it is surprisingly easy for historical myths to become historical fact because
often times people will prefer the version of a story that is the most
entertaining or the easiest to remember rather than one
that is the most accurate sometimes all it takes is for one person to come up with a good lie and
just like that hundreds of years later it's still presented as fact today we examine 10 of
these myths all about famous historical people who aren't around anymore to clear the air themselves
number 10 lady godiva in the naked ride the story of lady godiva's naked ride has been around for
over 700 years as the wife of leah frick earl of mercia she pleaded with her husband to lower
taxes which he said he would do if she would ride around town naked in the middle of the
day godiva agreed to do this and out of respect for her all peasants averted their gaze during
a naked ride except for one pervert named thomas who became known as peeping tom that's the story
though the existence of lady godiva is well attested she lived during the mid 11th century
was married to leafrick one of the richest men in anglo-saxon england everything else however seems
to be fiction which was steadily added to over the centuries the first to mention it was the
chronicle of roger of wendover 200 years later but he only made reference to leaffrick's challenge
he never said the godiva actually went through with it the peeping tom bit wasn't even added
until the 17th century so there's no historical evidence that the naked ride ever took place
9. walter rally in the tobacco craze staying in england we take a look at one of the country's
leading adventurers sir walter rally he explored and colonized the new world fought the spanish
armada and even led an expedition to search for the fabled el dorado he is also credited with
introducing tobacco to england in fact according to legend the concept of smoking was so alien
to englishmen that when rally's servant first saw him smoke he threw a bucket of water in him
thinking that his master was on fire so is any of this true the story about the servant is obviously
fiction but rally does deserve some partial credit because he played a role in popularizing tobacco
especially after supposedly convincing queen elizabeth the first to try it everyone else
copied the queen so smoking became the new hip thing to do but rally definitely did not introduce
it because the spanish had brought tobacco to europe decades earlier john frampton had
already published an english translation of the book of the tobacco and of his great virtues by
spanish physician nicholas manades promoting the plant's many medicinal qualities so the english
were aware of tobacco they just weren't really interested in smoking it number eight guiltor and
the guillotine you could probably guess by his name what joseph ignaz guitor is famous for but
contrary to myth he did not actually invent the guillotine arguably the most notorious execution
method in history in fact the 18th century french physician was a staunch abolitionist who did not
believe in the death penalty at all however since getting rid of it completely was unrealistic he
advocated for a more humane method of execution one which was quick painless and didn't involve
torture ultimately he got his wish but he had no hand in the design or manufacture of the
killing device several people were involved in its development but the actual construction was
done by a german harpsichord maker named tabaya schmidt the name guillotine stuck mainly due to a
song published in a popular french journal mocking the physician guitar bitterly regretted the last
moment of his existence this connection there is another myth involving him that says that he died
by guillotine which again is not true josephine's guitar died of old age at 75 years old afterward
his family petitioned the french government to change the name of the killing device but
it refused the family changed their name instead seven mussolini and his trains say what you want
about mussolini but at least he made the trains run on time or at least that's what people bring
up whenever they try to promote the virtues of an autocratic regime or when they try to see
the positives even in a worst case scenario regardless of the motivation behind it they
should probably stop saying it because it's not true the whole trains running on time idea was
propaganda used by mussolini to advance the notion of fascist efficiency pretty much every
biography on mussolini comes with testimonies from people who lived or visited italy during
his reign and knew firsthand the legendary precision and punctuality of italian trains
they don't mention that many repairs and improvements on italy's railway system were
done in the early 1920s before mussolini even came to power he simply later just took credit for them
6. george washington on the cherry tree one day in 1738 augustine washington's senior was walking
around his plantation when he noticed that someone had cut down his favorite cherry tree he suspected
his young son george who had just received a hatchet for his sixth birthday when augustine
confronted his son george washington admitted to the deed saying that he cannot tell a lie
impressed with his bravery and honesty augustine washington immediately forgave and embraced his
son it's a nice story that makes it all feel warm and fuzzy inside but it was completely made
up by a man named mason lochweens after george washington's death weens became one of the first
people to write a biography about the founding father titled simply the life of washington it
was published in 1800 and became a best seller it contained a lot of fictional stories especially
from washington's early years since weem's main interest beside making money of course was to turn
washington into a beloved role model for americans rather than the book having any kind of historical
accuracy the cherry tree story became the most popular myth associated with washington even
though it didn't actually appear until the book's 5th edition in 1806. 5. napoleon and the sphinx's
nose the great sphinx of giza is one of the most famous landmarks in the world but is instantly
recognizable and strangely enough one of the most defining features is something that is missing
its nose today we probably couldn't even picture the sphinx with a nose but obviously it did have
one at some point so what exactly happened weirdly enough the person who often gets the blame for the
missing nose is napoleon in 1798 he led a campaign into egypt and syria then part of the ottoman
empire and the story goes that an eric cannonball hit the sphinx's nose and smashed it to bits we
can safely let napoleon off the hook for this act of vandalism since there is pretty strong evidence
that the sphinx had already lost its nose before his time sketches by danish explorer frederick
lewis norden dated to 1737 decades before the french ruler was even born show the sphinx as
we know today going back even further 15th century historian al makrisi not only documented the loss
of the nose but also blamed it on a man named muhammad saeem al-daar who intentionally defaced
the sphinx as an act of iconoclasm number four ben franklin and his turkeys we've already covered
one founding father so let's mention another one benjamin franklin and his staunch admiration for
turkeys which supposedly prompted him to propose the turkey as america's national symbol instead
the bald eagle there are a few kernels of truth in this one which is probably why this myth is
so endearing it is true that franklin was part of the committee to select the national seal of
america alongside john adams and thomas jefferson so he would have had the opportunity to advocate
for the turkey if he so desired but he didn't do it instead franklin suggested a biblical scene
showing moses parting the red sea it is also true that franklin preferred the turkey over the bald
eagle he thought the eagle was a lazy animal of bad moral character who lived by stealing food
from the other birds whereas the turkey was more respectable and a true original native of america
however he only shared these opinions in a private letter to his daughter he never publicized them
and he wasn't even talking about the eagle from the great seal but rather the eagle used by a
club called the society of cincinnati which some people thought looked more like a turkey
than an eagle the whole sing was just a joke that people didn't get and that's how the myth was born
3. ponce de leon and the fountain of youth juan ponce de leon was a 16th century spanish explorer
and conquistador who led the first european expedition to florida and served as the first
governor of puerto rico however the main thing he is remembered for today is his search for the
mythical fountain of youth the legendary spring capable of de-aging anyone who swam in its waters
here's the thing though ponce de leon never did that the fountain of youth is not mentioned once
in any of his letters or documents his goal was something far more common and mundane
money specifically he was searching for another island like puerto rico where he could enjoy
another profitable governorship the connection with the fountain of youth appeared after the
explorer's death and was actually an attempt by a writer named gonzalo fernandez veda ivardes
to discredit him avedo disliked ponce de leon so he wrote how the conquistador was tricked
by the native americans to set off in pursuit of the fountain of youth it was meant to make
ponce de leon look like a gullible fool and the rest of the world bought it hook line and sinker
2. william howard taft and the big bathtub william howard taft served as the 27th president of the
united states but people mainly remember him today for being so fat that he once got stuck in the
white house bathtub and that it took six strong men to get him out it's true that taft was a large
man he stood almost six feet tall and weighed almost 350 pounds by the end of his presidency
he wasn't called big bill for nothing but even he wasn't big enough to get stuck in a bathtub that
had been installed in the white house especially for him yes taft had the force ought to order a
custom-made tub that was seven feet long three and a half feet wide and could easily accommodate four
regular men weighing over a ton it was at the time the largest bathtub built for one individual so
there was no way for big bill to get stuck inside it to top it all off this story was never reported
in the papers during taft's presidency the first mention of it seems to appear in the memoir of an
usher named i hoover who worked in the white house for 42 years and published a book with all kinds
of quirky and seedy stories from his time spent there number one magellan and his circumnavigation
being the first to do something is almost a sure-fire way to make it into the history books
some people even get lucky enough to become remembered for something they never actually
did take for example 16th century portuguese explorer ferdinand magellan if there is one
thing that most people know about magellan it's that he was the first person to circumnavigate
the globe in 1519. some places are more careful with their wording and say that magellan led or
masterminded the expedition that completed the first circumnavigation this is more accurate but
it's still amidst the fact that magellan himself never finished the voyage he was
killed in the philippines in 1521 and juan sebastian elcano became the new captain who
saw the voyage to completion curiously historians think that the person who probably deserves this
accolade the most was a malaysian slave named enrique ten years earlier magellan picked him
up in melaka to service his interpreter enrique then traveled west with magellan from asia to
europe then he set off in 1519 on magellan's fatal expedition going from europe to asia
however he left the ship after magellan's death in the philippines just a few hundred miles short of
his point of origin in malacca we don't know what happened to enrique after that but assuming
he made it home he would have completed the circumnavigation that he had unwittingly started
a decade earlier so i really hope you found this video interesting if you did
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