Category
Hoaxes & Forgeries
Historical forgeries, frauds and hoaxes, all long settled: how each deception was built, why it held for as long as it did, and how it was finally exposed.
3 entries
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Cardiff Giant: By White's Account, Its Stone Was Gypsum
The Cardiff Giant was dug up on October 16, 1869. Andrew D. White recorded that a piece said to be from it was gypsum. Who doubted it, and when, with CSV data.
Published
Picture credit
"Cardiff Giant" by Bain News Service — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cardiff_Giant_LCCN2014693762.jpg — Public domain (US: copy negative of a photograph marked as copyrighted in the 1860s, issued by Bain without a copyright notice, public domain in the United States either way; EU: the photograph names only a copyright claimant, C. O. Gott, whose dates are unknown, and was made in the 1860s, so the author is presumed to have died more than 70 years ago (presumed)); modified: cropped to remove the torn negative edge, the hand-lettered title at top left, the negative number at the right edge and a hand-written copyright line at lower right; the figure itself is not cut
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Donation of Constantine: Written Centuries After Constantine
The Catholic Encyclopedia dated the Donation of Constantine to 750–850 in 1909, long after Constantine died in 337, and Valla's treatise against it to 1440.
Published
Picture credit
"Portrait of Lorenzo Valla (Laurentius Valla)" by Theodor de Bry and Johann Theodor de Bry — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Portret_van_Lorenzo_Valla_Laurentius_Valla_(titel_op_object),_RP-P-1909-4359.jpg — CC0 1.0 (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
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Charles Ponzi: A Coupon Trade the Supreme Court Called False
In 1924 the U.S. Supreme Court called Charles Ponzi's postal-coupon trade a “false tale.” His $150-for-$100 promise and the 1920 run, from the Court's record.
Published
Picture credit
Illustration: From the Surviving Record. Generated schematic image — not a photograph or historical record. © From the Surviving Record, all rights reserved.