The Terrible History Thread

ParkCungHee

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Since History tends to have it's greatest bursts of activity when someone is incredibly wrong, and we like pointing out in great detail how people are wrong, I figured we'd assemble a great repository of stupid, baffling psuedohistory.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19769_5-baffling-discoveries-that-prove-history-books-are-wrong.html
So we have: Stupid Ancient Transoceanic Voyage theories, stupid linguistics theory and, it's very subtle, but a good job screwing up modern American History by pulling out the old tale about how Americans were afraid of Martians attacking in the 1930s.
 
I am making my contribution! Keep in mind, I find distorting of history ("The Crusades were defensive operations to protect Western Europe against Islam!") to be more interesting then outright ridiculous theses ("Koreans controlled the whole world in 1000BC!"). In other words, I find

this narrative about the fall of Byzantium (It was all fault of the We$t),
this apology for the British Empire (The British Empire was an overall force for Freedom - actually, quite balanced for the author),
or this "book of Greek lies" from Slavic Macedonia (Macedonia rules, Greece sucks and has almost no real history)

to be more interesting then Galvin Menzies' theories about China discovering America and starting the Renaissance. Fomenko's "New Chronology", however, crosses the line twice.

The former three distortions (especially the first two, the Macedonian one is a bit borderline) contain some actual history, but distort it to their ideological ends. The latter ones just throw all history away altogether.
 
Since History tends to have it's greatest bursts of activity when someone is incredibly wrong, and we like pointing out in great detail how people are wrong, I figured we'd assemble a great repository of stupid, baffling psuedohistory.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19769_5-baffling-discoveries-that-prove-history-books-are-wrong.html
So we have: Stupid Ancient Transoceanic Voyage theories, stupid linguistics theory and, it's very subtle, but a good job screwing up modern American History by pulling out the old tale about how Americans were afraid of Martians attacking in the 1930s.
WTF? Cracked is usually better than that. I especially like their articles debunking historical myths. Now they have to go and make one that gathers up several of them. I have encountered some awful history on Cracked before - the "Hitler liked to be peed on" story - but nothing this bad.
 
I've posted about the Hwanguk Empire before. It belongs very much in this thread.


WTF? Cracked is usually better than that. I especially like their articles debunking historical myths. Now they have to go and make one that gathers up several of them. I have encountered some awful history on Cracked before - the "Hitler liked to be peed on" story - but nothing this bad.

Yeah, that article was really painful to read. Most Cracked history articles are actually decent though.
 
Lone Wolf's Link said:
The most stable financial system in the history of mankind was created in Byzantium
Now, I know I'm entirely ignorant of Byzantine history, but given what the regular Romans were like, that seems...suspect.

The Byzantine financial-economic system underwent several serious crises during the course of history
Ah. Well there we go.
Double think aside, anyone know anything about Byzantine Finance?
 
WTF? Cracked is usually better than that. I especially like their articles debunking historical myths.
Cracked, in my experience, usually makes at least one wrong assertion in its articles. That one made far more then one, though.

Are you absolutely sure this isn't satire? Because I lolled reading this!
Nope. It was made by Christian Orthodox Archimandrite Tikhon, who is considered close to the Kremlin, in 2008 (during that time, there were debates about Putin's successor and his third term, hence assertions about "Byzantium's problems with successors", and "an emperor every four years").

Now, I know I'm entirely ignorant of Byzantine history, but given what the regular Romans were like, that seems...suspect.
Well, the Byzantine gold denomination was fairly stable from 4th to 11th centuries. Mind you, gold coinage is only a part of "financial system".

For more glorification of the other, very different Empire, also see "The Politically Incorrect Guide to the British Empire". Unlike the "Politically Incorrect Guide", Niall Ferguson's "Empire" (no link to its text on the Web) can, in parts, be interesting and informative, but it still distorts the British historical record (it's like a book about Mao's China that delegates the famine of the Great Leap to a footnote). And its last chapter, about noble British empire voluntarily sacrificing her colonies to fight the evil Germans, is on the level of Archimadrite Tikhon.

In fact, any Politically Incorrect Guide that deals with history can be safely understood as a distortion.

Also, more distorting of history based on ideology - the "Native Americans Morally Disqualified Themselves from the Land" article. Unfortunately, it had been pulled down, so you have to deal with an article that debunks it.
 
Lone Wolf said:
("The Crusades were defensive operations to protect Western Europe against Islam!")

Actually the Crusades - or more precisely the 1st Crusade - was indeed organized chiefly to protect Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem and the Holy Land from religious discrimination and persecutions by Seljuk Turks. As long as Arabs ruled in Jerusalem, there was religious tolerance there (Arabs were in general religiously tolerant, of course it depended on a particular ruler, but we can safely say that 9/10 of Caliphs supported the policy of religious tolerance in their domains). But in 1078 Seljuk Turks attacked and captured Jerusalem and the Holy Land from Arab hands. During the following years persecutions of Christians and (to a lesser extent) Jews started there. These sad news of course reached Europe - and this was one of the main reasons why the crusade was called.

When it comes to the part of "protecting Western Europe" - this is an exaggeration. But certainly one of goals of the 1st Crusade was to protect Christendom - precisely, Byzantine Empire - from Turkish expansion. Following the battle of Manzikert in 1071, Seljuk Turks captured entire Anatolia from Byzantine hands. And they organized ethnic cleansing in Anatolia (in fact most of Greek population fled already before Turkish forces came - later Turks expelled the rest of Greeks). The Byzantine Emperor had already asked Western Christianity for help against Islamic expansion many times before. But such a terrible defeat shocked Christendom and one of arguments used by Pope in 1095, when he started to exhort to organize a crusade, was the need of providing help to the Byzantines.

===========================

And of course vast majority of later crusades - after the 1st one - were organized to "keep alive" the Crusader States. Since the Crusader States suffered from chronic & serious shortage of soldiers (as attempts of Frankish colonization did not succeed), they couldn't survive without military help from Europe.

Of course I am referring to Middle Eastern crusades all the time. As we know there were also Baltic and Pomeranian crusades.

And during the Second Crusade, enroute to the Holy Land, the crusading army also helped to regain Lisbon from Muslim hands:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Lisbon

Such a "common factor" of the Crusades and the Reconquista.
 
In general, I think anything that describes itself as "The Politically Incorrect Guide" to anything is bunk.

EDIT: That's what I get for responding without reading the full post.
At any rate, I've seen "The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Civil War" plaguing bookshelves lately. I also rather like that the guide to the British Empire is factually wrong about WWII on the cover. At any rate, they have nothing on the Bulgarian Empire, who stood alone against Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, Fascist Italy, The Communist Soviet Union, Capitalist America, and Orangist Britain all by themselves.

DOUBLE EDIT: I also notice this Politically Incorrect guide neglects to mention Francis Drake ordering the murder of surrendering women and children. It's political correctness gone mad when people are worried about defending the righteousness of such actions.
 
Actually the Crusades - or more precisely the 1st Crusade - was indeed organized chiefly to protect Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem
That's not what I am talking about. I am talking about the "Protection of Western Europe". The "Fighting them over there so that we don't fight them here" thesis applied to the Crusades.
 
That's not what I am talking about. I am talking about the "Protection of Western Europe". The "Fighting them over there so that we don't fight them here" thesis applied to the Crusades.

Well, there is some grain of truth in it, we might say that they were indirectly defending their own countries.

Fighting off the enemy far away from your own borders also might be called "defence against their expansion / expansionism".

Considering that for example the USA "defended democracy" in North Korea during the Korean War. ;)

And recently the USA "protects the democratic world from terrorist attacks" in Afghanistan. :)

In such case Frankish crusaders could "defend Western Europe" in the Middle East as well.

BTW - not only Western Europe, since for example Polish knights also participated in crusades (even some of Polish dukes).
 
Well, there is some grain of truth in it, we might say that they were indirectly defending their own countries.
These ideological justifications were not present in calls for Crusades. I am not aware of any Crusader justification that talks about defending their own countries from Muslims. Defending the Outremer states, sure.
 
These ideological justifications were not present in calls for Crusades. I am not aware of any Crusader justification that talks about defending their own countries from Muslims.

There are several versions of Pope Urban II's speech at Clermont in 1095.

According to most versions he only mentioned "(...) defence of the Eastern Church (...)".

But according to one version he called: "(...) Christian soldiers, to defend the liberty of your country by armed endeavor (...)".

And since he said that to Western European soldiers, well... ;)
 
"(...) Christian soldiers, to defend the liberty of your country by armed endeavor (...)".
Even in this version, he doesn't bother to develop the thesis further. Regardless, it's clear that Muslims presented no threat to Western Europe during the Crusades' times and that the motive of "Fighting them over there so that we don't fight them here" was muted, if existed at all. Far cry from "The crusades were defensive conquests" thesis of Robert Spencer (P.I.G. to Islam and the Crusades).
 
Regardless, it's clear that Muslims presented no threat to Western Europe during the Crusades' times

Except of Iberian Peninsula and Sicily, I would say.

and that the motive of "Fighting them over there so that we don't fight them here" was muted, if existed at all.

Ok, I agree that this motive was muted.

Far cry from "The crusades were defensive conquests"

"Defensive conquest" is an oxymoron - not only in the context of crusades, but in general.

Preemptive attack and counterattack do exist, but "defensive conquest" - there is no such thing.
 
Well, in the Iberian Peninsula, both the Muslims and the Christians were threats to each other (and themselves) :lol:

"Defensive conquest" is an oxymoron - not only in the context of crusades, but in general.
Exactly.
 
Domen said:
And since he said that to Western European soldiers, well...

You seem to be using Guibert's version. If that's the case that isn't what Urban was talking about. The full context of the quote is:

"If in olden times the Maccabees attained to the highest praise of piety because they fought for the ceremonies and the Temple, it is also justly granted you, Christian soldiers, to defend their liberty of your country by armed endeavor. If you, likewise, consider that the abode of the holy apostles and any other saints should be striven for with such effort, why do you refuse to rescue the Cross, the Blood, the Tomb? Why do you refuse to visit them, to spend the price of your lives in rescuing them? You have thus far waged unjust wars, at one time and another; you have brandished mad weapons to your mutual destruction, for no other reason than covetousness and pride, as a result of which you have deserved eternal death and sure damnation. We now hold out to you wars which contain the glorious reward of martyrdom, which will retain that title of praise now and forever.

Which isn't a claim to defending one's own nation via Crusade but a challenge to extend the norms of Christian conduct (i.e. the defense of shrines) to other areas outside of one's own nation. But we might as well skip what was meant to have been said at the Council of Clermont (because that'd denigrate into a pointless debate revolving around something in plain English that Domen will insist means something else) because we have Urban's own instructions to guide us. He wrote in December 1025:

Your brotherhood, we believe, has long since learned from many accounts that a barbaric fury has deplorably afflicted an laid waste the churches of God in the regions of the Orient. More than this, blasphemous to say, it has even grasped in intolerabe servitude its churches and the Holy City of Christ, glorified b His passion and resurrection. Grieving with pious concern at this calamity, we visited the regions of Gaul and devoted ourselves largely to urging the princes of the land and their subjects to free the churches of the East. We solemnly enjoined upon them at the council of Auvergne (the accomplishment of) such an undertaking, as a preparation for the remission of all their sins. And we have constituted our most beloved son, Adhemar, Bishop of Puy, leader of this expedition and undertaking in our stead, so that those who, perchance, may wish to undertake this journey should comply With his commands, as if they were our own, and submit fully to his loosings or bindings, as far as shall seem to belong to such an office. If, moreover, there are any of your people whom God has inspired to this vow, let them know that he (Adhemar) will set out with the aid of God on the day of the Assumption of the Blessed Mary, and that they can then attach themselves to his following.

Which makes no mention of defending Europe but does mention helping out of the Churches of the East. Hilariously, he doesn't even make "YO, TEH MUSSLIMS HAVE ZE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SPELLCHECKER" his main point; he just throws it in there as one point among many to be concerned about.

Domen said:
Ok, I agree that this motive was muted.
It didn't exist. Simple as that.
 
Cracked, in my experience, usually makes at least one wrong assertion in its articles. That one made far more then one, though.
They are far from perfect, but they are generally pretty damn good for pop history articles (which they are). Especially from a humour magazine website, where the articles are entertainment first and history second. But that one, I don't know if I read more than the initial header and closed the tab.
 
At any rate, I've seen "The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Civil War" plaguing bookshelves lately

Funny you should mention that particular book. I had an audiobook of it once but stopped listening to because I found it quite distasteful. The bits I did listen to struck me as something akin to one long Confederate propaganda spech.
 
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