154. The Most Disastrous Party in History

概览

The episode uses Boris Johnson’s Partygate scandal as a jumping-off point for a countdown of the ten most disastrous parties in history, chosen from listener nominations. The hosts define a disastrous party not just as one that goes badly, but one that exposes deeper flaws, anxieties, or fractures already present in politics or society.

The countdown moves from comic embarrassment and property damage to murder, mass death, dynastic collapse, and symbolic historical catastrophe. Along the way, the hosts compare real events with legends, propaganda, and later mythmaking, repeatedly asking why certain parties became historical shorthand for failure or hubris.

The final choice is Persepolis, treated as a double disaster: Alexander the Great’s drunken burning of the Persian imperial capital, and the Shah of Iran’s 1971 celebration there, later remembered as a symbol of monarchical excess before the Iranian Revolution.

分段落总结

[00:30] Partygate as the Frame

[事实] The hosts open by connecting Leslie Gore’s song “It’s My Party” to Boris Johnson’s political troubles over Partygate. [事实] They describe the allegations that Downing Street held gatherings, quizzes, drinks, and parties during COVID lockdowns while the government was imposing rules on the public. [事实] Dominic argues that a party becomes politically disastrous when it highlights flaws or anxieties that were already present. [推测] The episode uses Partygate less as its main subject than as a modern example of how a party can become a symbol of broader political distrust.

[03:12] Choosing the Countdown

[事实] The top ten list comes from listener nominations submitted through Twitter and the show’s Discord. [事实] Several nominated parties are excluded because they had already been covered, including Rasputin’s final party and Belshazzar’s feast. [事实] Other near-misses include the Fidesz MEP caught fleeing a lockdown sex party, the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner mocking Donald Trump, and Andrew Jackson’s chaotic inauguration. [推测] The hosts frame the countdown as partly comic, but they signal early that the disasters will become increasingly grave.

[06:37] Number 10: Kaiser Wilhelm II’s Hunting Party

[事实] The tenth choice is a hunting party at Donaueschingen Castle in Baden-Wurttemberg on 14 November 1908, attended by Kaiser Wilhelm II. [事实] Count Dietrich von Hulsen-Haeseler, a senior Prussian military figure and childhood friend of the Kaiser, reportedly appeared in a pink tutu and performed a ballet routine before dying of a heart attack. [事实] The story is placed against the background of the Eulenburg scandal, when the Kaiser and German military elite were already facing accusations and anxieties around homosexuality. [推测] The hosts suggest the incident mattered because it fed existing concerns about masculinity, reputation, and the German high command before the First World War.

[11:12] Number 9: Fyre Festival

[事实] The ninth choice is the 2017 Fyre Festival, promoted by Billy McFarland and Ja Rule as a luxury music festival in the Bahamas. [事实] The event was advertised by major social media figures and sold as an exclusive, Instagram-friendly experience, but the infrastructure, accommodation, bands, and payments system failed. [事实] Attendees found inadequate tents, poor food, no proper wireless system for cashless payments, and had to be evacuated. [事实] Billy McFarland was later sentenced to prison. [推测] The hosts read the festival as a symbol of the gap between social media fantasy and physical reality.

[16:19] Number 8: Peter the Great at Sayes Court

[事实] The eighth choice is Peter the Great’s stay at John Evelyn’s house, Sayes Court in Deptford, in 1698. [事实] Peter and his entourage allegedly drank heavily, burned furniture, smashed pictures and windows, ruined floors and carpets, and destroyed Evelyn’s carefully cultivated hedges. [事实] Christopher Wren and the royal gardener were sent to assess the damage. [事实] The hosts say the damage amounted to 350 pounds and nine pence, a huge sum in seventeenth-century terms. [推测] The story is presented as the historical equivalent of a house party destroying the family home while the owner is away.

[19:46] Number 7: The Blood Feast of Roskilde

[事实] The seventh choice is the Blood Feast of Roskilde in Denmark on 9 August 1157. [事实] After years of conflict among rival claimants Sweyn III, Cnut V, and Valdemar I, the kingdom was divided among them by treaty. [事实] Sweyn invited the other two rulers to a party at Roskilde, where Cnut was killed and Valdemar was wounded but escaped. [事实] Valdemar later defeated Sweyn, who was killed while fleeing, and became Valdemar the Great. [推测] The hosts treat this as a classic medieval warning that a reconciliation feast with a rival may be a trap.

[23:10] Number 6: Muhammad Ali and the Mamluks

[事实] The sixth choice is Muhammad Ali’s 1811 massacre of the Mamluks in Cairo. [事实] Muhammad Ali, an Albanian ruler in Ottoman Egypt, invited the Mamluk warrior elite to a celebration connected to his son. [事实] After the festivities, the Mamluks were trapped in a narrow passage of the Cairo citadel and massacred. [事实] The hosts compare this with an earlier Abbasid destruction of the Umayyads, where dynastic elimination is also associated with a feast. [推测] This segment presents the party as a tool of regime change: hospitality becomes a weapon for eliminating political rivals.

[29:01] Number 5: Elagabalus and the Rose Petals

[事实] The fifth choice concerns the Roman emperor Elagabalus, who reigned from 218 to 222. [事实] The hosts rely on the Augustan History while stressing that its account is lurid and probably propagandistic. [事实] Elagabalus is described as staging extravagant and cruel party tricks, including fake food, frightening guests with harmless wild animals, and forcing guests to invent sauces. [事实] The most famous story says he suffocated guests beneath falling rose petals, later depicted by Lawrence Alma-Tadema. [推测] Because the hosts doubt the story’s reliability, Elagabalus ranks lower than he might if the events were clearly historical.

[34:24] Number 4: The Black Dinner and Abergavenny

[事实] The fourth choice is the Black Dinner in Scotland in 1440, associated with the powerful Douglas family. [事实] The young William Douglas and his younger brother were invited to dine with the ten-year-old James II of Scotland. [事实] A black bull’s head was brought in as a symbol of death, after which the Douglas brothers were taken out, given a false trial, and beheaded. [事实] The hosts note that the Black Dinner helped inspire the Red Wedding in Game of Thrones. [事实] They also discuss the Abergavenny Massacre, where William de Braose invited Welsh leaders to a Christmas feast before his men killed them.

[40:23] Number 3: The Bal des Ardents

[事实] The third choice is the Bal des Ardents, involving Charles VI of France in January 1393. [事实] After an earlier episode of mental collapse, Charles’s court tried to improve his spirits with entertainments and parties. [事实] At a wedding celebration, Charles and five others dressed as wild men in pitch-covered costumes with branches and hair attached. [事实] The Duke of Orleans entered with a torch, sparks ignited the costumes, and several participants burned to death. [事实] Charles survived because his young aunt shielded him with her large dress. [推测] The disaster deepened the sense of instability around Charles VI and the French court.

[47:04] Number 2: Khodynka Field

[事实] The second choice is the Khodynka Field tragedy during the coronation celebrations of Tsar Nicholas II and Alexandra in May 1896. [事实] A huge public celebration near Moscow promised bread, sausage, pretzels, gingerbread, beer, and commemorative cups. [事实] Rumors spread that the cups might contain gold coins and that supplies of food and beer might run out. [事实] Crowds stampeded across a rough field with ditches and ravines, causing at least 1,200 deaths and many more injuries. [事实] Nicholas and Alexandra still attended later events, including a ball at the French embassy, and Nicholas became associated with the nickname “Bloody Nicholas.” [推测] The hosts see the tragedy as a grim omen for a divided society and for Nicholas’s reign.

[51:24] Number 1: Persepolis as the Ultimate Disaster

[事实] The hosts choose Persepolis as the most disastrous party because it links Alexander the Great’s destruction of the city with the Shah of Iran’s later celebration there. [事实] Alexander captured Persepolis after defeating the Persian Empire and, according to the story, drunkenly burned the palace after the courtesan Thais urged revenge for Xerxes burning the Athenian Acropolis. [事实] The hosts say the burning of Persepolis became a lasting symbol of drunken hubris and imperial destruction. [事实] They then discuss the Shah of Iran’s 1971 celebration at Persepolis for the 2,500th anniversary associated with Cyrus the Great. [事实] The event involved foreign dignitaries, luxury arrangements, and elaborate spectacle, and after the Iranian Revolution it became a symbol of monarchical excess. [推测] The hosts argue that Persepolis wins because the same site generated two different historical memories of disastrous political overreach.

[58:40] Closing Reflections

[事实] Tom says the party he would most like to witness is the Black Forest hunting party because of the sheer improbability of the ballet performance. [事实] Dominic says he would especially dislike attending Fyre Festival because of the would-be influencer atmosphere. [事实] The hosts close by previewing a future episode on the last emperor of Mexico. [推测] The ending returns the episode from murder and catastrophe to the comic banter that shaped the countdown format.

播客点评/总结

The episode’s value lies in how it turns a light premise into a historical pattern: parties often become disastrous when they expose hypocrisy, insecurity, dynastic rivalry, social inequality, or political hubris. The strongest segments are those where the hosts connect vivid anecdotes to wider historical consequences, especially Khodynka Field and Persepolis.

Its comic style makes the material accessible, but the tone sometimes moves quickly from jokes to mass death and political violence. [推测] Listeners looking for a sober, heavily sourced treatment of each event may find the countdown format too brisk.

The episode is best suited to listeners who enjoy historical anecdote, political scandal, and the way myths form around events. [推测] It will work especially well for audiences already familiar with The Rest Is History’s conversational style, because much of the appeal comes from the hosts’ banter and recurring references.