Common Historical Myths Debunked

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10-07-2025

The Aztecs didn't call themselves Aztecs; they called themselves Mexica. The term "Aztec" was later popularized by European scholars in the 18th century, derived from Aztlán, the mythical homeland of the Mexica people.
Marie Antoinette's real name was Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna. She was, of course, Austrian, but her name was Frenchified when she married the then-future King Louis XVI of France.
The Mona Lisa didn't become a famous painting until 114 years ago. In fact, it was relatively obscure for centuries. Its rise to global fame began in 1911, when it was stolen from the Louvre by an Italian handyman named Vincenzo Peruggia, who believed the painting belonged in Italy. The heist made international headlines and turned the painting into a sensation. When it was eventually recovered two years later, massive crowds came to see it.
Napoleon Bonaparte wasn't actually short; he was about 5'6" or 5'7" (by modern standards), which was an average height for a man of that time. The reason we think he is short is that British caricatures and propaganda portrayed him as comically small to undermine his power.
The term "computer" actually predates the machine — it originally referred to a person who performed repetitive calculations by hand. These human computers were often employed to do complex math for science, engineering, and navigation long before electronic computers existed. The word only shifted to describe computer machines in the 1950s.
There were female gladiators in Ancient Rome — known as gladiatrices. Though far less common than their male counterparts, they did the exact same things. They were eventually banned, likely because their presence challenged traditional Roman gender roles.
Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece were actually full of color, and not the plain white marble and stone we often imagine today. Temples, homes, and public buildings were often painted in bright colors, decorated with murals, mosaics, and intricate patterns, while white marble statues were originally covered in vivid paints. Of course, over time, the paint wore away. During the Renaissance, when artists and architects rediscovered Roman ruins, they mistook the faded marble for the intended aesthetic.
The myth was further cemented by Johann Joachim Winckelmann, an influential 18th-century German art historian, who believed that the pure white look of ancient statues and architecture reflected a higher aesthetic ideal and was the pinnacle of classical beauty. He refused to accept any evidence that contradicted his belief.
The Salem "witches" weren't burned at the stake. They were hanged or beheaded, but their bodies were burned after the fact to make sure they didn't cast spells after death. Being burned at the stake for being a witch was actually something they did in Europe from the late 1400s through the 1700s, which is a reason we associate that with the Salem Witch Trials.
Ludwig van Beethoven wasn't completely deaf when he composed many of his most famous works. His hearing declined gradually over time. In his early career, he could still hear well enough to perform and conduct, and even as his hearing worsened, he continued to compose with the help of muscle memory, vibration, and written notation. The common myth we all heard was that he couldn't hear at all by the time he wrote his final symphony, Symphony No. 9. However, that isn't true — he still could hear faintly.
The Library of Alexandria didn't burn down in a single catastrophic event. The reality is that its destruction was a gradual process that happened over centuries. The library suffered from multiple attacks, damage (like during Julius Caesar's siege of Alexandria in 48 BCE), political turmoil, and long periods of neglect.
Jackie Kennedy's iconic pink suit is, of course, forever linked to JFK's assassination. However, it wasn't a suit she had just for that trip; she wore the suit publicly at least six times before that day. Below is a photo of her wearing it to visit her sister, Lee Radziwill, in London in March 1962, and when the then-Maharajah and Maharani of Jaipur visited the White House in October 1962.
Vikings didn't wear horned helmets. They likely wore simple helmets made of metal or leather. The idea that they wore them came from costume designer Carl Emil Doepler, who created horned helmets for the Viking characters in the German opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen in the 1870s.
Contrary to popular belief, medieval people didn't think the Earth was flat. In fact, educated people knew it was round. Scholars in the Middle Ages, especially those influenced by ancient Greek and Roman texts, widely accepted the Earth's spherical shape. The myth that everyone thought the world was flat started in the 1830s to paint the Middle Ages as a "dark" and ignorant era that was held back by the Catholic Church.
Similarly, people weren't concerned that Christopher Columbus would fall off the Earth because it was flat. They were concerned that he had underestimated the size of the world, and that he would run out of supplies in the middle of the ocean before he made it to Asia.
Despite the popular myth, the Ford Model T didn't only come in black. When the Model T launched in 1908, buyers could choose from colors like red, blue, green, and gray. However, between 1914 and 1925, Ford standardized production for efficiency, and black became the standard (and often only) color the Model T came in. Although black dominated during those peak years, color options returned toward the end of production, which officially ended in 1927.
Most pirates didn't bury their treasure — that's more legend than reality. In truth, they spent their loot quickly on things like food, alcohol, weapons, and women. Life at sea was dangerous and short, so pirates tended to live in the moment. Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 novel Treasure Island is largely responsible for popularizing the myth of pirates burying treasure.
Color television existed in the '50s — the technology for it had been in development since the '40s. But, few people owned color TV sets because they were very pricey. A color television set cost about $1,000 in 1954, which is over $11,900 today if adjusted for inflation.
Additionally, there weren't many color TV shows or specials broadcast since they were very expensive to produce.
Before the 1980s, the Roswell UFO crash was basically an unknown event. While it was huge news in 1947, when it happened, it quickly got forgotten after the United States Air Force issued an almost immediate retraction that they had not recovered a crashed UFO in Roswell, New Mexico, and that it had been debris from a downed weather balloon. It wasn't until a 1980 book, The Roswell Incident, that the story was revived with claims of a government cover-up and alien bodies.
The Roswell Incident not only further delved into the story, but it also claimed that they interviewed witnesses to the event and how the government worked at covering it up. Also, in 1980, the National Enquirer published an interview with someone who had allegedly picked up the debris from the crash.
And lastly, the United States didn't have an official national anthem until 1931 — more than 150 years after gaining independence. It wasn't until Congress passed a resolution and Herbert Hoover signed it into law that "The Star-Spangled Banner" became the official anthem. Before that, there was no single song that represented the nation.