Hoax Museum Blog: History

Sky Disc of Nebra — image Yet another German archaeological fraud has possibly been uncovered. The Guardian reports that controversy has erupted over the authenticity of the 'Sky Disc of Nebra'. The disc, which shows the sun, moon and stars, was found in 1999 by two amateur metal detectors near the town of Nebra in Germany. It was believed to be 3600 years old. Now some experts, including Peter Schauer of Regensburg University, are claiming that it's a fake. This issue has arisen because the two guys who found it were charged with handling stolen goods after they tried to sell the disc to a museum. I don't really understand what the basis of the charge is. Were they not allowed to sell it because it's considered the property of the German government? Anyway, the basis of their defense is that the disc is fake, and therefore it is theirs to sell.
Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2005.   Comments (14)

The Bat Creek Stone — image In 1889 a curiously engraved stone was found in an Indian mound near Bat Creek, Ohio. The discoverer of the stone was John Emmert, who was working for the Smithsonian's Mound Survey Project. Emmert thought (or said he thought) that the inscription was written in Cherokee and sent the 'Bat Creek Stone' off to the Smithsonian, which accepted the stone as authentic. The Smithsonian then included a reference to the stone in its final report on the Mounds--the report in which it concluded that the mounds had been built by ancient American Indians, not by an ancient tribe of world-wandering Europeans or Israelites (the origin of the Indian mounds was a huge debate back in the 19th century and spawned numerous fanciful theories). Fast-forward to the 1960s when Hebrew scholar Cyrus Gordon realized that the Bat Creek Stone was actually inscribed with an ancient form of Hebrew, not Cherokee. Then in the late 1980s artifacts discovered alongside the stone were radiocarbon dated and found to be over 1500 years old. Some saw this as dramatic evidence of the presence of 'Hebrew sailors' in North America way back when. Perhaps a lost tribe of Israelites really had built the mounds? Or perhaps not. In the most recent issue of American Antiquity, Robert Mainfort and Mary Kwas (archaeologists at the University of Arkansas) expose the Bat Creek Stone as a forgery (The Columbus Dispatch has an article about this, but won't let people see it for free). Mainfort and Kwas discovered that the inscription was copied from an illustration that appeared in a widely available book titled General History, Cyclopedia, and Dictionary of Freemasonry, published in 1870 (nineteen years before the finding of the stone). As for who the forger was, the obvious suspect is John Emmert, since he was alone when he dug the stone out of the mound. So much for those Hebrew sailors in ancient America.
Posted: Wed Dec 15, 2004.   Comments (43)

Atlantis Found — A lot of people lately seem to be finding the lost city of Atlantis. Back in June a researcher said he located it off the southern coast of Spain by studying satellite images. Then last month US researchers said they found the city off the coast of Cyprus by using sonar technology. But my favorite is the discovery of Atlantis announced yesterday by the Hawaiian Phonics tutor Dennis Brooks. He's studied the issue deeply and has concluded that Atlantis is, in fact, Tampa, Florida. He points out that the dimensions of Atlantis as described by Plato pretty much match up with the dimensions of Tampa and Harbor Island (in Tampa Bay). So there you go. Mystery solved.
Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2004.   Comments (9)

Stunning Ingratitude of De Gaulle — image In 1945 did Charles De Gaulle really say to Winston Churchill, in reference to the military aid that the Allies provided to France to defeat Germany, that "We shall stun you with our ingratitude"? Monday, November 22 was the birthday of De Gaulle, and a number of right-leaning blogs marked the occasion by posting this quotation (they seem to have picked it up from an article in the Belfast Telegraph). So did De Gaulle really say this?

Even though the tense verbal exchanges between De Gaulle and Churchill are well known, this particular remark sounded hoaxy to me. A quick google search didn't turn up any source that could verify the remark, though it did pull up an essay noting that Churchill once quoted to De Gaulle a passage from Plutarch: "ingratitude towards great men is the mark of a strong people." So it's possible that De Gaulle responded to this comment by saying that the French would stun Churchill with their ingratitude (in which context, the remark would be a compliment).

However, a second, more thorough google search revealed that the 'stunning ingratitude' quotation has been attributed to a number of other people besides De Gaulle. This 2003 article in theage.com.au attributes it to the prime minister of the Hapsburg Empire: When, in 1848, Tsarist Russia intervened to put down an insurrection in Hungary, thus saving the Hapsburg Empire which was then in deep trouble, the Hapsburg prime minister commented that: "We shall astonish the world with our ingratitude."

But quite a few other people (including the conservative columnists Pat Buchanan and George Will) credit the remark to the Italian statesman Camillo Benso Cavour: The Sardinian minister who guided his country to the unification of Italy in the mid-1800, Cavour, did so with French help in a war with Austria. Without the French Army the Austrians would probably still have been ruling Northern Italy in 1914. Cavour's comment was that someday the Italians would astonish the world with their ingratitude to France.


I suspect that Cavour is the true source of the saying. In which case, it's ironic that a remark originally referring to ingratitude towards France has now come full circle and is being used to demonstrate (supposedly) the ingratitude of France.
Posted: Sat Nov 27, 2004.   Comments (7)


Coca-Cola Fantasy Items — Here's an interesting piece from a newspaper about the burgeoning market in Coca-Cola Fantasy items. One of the paper's readers wrote in to ask whether their Coca-Cola belt buckle designed by Tiffany Studios and showing a nude woman sitting on a crescent moon was of any value (unfortunately there's no picture of the item). The paper's reply: No, because the item is a fantasy fake:

[This] is what Coca-Cola collectors call a "fantasy," which is a piece that never existed as an old item, was not used in advertising by the Coca-Cola Co. (nor sanctioned by them), but is a modern creation meant to appeal to collectors or to mislead the unwary. There are literally tons and tons of these Coca-Cola "fantasy" items out there, lurking in flea markets and at garage sales. The variety seems to be endless, and belt buckles are one of the favorite items to be made as "fantasies," and many of them feature nude women, including one extremely tasteless and offensive example that has the representation of a nude nun of all things!

Nude Nun Coke memorabilia. I may be twisted, but for some reason that seems more interesting to me than the authentic Coke stuff.
Posted: Mon Nov 08, 2004.   Comments (31)

California As An Island — image The Philadelphia Print Shop has a great online collection of ancient maps that contain mythical geography. Mythical geography describes "geographic features that appear on the map but not on the earth; cities where none ever were, islands where there are but waves, lakes and rivers where there is dry land, and kingdoms of non-existent kings." (I have some more information about this topic in my Medieval Travel Lies Gallery). My favorite ancient maps in the Print Shop's collection are the ones of California as an island. Of course, it remains to be seen whether these were actually geographic myths, or astute predictions of the future. Being in San Diego, I'd love to be able to hang a map of California as an island in my living room, but since their prices range from $500 all the way up to $7000, that's not going to happen anytime soon. (via J-Walk)
Posted: Wed Aug 04, 2004.   Comments (4)

Inscription One: Real or Fake? — image Inscription One is a stone obelisk engraved with ancient Thai script that describes the utopian kingdom of Siam. Believed to have been created in 1292, it's considered one of the great national treasures of Thailand, comparable to the American Liberty Bell or the English Magna Carta. But recently two scholars, Michael Wright and Piriya Krairiksh, have suggested that Inscription One is nothing more than a fake. They theorize that the obelisk actually dates only to 1833, the year in which it was 'rediscovered' by Prince Mongkut (who later became King Rama IV). They suggest that the Prince used it as a piece of national propaganda to promote his reformist policies. This theory isn't gaining the two scholars many friends in Thailand. 5000 outraged demonstrators recently "carried out a cursing ritual, burning chillies and salt and the names of the two men written on scraps of paper." A Thai politician has also demanded the arrest of the two men. Michael Wright, however, is shrugging all this off. He insists that he feels no ill-effects from the curse at all. (but just wait until his penis melts into his body, and then see what he says!)
Posted: Mon Aug 02, 2004.   Comments (4)

The Journal of Liwwat Bocke — Liwwat Bocke was a German woman who moved to Ohio as a young woman during the nineteenth century. From the 1820s until the 1880s she kept a journal of her experiences... a journal that eventually spanned 1100 pages, all of which is written in a dialect of northern Germany known as Plattdeutsch. When historians discovered her journal during the 1970s they thought it was a remarkable find, sure to shed valuable light on the history of the settlement of Ohio. But now they're not so sure. Analysis of the document has revealed that it's a fake, plagiarized from other sources and containing numerous anachronisms. What no one can figure out is who created this forgery, and why they did it. As this article in The Plain Dealer notes, why would someone "go to such great effort to fake a journal about life in the 19th century and then attribute it to a German-speaking farm woman who is buried in a rural church cemetery in Auglaize County... Who would go to the trouble of hand-writing more than a thousand pages in Plattdeutsch - a low German dialect spoken mostly by older, rural people - to describe the settlement of Ohio?"
Posted: Tue Jun 15, 2004.   Comments (43)

Giant Skeleton Unearthed — image A remarkable photograph reveals archaeologists unearthing a massive (and when I say massive, I mean massive... we're talking a 50-foot behemoth here) skeleton at a site in Saudi Arabia. Of course, the Saudi military is keeping this all very hush, hush. The public couldn't handle knowing about such a remarkable discovery. If you get your news from The New Nation, 'Bangladesh's Independent News Source,' you might think this was an actual piece of news. But of course, it's totally false. The picture comes from a Worth1000 photoshop contest. The original, undoctored source of the image was a Cornell-sponsored dig of a mastodon in New York. Somehow the picture escaped into the alternative reality of email, accompanied by a bogus caption claiming that the picture was taken in Saudi Arabia, etc., etc. Apparently The New Nation received this email (forwarded to them from an anti-Muslim group that takes it upon itself to hoax Muslim papers) and fell for it hook, line, and sinker. The historically minded will note the long-standing popularity of Giant hoaxes, going all the way back to the 18th century where we find Commodore Byron's tales of Patagonian Giants, or the amazing popularity of giants, such as the Cardiff Giant, in the 19th century. (via Liquito and Apothecary's Drawer)
Posted: Wed May 12, 2004.   Comments (0)

Not Cook — image The Australian Museum has determined that a bone in its possession, that sports an arrow sticking through it, did not come from the leg of Captain James Cook. Strike all that. My mistake. The arrow is made out of bone, and this bone was long rumored to be a bone from Captain James Cook's leg. But it appears that the bone is actually from some kind of sea mammal.
Posted: Thu Apr 29, 2004.   Comments (1)

Hitler Diary sold — I'm a few days late noting this story, but I had to mention it anyway. One volume of the forged Hitler Diaries was recently sold at auction in Berlin, fetching around $7700. If there really was such a thing as a brick-and-mortar Museum of Hoaxes, I would have definitely put in a bid for it.
Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2004.   Comments (0)

Shroud of Turin — image BBC News has a good summary of the Shroud of Turin controversy, in light of the second face that was discovered on the backside of it. "Does this mean it is real after all? Or does it mean it's an even better hoax than was previously thought?" The answer: no one really knows. I noted in my book that the debate about the shroud rages on and likely will for the foreseeable future. The emergence of new evidence has simply made that more true than ever.
Posted: Sun Apr 18, 2004.   Comments (24)

The Vinland Map — The debate about the Vinland Map continues, and Scientific American summarizes the controversy. Everyone agrees that the parchment the map was written on is medieval, but what about the ink? That's the question.
Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2004.   Comments (0)

Kensington Runestone — The Kensington Runestone, unearthed in Minnesota in 1898 and hailed as evidence of the presence of Norse explorers in ancient America, is off on a grand tour. First stop Sweden.
Posted: Mon Jan 12, 2004.   Comments (0)

Posted: Mon Jan 12, 2004.   Comments (0)

The Michigan Relics — michigan relicsIn October, 1890 James Scotford unearthed some relics while digging postholes for a fence in Montcalm County, Michigan. The relics appeared to demonstrate the prior existence of a Near Eastern culture in ancient America. They were eventually debunked as frauds, though not before attracting a lot of attention and stirring up lots of controversy. Now the relics are on display again. The Michigan Historical Museum has a special exhibit devoted to them titled 'Digging Up Controversy: The Michigan Relics.' Much of the exhibit can be viewed online. Definitely worth checking out.
Posted: Thu Jan 01, 2004.   Comments (0)

Vindication for Man Will Never Fly Society — The reenactment of the Wright Brothers' first flight failed. I hate to say it, but the members of the Man Will Never Fly Society, whom I linked to just a few posts below, did predict that would happen.
Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003.   Comments (0)

Manned Flight is a Hoax — men will never flyAccording to the members of the Man Will Never Fly Society, the official account of the Wright Brothers' 1903 first flight, the anniversary of which is coming up on Dec. 17th, is all a hoax. They contend that the plane never flew... and all subsequent manned flights are a hoax also. Never mind that the majority of the members of this society are pilots. Every year they meet and have a boozy celebration to commemmorate the Wright Brothers' non-flight. In fact, alcohol seems to be the main focus of their meetings, because the more they drink the more confident they become in the truth of their position. So it might best be described as a drinking club. Their motto is "Birds fly. Men drink," and their website proclaims: "The Man Will Never Fly Memorial Society has fought the hallucination of airplane flight with every weapon at its command save sobriety." Sounds like a fun group to be a member of. (Thanks to Alex Richbourg for the link).
Posted: Fri Dec 12, 2003.   Comments (0)

Antebellum Island — antebellum islandThe Onion has a good parody of the Reality TV genre: Antebellum Island. It's a new 'alternate reality' show, supposedly being aired by CBS, set on an island on which the South won the Civil War. The show's motto is 'Secede, Suppress, Survive.'
Posted: Thu Dec 04, 2003.   Comments (0)

Princess Caraboo — BBC Legacies, the BBC's new website for exploring local history, is doing a feature this month on Local Legends, and has put up an article about one of Bristol's local legends, Princess Caraboo (though perhaps legends is the wrong word to describe the Princess, since she was quite real, though not a real Princess). It's a good article, and they were nice enough to link back to the Museum of Hoaxes in a sidebar.
Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003.   Comments (0)

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