NASA's DHC-3 Otter plane flies in Operation IceBridge-Alaska surveys of mountain glaciers in Alaska in this image released on September 18, 2014. Over the past few decades, average global temperatures have been on the rise, and this warming is happening two to three times faster in the Arctic. (Photo by Chris Larsen/Reuters/NASA/University of Alaska-Fairbanks)

Protesters wearing masks perform during anti-austerity and anti-graft protests in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on January 11, 2013. More than 5,000 Slovenians gathered in the center of Ljubljana on Friday to protest against a corruption scandal that threatens to bring down the government. Slovenia's anti-corruption commission said earlier this week that Prime Minister Janez Jansa had been unable to explain the source of some of his income in recent years. (Photo by Srdjan Zivulovic/Reuters via The Atlantic)

Groom Praem Pam Srichamnan and his bride Suriya Utai jump into a pond during a wedding ceremony ahead of Valentine's Day in Prachin Buri province, east of Bangkok February 13, 2014. Three Thai couples took part in the wedding ceremony arranged by a resort aimed to strengthen the relationships of the couples by doing fun activities. (Photo by Damir Sagolj/Reuters)

Do you think that history is a science? Well, not exactly. First, and foremost, history is the state's “legend of wars”, it’s official regalia. Of course, public historians are not interested in scientific truth – quite the opposite. In this respect, any attempt to present a state’s history as altruistic and benevolent as possible is welcomed and encouraged – as opposed to any revisionism attempts that may be more accurate. In this matter, Chinese have surpassed us all – they revised in highly creative manner (but rather shamelessly) the technology already invented by Europeans, a process that resulted in oldest state on the planet. Here is an interesting paradox: ask any sinologist about the Middle Kingdom during second century B.C., and he will describe it to you in such a vivid manner as if he has been living there all his life – but as soon as you will ask him to describe Chinese history in the 19-20th centuries… let's say, his eagerness will be greatly diminished. However, we will discuss China in a different article, and in the meantime we will try to understand how exactly historic “legend of wars” is formed and functions – based on a specific and well-known example. A great example is Ferdinand Magellan's first voyage around the world.

Takeoka Chisaka, Hiroshima, Japan. “One morning in August 1945, I was walking home from the night shift at a factory in Hiroshima. As I reached my door, there was a huge explosion. When I came to, my head was bleeding and I had been blasted 30m away. The atomic bomb had detonated. When I found my mother, her eyes were badly burned. A doctor said they had to come out, but he didn’t have the proper tools so used a knife instead. It was hellish. I became a peace-worker after the war. In the 1960s, at a meeting at the UN, I met one of the people who created the atomic bomb. He apologised”. (Photo and caption by Sasha Maslov)

An immigrant from Mali rests at the Greek-Macedonian border before an attempt to flee to Macedonia May 13, 2015 village of Idomeni in Kilkis prefecture May 13, 2015. Hundreds of mostly Afghan, Syrian, and African immigrants cross daily from Greece into Macedonia on their way to northern European countries; most of them are turned back by Macedonian border guards. (Photo by Yannis Behrakis/Reuters)

Snow covers roofs, streets and the Charles River following a winter blizzard in Boston, Massachusetts January 28, 2015. A powerful blizzard struck Boston and surrounding New England on Tuesday, leaving some 4.5 million people grappling with as much as three feet of snow and coastal flooding. (Photo by Brian Snyder/Reuters)

Models display a creation by K-Lynn Lingerie during a fashion show in the Lebanese capital Beirut on April 24, 2016. (Photo by Anwar Amro/AFP Photo)