21.
That knights in plate mail were big, slow, clunky bruisers. In reality plate armor is actually easier to move around in than what we think of in video games as medium armor like chainmail. Why? Because its fitted to the wearer and held on with a complex collection of straps and belts. This distributes the weight evenly across the body. In comparison to chain mail (or samurai o-yoroi which often comes up when this is mentioned), this is far more comfortable as the others put weight straight on the arms and shoulders.
In a similar vein, padded or cloth armor is often portrayed in games as the lowest form of protection but a properly made gamberson of such is actually surprisingly good protection. The layers of tough textile, often stitched so the weave is going in different directions each layer, actually can really stagger a slashing blow.
22.
That Marie Antoniette proclaimed “Let them eat cake.” In reality it seems to have emerged from a short anecdote in an autobiography published by french (edit: Genevan born) philosopher Jean-Jacques Rosseau and is frequently misattributed to her.
23.
Salieri and Mozart actually got along quite well. If they did have a rivalry, it was merely professional.
Salieri didn’t promise his chastity to god, or if he did he didn’t follow through because he got married and had kids.
Salieri didn’t have to manipulate the emperor to earn favour with him. He was a well respected composer, and one of the richest men in the country at the time.
Amadeus is a great film, but it’s a good thing that it doesn’t start with “based on a true story”. At least it’s honest… I’m looking at you Braveheart!
24.
That Ancient Greeks and Romans were super gay, or super OK with homosexuality.
The first and most important point is that they did not conceive of sexuality in any way similar to how we do. They didn’t think of it as defined strictly, or even most importantly, along gender lines. They viewed sexuality in terms of dominant and submissive, or, more crassly, the one doing the f**king and the one being f**ked. This was also heavily tied to their public life and roles, as well. It was normal for men to sleep with other men, so long as the older man in a position of authority over the other man was the dominant partner in the relationship. For example, if a Senator had a relationship with a young assistant, or a general had a relationship with a lieutenant, that would not be seen as scandalous. However, if the roles were reversed, say the lieutenant were the one penetrating the general, that would be incredibly scandalous.
Another thing to add on to this is that these were incredibly misogynistic cultures. So while it was normal for two men to be in a sexual relationship (under the conditions I described above), women were always the submissive partner in a sexual relationship. It was incredibly scandalous for two women to sleep together because that would be two submissive partners.
Finally, sexual relationships and marriage were not quite as connected as we see them today. Sure, technically, you weren’t supposed to have sex with anyone other than your spouse, but men quite regularly slept with many partners of both genders without much controversy. Men would have sexual relationships with both men and women outside their marriage. You were supposed to be discrete with your dalliances, and not carry on long term relationships with someone else when you were married, but that, too, was regularly ignored. Again, though, touching back on the misogyny, if a woman were to cheat on her husband that would be grounds for divorce. Marriage was always between a man and a woman. So even if a man had a relationship with another man, marriage between two men (or two women for that matter) was just incompatible with how they thought about marriage. That’s not to say there weren’t examples of men having long-term permanent romantic relationships with other men, just that they would never have considered marriage as a possibility or something they wanted.
Now there were certainly people we would consider homosexual. The 2nd century Roman Emperor Hadrian, for example, was absolutely a homosexual. He had a long term romantic and sexual relationship with a man (much younger than him, by the way). He had a wife, but that was more for political and public image reasons than anything romantic or sexual. They had no children, and the ancient sources even suggest they never even had sex. The only thing that was notable about Hadrian’s sexuality in his time is how public he was about carrying on a sexual relationship with someone other than his wife.
25.
The myth that Titanic was in any way badly designed, badly built, or badly operated – by the standards of the time. In fact there are so many crazy inaccuracies surrounding Titanic that it’s hard to list them all here… But I’ll give it a go!
She was an incredibly seaworthy ship – probably moreso than any passenger ship around today. The iceberg damage stretched almost a third of the way down her side, and she still stayed afloat for more than two hours!
In that time, all but two of her lifeboats were launched – there wasn’t time to launch any more. She could have had a hundred more lifeboats on board, but that wouldn’t have helped without vastly more crew to operate them.
Titanic’s passengers genuinely did believe that she was practically unsinkable. When the time came to begin loading the lifeboats, many thought they would be safer staying on Titanic. There wasn’t time for the crew to wait around convincing more people to get in, so when a lifeboat was ready, if there was no-one else waiting to get in, it had to go. This is why so many of Titanic’s lifeboats left only half-full – it’s not just because the crew were worried about over-filling them.
Titanic wasn’t travelling too fast for the conditions – by the standards of practice around at the time. Further precautions were put into practice after the incident, but no-one on board can be blamed for doing what anyone on any ship would have done the same.
Titanic was by no means a fast ship, nor was she ever intended to be. The White Star Line (Titanic’s owners) were in competition with one other big shipping line, Cunard. Cunard’s liners (Mauretania, Lusitania and later Aquatania) were the fastest in the business. To combat this, instead of fighting for speed, White Star decided to try to make their liners the most luxurious in the world. Olympic and Titanic were famed for their splendour and comfort – passengers said that it was easy to forget that you were at sea, as there were very few vibrations from the engines, and the ships remained stable even in fairly rough seas. By comparison, Cunard’s liners were very fast, but their quadruple-screw configuration made vibration more apparent. It’s a myth that Titanic was ever trying to make record-breaking speed across the Atlantic.
She wasn’t built using sub-standard materials. This rumour goes around a lot these days because of an article that was written some time ago; what the article is supposed to mean is that there is much better quality steel available today. This was not the case in 1909. Additionally, Titanic’s builders were paid on a fee plus materials basis – they were given a set fee to construct the ship, plus the cost of all materials used. There was no incentive to use anything but the best steel they could get their hands on. The shipyard had an excellent reputation and would not risk tainting it by using bad steel, which could easily be noticed on inspection anyway.
Titanic and her two sister ships Olympic and Britannic were also surprisingly manoeuvrable for their size – much moreso than was expected. Some will tell you that Titanic’s rudder was too small, but this simply isn’t true. In fact, Olympic’s wartime captain marvelled at her manoeuvrability, and was even able to throw her into a sudden turn, ramming (and sinking) a German U-boat. Olympic was the first of only two merchant vessels throughout the First World War recorded to have sunk an enemy vessel.
While it’s true that the lookouts’ binoculars were misplaced (or rather, locked away in a cabinet that no-one on board had the key to open), this made no difference to Titanic’s fate. The images of sea captains and pirates scanning the horizon through telescopes, while common in films, has virtually no stead in reality. Binoculars and telescopes narrow your field of vision down to a fine point, making it harder to spot anything. Lookouts on real ships will use their eyes alone to search for objects of interest, and once they’ve been spotted, will u
26.
People believe, that the ex soviet union nations liked the soviet union and wanted to be annexed. the soviets treated the ex soviet countries badly. deportings every day. freedom of speech doesnt exist. you couldnt even show your countrys original flag.
27.
That Anne Boleyn had six fingers. She would have never been a lady in waiting to Catherine of Aragon, or even a mistress to Henry if she did, as it would be considered an imperfection. Most of it was made up after she was executed.
28.
Hitler didn’t become a monster because he was kicked out of art school.
He was a neckbeard bouncing around Vienna filling his head with all sorts of bulls**t “philosophy” and well on his way to becoming a monster when someone suggested that he look into an art and architecture program at some school. He made a half-a**ed application which was denied and he continued to sell little paintings to get by while he read all his crazy books. He trumped up the kicked out of art school story in Mein Kampf.
29.
That Iceland was named Iceland by the vikings to try to try to trick colonists into not colonizing when in fact the reason is that when the first people landed on iceland it was winter and the viking that named it saw a lot of ice and promptly named it as such
30.
People believe the Catholic Church was routinely anti-science.
In reality the church sponsored an lot of science. For example the big bang theory was the product of a Catholic priest and encountered atheist resistance because they thought it sounded too much like creation.
