Historical "facts" and popular representations of histrical figures that are wrong

[Gavmando]

Cleopatra was not beautiful. She was about 14th generation inbread. And at the time she and Julius Ceasar were bumping uglies, she was 14 and he was about 50.

The movie 300 is a thorn in my side. As someone who had looked into the battle of Thermopylae, it got a little bit frustrating with the poor representation of the phalanx, giving the persians elephants, gunpowder, that massive guy, the last stand only containing 300 Spartans (when in reality, there was around two thousand people in the last stand), no mention of Admiral Themistocles, the reasoning for Spartans not sending the full force and the representation of Spartan training as being solely about strength, when in fact they were trained to win at all costs (the right of passage was to murder a slave without being caught, requiring stealth over brute force).

Annoyingly, there are people I know who believe that film was accurate.

I see it as being a movie based on a comic book. It's the only way I can accept it. And the other guys with the Spartans were Perioci. There were about 1400 of them.

 

[MammothBlade]

I know its not exactly a fact; but i hate how the movie V for Vendetta was taken so seriously after these latest wikileaks/anon outbursts. I ACTAULY heard someone say 'wikileaks is awesome just watch vfv and you'll see'.

Guy Fawkes was not a hero.


That said its a fucking brilliant film, just don't heroworship it. Its embaressing for real fans, i mentioned it once to someone when asked my fav films and there were like 'woo anon'.
Ugh

Whether or not someone is a "hero" is subjective to the observer. Now I don't know all there is to know, but there are plenty of catholics who considered him a hero and a martyr. You can call him what you like, but the gruesome torture and execution of him and his co-conspirators was worse than his potential act of treason.

His historical myth is such that Guy Fawkes is an icon and a legend on the level of Che Guevara and Lenin. People are united by those they consider heroes. Their original intent and personal traits can be distorted in the image of whatever cause will borrow them.

 

[Scorpid]

My uncle told me something about how Abraham Lincoln was actually really racist or something. No idea if that's true or not but it seemed far fetched to me so I just agreed with him so he'd shut up.

Being a student of the Civil War and ante bellem era. It wasn't really a matter of if Lincoln cared about slavery or not. People think of him as this mythical man that cared utterly about the slavery issue, as sort of saint for slave, which he actually would become and see himself as towards the end of his presidency and the war, but starting out he was not. In the Douglas Lincoln debates for example in 1859-60 you'll find some speeches where he calls for slavery to end, another debate where he'll say it must be tolerated. Abolition of slavery wasn't his goal. Most often you'll find him calling for slavery to be taken out slowly, by stopping the spread of slavery, which would mean new slave states wouldn't be emitted into the union and from there he and many other moderate republican believed that it would slowly turn on itself, since there would be no more high value markets for slaves to be traded if new states couldn't be emitted where slavery was allowed.
For example the largest slave to free population wasn't where alot of people expect, many think it was Georgia, Alabama, South and North Carolina Virgina even, when actually the highest concentration of Slaves and slave owners was Louisiana and Mississippi. It was no coincidence that Jefferson Davis came from that state. The then burgeoning confederacy absolutely had to have Louisiana Mississippi and Virginia if they were going to continue to exist in the face of the pressure that that the President to be (Lincoln) was going to place on their legitimacy.
SO did Lincoln care about slaves, yes. Was his interest in slavery in the beginning of his campaign and presidency one of pure altruism no probably not. His interest was keeping the United states intact and he was personally was probably more disgusted with the hypocrisy of slavery in the US then the actual treatment of slaves, much like many people of the time. Towards the end of his life though he became much more interested in the ending of slavery for moral reasons then a pure political one as he did before. He became more religious and his tours of the ruins of Richmond would have profound impact on him and his views of black man.
You should also read about Davis he was also a fascinating character of history much like Lincoln himself.

 

[k3v1n]

"Sir" Francis Drake was nothing but a pirate and a thief.

 

[DJjaffacake]

America is responsible for winning World War II/America had nothing to do with winning World War II.

That's right, those are both false. Britain was holding out against Germany and Italy, this is true. Russia dedicated a lot of manpower, and the failed invasion of Russia weakened Germany, also true.

However, Britain didn't have the resources to fight against Japan. Meanwhile, Russia lost a lot of manpower in that failed invasion, so they would have had problems with an attack on Japan as well.

On top of that, without the atomic bombs that the U.S. developed, the back-up invasion plan would have resulted in many more deaths on both sides.

So it's not true that America is the only reason the Allies won World War II, but they were a large help.

The enigma machine "history" is barking. There was an awful US film, of which I forget the name, that had the Yanks securing the device. In fact it was a Polish/English team that secured the device. In addition, a bit of "our own history" that is suspect here, the English didn't actually crack the code first, the Poles did, then the English cracked increasing levels of sophistication. Turing, the legend, formalised algorithms. He then killed himself due to being a depressive and gay, the abuse he would have received got for stating the latter triggered the former. Turing *worship* Poland *worship*. If you want to get revisionist about history and hate your past then England's abandonment of Poland to Stalin is pretty much unforgivable.

Dood. British, not English, and the UK, not England.

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

The first one I could think of was that Napoleon was short. He wasn't, 5'7" was average for his time and he was seen in public with his guards who were well above average.

Yup.
The lie that he was short came from the diffirence between the British inch (2.54cm) and the French Pouce (~27cm).

 

[TheNaut131]

You know, after looking through the thread< I've learned only one thing about history.

History is bullshit.

The only thing I can currently comment on is the whole Edison-stealing-from-Tesla thing. By the way, we should probably get to work on bringing him back to life. God knows the man had an idea for some sort of device like that. Throw that man at cancer and energy!

We'll be living in a Utopia within...oh about 3 to 5 decades.

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

Guy Fawkes was not a hero.

No, he was a terrorist. He and the the rest of the conspirators we motivated by religion (themselves being Catholic) and planned to kill the Protestant King James.

In fact, the current anti-terrorism laws in England make it illegal to venerate or celebrate a terrorist, which kind of makes the whole 5th November celebrations a little suspect

I thought they tried to blow up parlement... Then again, I'm not from the UK, so my facts might not be straight... and the only reason I know about bonfire night is because I looked up some fall foods for Halloween. So yes, I learned about this Holiday by Treacle Toffee.

 

[A3sir]

As for WWII, it never ended.

The European theatre didn't end until 1990. In 1945, Germany was fractured and didn't exist as a country, only East Germany and West Germany, none of which were official combatants in the war. The peace treaty was only signed in 1990 after the Berlin wall came down and the country of Germany was reunited.

Clear delineation between the end of the Second World War, a war in Europe fought against Fascism, and the Cold War, a war fought against Communism.

The peace treaty ending the European theatre in WWII was signed in 1990. It's not about the struggles merging into one flowing conflict, the piece of paper saying "Germany surrenders" was signed in 1990, it is an undeniable fact that the European theatre didn't end until 1990.

AsThe pacific theatre never ended, Japan and Russia never signed peace agreements with each other and there is still and island in the pacific that both countries have troops stationed and neither are willing to give up, meaning WWII is still a currently active war.

Triviality.

When such things occur it's best to remind oneself of the definitions of "de facto" and "de jure".

It doesn't matter if something is trivial, the fact is it is there and the second world war "rages" on.

Trivial things that you can giggle at is what makes history great.

With that line of thinking, how many other wars that never had formal conclusion continue to "rage" on. I doubt there was a formal peace between the Ottomans and the Byzantines after the fall of Constantinople.

Could we argue that the Ottoman-Byzantine Wars continue to this very day?

Again, de facto and de jure.

The humor of history seems to escape you. I suggest you find it if you really want to enjoy the subject.

 

[Xanadu84]

That modern psychology was founded by Sigmund Freud or that his theories are still relevant to this day. He didn't and they're not. Freud's lasting contribution to modern psychology is popularizing it and some of his counseling methods.

Oh man this. Freud's contribution was basically to popularize the idea that people do...stuff, for...reasons. Which to be fair, the idea that human behavior could be viewed through the lens of science was actually a bit revolutionary for it's time. Of course, the problem is that he merely popularized it: Wilhelm Wundt had already been doing this for decades, using methodology that was infinitely more sound, and coming to conclusions and treatments that were actually backed up by some sort of evidence.

Freud made the idea of Psychology more popular, but honestly, I can't name a single actual idea of his that holds up as a science. The whole id/ego/superego are interesting as a philosophy and as a sort of thought experiment on human thinking, but it really has zero objective merit. Every theory he had does little for the field besides providing naysayers with a very easily discredited BS approach that is literally just stuff Freud made up because he thought it sounded nice. At worst, misguided people take it seriously and end up with a horrifically sexist view of the world, and people end up taking it on the authority of a guy who was totally clueless.

Freud would have made a great Macro-economist.

 

[Stu35]

Guy Fawkes was not a hero.

No, he was a terrorist. He and the the rest of the conspirators we motivated by religion (themselves being Catholic) and planned to kill the Protestant King James.

In fact, the current anti-terrorism laws in England make it illegal to venerate or celebrate a terrorist, which kind of makes the whole 5th November celebrations a little suspect

Not really. The 5th of November celebrates the foiling of the terrorist plot, thats why we burn effigies of Guy Fawkes, detonate fireworks, and also get wankered and shag birds in fancy dress... Although that last one might be a more recent tradition.

I thought they tried to blow up parlement... Then again, I'm not from the UK, so my facts might not be straight... and the only reason I know about bonfire night is because I looked up some fall foods for Halloween. So yes, I learned about this Holiday by Treacle Toffee.

They did try to blow up parliament. Thats why we have fireworks.

Burn the effigy to show the traitor on the fire.

Blow the fireworks to represent what he was trying to do.

Shag the women and drink the beers... because god damn it we're British, and we love to put our dicks in women and alcohol down our throats.

 

[Eddie the head]

I just know that half of this is going to be bashing on the United States, so I am going to try and avoid anything to do with that. But Albert Einstein never failed a math class when he was young. King Richard the Lionhearted didn't speak a lick of English. Also the "Bad guy" the Robbin Hood had high taxes because they where paying for the crusades. Witch people supported, but they didn't want to pay for it.

 

[Winthrop]

Linchon didn't give a fuck about slaves

I could swear I read last year that only Confederate slaves were freed at first and slaves in Union states were protected property, almost as a giant fuck you to the rebels. I may have read it wrong or mixed it up in the time since but I read something along those lines.

That is very true. The emancipation proclamation (the thing that freed the slaves) only applied to rebel states, not the border states (states with slavery that were still in the Union). It is worth noting that because these states were not a part of the USA, the proclamation essentially did nothing. It was more symbolic than anything else. It did later lead to the emancipation of slaves in the remaining states by the Thireenth Amendment, but not until after Lincoln had died.

As for all the Hitler stuff, I think he was a great politician but a bad leader. He made people want to support him and made impressive claims at a time when people needed the hope he could provide. Unfortunately, there was little substance behind his claims and instead a whole lot of crazy.

 

[swani24]

americans claiming that the atomic bombs were necessary to defeat japan without an invasion. it's history revisionism at it's best, japan had already signaled willingness to surrender prior to the bombings but was ignored. the consensus among historians is pretty much that it was to field test those things and to intimidate the soviets, which were perceived as a growing threat.
also, slightly related: pretending like the germans would have won the war in europe without american assistance. no. just...no. (pacific is a different deal though)

Yeah the bombs weren't necessary but the projected casualties of an invasion of the main Japanese islands would have resulted in a MASSIVE number of deaths on both sides.

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/the-final-months-of-the-war-with-japan-signals-intelligence-u-s-invasion-planning-and-the-a-bomb-decision/csi9810001.html#rtoc4

These are two decent sources that detail the intelligence gathered in preparation for the invasion of Japan. I also read a couple really good books when I was in college though I can only remember one of them, Double Victory, which detail both sides of this argument. It is pretty obvious though that Japan was not going to surrender unconditionally and it came down to either invading the country or using the A-bomb. Also, the Japanese military were arming their civilians and school children with guns, swords, bows and arrows, and anything else they could find while constantly telling them that the American soldiers were going to eat their children and murder them. It also took the American forces years to remove the thousands of booby traps that had been set around the islands. Overall an invasion would have been disastrous and Japan was not willing to give up their imperial style of government. Glad I never have to make decisions like this! I really don't understand why anyone actually wants to be president!

 

[swani24]

Forgot the second source....
http://ussslcca25.com/jaekel03.htm

 

[bl4ckh4wk64]

Mussolini didn't make the trains run on time. He was just very good at making it look like he did so when foreign journalists appeared.

Mussolini was a fucking asshole. Hearing stories from my grandmother, he basically told Italy to go fuck themselves, he had other things to take care of. That's why essentially every Italian family have their own garden, to grow their own food. Then again, my grandmother is getting pretty old, so...

In regards to Lincoln, I believe it was his Secretary of State, William Seward, that stated something along the lines of, "We show sympathy with slavery by freeing them where we can't and keeping them in bondage where we can free them."
It's not the fact that Lincoln was racist, it's just that he needed a reason to unite the North against the South and he figured the best way was to give them a moral high horse to stand on. The Emancipation Proclamation wasn't based around freeing slaves, it was based around disrupting the supply lines and the base of the the Southern economy. The South originally seceded because they feared that Lincoln and the Republican party would ban slavery in the US, which they eventually did.

Another thing:
Nazi Germany probably would have won World War II if Hitler hadn't been such an arrogant douchebag. If he had listened to the generals that he appointed, he wouldn't have made mistakes like invade fucking Russia.

 

[Innegativeion]

Great leaders don't start a war that completely destroys their country.

Captcha: Piping hot

Why thank you.

Not to mention 'victim of circumstance' is a pretty poor moral defense for unwaveringly allowing oneself to become the posterboy of mass genocide.

I would go as far to say the effectiveness of Hitler's leadership does not absolve him of the demonization he receives. He is, after all, responsible for what is arguably the greatest crime against human dignity that can be traced to a single leader.

 

[Altorin]

I think the most glaring one is the idea that native americans of all sorts were unsophisticated primitives with low populations and sharp sticks, and they never stood a chance against the invading europeans. The latter is true, but only because of diseases.. Within a few years after their first contact with Europeans, their populations collapsed, leaving them at about 10% of their population. They basically suffered the Super-Black Plague as all manner of deadly diseases that the Europeans had overtime and with travel to other places had developed strong resistances to just absolutely ravaged them, leaving them vastly underpopulated and ripe for invasion by the Europeans that just assumed that they were sparsely populated for other reasons, like they were cavemen.