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[DaoiCarpates]

10. Abner Doubleday Invented Baseball



This very common myth of baseball credits Doubleday with inventing the game, supposedly in Elihu Phinney's cow pasture in Cooperstown, New York, in 1839. In 1905, a committee was appointed to investigate the origins of the game, their conclusion was:

"the first scheme for playing baseball, according to the best evidence obtainable to date, was devised by Abner Doubleday at Cooperstown, New York, in 1839. [In] the years to come, in the view of the hundreds of thousands of people who are devoted to baseball, and the millions who will be, Abner Doubleday's fame will rest evenly, if not quite as much, upon the fact that he was its inventor … as upon his brilliant and distinguished career as an officer in the Federal Army."

In fact, this conclusion was based on the testimony of one man, who was of questionable credibility. Jeff Idelson of the Baseball Hall of Fame has said that baseball was not really invented anywhere, but as far as history is concerned, the first written rules of baseball were penned by Alexander Joy Cartwright for the baseball club The Knickerbockers. On June 3, 1953, Congress officially credited Cartwright with inventing the modern game of baseball.

9. The Colossus of Rhodes



Most ancient and even modern paintings of the now long gone Ancient Wonder of the World, the Colossus of Rhodes show him straddling the harbour entrance with ships entering the port beneath his legs. The Colossus was a statue (the tallest in the ancient world) of the Greek God Helios, built between 292 and 280 BC and standing at a height of 30m (100ft). Contrary to the popular misconception that the statues legs were apart,the Colossus actually stood with his legs slightly apart on one side of the entrance to the harbour. This renders virtually all illustrations of the statue, incorrect. The image above is a truthful depiction of his likely stance.

8. Witches were burnt in Salem



In 1692 and 1693, anti-witch Mania hit Salem, Massachusetts resulting in a series of trials that lead to the deaths of 20 accused witches. Over 150 people were tried for the crime of Witchery. Contrary to the popular myth that the witches were burnt, they were, in fact, hanged to death. Of the 20, 14 were women and 6 were men. All were executed according to this method with the exception of one man who died during judicial torture.

7. Lizzie Borden took an axe…



Unfortunately this myth rears its ugly head quite often, and often no amount of effort is sufficient to disprove it to the true believers. First off, Lizzie – she is famous through the children's poem:

Lizzie Borden took an axe
And gave her mother forty whacks.
And when she saw what she had done
She gave her father forty-one.

In fact, her father was axed 11 times and her step-mother 18 or 19 but that is not the real myth – the real myth is the belief that Lizzie Borden committed the crime at all. After a mere one hour of jury deliberation, Lizzie was found innocent of the crime. To give further weight to her innocence, shortly before her trial a second axe murder happened in the area. Additionally, Lizzie was found with no blood on her minutes after the crime took place, and no murder weapon was ever found.

6. Salome Wanted John the Baptist Killed



The Bible tells the tale of Herod executing John the Baptist and giving his head as a gift to his daughter in reward for her dance at his birthday. Most people mistakenly believe that Salome, the daughter, requested this out of anger for John refuses her advances. It was, in fact, Herodias, her mother who wanted John killed, not Salome – she was merely the messenger.

And when the daughter of the same Herodias had come in, and had danced, and pleased Herod, and them that were at table with him, the king said to the damsel: Ask of me what thou wilt, and I will give it thee. And he swore to her: Whatsoever thou shalt ask I will give thee, though it be the half of my kingdom. Who when she was gone out, said to her mother, What shall I ask? But her mother said: The head of John the Baptist. And when she was come in immediately with haste to the king, she asked, saying: I will that forthwith thou give me in a dish, the head of John the Baptist. Mark 6:22-25

This popular myth has been seen in opera, poetry, and painting

5. Edison Invented the Lightbulb



In fact, Thomas Edison not only did not invent the light-bulb, he did not invent many of the things attributed to him. His shrewd business skills enabled him to steal, improve, and patent many ideas before their original inventors were able to. He was, in addition, a ruthless man who attempted to discredit other inventors in order to gain popularity for his own. Prior to Edison's patent for the electric light-bulb in 1880, electric lights had already been invented. In 1840, British Astronomer and Chemist, Warren de la Rue, enclosed a platinum coil in a vacuum tube and passed an electric current through it, thus creating the world’s first light bulb – a full 40 years before Edison.

4. Pope Joan



The myth tells us that a young woman dressed as a priest and went to Rome to study. Eventually she became Pope but gave birth to a child while in a papal procession, causing the crowds to kill her by stoning. In fact, there never was a Pope Joan. The myth seems to have originated around the 13th century from the writings of Martin of Opava (Martin Polonus), a Polish chronicler, and it generally places Joan in the 9th century Papacy. Aside from Catholic literature, even enemies of the Catholic Church at the time (for example, Photius) make no mention at all of a female Pope. According to the Catholic Encyclopaedia:

"Between Leo IV and Benedict III, where Martinus Polonus places her, she cannot be inserted, because Leo IV died 17 July 855, and immediately after his death Benedict III was elected by the clergy and people of Rome; but owing to the setting up of an antipope, in the person of the deposed Cardinal Anastasius, he was not consecrated until 29 September. Coins exist which bear both the image of Benedict III and of Emperor Lothair, who died 28 September 855; therefore Benedict must have been recognized as pope before the last-mentioned date."

The recent resurgence in the belief in this myth is most like the result of Anti-Catholic and feminist wishful thinking, according to Philip Jenkins, author of The New Anti-Catholicism.

3. Lady Godiva Rode Naked



Lady Godiva was an Anglo-Saxon noble woman who is supposed to have ridden through the streets of Coventry naked in order to force her husband – Leofric (968–1057) – to remove an unfair tax on his tenants. Both she and her husband were very generous to the poor and religious institutions in their time. In 1043 Leofric founded and endowed a Benedictine monastery at Coventry and it is believed that his wife, Godiva, was the primary instigator of this. It is very possible that the legend has sprung from this particular event. But there is no doubt that her husband was a very generous man with little need for coercion. Interestingly, the legend of the Peeping Tom also arises from this myth as later versions of it describe a man, Tom, who peeped at Lady Godiva whilst she rode naked, and was struck blind.

2. "Let them eat Cake"



According to popular myth, Queen Marie Antoinette was heard to say: "S'ils n'ont plus de pain, qu'ils mangent de la brioche." ("If they have no bread, let them eat brioche") – referring to the poor. First of all, even if Queen Marie had made this comment, it would have not had the same meaning as it does today. Laws at the time of her reign meant that bakers who ran out of cheap bread, had to sell their finer bread (such as brioche) at the lower price, in order to protect people from ruthless bakers who would make insufficient quantities of inexpensive bread in order to make a bigger profit. That aside, the Queen did not say these words at all, they were actually written by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his book "Confessions" – written a number of years before Marie Antoinette became Queen. His exact words:

"I recalled the make-shift of a great princess who was told that the peasants had no bread and who replied: 'Let them eat brioche'. "

The misattribution and perpetuation of this myth is most likely a result of anti-Royal propaganda following the revolution in which she and her husband were murdered.

1. Nero Fiddled while Rome Burned



In July 18 to July 19, 64 AD, the Great Fire of Rome occurred. The popular myth surrounding this event is that Nero fiddled whilst he watched Rome burn, and later benefited from its burning by using cleared land for his new palace.

Suetonius and Cassius Dio said that Nero sang the “Sack of Ilium” in stage costume while the city burned. However, Tacitus' account has Nero in Antium at the time of the fire. Tacitus said that Nero playing his lyre and singing while the city burned was only rumour. In fact, According to Tacitus, upon hearing news of the fire, Nero rushed back to Rome to organize a relief effort, which he paid for from his own funds. After the fire, Nero opened his palaces to provide shelter for the homeless, and arranged for food supplies to be delivered in order to prevent starvation among the survivors. In the wake of the fire, he made a new urban development plan. Houses after the fire were spaced out, built in brick, and faced by porticos on wide roads. Nero also built a new palace complex known as the Domus Aurea in an area cleared by the fire.

Incidentally, the violin (fiddle) would not be invented for a full 1,000 years after the Great Fire of Rome.

[DaoiCarpates]

10. The Old Religion



The Myth: An Old Religion was practised in rural Europe until it was stamped out by the witchcraft persecutions, which killed millions of women.

The Witch-cult is the term for a hypothetical pre-Christian, pagan religion of Europe that allegedly survived into at least the early modern period. The theory was postulated by some 19th and 20th century scholars based upon the conspiracy theory that the European witchcraft which had been persecuted in the witch-hunt had been a part of a Satanic plot to overthrow Christianity, and indeed most of the evidence for the theory was compiled by studying the accounts of the persecutors in the witch trials in Early Modern Europe. The theory notably gave rise to several neopagan religions, such as Wicca and Stregheria in the 20th century. In fact, there was no "old religion" and modern day Wicca originated in the 20th century and was popularized by Gerald Gardner in 1954.

9. The Great Depression



The Myth: Starvation was rife in the Great Depression

It is very common when hearing about the Great Depression to imagine hoards of families starving to death due to lack of food and money, but while money was, indeed, scarce, most people were able to survive through resourcefulness and charity. The depression meant hunger, malnutrition, overcrowding, and poor health. It gave rise to widespread poverty and suffering. While virtually no one died from starvation, many did not have enough to eat. People searched garbage dumps for food or ate weeds. It is the resourcefulness that people learnt during this time that helped to make rationing easier on the British during the Second World War. The replacement of a hands-off approach to the economy with a more regulated one by President Roosevelt has been blamed by many for the current economic crisis.

8. Queen Cleopatra



The Myth: Cleopatra was Egyptian

Though Cleopatra bore the ancient Egyptian title of Pharaoh, the Ptolemaic dynasty (of which she was a part) was Hellenistic (Greek), having been founded 300 years before by Ptolemy I Soter, a Macedonian Greek general of Alexander the Great (depicted by Anthony Hopkins in the Oliver Stone film: Alexander). As such Cleopatra’s language was the Greek spoken by the Hellenic aristocracy, though she was reputed to be the first ruler of the dynasty to learn Egyptian. She also adopted common Egyptian beliefs and deities. According to tradition, saddened by the loss of her lover Mark Antony, she killed herself by means of an asp bite on August 12, 30 BC.

7. The Pyramid Builders



The Myth: Slaves built the pyramids

We have all seen the films and heard the tales of slaves captured by Egyptian military excursions being used to build the pyramids and temples of Ancient Egypt, but, in fact, they are all completely wrong. Contrary to popular belief, excavated skeletons show that the pyramid builders were actually Egyptians who were most likely in the permanent employ of the Pharaoh. Graffiti indicates that at least some of these workers took pride in their work, calling their teams "Friends of Khufu", "Drunkards of Menkaure", and so on — names indicating allegiances to Pharaohs.

6. Inquisition Death Toll



The Myth: The inquisition saw the slaughter of tens of thousands

The modern day notion of a unified and horrible "Inquisition" is an assemblage of the "body of legends and myths which, between the sixteenth and the twentieth centuries, established the perceived character of inquisitorial tribunals and influenced all ensuing efforts to recover their historical reality". It was the relatively limited persecution of Protestants, mostly by the inquisitions in Spain and Italy, that provoked the first image of "The Inquisition" as the most violent and suppressive vehicle of the Church. Under the rule of the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I and threatened with military attacks from Spain, England found a new surge of nationalism being fuelled by anti-Catholic propaganda centred on a series of books and pamphlets that detailed the horror of the "Spanish Inquisition". But the reality? No more than 2,000 people who were tried by the Inquisition were executed. The Spanish Inquisition (which should not be confused with the Office of Inquisition which still exists in the Church as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) ceased operating on the 15th July 1834.

5. Caligula's Horse



The Myth: Emperor Caligula made his horse a consul (a figurative head of the republican government)

Caligula's love for his horse, Incitatus, was well known in his time and in present times, but the modern love of a good myth has promoted the horse to a far greater position than in reality. About seventy years after Caligula died, the historian Seutonius wrote of Caligula and Incitatus: "Besides a stall of marble, a manger of ivory, purple blankets and a collar of precious stones, he even gave his horse a house, a troop of slaves and furniture, for the more elegant entertainment of the guests invited in his name: and it is also said that he planned to make him consul." The fact that this was not a first hand account (hence saying: "it is also said") the report is dubious. There are no other records that indicate that Caligula did ever indicate that he planned to raise Incitatus to such an important place – let alone do it.

4. Horsing Around



The Myth: Catherine the Great died whilst having sex with a horse

While this myth is very amusing (no doubt the reason for its popularity), Catherine died in bed of illness; there were no equines involved and a Catherine/horse nexus was never attempted. So how did the myth arise? During past centuries the easiest way for people to offend and verbally attack their female enemies was sex. Catherine the Great was always going to attract rumours about her sex life, but her voracious sexual appetite – while modest by modern standards – meant that the rumours had to be even wilder. Historians believe the horse myth originated in France, among the French upper classes, soon after Catherine's death as a way to mar her legend.

3. Spanish Flu



The Myth: Spanish flu came from Spain

The Spanish flu pandemic (the same virus as Swine flu) lasted from March 1918 to June 1920, spreading even to the Arctic and remote Pacific islands. It is estimated that anywhere from 50 to 100 million people were killed worldwide, or the approximate equivalent of one third of the population of Europe. Although the first cases of the disease were registered in the continental US and the rest of Europe long before getting to Spain, the 1918 Flu received its nickname "Spanish Flu" because Spain, a neutral country in WWI, had no special censorship for news against the disease and its consequences. Hence the most reliable news came from Spain, giving the false impression that Spain was the most — if not the only — affected zone. So thanks to the honesty of Spain, they are now marred forever by the title of the worst flu epidemic in modern history.

2. Lopsided



The Myth: Amazons were women who cut off one breast so they could use a bow and arrow better

Considering how ridiculous this story is, it is hard to believe that so many people believe it. This element of the Amazon myth was invented in the 5th century B.C. The poor Amazons had to start mutilating themselves because some big boob thoughtlessly dabbled in the dark art of etymology without the proper equipment. Hellanicus of Lesbos imagined the name was derived from the Greek prefix a- ("without") and mazos, a variant of mastos ("breast"). He was surely wrong, but his folk etymology is still firmly embedded in the collective consciousness after more than two dozen centuries. There was no hint before his time, either in writing or art, that the Amazons had anything other than usual complement of breasts, so we can safely assume that the one-breasted image we have of them flowed from the (false) etymology and not vice versa.

1. Shalom!



The Myth: Jesus spoke Hebrew

First of all, Jesus probably did have a knowledge of Hebrew, but he didn't speak it. The language spoken by Jesus (and the apostles) was Aramaic. Aramaic is a semitic language and it was the day-to-day language of Israel from 539 BC – 70 AD. In fact, contrary to popular belief, some parts of the Bible were never written in Hebrew – but rather Aramaic – chiefly Daniel and Ezra. It is also likely that Jesus was fluent in Greek as this was the secondary language of the region and it was the language of the common version of the Bible used by the Jews at the time. Even one of the most well know sayings of Jesus upon the Cross is Aramaic: "Eloi Eloi lema sabachthani?" meaning "My God, my God, for what have you forsaken me?"