Written by the Winners: Difference between revisions

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** The objective historical truth about Drusilla is that the imperial oath was aimed at her as well as her brother, that the coins of the empire depicted her like they would depict any emperor, that she had a imperial cult around her just like the other emperors had, and that there was a national mourning when she died. Also, that she was married to another man and that her brother was married to another woman. Two of the funny quirks about the rumors about [[Brother-Sister Incest]] is that they 1. Seems to have started after Caligula's death, and thus long after Drusilla's death. 2. That the story was simplified by pretending that Drusilla's husband and Caligula's wife didn't exist, rather then commenting on how ''they'' reacted to the stories.

** The ruins of Pompeii were a great find in large part because they were uncontaminated by this (though it is also valued for a lot of mundane information about Roman life).

* The Byzantine practice of Iconclanism, the banning of the veneration of icons, became utterly hated after a century of intense religious debate, and thus, any emperor who even remotely promoted it got utterly slandered by the anti Iconlanists regardless of all the good they did for the Empire. Leo III, who founded the Isaurian dynasty and who saved the Byzantine Empire from the Umayyad Caliphate, was utterly demonized by his religious rivals and slammed for heresy, to the point that it took more recent historians decades to restore his reputation. and Leo was more fortunate, since even his fiercest enemies had to concede he did bring an end to a century of turmoil. His successor, Constantine V, who was even more Iconclanistic, managed to follow up on the reforms of his father and managed win a string of victories against the Abbasid Caliphate and the First Bulgarian Empire, finally becoming the Emperor under which Byzantium could go on the offensive. Nevertheless, Constantine was still hated and bashed, especially since iconclanism would mark the end of Byzantium's hold over the Papacy and mark the permanent split of the churches. Not surprisingly, it took centuries for moderate historians to start to heal these reputations, pointing out their positive sides and actions and the fact that many Byzantine citizens associated iconclanism with military victory, as the Byzantines started winning when iconclanism was instituted, a state of mind that persisted until the victories of the Macedonian dynasty, who were not iconclanists, showed that iconclanism was not necessary for victory or the Empire's well being.

* [[Richard of Gloucester|Richard III of England]] is a good example. While he wasn't the nicest guy around, he was also not the [[Complete Monster]] that the dynasty that succeeded him portrayed him as, either, as the modern research shows. It doesn't help that [[Shakespeare]] was [[Richard III|with the Tudors on this issue]].

* Ivan IV of Russia. Consider at the very least the fact that he actually ''prayed'' for those he sentenced to death. Though, that would not be especially abnormal for his highly religious time. Still, there is plenty of historical debate as to whether he destroyed Muscovite society and caused the Time of Troubles or whether he dug out the foundations of Peter the Great's new Russian Empire (or both). There is also debate as to whether his epithet "Groznii" means "Terrible" in the modern sense of "horrible" or in the Old Testament sense of "awe-inspiring". The fact remains that he has been used as a historical justification for the need of a strong leader in Russian society (see: Stalin).