic Jamestowne. "Meeting the English." Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation. https://historicjamestowne.org/history/pocahontas/meeting-the-english/
Mansky, Jackie. "The True Story of Pocahontas Is More Complicated Than You Might Think." Smithsonian Magazine, updated February 20, 2024. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-pocahontas-more-complicated-than-you-might-think-180962649/
National Park Service. "Pocahontas: Her Life and Legend." Jamestown National Historic Site, last updated September 4, 2022. https://www.nps.gov/jame/learn/historyculture/pocahontas-her-life-and-legend.htm
Paul, Heike. "Pocahontas and the Myth of Transatlantic Love." In The Myths That Made America. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1wxsdq.6
Silverman, David. "John Smith’s Bold Endeavor." Interview by Lisa Q. Wolfinger. NOVA: Pocahontas Revealed, PBS. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/pocahontas/silverman.html
Smith, John. Excerpts from The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles (1624). Encyclopedia Virginia. https://encyclopediavirginia.org/primary-documents/john-smith-and-pocahontas-in-england-an-excerpt-from-the-generall-historie-of-virginia-new-england-and-the-summer-isles-by-john-smith-1624
Wood, Karenne. "Prisoners of History: Pocahontas, Mary Jemison, and the Poetics of an American Myth." Studies in American Indian Literatures 28, no. 1 (2016): 73–82. https://doi.org/10.5250/studamerindilite.28.1.0073
van der Straet, Jan (Stradanus). Allegory of America, ca. 1587–89. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/343845

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You loved our first WWII episode, so we're back with MORE! This week we're covering stories that your history teacher definitely skipped: women in codebreaking, queer resistance, and psychological warfare. Think cracking Nazi spy rings from behind a desk, two lesbian stepsister artists using "paper bullets" to take down an occupying army, and a 21-year-old Jewish refugee who had German soldiers writing her love letters.

No dry lectures. Just the drama, the gossip, and the stories that actually deserved the spotlight.

Haven't listened to Part 1 yet? Start there — that's where we lay the context on the origin of and players in WWII.

Obsessed? Want more? Check our fiction & nonfiction book recommendations here: https://bookshop.org/shop/SPILLED

Research Documents:
BBC Future. “The Female Code Breakers Who Were Left Out of History Books.” bbc.com/future, October 9, 2017. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20171009-the-female-code-breakers-who-were-left-out-of-history-books
BBC. “The Bletchley Girls: Cracking Women.” bbc.co.uk. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/Q3lFn2vTv9JMgxX98bRhL/the-bletchley-girls-cracking-women
The Art Newspaper. “How Artist Couple Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore Resisted the Nazis with Their Paper Bullets.” November 4, 2020. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2020/11/04/extract-or-how-artist-couple-claude-cahun-and-marcel-moore-resisted-the-nazis-with-their-paper-bullets
History Extra. “On the Same Side: Homosexuals During the Second World War.” https://www.historyextra.com/period/second-world-war/on-the-same-side-homosexuals-during-the-second-world-war/
Putnam, Jennifer, PhD. “V for Victory: A Sign of Resistance.” The National WWII Museum, February 1, 2024. https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/v-victory-sign-resistance
White, April. “One of the Allies’ Secret Weapons Against the Nazis Was a 21-Year-Old Woman Armed With a Microphone and a Script of Lies.” Smithsonian Magazine, March 2026. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/allies-secret-weapons-against-nazis-woman-armed-microphone-script-lies-180988094/
Context Sources:
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. “Introduction to the Holocaust.” https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/introduction-to-the-holocaust
National WWII Museum. “WWII by the Numbers.” https://www.nationalww2museum.org/students-teachers/student-resources/research-starters/research-starters-worldwide-deaths-world-war
History.com Editors. “World War II.” https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/world-war-ii-history

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