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 <div id="fb-root"></div><p><img src="https://www.historyhustle.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/History-Hustle-Cockaigne-1.jpg" alt="History Hustle Cockaigne image" width="1000" height="650" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-4110"></p><h1>What is Cockaigne?</h1><p>We all know that to get in the Christian heaven you have to be goodie-goodie and abstain from the pleasures of the flesh. </p><p>But what if there was an a different type of heaven where you can drink alcohol, the sky rains cheese, and laziness is encouraged?</p><p>Medieval folks dreamed up just such a place. It&rsquo;s called Cockaigne, and it&rsquo;s sort of the peasant&rsquo;s heaven. Etymologically, <a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica/Cockaigne,_Land_of" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">it means</a> something like &ldquo;cake land&rdquo;. </p><p>
<figure id="attachment_4137" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-4137" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img src="https://www.historyhustle.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Cackaigne-cartoon-history-hustle.jpg" alt="Cackaigne cartoon history hustle image" width="750" height="496" class="size-full wp-image-4137"><figcaption id="caption-attachment-4137" class="wp-caption-text">Being a peasant probably sucked sometimes.</figcaption></figure>
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<p style="font-size:30px">&ldquo;The weather is always mild, the wine flows freely, sex is readily available, and all people enjoy eternal youth.&rdquo;</p>
</blockquote><p>Alright, so the idea of this luxurious lazy person&rsquo;s paradise called Cockaigne actually comes from multiple medieval <a href="https://www.sfsu.edu/~medieval/complaintlit/cokaygne.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">myths and poems</a> that mention it in one way or another, often some form of naughty satire. </p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockaigne" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Cockaigne</a> serves as a symbol for a dream land that relieves the hard-working peasants from the toil of daily labor and the strict moral authority. It&rsquo;s like an anti-heaven where sinning and luxury are encouraged.</p><p>
<figure id="attachment_4139" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-4139" style="width: 946px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img src="https://www.historyhustle.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Cockaigne-cartoon-history-hustle-2.jpg" alt="Cockaigne cartoon history hustle 2 image" width="946" height="621" class="size-full wp-image-4139"><figcaption id="caption-attachment-4139" class="wp-caption-text">&ldquo;I just want to get turnt sometimes.&rdquo;</figcaption></figure>
</p><p>It was common for satirists at the time to write about Cockaigne, as it &ldquo;represented both wish fulfillment and resentment at the strictures of asceticism and dearth.&rdquo;</p><p>So basically, medieval comedy writers thumbing their nose up at all the annoying church rules.</p><h2>The old Cockaigne poems</h2><p>One of the poems is called &ldquo;The Land of Cockaigne&rdquo;, which is one poem out of a 16-part collection of poems written in an Irish dialect of Middle English.</p>
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<p>Here is a snippet, edited for length:</p><p>&ldquo;When they are far from the abbey, they undress to play, and jump into the water &hellip; The young monks who see them get ready and start out &hellip; and come to the nuns immediately &hellip; and teaches the nuns a prayer with their legs up and down in the air&rdquo;</p><h1>Skies rain cheese</h1><p>Oh, but Cockaigne is so much more than that.</p><p>The skies rain cheese. Yes, delicious cheese from the sky. Houses were made of cake. Streets are paved with pastry. Shops offer everything for free. </p><p>And if that&rsquo;s not enough for you&hellip;</p><p>&ldquo;&hellip;roasted pigs wander about with knives in their backs to make carving easy, where grilled geese fly directly into one&rsquo;s mouth, where cooked fish jump out of the water and land at one&rsquo;s feet. The weather is always mild, the wine flows freely, sex is readily available, and all people enjoy eternal youth.&rdquo;</p><p><img src="https://www.historyhustle.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Cockaigne-history-hustle-cartoon-happy.jpg" alt="Cockaigne history hustle cartoon happy image" width="844" height="616" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-4149"></p><p>Truth be told, many peasants probably just wanted to be safe, happy, comfortable, and not abused like the rest of us. Cockaigne probably reflects more the poets&rsquo; interpretations of what they want. What do you think? Is Cockaigne your type of heaven?</p><p>Here&rsquo;s a book about it, if you want to learn more:</p>
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