List of common misconceptions about history

• The so-called Roman salute, in which the arm is fully extended forwards or diagonally with palm down and fingers touching, was not used in ancient Rome. The gesture was first associated with ancient Rome in the 1784 painting The Oath of the Horatii by the French artist Jacques-Louis David, which inspired later salutes, most notably the Nazi salute.{{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Winkler |first=Martin M. |title=The Roman Salute: Cinema, History, Ideology |publisher=Ohio State University Press |location=Columbus |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-8142-0864-9|page=56}}

File:Amphitheatre-Toulouse 2.JPG in a Roman amphitheater]]

• Wealthy Ancient Romans did not use rooms called vomitoria to purge food during meals so they could continue eating{{#invoke:Cite|book|last=McKeown|first=J.C.|title=A Cabinet of Roman Curiosities: Strange Tales and Surprising Facts from the World's Greatest Empire|date=2010|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-539375-0|pages=153–54|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YGYwlMZ3ursC&pg=PA153}} and vomiting was not a regular part of Roman dining customs.{{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Fass|first=Patrick|title=Around the Roman Table|date=1994|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=978-0-226-23347-5|pages=66–67|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YXGlAr17oekC|access-date=September 21, 2016|archive-date=January 21, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034111/https://books.google.com/books?id=YXGlAr17oekC|url-status=live}} A vomitorium of an amphitheatre or stadium was a passageway allowing quick exit at the end of an event.
• Scipio Aemilianus did not sow salt over the city of Carthage after defeating it in the Third Punic War.a. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Ridley|first1=R.T.|title=To Be Taken with a Pinch of Salt: The Destruction of Carthage |journal=Classical Philology|volume=81|issue=2|year=1986 |pages=140–146|doi=10.1086/366973|s2cid=161696751 |jstor=269786}}: "a tradition in Roman history well known to most students"

b. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Stevens|first1=Susan T. |year=1988|title=A Legend of the Destruction of Carthage |journal=Classical Philology |volume=83 |issue=1 |pages=39–41 |jstor=269635 |doi=10.1086/367078 |s2cid=161764925}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Visona |first1=Paolo |year=1988 |title=Passing the Salt: On the Destruction of Carthage Again |journal=Classical Philology |volume=83 |issue=1 |pages=41–42 |jstor=269636 |doi=10.1086/367079 |s2cid=162289604}}: "this story... had already gained widespread currency"

d. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Warmington |first1=B.H. |title=The Destruction of Carthage: A Retractatio |journal=Classical Philology |volume=83 |issue=4 |pages=308–10|year=1988| jstor=269510 |doi=10.1086/367123 |s2cid=162850949}}: "the frequently repeated story"

• Julius Caesar was not born via caesarean section. Such a procedure would have been fatal to the mother at the time, and Caesar's mother was still alive when he was 45 years old."[A mother in the 1st century AD] could not survive the trauma of a Caesarean" Oxford Classical Dictionary, Third Edition, "Childbirth"{{#invoke:Cite|book|last1=Wanjek |first1=Christopher |title=Bad Medicine: Misconceptions and Misuses Revealed, from Distance Healing to Vitamin O |year=2003 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-471-46315-3 |page=5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oIJ5TKh7mPgC&dq=caesar&pg=PA5 |language=en}}
• During his assassination, there is no proof that Julius Caesar ever said "Et tu, Brute?" ("You too, Brutus?").{{Cite book |last=Tempest |first=Kathryn |url=https://www.worldcat.org/title/982651923 |title=Brutus: the noble conspirator |date=2017 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-18009-1 |location=New Haven |oclc=982651923}} Instead, the prevailing theories are that he remained silent, or that his last words were "καὶ σύ, τέκνον?" ("You too, child?"). The popular misconception comes from the play Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare.{{Cite web|date=2014-06-02 |title=Vad sa? |url=https://spraktidningen.se/artiklar/vad-sa/ |access-date=2025-04-28 |website=Språktidningen |language=sv-SE}}

{{See also|List of common misconceptions about the Middle Ages}}

• The Middle Ages were not "a time of ignorance, barbarism and superstition"; the Church did not place religious authority over personal experience and rational activity; and the term "Dark Ages" is rejected by modern historians.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|first=David C.|last=Lindberg|chapter=The Medieval Church Encounters the Classical Tradition: Saint Augustine, Roger Bacon, and the Handmaiden Metaphor|editor1-first=David C.|editor1-last=Lindberg|editor2-first=Ronald L.|editor2-last=Numbers|title=When Science & Christianity Meet|location=Chicago|publisher=University of Chicago Press|year=2003|page=8}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|first=Edward|last=Grant|title=God and Reason in the Middle Ages|publisher=Cambridge|year=2001|page=9}}

c. {{cite encyclopedia |first=Ted |last=Peters |chapter=Science and Religion |editor-first=Lindsay |editor-last=Jones |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Religion |edition=2nd |publisher=Thomson Gale |year=2005 |page=8182}}

d. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Snyder|first=Christopher A.|author-link=Christopher Snyder (historian)|year=1998|title=An Age of Tyrants: Britain and the Britons A.D. 400–600|publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press|publication-date=1998|location=University Park|pages=xiii–xiv|isbn=978-0-271-01780-8}}

• While modern life expectancies are much higher than those in the Middle Ages and earlier,{{#invoke:Cite|book| vauthors = Bitel LM |title=Women in Early Medieval Europe, 400–1100 |date=2002-10-24 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-59773-9 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XRudk_NcA7cC&pg=PA25}}{{#invoke:Cite|web| publisher = U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs | work = Population Division |title=World Population Prospects 2019 |url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Publications/Files/WPP2019_Highlights.pdf}} adults in the Middle Ages did not die in their 30s on average. That was the life expectancy at birth, which was skewed by high infant and adolescent mortality. The life expectancy among adults was much higher; a 21-year-old man in medieval England, for example, could expect to live to the age of 64.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://apps.business.ualberta.ca/rfield/lifeexpectancy.htm |title='Expectations of Life' by H.O. Lancaster as per | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120904043610/http://apps.business.ualberta.ca/rfield/lifeexpectancy.htm | archive-date = September 4, 2012| url-status=live}}{{#invoke:Cite|book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=oIJ5TKh7mPgC&q=%22this+is+one+of+the+biggest+misconceptions+about+old+age%22&pg=PA70 |author-link=Christopher Wanjek |last=Wanjek |first=Christopher |title=Bad Medicine: Misconceptions and Misuses Revealed, from Distance Healing to Vitamin O |publisher=Wiley |year=2002 |pages=70–71 |isbn=978-0-471-43499-3}}
• In the tale of King Canute and the tide, the king did not command the tide to reverse in a fit of delusional arrogance. According to the story, his intent was to prove a point that no man is all-powerful, and that all people must bend to forces beyond their control, such as the tides.{{#invoke:Cite|news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13524677|title=Is King Canute misunderstood?|publisher=BBC|date=May 26, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140420145809/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13524677|archive-date=April 20, 2014|url-status=live}}
• There is no evidence that iron maidens were used for torture, or even yet invented, in the Middle Ages. Instead they were pieced together in the 18th century from several artifacts found in museums, arsenals and the like to create spectacular objects intended for commercial exhibition.{{#invoke:Cite|book|first=Wolfgang|last=Schild|date=2000|title=Die eiserne Jungfrau. Dichtung und Wahrheit (Schriftenreihe des Mittelalterlichen Kriminalmuseums Rothenburg o. d. Tauber Nr. 3)|location=Rothenburg ob der Tauber|publisher=Mittelalterl. Kriminalmuseum}}
• Spiral staircases in castles were not designed in a clockwise direction to hinder right-handed attackers.{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Guy|first=Neil|title=The Rise of the Anticlockwise Newel Stair|journal=The Castle Studies Group Journal|volume=25|year=2011–2012|pages=114, 163|url=http://www.castlestudiesgroup.org.uk/CSGJournal2011-12X5stairs.pdf|access-date=May 12, 2020|archive-date=August 7, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200807073740/http://www.castlestudiesgroup.org.uk/CSGJournal2011-12X5stairs.pdf|url-status=live}}{{#invoke:Cite|book|url=https://historytheinterestingbits.com/2019/10/09/guest-post-busting-mediaeval-building-myths-part-one/|title=Guest Post: Busting Mediaeval Building Myths: Part One|publisher=History... the interesting bits!|first=James|last=Wright|date=October 9, 2019|access-date=February 24, 2020|archive-date=January 8, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200108190529/https://historytheinterestingbits.com/2019/10/09/guest-post-busting-mediaeval-building-myths-part-one/|url-status=live}} While clockwise spiral staircases are more common in castles than anti-clockwise, they were even more common in medieval structures without a military role, such as religious buildings.{{cite thesis |last=Ryder |first=Charles |title=The spiral stair or vice: its origins, role and meaning in medieval stone castles |access-date=May 12, 2020 |type=PhD |publisher=University of Liverpool |url=https://chesterrep.openrepository.com/handle/10034/239772 |page=294 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200223182558/https://chesterrep.openrepository.com/handle/10034/239772 |archive-date=February 23, 2020 |year=2011 |url-status=live}}
• The plate armor of European soldiers did not stop soldiers from moving around or necessitate a crane to get them into a saddle. They needed to be able to fight on foot in case they could not ride their horse and could mount and dismount without help.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Breiding|first=Dirk|title=Department of Arms and Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art|url=http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/aams/hd_aams.htm#weight_b|publisher=metmuseum.org|access-date=February 23, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140426172847/http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/aams/hd_aams.htm|archive-date=April 26, 2014|url-status=live}} However, armor used in tournaments in the late Middle Ages was significantly heavier than that used in warfare.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://madeofwynn.net/2012/10/08/medieval-anachronisms-part-3-cranes-hoisting-armored-knights/|title=Cranes hoisting armored knights|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131029210602/http://madeofwynn.net/2012/10/08/medieval-anachronisms-part-3-cranes-hoisting-armored-knights/|archive-date=October 29, 2013|access-date=October 23, 2013}}
• Whether chastity belts, devices designed to prevent women from having sexual intercourse, were invented in medieval times is disputed by modern historians. Most existing chastity belts are now thought to be deliberate fakes from the 19th century.{{#invoke:Cite|book|title=Misconceptions About the Middle Ages|last=Keyser|first=Linda Migl|date=2008|publisher=Routledge|editor-last=Harris|editor-first=Stephen J.|chapter=The Medieval Chastity Belt Unbuckled|ref=have|editor2-last=Grigsby|editor2-first=Bryon L.}}

File:Gossuin de Metz - L'image du monde - BNF Fr. 574 fo42 - miniature.jpg]]

• Medieval European scholars did not believe the Earth was flat. Scholars have known the Earth is spherical since at least the sixth century BCE.{{#invoke:Cite|news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/busting-a-myth-about-columbus-and-a-flat-earth/2011/10/10/gIQAXszQaL_blog.html|title=Busting a myth about Columbus and a flat Earth|newspaper=Washington Post|language=en|access-date=September 29, 2018|archive-date=February 20, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220220023642/https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/busting-a-myth-about-columbus-and-a-flat-earth/2011/10/10/gIQAXszQaL_blog.html|url-status=live}}
• Medieval cartographers did not regularly write "here be dragons" on their maps. The only maps from this era that have the phrase inscribed on them are the Hunt-Lenox Globe and the Ostrich Egg Globe, next to a coast in Southeast Asia for both of them. Maps in this period did occasionally have illustrations of mythical or real animals.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Meyer|first=Robinson|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/12/no-old-maps-actually-say-here-be-dragons/282267/|title=No Old Maps Actually Say 'Here Be Dragons'|website=The Atlantic|date=December 12, 2013|access-date=June 24, 2022|archive-date=February 1, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230201040526/https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/12/no-old-maps-actually-say-here-be-dragons/282267/|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Van Duzer|first=Chet|date=June 4, 2014|title=Bring on the Monsters and Marvels: Non-Ptolemaic Legends on Manuscript Maps of Ptolemy's Geography|journal=Viator|volume=45|issue=2|pages=303–334|doi=10.1484/J.VIATOR.1.103923|issn=0083-5897}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Kim|first=Meeri|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/oldest-globe-to-depict-the-new-world-may-have-been-discovered/2013/08/19/503b2b4a-06b4-11e3-a07f-49ddc7417125_story.html|title=Oldest globe to depict the New World may have been discovered|newspaper=The Washington Post|date=August 19, 2013|access-date=July 2, 2022|quote=The only other map or globe on which this specific phrase appears is what can arguably be called the egg's twin: the copper Hunt-Lenox Globe, dated around 1510 and housed by the Rare Book Division of the New York Public Library.|archive-date=September 30, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210930080237/https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/oldest-globe-to-depict-the-new-world-may-have-been-discovered/2013/08/19/503b2b4a-06b4-11e3-a07f-49ddc7417125_story.html|url-status=live}}

• Christopher Columbus' efforts to obtain support for his voyages were not hampered by belief in a flat Earth, but by valid worries that the East Indies were farther than he realized.{{cite encyclopedia |title=The Myth of the Flat Earth |encyclopedia=Misconceptions about the Middle Ages |publisher=Routledge |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hdCTAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT149 |access-date=January 26, 2014 |date=2010 |editor=Stephen Harris |isbn=978-1-135-98666-7 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240808134641/https://books.google.com/books?id=hdCTAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT149#v=onepage&q&f=false |archive-date=August 8, 2024 |author=Louise M. Bishop |editor2=Bryon L. Grigsby}} In fact, Columbus grossly underestimated the Earth's circumference because of two calculation errors.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/at-work/test-and-measurement/columbuss-geographical-miscalculations|title=Columbus's Geographical Miscalculations|website=IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News|language=en|access-date=October 3, 2018|date=October 9, 2012|archive-date=October 3, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181003063329/https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/at-work/test-and-measurement/columbuss-geographical-miscalculations}} The myth that Columbus proved the Earth was round was propagated by authors like Washington Irving in A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus.
• Columbus was not the first European to visit the Americas:a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YkLCiKN0x4UC&pg=PA90|title=Terra cognita: the mental discovery of America|author1=Eviatar Zerubavel|date=2003|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-0-7658-0987-2|pages=90–91|access-date=September 21, 2016|archive-date=January 21, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034111/https://books.google.com/books?id=YkLCiKN0x4UC&pg=PA90|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Sale|first=Kirkpatrick|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AUd0QgAACAAJ|title=The Conquest of Paradise: Christopher Columbus and the Columbian Legacy|year=1991|pages=204–09|publisher=Plume|isbn=978-1-84511-154-0|via=Google Books}} Leif Erikson, and possibly other Vikings before him, explored Vinland, an area of coastal North America. Ruins at L'Anse aux Meadows prove that at least one Norse settlement was built in Newfoundland, confirming a story in the Saga of Erik the Red.

• There is no evidence that Viking warriors wore horns on their helmets; this would have been impractical in battle.{{#invoke:Cite|book|title=World History: Societies of the Past|last=Kahn|first=Charles|date=2005|publisher=Portage & Main Press|isbn=978-1-55379-045-7|page=9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gEXCIH4tek8C}}{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Viking helmets|publisher=National Museum of Denmark|quote= In a battle situation, horns on a helmet would get in the way. |url=https://en.natmus.dk/historical-knowledge/denmark/prehistoric-period-until-1050-ad/the-viking-age/weapons/helmets/}}
• Vikings did not drink out of the skulls of vanquished enemies. This was based on a mistranslation of the skaldic poetic use of ór bjúgviðum hausa (branches of skulls) to refer to drinking horns.E. W. Gordon, Introduction to Old Norse (2nd edition, Oxford 1962) pp. lxix–lxx.
• Vikings did not name Iceland "Iceland" as a ploy to discourage oversettlement. According to the Sagas of Icelanders, Hrafna-Flóki Vilgerðarson saw icebergs on the island when he traveled there, and named the island after them.{{cite magazine |last=Evans |first=Andrew |url=https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/06/iceland-greenland-name-swap/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160630143403/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/06/iceland-greenland-name-swap/ |archive-date=June 30, 2016 |title=Is Iceland Really Green and Greenland Really Icy? |magazine=National Geographic |date=June 2016}} Popular legend holds that Greenland was named in the hopes of attracting settlers.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17946/17946-h/17946-h.htm |title=Eirik the Red's Saga |publisher=Gutenberg.org |date=March 8, 2006 |access-date=September 6, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110511061916/http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17946/17946-h/17946-h.htm |archive-date=May 11, 2011 |url-status=live }}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://ancientstandard.com/2010/12/17/how-greenland-got-its-name|title=How Greenland Got Its Name|work=The Ancient Standard|date=December 17, 2010|access-date=January 24, 2020|archive-date=March 19, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120319050912/http://ancientstandard.com/2010/12/17/how-greenland-got-its-name/}}.

c. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Grove|first=Jonathan|year=2009|url=https://cambridge.academia.edu/JonathanGrove/Papers/397439/The_Place_of_Greenland_In_Medieval_Icelandic_Saga_Narrative|title=The place of Greenland in medieval Icelandic saga narrative|journal=Journal of the North Atlantic|volume=2|pages=30–51|doi=10.3721/037.002.s206|s2cid=163032041|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120411212816/http://cambridge.academia.edu/JonathanGrove/Papers/397439/The_Place_of_Greenland_In_Medieval_Icelandic_Saga_Narrative|archive-date=April 11, 2012}}

{{further|Black legend}}

• The Mexica people of the Aztec Empire did not mistake Hernán Cortés and his landing party for gods during Cortés' conquest of the empire. This notion came from Francisco López de Gómara, who never went to Mexico and concocted the myth while working for the retired Cortés in Spain years after the conquest.Wills, Matthew (January 17, 2020). [https://daily.jstor.org/the-mexica-didnt-believe-the-conquistadors-were-gods/ The Mexica Didn't Believe the Conquistadors Were Gods] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230403223246/https://daily.jstor.org/the-mexica-didnt-believe-the-conquistadors-were-gods/ |date=April 3, 2023 }}. Daily JSTOR. Retrieved January 19, 2020.
• The elite of the Dutch Golden Age wore black clothes primarily as a status symbol rather than out of Puritan self-restraint. The clothes attracted status from the difficulty of the dyeing process and the cost of elaborate embellishments.{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Pound |first=Cath |date=March 14, 2018 |title=When the Old Masters Were the P.R. Agents of the Rich and Powerful |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/14/arts/high-society-rijksmuseum.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20180314203736/https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/14/arts/high-society-rijksmuseum.html |archive-date=March 14, 2018 |access-date=June 26, 2024 |work=The New York Times}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Higgins |first=Charlotte |date=June 22, 2007 |title=The old black |url=https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/jun/22/art.fashion |access-date=June 26, 2024 |work=The Guardian}}
• Shah Jahan, the Indian Mughal Emperor who commissioned the Taj Mahal, did not cut off the hands of the rumored 40,000 workers or lead designers so as to not allow the construction of another monument more beautiful than the Taj Mahal. This is an urban myth that goes back to the 1960s.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Mehta|first=Archit|date=2021-12-24|title=Fact-check: Did Shah Jahan chop off the hands of Taj Mahal workers?|url=https://www.altnews.in/fact-check-did-shah-jahan-chop-off-the-hands-of-taj-mahal-workers/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220812075912/https://www.altnews.in/fact-check-did-shah-jahan-chop-off-the-hands-of-taj-mahal-workers/|archive-date=12 August 2022|access-date=2024-01-24|website=Alt News}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Beg|first=M. Saleem|date=2022-03-08|title=Debunking an urban myth about Taj Mahal|url=https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/debunking-an-urban-myth-about-taj-mahal/article65205195.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230709230812/https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/debunking-an-urban-myth-about-taj-mahal/article65205195.ece|archive-date=9 July 2023|access-date=2024-01-24|work=The Hindu|language=en-IN|issn=0971-751X}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=S. Sharma|first=Manimugdha|date=2017-10-22|title=Busting the Taj fake news|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-times/busting-the-taj-fake-news/articleshow/61166015.cms|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231004054041/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-times/busting-the-taj-fake-news/articleshow/61166015.cms|archive-date=4 October 2023|access-date=2024-01-24|work=The Times of India|issn=0971-8257}}
• The story that Isaac Newton was inspired to research the nature of gravity when an apple fell on his head is almost certainly apocryphal. All Newton himself ever said was that the idea came to him as he sat "in a contemplative mood" and "was occasioned by the fall of an apple".{{#invoke:Cite|journal|title=Newton's apple: The real story|date=January 18, 2010 |journal=New Scientist |url=https://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/01/newtons-apple-the-real-story.php|archive-url=https://archive.today/20100121073908/http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/01/newtons-apple-the-real-story.php|archive-date=January 21, 2010|access-date=May 10, 2010}}

File:Marie-Antoinette, 1775 - Musée Antoine Lécuyer.jpg" is misattributed to Marie Antoinette.]]

• Marie Antoinette did not say "let them eat cake" when she heard that the French peasantry were starving due to a shortage of bread. The phrase was first published in Rousseau's Confessions, written when Marie Antoinette was only nine years old and not attributed to her, just to "a great princess". It was first attributed to her in 1843.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://history.howstuffworks.com/european-history/top-5-marie-antoinette-scandals1.htm|title=Top 5 Marie Antoinette Scandals|publisher=history.howstuffworks.com|access-date=January 13, 2023|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120904040526/http://history.howstuffworks.com/european-history/top-5-marie-antoinette-scandals1.htm|archive-date=September 4, 2012|url-status=live|date=September 2, 2008}}

• The early settlers (commonly known as Pilgrims) of the Plymouth Colony in North America usually did not wear all black, and their capotains (hats) did not include buckles. Instead, their fashion was based on that of the late Elizabethan era.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://web.ccsd.k12.wy.us/techcurr/social%20studies/05/0101pilcloth.html|title=Plymouth Colony Clothing|publisher=Web.ccsd.k12.wy.us|access-date=February 9, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131022032249/http://web.ccsd.k12.wy.us/techcurr/social%20studies/05/0101pilcloth.html|archive-date=October 22, 2013}} The traditional image was formed in the 19th century when buckles were a kind of emblem of quaintness.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Schenone|first=Laura|author-link=Laura Schenone|title=A Thousand Years Over A Hot Stove: A History Of American Women Told Through Food, Recipes, And Remembrances|location=New York|publisher=W. W. Norton & Company|year=2004|page=118|isbn=978-0-393-32627-7}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Wilson|first=Susan|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VwlpQwAACAAJ|title=Literary Trail of Greater Boston|location=Boston|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Company|year=2000|page=23|isbn=978-0-618-05013-0|via=Google Books|access-date=April 18, 2021|archive-date=May 23, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240523022412/https://books.google.com.et/books?id=VwlpQwAACAAJ&redir_esc=y|url-status=live}} (The Puritans, who settled in the adjacent Massachusetts Bay Colony shortly after the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, did frequently wear all black.){{#invoke:Cite|web|last1=Brooks|first1=Rebecca Beatrice|title=What Did the Pilgrims Wear?|url=https://historyofmassachusetts.org/what-did-pilgrims-wear/|website=History of Massachusetts Blog|publisher=Rebecca Beatrice Brooks|access-date=November 10, 2019|date=July 22, 2018|archive-date=November 10, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191110011232/https://historyofmassachusetts.org/what-did-pilgrims-wear/|url-status=live}}

• People accused of witchcraft were not burned at the stake during the Salem witch trials. Of the accused, nineteen people convicted of witchcraft were executed by hanging, at least five died in prison, and one man was pressed to death by stones while trying to extract a confession from him.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Rosenthal|first=Bernard|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YNYyMV_huGAC&pg=PA209|title=Salem Story: Reading the Witch Trials of 1692|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1995|isbn=978-0-521-55820-4|page=209|access-date=September 21, 2016|archive-date=January 21, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034111/https://books.google.com/books?id=YNYyMV_huGAC&pg=PA209|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Adams|first=Gretchen|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wMIF3EFgnRsC&pg=PR22|title=The Specter of Salem: Remembering the Witch Trials in Nineteenth-Century America|publisher=ReadHowYouWant.com|year=2010|isbn=978-1-4596-0582-4|page=xxii|via=Google Books|access-date=September 21, 2016|archive-date=January 21, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034111/https://books.google.com/books?id=wMIF3EFgnRsC&pg=PR22|url-status=live}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Kruse|first=Colton|date=March 22, 2018|title=Salem Never Burned Any Witches At The Stake|url=https://www.ripleys.com/weird-news/or-not-salem-witch-trials/|access-date=July 18, 2022|website=Ripley's Believe It or Not!|language=en-US|archive-date=December 3, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221203085349/https://www.ripleys.com/weird-news/or-not-salem-witch-trials/|url-status=live}}

• George Washington did not have wooden teeth. His dentures were made of lead, gold, hippopotamus ivory, the teeth of various animals, including horse and donkey teeth,{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6875436 |title=Washington's False Teeth Not Wooden |work=NBC News |date=January 27, 2005 |access-date=August 29, 2009 |archive-date=February 11, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130211015649/http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6875436 |url-status=live }}{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Etter |first=William M. |title=George Washington's Teeth Myth |url=https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/wooden-teeth-myth/ |access-date=24 March 2019 |website=www.mountvernon.org |publisher=Mount Vernon Ladies' Association |archive-date=January 10, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240110063639/https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/wooden-teeth-myth/ |url-status=live }} and human teeth, possibly bought from slaves or poor people.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last1=Thompson|first1=Mary V.|title=The Private Life of George Washington's Slaves|website=PBS|url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/jefferson/video/lives.html|access-date=June 16, 2014|archive-date=June 25, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140625025145/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/jefferson/video/lives.html|url-status=live}}{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Teeth |url=https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/health/teeth/ |access-date=2022-12-02 |website=George Washington's Mount Vernon |language=en |archive-date=December 5, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231205224433/https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/health/teeth/ |url-status=live }} Because ivory teeth quickly became stained, they may have had the appearance of wood to observers.

File:Washington Teeth.jpg]]

• George Washington also did not say "I cannot tell a lie" when being caught cutting down his father's cherry tree. Both the phrase and the tree were a fabricated anecdote created by one of Washington's biographers, Mason Locke Weems, to portray him as exceptionally honest.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=https://www.britannica.com/story/did-george-washington-really-say-i-cant-tell-a-lie|title=Did George Washington Really Say, 'I Can't Tell a Lie'?|publisher=britannica.com|access-date=March 9, 2025|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20190217105750/https://www.britannica.com/story/did-george-washington-really-say-i-cant-tell-a-lie|archive-date=February 17, 2019|url-status=live|date=February 15, 2019}}
• The signing of the United States Declaration of Independence did not occur on July 4, 1776. After the Second Continental Congress voted to declare independence on July 2, the final language of the document was approved on July 4, and it was printed and distributed on July 4–5.{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Declaration of Independence – A History |url=https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_history.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100126014257/http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_history.html |archive-date=January 26, 2010 |access-date=April 4, 2011 |work=archives.gov |publisher=U.S. National Archives and Records Administration}} However, the actual signing occurred on August 2, 1776.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.gallup.com/poll/3742/new-poll-gauges-americans-general-knowledge-levels.aspx|date=July 6, 1999|title=New Poll Gauges Americans' General Knowledge Levels|first=Steve|last=Crabtree|publisher=Gallup News Service|access-date=January 13, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140327130003/http://www.gallup.com/poll/3742/New-Poll-Gauges-Americans-General-Knowledge-Levels.aspx|archive-date=March 27, 2014|url-status=live}}
• Benjamin Franklin did not propose that the wild turkey be used as the symbol for the United States instead of the bald eagle. While he did serve on a commission that tried to design a seal after the Declaration of Independence, his proposal was an image of Moses. His objections to the eagle as a national symbol and preference for the turkey were stated in a 1784 letter to his daughter in response to the Society of the Cincinnati's use of the former; he never expressed that sentiment publicly.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Lund|first=Nicholas|title=Did Benjamin Franklin Really Say the National Symbol Should Be the Turkey?|url=http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/holidays/2013/11/benjamin_franklin_turkey_symbol_why_he_hated_the_bald_eagle_for_the_great.html|work=Slate|date=November 21, 2013|access-date=November 22, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427083733/http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/holidays/2013/11/benjamin_franklin_turkey_symbol_why_he_hated_the_bald_eagle_for_the_great.html|archive-date = April 27, 2014|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=McMillan|first=Joseph|url=http://americanheraldry.org/pages/index.php?n=MMM.Turkey|title=The Arms of the United States: Benjamin Franklin and the Turkey|publisher=American Heraldry Society|date=May 18, 2007|access-date=November 24, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427082418/http://www.americanheraldry.org/pages/index.php?n=MMM.Turkey|archive-date=April 27, 2014}}

• There was never a bill to make German the official language of the United States that was defeated by one vote in the House of Representatives, nor has one been proposed at the state level. In 1794, a petition from a group of German immigrants was put aside on a procedural vote of 42 to 41, that would have had the government publish some laws in German. This was the basis of the Muhlenberg legend, named after the Speaker of the House at the time, Frederick Muhlenberg, who was of German descent and abstained from this vote.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|title=Der Dativ ist dem Genetiv sein Tod|author-link=Bastian Sick|first=Bastian|last=Sick|publisher=Kiepenheuer & Witsch|date=2004|isbn=978-3-462-03448-6|url=https://archive.org/details/derdativistdemge00sick|language=german|pages=131–135|via=Internet Archive|url-access=registration}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.ulib.iupui.edu/kade/adams/chap7.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100624133002/http://www.ulib.iupui.edu/kade/adams/chap7.html|title=Willi Paul Adams: The German Americans. Chapter 7: German or English|archive-date=June 24, 2010}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/german.asp|date=July 9, 2007|title=The German Vote|website=Snopes|access-date=August 31, 2013|archive-date=December 16, 2008|archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20081216214909/http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/german.asp|url-status=live}}

File:Eastlake - Napoleon on the Bellerophon.jpg

• Napoleon Bonaparte was not especially short for a Frenchman of his time. He was the height of an average French male in 1800, but short for an aristocrat or officer.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|author=Owen Connelly|title=Blundering to Glory: Napoleon's Military Campaigns|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4Pzu7_QhfU8C&pg=PA7|year=2006|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|page=7|isbn=978-0-7425-5318-7}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|title= Sorry, Wrong Answer: Trivia Questions That Even Know-It-Alls Get Wrong |author-link= Rod L. Evans |first= Rod L. |last= Evans |publisher= Penguin Books |date= 2010 |isbn= 978-0-399-53586-4 |access-date= December 31, 2011 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Q7CkHF7xTuYC&pg=PT116 |archive-date= January 21, 2023 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034113/https://books.google.com/books?id=Q7CkHF7xTuYC&pg=PT116 |url-status= live }}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|news|date= February 11, 2009 |title= Forget Napoleon – Height Rules |work= CBS News |access-date= December 31, 2011 |url= http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/10/17/health/main578654.shtml |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20130702045955/http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/10/17/health/main578654.shtml |archive-date= July 2, 2013 |url-status= live }} After his death in 1821, the French emperor's height was recorded as 5 feet 2 inches in French feet, which in English measurements is {{Convert|1.70|m|order=flip}}.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.napoleon.org/en/essential_napoleon/faq/index.asp#ancre54 |title=Fondation Napoléon |publisher=Napoleon.org|access-date=August 29, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140417162738/http://www.napoleon.org/en/essential_napoleon/faq/index.asp|archive-date = April 17, 2014| url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=La taille de Napoléon |url=http://www.napoleon.org/fr/salle_lecture/articles/files/Taillenapo_RIN_89_oct1963_2006.asp |language=fr|access-date=July 22, 2010|archive-url=https://www.webcitation.org/5jk3XhZKJ?url=http://www.napoleon.org/fr/salle_lecture/articles/files/Taillenapo_RIN_89_oct1963_2006.asp |archive-date=September 12, 2009 |url-status=live}}{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Napoleon's Imperial Guard |url=http://napoleonistyka.atspace.com/IMPERIAL_GUARD_infantry_1.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427082423/http://napoleonistyka.atspace.com/IMPERIAL_GUARD_infantry_1.htm |archive-date=April 27, 2014}}

• The nose of the Great Sphinx of Giza was not shot off by Napoleon's troops during the French campaign in Egypt (1798–1801); it has been missing since at least the 10th century.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=The nose of the Great Sphinx |url=https://www.britannica.com/video/179518/investigation-Great-Sphinx-Egypt-Giza |access-date=2022-11-27 |website=britannica.com |language=en |archive-date=February 27, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230227192151/https://www.britannica.com/video/179518/investigation-Great-Sphinx-Egypt-Giza |url-status=live }}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Feder |first=Kenneth L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RlRz2symkAsC&dq=nose+of+the+sphinx+shot+myth&pg=PA129 |title=Encyclopedia of Dubious Archaeology: From Atlantis to the Walam Olum: From Atlantis to the Walam Olum |year=2010 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-37919-2 |language=en |access-date=December 18, 2022 |archive-date=April 3, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230403224957/https://books.google.com/books?id=RlRz2symkAsC&dq=nose+of+the+sphinx+shot+myth&pg=PA129 |url-status=live }}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Zivie-Coche|first=Christiane|title=Sphinx: History of a Monument|publisher=Cornell University Press|year=2002|isbn=978-0-8014-3962-9|page=16}}

• Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico's Independence Day, but the celebration of the Mexican Army's victory over the French in the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. Mexico's Declaration of Independence from Spain in 1810 is celebrated on September 16.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/0505_060505_cinco_de_mayo.html |work=National Geographic News |title=Cinco de Mayo, From Mexican Fiesta to Popular U.S. Holiday |first=Stefan |last=Lovgren |date=May 5, 2006 |archive-url=https://www.webcitation.org/5QBwlWfYP?url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/0505_060505_cinco_de_mayo.html |archive-date=July 9, 2007 }}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://news.discovery.com/history/cinco-de-mayo-not-mexicos-independence-day.html|title=Cinco de Mayo: NOT Mexico's Independence Day |author=Lauren Effron |work=Discovery News |publisher=Discovery Channel|date=May 5, 2010|access-date=May 5, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120321055147/http://news.discovery.com/history/cinco-de-mayo-not-mexicos-independence-day.html |archive-date=March 21, 2012|url-status=live}}

• Victorian-era doctors did not invent the vibrator to cure female "hysteria" by triggering orgasm.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Hysteria|date=August 12, 2015|publisher=Welcome Collection|url=https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/hysteria|access-date=September 25, 2018|archive-date=August 8, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180808171603/https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/hysteria|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=King|first=Helen|title=Galen and the widow. Towards a history of therapeutic masturbation in ancient gynaecology|journal=Eugesta, Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity|year=2011|pages=227–31}}
c. {{cite magazine |title=Victorian-Era Orgasms and the Crisis of Peer Review |magazine=The Atlantic |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2018/09/victorian-vibrators-orgasms-doctors/569446/ |access-date=September 25, 2018 |date=September 6, 2018 |archive-date=September 20, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180920210318/https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2018/09/victorian-vibrators-orgasms-doctors/569446/ |url-status=live}}

d. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Why the Movie "Hysteria" Gets Its Vibrator History Wrong|work=dildographer |url=https://dildographer.com/2012/05/04/why-the-movie-hysteria-gets-its-vibrator-history-wrong/|access-date=September 25, 2018|date=May 4, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190415173243/https://dildographer.com/2012/05/04/why-the-movie-hysteria-gets-its-vibrator-history-wrong/|archive-date=April 15, 2019}}

e. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=King|first=Helen|title=Galen and the widow. Towards a history of therapeutic masturbation in ancient gynaecology|journal=Eugesta, Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity|year= 2011|pages=206–08}}

f. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Buzzkill: Vibrators and the Victorians (NSFW)|publisher=The Whores of Yore|url=https://www.thewhoresofyore.com/kates-journal/buzzkill-vibrators-and-the-victorians|access-date=September 25, 2018|archive-date=August 9, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180809111703/https://www.thewhoresofyore.com/kates-journal/buzzkill-vibrators-and-the-victorians|url-status=live}}

g. {{#invoke:Cite|news|title=No, no, no! Victorians didn't invent the vibrator|newspaper=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/nov/10/victorians-invent-vibrator-orgasms-women-doctors-fantasy|access-date=September 25, 2018|date=November 10, 2014|last1=Riddell|first1=Fern|author-link1=Fern Riddell|archive-date=April 15, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190415173536/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/nov/10/victorians-invent-vibrator-orgasms-women-doctors-fantasy|url-status=live}}

File:Albert Einstein as a child.jpg, photographed at 14, did not fail mathematics at school.]]

• Albert Einstein did not fail mathematics classes in school. Einstein remarked, "I never failed in mathematics.... Before I was fifteen I had mastered differential and integral calculus."a. {{cite magazine |author=Isaacson, Walter |date=April 5, 2007 |title=Making the Grade |url=https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1936731_1936743_1936758,00.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329164620/http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0%2C28804%2C1936731_1936743_1936758%2C00.html |archive-date=March 29, 2014 |access-date=December 31, 2013 |magazine=Time}} Einstein did, however, fail his first entrance exam into the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School (ETH) in 1895, when he was two years younger than his fellow students, but scored exceedingly well in the mathematics and science sections, and then passed on his second attempt.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Kruszelnicki |first=Karl |title=Einstein Failed School |website=Australian Broadcasting Corporation |url=http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/06/23/1115185.htm?site=science/greatmomentsinscience |access-date=July 12, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427082641/http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/06/23/1115185.htm?site=science%2Fgreatmomentsinscience |archive-date=April 27, 2014 |url-status=live |date=June 22, 2004 }}
• Alfred Nobel did not omit mathematics in the Nobel Prize due to a rivalry with mathematician Gösta Mittag-Leffler, as there is little evidence the two ever met, nor was it because Nobel's spouse had an affair with a mathematician, as Nobel was never married. The more likely explanation is that Nobel believed mathematics was too theoretical to benefit humankind, as well as his personal lack of interest in the field.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=López-Ortiz |first=Alex |date=February 20, 1998 |title=Why is there no Nobel in mathematics? |website=University of Waterloo |url=https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/~alopez-o/math-faq/mathtext/node21.html |access-date=June 28, 2022 |archive-date=February 17, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230217135338/https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/~alopez-o/math-faq/mathtext/node21.html |url-status=live }}
  b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Mikkelson |first=David |date=October 4, 2013 |title=No Nobel Prize for Math |website=Snopes |url=https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/the-prizes-rite/ |access-date=June 28, 2022 |archive-date=November 12, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211112002131/https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/the-prizes-rite/ |url-status=live }}
  c. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Firaque |first=Kabir |date=October 16, 2019 |title=Explained: Why is there no mathematics Nobel? The theories, the facts, the myths |url=https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/why-is-there-no-mathematics-nobel-the-theories-the-facts-the-myths-6071015/ |access-date=June 28, 2022 |website=The Indian Express |archive-date=March 24, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230324134705/https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/why-is-there-no-mathematics-nobel-the-theories-the-facts-the-myths-6071015/ |url-status=live }} (See also: Nobel Prize controversies)
• Grigori Rasputin was not assassinated by being fed cyanide-laced cakes and wine, shot multiple times, and then thrown into the Little Nevka river when he survived the former two. A contemporary autopsy reported that he was just killed with gunshots. A sensationalized account from the memoirs of co-conspirator Prince Felix Yusupov is the only source of this story.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Harris |first=Carolyn |date=December 27, 2016 |title=The Murder of Rasputin, 100 Years Later |website=Smithsonian Magazine |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/murder-rasputin-100-years-later-180961572/ |access-date=October 16, 2023 |archive-date=October 15, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231015210652/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/murder-rasputin-100-years-later-180961572/ |url-status=live }}{{#invoke:Cite|web|date=December 31, 2016 |title=How was Russian mystic Rasputin murdered? |website=BBC |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38469903 |access-date=October 16, 2023 |archive-date=October 31, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231031131904/https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38469903 |url-status=live }}{{#invoke:Cite|book|first=Douglas|last=Smith|chapter=A Cowardly Crime|publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |title=Rasputin: Faith, Power, and the Twilight of the Romanovs |year=2016|isbn=978-0-374-71123-8|pages=590–592}}
• The Italian dictator Benito Mussolini did not "make the trains run on time". Much of the repair work had been performed before he and the Fascist Party came to power in 1922. Moreover, the Italian railways' supposed adherence to timetables was more propaganda than reality.{{#invoke:Cite|news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/rear-window-making-italy-work-did-mussolini-really-get-the-trains-running-on-time-1367688.html|title=Rear Window: Making Italy work: Did Mussolini really get the trains running on time|access-date=September 3, 2010|work=The Independent|location=London|first=Brian |last=Cathcart|date=April 3, 1994|url-status=live|archive-date=January 24, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120124072305/http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/rear-window-making-italy-work-did-mussolini-really-get-the-trains-running-on-time-1367688.html}}
• There is no evidence of Polish cavalry mounting a brave but futile charge against German tanks using lances and sabers during the German invasion of Poland in 1939. This story may have originated from German propaganda efforts following the charge at Krojanty.a. {{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Ankerstjerne|first=Christian|title=The myth of Polish cavalry charges |publisher=Panzerworld |url=http://www.panzerworld.net/fallweiss.html#polish-cavalry-charges-against-tanks |access-date=April 5, 2011|url-status=live|archive-date=August 4, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120804070934/http://www.panzerworld.net/fallweiss.html}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.polamjournal.com/Library/APHistory/Cavalry_Myth/cavalry_myth.html |title=The Mythical Polish Cavalry Charge |work=Polish American Journal|publisher=Polamjournal.com |date=July 2008|access-date=February 9, 2012|archive-url=https://www.webcitation.org/6AvQeRgCM?url=http://www.polamjournal.com/Library/APHistory/Cavalry_Myth/cavalry_myth.html |archive-date=September 24, 2012 |url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Some Essential Definitions & Myths Associated with the Holocaust |url=http://www.chgs.umn.edu/histories/myths.html|access-date=April 5, 2011|publisher=Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies – University of Minnesota|archive-date=May 15, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110515002212/http://www.chgs.umn.edu/histories/myths.html}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|web|title=King Christian and the Star of David|url=http://www.natmus.dk/sw81068.asp|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110928011038/http://www.natmus.dk/sw81068.asp|archive-date=September 28, 2011|access-date=February 21, 2017|publisher=The National Museum of Denmark}}

• Not all skinheads are white supremacists; many skinheads identify as left-wing or apolitical, and many oppose racism, such as the Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice. Originating from the 1960s British working class, many of its initial adherents were black and West Indian; it became associated with white supremacy in the 1970s as a result of far-right groups like the National Front recruiting from the subculture for grassroot support.a. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Craig |first1=Laura |last2=Young |first2=Kevin |date=2008 |title=Beyond White Pride: Identity, Meaning and Contradiction in the Canadian Skinhead Subculture* |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229688891 |journal=Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue Canadienne de Sociologie|pages=175–206 |volume=34 |number=2 |doi=10.1111/j.1755-618x.1997.tb00206.x |access-date=July 2, 2022}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Borgeson |first1=Kevin |last2=Valeri |first2=Robin |date=Fall 2005 |title=Examining Differences in Skinhead Ideology and Culture Through an Analysis of Skinhead Websites |journal=Michigan Sociological Review|pages=45–62 |volume=19 |jstor=40969104}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Lambert |first=Chris |date=November 12, 2017 |title='Black Skinhead': The politics of New Kanye |website=Daily Dot |url=https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/kanye-west-black-skinhead/ |access-date=July 2, 2022 |quote="Skinhead" was a term originally used to describe a 1960s British working-class subculture that revolved around fashion and music and that would heavily inspire the punk rock scene. While it has harmless roots, the skinhead movement fell into polemic politics. Nowadays, it's popularly associated with neo-Nazis, despite having split demographics of far-right, far-left, and apolitical.}}{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Brown|first1=Timothy S.|title=Subcultures, Pop Music and Politics: Skinheads and 'Nazi Rock' in England and Germany|journal=Journal of Social History|date=January 1, 2004|volume=38|issue=1|pages=157–178|jstor=3790031|doi=10.1353/jsh.2004.0079|s2cid=42029805}}{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Cotter|first=John M.|date=1999|title=Sounds of hate: White power rock and roll and the neo-nazi skinhead subculture|journal=Terrorism and Political Violence|volume=11|issue=2|pages=111–140|doi=10.1080/09546559908427509|issn=0954-6553}}{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Shaffer|first=Ryan|date=2013|title=The soundtrack of neo-fascism: youth and music in the National Front|journal=Patterns of Prejudice|volume=47|issue=4–5|pages=458–482|doi=10.1080/0031322X.2013.842289|s2cid=144461518|issn=0031-322X}}

File:Betsy Ross flag.svg

• Betsy Ross did not design or make the first official U.S. flag, despite it being widely known as the Betsy Ross flag. The claim was first made by her grandson a century later.Marc Leepson, "[https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-the-american-flag/2011/06/08/AG3ZSkOH_story.html Five myths about the American flag]" {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170715155019/https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-the-american-flag/2011/06/08/AG3ZSkOH_story.html |date=2017-07-15 }}, The Washington Post, June 12, 2011, p. B2.

File:Emancipation Proclamation.PNG abolished chattel slavery in the United States nationwide, not the Emancipation Proclamation (red areas only).]]

• Abraham Lincoln did not write his Gettysburg Address speech on the back of an envelope on his train ride to Gettysburg. The speech was substantially complete before Lincoln left Washington for Gettysburg.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/lincoln/exhibition/gettysburg/|title=The Lincoln Presidency: Last Full Measure of Devotion|website=rmc.library.cornell.edu}}{{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Green|first=Joey|title=Contrary to Popular Belief: More than 250 False Facts Revealed|publisher=Broadway|date=2005|isbn=978-0-7679-1992-0}}
• The Emancipation Proclamation did not free all slaves in the United States; the Proclamation applied in the ten states that were still in rebellion in 1863, and thus did not cover the nearly five hundred thousand slaves in the slaveholding border states that had not seceded.{{#invoke:Cite|book| last=Foner | first=Eric |author-link=Eric Foner | title=The fiery trial: Abraham Lincoln and American slavery |location=New York |publisher=W. W. Norton | date=2010 | isbn=978-0-393-06618-0 | oclc=601096674 | pages=241–242}} (See also: Abolition of slavery timeline)
• Likewise, the June 19, 1865 order celebrated annually as "Juneteenth" only applied in Texas, not the United States at large. The Thirteenth Amendment, ratified and proclaimed in December 1865, was the article that banned slavery nationwide except as punishment for a crime.{{cite news |last1=Stewart |first1=Alicia W. |title=150 years later, myths persist about the Emancipation Proclamation |url=https://www.cnn.com/2013/01/01/us/150-years-later-myths-persist-about-the-emancipation-proclamation/index.html |access-date=29 July 2024 |publisher=CNN |date=1 January 2013}}{{cite book |editor1-last=Berlin |editor1-first=Ira |editor2-last=Fields |editor2-first=Barbara J. |editor3-last=Glymph |editor3-first=Thavolia |editor4-last=Reidy |editor4-first=Joseph P. |editor5-last=Rowland |editor5-first=Leslie S. |title=Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation, 1861–1867: Series 1, Volume 1: The Destruction of Slavery |date=1985 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-22979-1 |page=69 |url=https://archive.org/details/destructionofsla0001unse/page/68/mode/1up?view=theater |url-access=registration}}
• The Alaska Purchase was generally viewed as positive or neutral in the United States, both among the public and the press. The opponents of the purchase who characterized it as "Seward's Folly", alluding to William H. Seward, the Secretary of State who negotiated it, represented a minority opinion at the time.a. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|last1=Haycox|first1=Stephen|title=Truth and Expectation: Myth in Alaska History|journal=Northern Review|date=1990|volume=6|url=http://journals.sfu.ca/nr/index.php/nr/article/viewFile/397/390|access-date=August 31, 2015}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|journal|first=Richard E. Jr. |last=Welch |title=American Public Opinion and the Purchase of Russian America |journal=American Slavic and East European Review |year=1958 |volume=17 |issue=4 |pages=481–94 |jstor=3001132 |doi=10.2307/3001132 }}

c. Howard I. Kushner, {{"'}}Seward's Folly'?: American Commerce in Russian America and the Alaska Purchase". California Historical Quarterly (1975): 4–26. {{JSTOR|25157541}}.

d. {{#invoke:Cite|news|title=Biographer calls Seward's Folly a myth|url=http://www.thesewardphoenixlog.com/story/2014/04/03/features/biographer-calls-sewards-folly-a-myth/2492.html|access-date=August 31, 2015|agency=The Seward Phoenix LOG|date=April 3, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170622084130/http://www.thesewardphoenixlog.com/story/2014/04/03/features/biographer-calls-sewards-folly-a-myth/2492.html|archive-date=June 22, 2017}}

e. {{Cite video |url=https://www.c-span.org/video/?326990-1/founding-anchorage-alaska |title=Founding of Anchorage, Alaska |date=July 9, 2015 |type=Adobe Flash |access-date=December 22, 2017 |people=Professor Preston Jones (Featured Speaker) |publisher=C-SPAN}}{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Cook |first=Mary Alice |date=Spring 2011 |title=Manifest Opportunity: The Alaska Purchase as a Bridge Between United States Expansion and Imperialism |url=http://alaskahistoricalsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Article-on-purchase.pdf |journal=Alaska History |volume=26 |issue=1 |pages=1–10}}

• Cowboy hats were not initially popular in the Western American frontier, with derby or bowler hats being the typical headgear of choice.{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=The Hat That Won the West |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=336&dat=19571026&id=xQQpAAAAIBAJ&pg=7036,5636283 |access-date=February 10, 2010}} Heavy marketing of the Stetson "Boss of the Plains" model in the years following the American Civil War was the primary driving force behind the cowboy hat's popularity, with its characteristic dented top not becoming standard until near the end of the 19th century.Snyder, Jeffrey B. (1997) Stetson Hats and the John B. Stetson Company 1865–1970. p. 50 {{ISBN|978-0-7643-0211-4}}
• The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 was not caused by Mrs. O'Leary's cow kicking over a lantern. A newspaper reporter later admitted to having invented the story to make colorful copy.{{#invoke:Cite|web| title = The O'Leary Legend | website= Chicago History Museum | url = http://www.chicagohistory.org/fire/oleary/essay-2.html | access-date = March 18, 2007 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110110110402/http://www.chicagohistory.org/fire/oleary/essay-2.html | archive-date=January 10, 2011}}
• There is no evidence that Frederic Remington, on assignment to Cuba in 1897, telegraphed William Randolph Hearst: "There will be no war. I wish to return," nor that Hearst responded: "Please remain. You furnish the pictures, and I'll furnish the war". The anecdote was originally included in a book by James Creelman and probably never happened.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last1=Campbell |first1=W. Joseph|title=Getting it Wrong: Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism|url=https://archive.org/details/gettingitwrongte0000camp|url-access=registration |date=2010|publisher=University of California Press|location=Berkeley|isbn=978-0-520-26209-6|pages=[https://archive.org/details/gettingitwrongte0000camp/page/9 9]–25|via=Internet Archive}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Campbell|first=W. Joseph|year=2003|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TflDlgzRtSYC&pg=PA72|title=Yellow Journalism: Puncturing the Myths, Defining the Legacies|publisher= Praeger|page=72|isbn=978-0-275-98113-6}}

• The electrocution of Topsy the Elephant was not an anti-alternating current demonstration organized by Thomas A. Edison during the war of the currents. Edison was never at Luna Park, and the electrocution of Topsy took place ten years after the war of currents.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://edison.rutgers.edu/topsy.htm|title=Did Edison really electrocute Topsy the Elephant|website=The Edison Papers|via=Rutgers University|date=October 28, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131113102308/http://edison.rutgers.edu/topsy.htm |archive-date=November 13, 2013 }} This myth may stem from the fact that the recording of the event was produced by the Edison film company.
• Mary Mallon, known as "Typhoid Mary", testified at her 1909 trial that she did not believe she was contagious while an asymptomatic carrier of the bacteria Salmonella typhi.{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Foss |first=Katherine |date=April 24, 2020 |title=#TyphoidMary – now a hashtag – was a maligned immigrant who got a bum rap |url=https://theconversation.com/typhoidmary-now-a-hashtag-was-a-maligned-immigrant-who-got-a-bum-rap-136571 |work=The Conversation}} She later infected many others, while using fake names and evading health authorities.
• Immigrants' last names were not Americanized (voluntarily, mistakenly, or otherwise) upon arrival at Ellis Island. Officials there kept no records other than checking ship manifests created at the point of origin, and there was simply no paperwork that would have let them recast surnames, let alone any law. At the time in New York, anyone could change the spelling of their name simply by using that new spelling.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.nypl.org/blog/2013/07/02/name-changes-ellis-island |title=Why Your Family Name Was Not Changed at Ellis Island (and One That Was) |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151208072225/http://www.nypl.org/blog/2013/07/02/name-changes-ellis-island |archive-date=December 8, 2015 |url-status=live}} These names are often referred to as an "Ellis Island Special".
• Prohibition did not make drinking alcohol illegal in the United States. The Eighteenth Amendment and the subsequent Volstead Act prohibited the production, sale, and transport of "intoxicating liquors" within the United States, but their possession and consumption were never outlawed.{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Prohibition {{!}} Definition, History, Eighteenth Amendment, & Repeal|url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Prohibition-United-States-history-1920-1933|access-date=2022-10-24|website=britannica.com|language=en}}
• Distraught stockbrokers did not jump to their deaths in large numbers after the Wall Street Crash of 1929. Although extensively reported by the news media, the phenomenon was limited in number and the overall suicide rate following the 1929 crash did not increase.{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Market Crash Exacts a Toll in Suicides|date=January 12, 2009 |url=https://macleans.ca/economy/business/market-crash-exacts-a-toll-in-suicides/|access-date=2024-08-24|language=en}}
• There was no widespread outbreak of panic across the United States in response to Orson Welles' 1938 radio adaptation of H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds. Only a very small share of the radio audience was listening to it, but newspapers, being eager to discredit radio as a competitor for advertising, played up isolated reports of incidents and increased emergency calls. Both Welles and CBS, which had initially reacted apologetically, later came to realize that the myth benefited them and actively embraced it in later years.a. {{#invoke:Cite|news|last1=Pooley|first1=Jefferson|author2-link=Michael J. Socolow|last2=Socolow|first2=Michael|title=The Myth of the War of the Worlds Panic|url=http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/history/2013/10/orson_welles_war_of_the_worlds_panic_myth_the_infamous_radio_broadcast_did.html|newspaper=Slate|date=October 28, 2013|access-date=November 24, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140509160518/http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/history/2013/10/orson_welles_war_of_the_worlds_panic_myth_the_infamous_radio_broadcast_did.html| archive-date=May 9, 2014| url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last1 = Campbell|first1 = W. Joseph|title=Getting it wrong: ten of the greatest misreported stories in American Journalism|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SodvJ4EuTggC|date=2010|publisher=University of California Press|location= Berkeley|isbn=978-0-520-26209-6| pages=26–44|via=Google Books}}

• American pilot Kenneth Arnold did not coin the term flying saucer; he did not use that phrase when describing his 1947 UFO sighting at Mount Rainier, Washington. The East Oregonian, the first newspaper to report on the incident, merely quoted him as saying the objects "flew like a saucer" and were "flat like a pie pan".{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Garber |first=Megan |date=June 15, 2014 |title=The Man Who Introduced the World to Flying Saucers |work=The Atlantic|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/06/the-man-who-introduced-the-world-to-flying-saucers/372732/ |access-date=June 24, 2022}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Lacitis |first=Eric |date=June 24, 2017 |title='Flying saucers' became a thing 70 years ago Saturday with sighting near Mount Rainier |work=The Seattle Times|url=https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/northwest/flying-saucers-became-a-thing-70-years-ago-saturday-with-sighting-near-mount-rainier/ |access-date=June 24, 2022}}{{#invoke:Cite|interview |title=12:15 news |last=Arnold |first=Kenneth |date=June 26, 1947 |interviewer-last=Smith |interviewer-first=Ted |publisher=KWRC |location=Pendleton, Oregon |type=Radio}}{{#invoke:Cite|news |last1=Meyer |first1=Dave |title=64th anniversary of flying saucers at Mt. Rainier |url=https://www.knkx.org/other-news/2011-06-24/64th-anniversary-of-flying-saucers-at-mt-rainier |access-date=18 July 2024 |work=KNKX Public Radio |date=24 June 2011 |language=en |quote=Arnold described the shiny objects as 'something like a pie plate that was cut in half with a sort of a convex triangle in the rear' and that they flew 'like a saucer if you skipped it across the water.' The term 'flying saucer' made it into a newspaper headline and the rest, as they say, is history.}}
• U.S. Senator George Smathers never gave a speech to a less-educated audience describing his opponent, Claude Pepper, as an "extrovert" whose sister was a "thespian", in the apparent hope they would confuse them with similar-sounding words like "pervert" and "lesbian". Smathers offered US$10,000 to anyone who could prove he had made the speech; it was never claimed.a. {{#invoke:Cite|news|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,805369,00.html |magazine=Time |title=Florida: Anything Goes |date=April 17, 1950 |access-date=May 3, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130624133711/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0%2C9171%2C805369%2C00.html |archive-date=June 24, 2013 }}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Nohlgren|first=Stephen|title=A born winner, if not a native Floridian|url=http://www.sptimes.com/2003/11/29/State/A_born_winner__if_not.shtml|newspaper=St. Petersburg Times|date=November 29, 2003|access-date=October 8, 2011 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20121005062919/http://www.sptimes.com/2003/11/29/State/A_born_winner__if_not.shtml | archive-date = October 5, 2012| url-status=live}}

• Dwight D. Eisenhower did not order the construction of the Interstate Highway System for the sole purpose of evacuating cities in the event of nuclear warfare. While military motivations were present, the primary motivations were civilian.{{#invoke:Cite|web|title=Interstate Highway System – The Myths |url=https://highways.dot.gov/highway-history/interstate-system/50th-anniversary/interstate-highway-system-myths#question2 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240429041854/https://highways.dot.gov/highway-history/interstate-system/50th-anniversary/interstate-highway-system-myths#question2 |archive-date=April 29, 2024 |access-date=June 24, 2024 |website=Federal Highway Administration}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Laskow |first=Sarah |date=August 24, 2015 |title=Eisenhower and History's Worst Cross-Country Road Trip |url=https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/08/in-1919-eisenhower-took-a-disastrous-road-trip-that-led-to-his-support-of-the-modern-paved-highway.html |access-date=June 24, 2024 |work=Slate}}
• Rosa Parks was not sitting in the front ("white") section of the bus during the event that made her famous and incited the Montgomery bus boycott. Rather, she was sitting in the front of the back ("colored") section of the bus, where African Americans were expected to sit, and rejected an order from the driver to vacate her seat in favor of a white passenger when the "white" section of the bus had become full.{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/rosa-parks |title=An Act of Courage, The Arrest Records of Rosa Parks |date=August 15, 2015 |access-date=December 1, 2020 |website=National Archives}}
• The African-American intellectual and activist W. E. B. Du Bois did not renounce his U.S. citizenship while living in Ghana shortly before his death.{{#invoke:Cite|book|last1=Bass|first1=Amy|title=Those about Him Remained Silent: The Battle Over W.E.B. Du Bois|date=2009|publisher=University of Minnesota Press|isbn=978-0-8166-4495-7|page=155|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wn7B_04lNJkC&pg=PA155}}a. {{#invoke:Cite|news|title=Renouncing citizenship is usually all about the Benjamins, say experts|url=http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/05/11/renouncing-citizenship-is-usually-all-about-benjamins-say-experts/|newspaper=Fox News|date=May 11, 2012|access-date=May 18, 2015}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|news|title=Celebrities Who Renounced Their Citizenship|url=https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/01/celebrities-who-renounced-citizenship_n_2602099.html|newspaper=Huffington Post|date=February 1, 2012|access-date=May 18, 2015}}

c. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last1=Aberjhani|first1=Sandra L. West|title=Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance|date=2003|publisher=Infobase Publishing|isbn=978-1-4381-3017-0|page=89|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XP48QWTmjyUC&pg=PA89}} In early 1963, his membership in the Communist Party and support for the Soviet Union led the U.S. State Department to refuse to renew his passport while he was already in Ghana. After leaving the embassy, he stated his intention to renounce his citizenship in protest, but while he took Ghanaian citizenship, he never actually renounced his American citizenship.{{#invoke:Cite|book|last1=Lewis|first1=David|title=W.E.B. Du Bois: A Biography|date=2009|publisher=MacMillan|isbn=978-0-8050-8805-2|page=841|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BU4vH95YySgC&pg=PA841}}

• US President John F. Kennedy's words "{{lang|de|Ich bin ein Berliner}}" are standard German for "I am a Berliner (citizen of Berlin)."a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Daum|first=Andreas W.|title=Kennedy in Berlin|publisher=Cambridge University Press|pages=148–49|date=2007|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IrK1TG34vw8C&pg=PT148|isbn=978-3-506-71991-1|access-date=May 13, 2018|archive-date=January 21, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230121034115/https://books.google.com/books?id=IrK1TG34vw8C&pg=PT148|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.canoo.net/services/OnlineGrammar/Wort/Artikel/Gebrauch/ArtIndef.html|title=Gebrauch des unbestimmten Artikels (German, "Use of the indefinite article")|publisher=Canoo Engineering AG|access-date=July 5, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140328165614/http://canoo.net/services/OnlineGrammar/Wort/Artikel/Gebrauch/ArtIndef.html|archive-date=March 28, 2014|url-status=live}} It is not true that by using the indefinite article ein, he changed the meaning of the sentence from the intended "I am a citizen of Berlin" to "I am a Berliner", a Berliner being a type of German pastry, similar to a jelly doughnut, amusing Germans.a. {{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Ryan|first=Halford Ross|title=U.S. presidents as orators: a bio-critical sourcebook|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Efqq9cYYqq0C&pg=PA220|year=1995|publisher=Greenwood|isbn=978-0-313-29059-6|pages=219–20|access-date=May 23, 2024|archive-date=May 23, 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240523022410/https://books.google.com/books?id=Efqq9cYYqq0C&pg=PA220|url-status=live}}

b. {{#invoke:Cite|web|url= http://www1.stadtkind.com/item/135/ich-bin-ein-berliner-john-f-kennedy-west-berlin.htm|language= de|trans-title= I am a jelly doughnut. Or a Berliner?|title= Ich bin ein Pfannkuchen. Oder ein Berliner?|date= August 22, 2005|publisher= Stadtkind|access-date= June 26, 2013|archive-date= June 19, 2008|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080619060413/http://www1.stadtkind.com/item/135/ich-bin-ein-berliner-john-f-kennedy-west-berlin.htm}} Furthermore, the pastry, which is known by many names in Germany, was not then – nor is it now – commonly called "Berliner" in the Berlin area.{{#invoke:Cite|news|url=https://m.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/berliner-krapfen-pfannkuchen-wie-heisst-der-kreppel-wirklich-16068952.html|title=Essen und Sprechen Geben Sie mir ein Semmelbrötchen!|newspaper=Faz.net|date=March 5, 2019|last1=Rüther|first1=Tobias|access-date=May 23, 2024|archive-date=October 20, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211020101500/https://m.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/berliner-krapfen-pfannkuchen-wie-heisst-der-kreppel-wirklich-16068952.html|url-status=live}}

• When Kitty Genovese was murdered outside her apartment in 1964, there were not 38 neighbors standing idly by and watching who failed to call the police until after she was dead, as was initially reported{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Gansberg |first=Martin |url=http://www.37themovie.com/images/about/NYTimes_KittyGenoveseArticle.pdf |title=37 Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police |newspaper=The New York Times |date=March 27, 1964 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150807055841/http://www.37themovie.com/images/about/NYTimes_KittyGenoveseArticle.pdf |archive-date=August 7, 2015 }} to widespread public outrage that persisted for years and even became the basis of a theory in social psychology. In fact, witnesses only heard brief portions of the attack and did not realize what was occurring, and only six or seven actually saw anything. One witness, who had called the police, said when interviewed by officers at the scene, "I didn't want to get involved",{{#invoke:Cite|book|last=Bregman |first=Rutger |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=R7rEDwAAQBAJ&q=humankind+%2522Karl+Ross%2522&pg=PT179 |title=Humankind: A Hopeful History |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |year=2020 |isbn=978-1-4088-9896-3 |language=en |chapter=9}} an attitude later attributed to all the neighbors.{{#invoke:Cite|news|author= Rasenberger, Jim| url= http://www.americanheritage.com/content/nightmare-austin-street|title= Nightmare on Austin Street| work= American Heritage| date= October 2006|access-date=May 18, 2015}}

File:Pruitt-igoeUSGS02.jpg

• While it was praised by one architectural magazine before it was built as "the best high apartment of the year", the Pruitt–Igoe housing project in St. Louis, Missouri never won any awards for its design.{{#invoke:Cite|web|last=Cendón|first=Sara Fernández|title=Pruitt-Igoe 40 Years Later |url=http://www.aia.org/practicing/AIAB092656|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140314062237/http://www.aia.org/practicing/AIAB092656|archive-date=March 14, 2014|publisher=American Institute of Architects|date=February 3, 2012|access-date=December 31, 2014|quote=For example, Pruitt-Igoe is often cited as an AIA-award recipient, but the project never won any architectural awards. }} The architectural firm that designed the buildings did win an award for an earlier St. Louis project, which may have been confused with Pruitt–Igoe.{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Bristol|first=Katharine|title=The Pruitt–Igoe Myth|journal=Journal of Architectural Education|date=May 1991|volume=44|issue=3|page=168|url=http://www.pruitt-igoe.com/temp/1991-bristol-pruitt-igoemyth.pdf|issn=1531-314X|doi=10.1111/j.1531-314X.2010.01093.x|s2cid=219542179|quote=Though it is commonly accorded the epithet 'award-winning,"' Pruitt-Igoe never won any kind of architectural prize. An earlier St. Louis housing project by the same team of architects, the John Cochran Garden Apartments, did win two architectural awards. At some point this prize seems to have been incorrectly attributed to Pruitt-Igoe|access-date=December 31, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924082652/http://www.pruitt-igoe.com/temp/1991-bristol-pruitt-igoemyth.pdf|archive-date=September 24, 2015}}
• There is little contemporary documentary evidence for the notion that US Vietnam veterans were spat upon by anti-war protesters upon return to the United States. This belief was detailed in some biographical accounts and was later popularized by films such as Rambo.Jerry Lembcke, The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam, 1998, {{isbn|978-0-8147-5147-3}}{{#invoke:Cite|book|first=Bob|last=Greene|author-link=Bob Greene|title=Homecoming: When the Soldier Returned from Vietnam|publisher=G. P. Putnam's Sons|year=1989|isbn=978-0-399-13386-2}}{{#invoke:Cite|journal|last=Vlieg|first=Heather|title=Were They Spat On? Understanding The Homecoming Experience of Vietnam Veterans|journal=The Grand Valley Journal of History|date=September 2019|volume=7|issue=1 |url=https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1187&context=gvjh}}
• Women did not burn their bras outside the Miss America contest in 1969 as a protest in support of women's liberation. They did symbolically throw bras in a trash can, along with other articles seen as emblematic of women's position in American society such as mops, make-up, and high-heeled shoes. The myth of bra burning came when a journalist hypothetically suggested that women may do so in the future, as men of the era burned their draft cards.{{#invoke:Cite|news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-45303069|title=100 Women: The truth behind the 'bra-burning' feminists|work=BBC News|date=September 6, 2018}}
• The American space program in the 1960s never had a wide base of public support and did not unify America. Belief that the Apollo program was worth the time and money invested peaked at 51% for a few months after the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing, and otherwise had fluctuated between 35–45% support.{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Novak |first=Matt |date=May 15, 2012 |title=How Space-Age Nostalgia Hobbles Our Future |url=https://slate.com/technology/2012/05/space-program-s-future-and-landing-on-the-moon-how-nostalgia-for-the-apollo-program-doesn-t-help.html |access-date=June 26, 2024 |work=Slate}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Saripalli |first=Srikanth |date=September 19, 2013 |title=To Boldly Go Nowhere, for Now |url=https://slate.com/technology/2013/09/manned-space-exploration-cyborgs-and-finding-the-next-earth.html |access-date=June 26, 2024 |work=Slate}}{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Strauss |first=Mark |date=April 14, 2011 |title=Ten Enduring Myths About the U.S. Space Program |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/ten-enduring-myths-about-the-us-space-program-1969206/ |access-date=June 26, 2024 |work=Smithsonian}}
• Despite popularizing the phrase "drinking the Kool-Aid",{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=93983|title=Kool Aid/Flavor Aid: Inaccuracies vs. Facts Part 7|website=Alternative Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple|access-date=June 20, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200713202524/https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=93983|archive-date=July 13, 2020}} Kool-Aid was not used for the potassium cyanide-fruit punch mix ingested as part of the Jonestown massacre.{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Higgins|first=Chris|title=Stop Saying 'Drink the Kool-Aid'|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/11/stop-saying-drink-the-kool-aid/264957/|website=The Atlantic|date=November 8, 2012|access-date=June 20, 2022}} A similar product, Flavor-Aid, was used.{{#invoke:Cite|news|last=Krause|first=Charles A.|title=Jonestown Is an Eerie Ghost Town Now|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1978/12/17/jonestown-is-an-eerie-ghost-town-now/3baa4355-58ea-41c0-ae04-a962b3e34651/|newspaper=Washington Post|date=December 17, 1978|access-date=June 20, 2022|quote=A pair of woman's eyelasses, a towel, a pair of shorts, packets of unopened Flavor-Aid lie scattered about waiting for the final cleanup that may one day return Jonestown to the tidy, if overcrowded, little community it once was.}}{{#invoke:Cite|web|url=http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/92/debunk.html |title=Don't Drink the Grape-Flavored Sugar Water... |access-date=June 20, 2022 |author=Kihn, Martin|date=March 2005 |publisher=Fast Company|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050407051630/http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/92/debunk.html|archive-date=April 7, 2005}}

• Napoleon Bonaparte did not say "Let China sleep, for when she wakes she will shake the world," or any similar declaration. {{citation|title= Non, Napoléon N'a Pas Dit: "Laissons La Chine Dormir, Car Quand Elle Se Réveillera, Le Monde Tremblera" (No, Napoleon Did Not Say: "Let China Sleep. Because When She Wakes Up, The World Will Tremble ")|first= Peter|last=Hicks|url=https://www.napoleon.org/histoire-des-2-empires/articles/une-chronique-de-peter-hicks-napoleon-a-t-il-dit-laissons-la-chine-dormir-car-quand-elle-se-reveillera-le-monde-tremblera/|website=Napoleon.org|date=September 2019|access-date= 30 May 2020}}
• There is no known equivalent in the Chinese language for the "Chinese curse," "May you live in interesting times." {{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780300107982 |title=The Yale Book of Quotations |publisher=Yale University Press|year=2006 |isbn=978-0-300-10798-2 |editor-last=Shapiro |editor-first=Fred Richard |editor-link=Fred R. Shapiro |location=New Haven, Connecticut; London |chapter=Sayings}}

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history

common misconceptions