# Which historical events have been most misrepresented? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 22, 2015, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288 "2015-04-22T15:05:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/1 "2015-04-22T15:05:05Z")
Misrepresented by who? Well, popular culture, TV, films, books to education, what kids are taught in the classroom. And by whose standards? Let’s say you can grab an eyewitness from the time and expose him or her to how what they saw and experienced is represented today. Pretty much every historical event is going to be misrepresented, or rather partially or monorepresented, seen from only one angle, but some more than others. This is inspired by my recent studying of WWI and wondering how relatable a British soldier would find the general recollection of events (granted, WWI is a pretty big ‘event’). [Not much, in my opinion.](http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-25776836) A lot of my ideas from pop-culture osmosis and education turned out to be bullshit. The idea that the whole war was one raging battle along the entire front that men were constantly exposed to. The notion of ‘lions led by donkeys’, when more British generals were killed in WWI than WWII. That machine guns were the number one nemesis, when shell fragments were the biggest killer. Which events have you studied and realised that the people who were there would balk at its pop-culture retelling and provoke the response “That’s not how it happened!”? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/2 "2015-04-22T15:23:32Z")
For a long time, the dominant pop-culture narrative of Reconstruction was that found in _Gone With the Wind_, and needless to say, it had only marginal connection to the truth. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/3 "2015-04-22T15:27:26Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > For a long time, the dominant pop-culture narrative of Reconstruction was that found in _Gone With the Wind_, and needless to say, it had only marginal connection to the truth. Heck, look at **Birth of a Nation**. Truly cringe-worthy in its depiction of Reconstruction legislatures, filled with stereotyped blacks ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_T-Cups](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Sir\_T-Cups](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_T-Cups)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/4 "2015-04-22T15:27:59Z")
I am guessing the answer to this question is an exponential curve the further back in history you get. I can’t imagine much of anything about the Ancient (read: Biblical) world is true, and it gets slightly more truthful the more recent you get. And to throw a wrench in things, I am thinking that the curve will eventually level off (100% true) and then start to waiver again when we get to things that happened in the last couple of years because of the misinformation of the internet actually makes modern things false because of the abundance of information and false sources ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/5 "2015-04-22T15:31:54Z")
The Spanish conquest of Peru. Also, pretty much everything I was taught in high school. ---
**Author:** ![chacoguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/50afbb/32.png) [@chacoguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chacoguy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/6 "2015-04-22T18:54:54Z")
Custer’s Last Stand. ---
**Author:** ![That\_Don\_Guy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/that_don_guy/32/538_2.png) [@That\_Don\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/That_Don_Guy)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/7 "2015-04-22T19:27:32Z")
Probably the most well known “misunderstood” event, at least in the USA, is the ride Paul Revere and a few others made on April 18, 1775. Most people take the Longfellow poem as gospel, and add “The British are Coming!” for some reason. (The TV series _Sleepy Hollow_ had a scene where Ichabod tried to correct a tour guide about what actually happened.) ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/8 "2015-04-22T19:35:34Z")
> [@Mr.Kobayashi](#): > > The idea that the whole war was one raging battle along the entire front that men were constantly exposed to. I’d agree that’s an actual misrepresentation > [@](#): > > The notion of ‘lions led by donkeys’, when more British generals were killed in WWI than WWII. The two are not mutually exclusive. There are many instances of personally brave but tactically foolish generals pre-WW1 > [@](#): > > That machine guns were the number one nemesis, when shell fragments were the biggest killer. I’m not sure who has this misrepresentation. I for one, if you asked me and I had time to think about it, I’d have to guess it was artillery that killed the most in WW1. If I didn’t, then my gut answer would be that they were about equal, with rows and rows plowed by machine guns in spurts, but balanced out by shell after shell over time. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/9 "2015-04-22T19:41:32Z")
> [@chacoguy](#): > > Custer’s Last Stand. Yeah, that tank was most certainly not there. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/10 "2015-04-22T19:41:40Z")
Christopher Columbus, who brought culture, science & sophistication to the naked savages of the New World, as opposed to exploitation and slavery. That, and, Creation. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/11 "2015-04-22T19:54:39Z")
> [@That\_Don\_Guy](#): > > Probably the most well known “misunderstood” event, at least in the USA, is the ride Paul Revere and a few others made on April 18, 1775. Most people take the Longfellow poem as gospel, and add “The British are Coming!” for some reason. (The TV series _Sleepy Hollow_ had a scene where Ichabod tried to correct a tour guide about what actually happened.) Of course, we all understand the Paul Revere story much better now that Sarah Palin has educated us about it. :smack: Or, [Palin’s Twist on Paul Revere](http://www.factcheck.org/2011/06/palins-twist-on-paul-revere/) (article includes quotes from Revere’s own account). ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/12 "2015-04-22T19:55:16Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > The two are not mutually exclusive. There are many instances of personally brave but tactically foolish generals pre-WW1 Every war has its screw ups, but WWI generals and in I think in particular Haig get painted with this, in a manner that contemporaries [would not have recognised](http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/zq2y87h#zsx3wmn); as a butcher, a madman or just incompetent. > [@](#): > > I’m not sure who has this misrepresentation. I for one, if you asked me and I had time to think about it, I’d have to guess it was artillery that killed the most in WW1. If I didn’t, then my gut answer would be that they were about equal, with rows and rows plowed by machine guns in spurts, but balanced out by shell after shell over time. I think a popular view of a WWI battle, or WWI in general, is the boys going ‘over the top’ to be sythed down by Jerry’s machine guns, in any case I’ll admit it was certainly mine before I read into the subject. Whether that’s due to media misrepresentation, inadequate education or my own personal stupidity is up for debate, I blame all three myself. ---
**Author:** ![SaharaTea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@SaharaTea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SaharaTea)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/13 "2015-04-22T20:00:18Z")
The Declaration of Independence. Many people believe the vote for independence and the signing of the Declaration happened all in one room on July 4, 1776. In reality the vote occurred on July 2, the Declaration was formally ratified on July 4 and many delegates signed on a later date. It’s also widely believed that the people accused of witchcraft in 1692 Salem were burned at the stake. Instead they were hanged, with one crushed to death by stones. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/14 "2015-04-22T20:04:59Z")
The Boston Tea Party, in which a devoted band of patriots galvanized the people into a desire to overthrow the tyranny of Taxation without Representation. Totally not orchestrated by a smuggler with a warehouse full of black-market tea marked with last year’s forged tax stamps, which he couldn’t sell at any price, so long as there was an ample supply of legal tea sitting in ships in the harbor waiting to be offloaded. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/15 "2015-04-22T20:11:42Z")
That the pre-Columbian Native inhabitants of North America were largely hunter-gatherers, living either (a) in peaceful co-existence with nature (in one version of the myth); or (b) in nasty savagry (in another version). In reality, by far the majority of the population were agriculturalists, and some lived in cities of considerable size. Cahokia, for example. It was a city larger than any in the US until the 1780s, allegedly. > **[Cahokia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cahokia)** > > The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site /kəˈhoʊkiə/ (11 MS 2) is the site of a pre-Columbian Native American city (which existed c. 1050–1350 CE) directly across the Mississippi River from modern St. Louis, Missouri. This historic park lies in south-western Illinois between East St. Louis and Collinsville. The park covers 2,200 acres (890 ha), or about 3.5 square miles (9 km2), and contains about 80 manmade mounds, but the ancient city was much larger. At its apex around 1100 CE, the city Cahok... If you were to ask many about pre-Columbian cities in the US, they would not know what you were talking about. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/16 "2015-04-22T20:14:34Z")
> [@Sir\_T-Cups](#): > > I am guessing the answer to this question is an exponential curve the further back in history you get. > > I can’t imagine much of anything about the Ancient (read: Biblical) world is true, and it gets slightly more truthful the more recent you get. Nah, it’s messier than that. It depends a lot on whether there were any historians around, and what they were interested in. The “Ancient (read: Biblical)” world is a huge thing. Old Testament stuff, for instance, involves a lot of reading between lines. But the ancient world also includes the Greek world and the Roman Empire. We know a metric boatload about that, although not necessarily always the things we want to know. On the other hand, again: Start talking about, say, the historical Jesus or the earliest history of Islam, and things get seriously spotty. Then you have things like the time after the end of Roman rule in Britain, where the place falls off the map for a while, and you’re left with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table until history starts going again around the 600s. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/17 "2015-04-22T20:53:27Z")
The American Civil war. It was about the “right” of large slaveholding families to extend slavery to the new Western territories. The Federal Government was OK with allowing the Old South to keep slaves, but would not allow it to be extended outside the area. later, Lincoln decided to end slavery (Emancipation Proclamation). But that came later. ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/18 "2015-04-22T21:33:05Z")
> [@chacoguy](#): > > Custer’s Last Stand. Plus, ya know, the whole Western genre which with very rare exeptions greatly misrepresents the actual history. That’d probably be the winner hands down if we’re just talking about sheer output of misleading media. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2015, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/19 "2015-04-22T22:52:41Z")
There’s a fairly wide disagreement between Turkey and the rest of the world about how to properly represent the (possible) Armenian Holocaust. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2015, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288/20 "2015-04-23T01:09:28Z")
I would seriously say almost all of them. History, and the events thereof, has always been basically written either by the winners or the losers and both take pen in hand with a certain bias. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-historical-events-have-been-most-misrepresented/718288.md?page=2)