Valery Bystritskii, 10, gets a fellow student into a lock at Bunny's Gym in July 2015 in Winchester, Tennessee. (Photo by Mike Saliba/Barcroft USA)

Tourists in the Serengeti, Tanzania in the second decade of February 2024, get more than they bargained for as a cheetah jumps on the bonnet of their jeep to make their acquaintance. (Photo by Ann Aveyard/Animal News Agency)

A woman carries a water pump to work on February 11, 2017 in Almolonga, Guatemala. The Mayan town in the western highlands district of Quetzaltenango has surged in prosperity in recent years with high-productivity vegetable farming, exporting much of its excess crops to neighborning El Salvador. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

The sun begins to set over this rusty beachside mansion that has been left abandoned for more than 25 years in Thailand, June 2017. A deserted beachside mansion in southern Thailand has retained its beauty – despite no one living there for more than 25 years. In June this year abandoned photographer, Dax Ward, ventured to the Prachuap Khiri-Khan Province to capture the haunting attraction on camera. (Photo by Dax Ward/Barcroft Images)

A man interacts with his camel while posing for a picture at the Pushkar Camel Fair in Pushkar in the Indian state of Rajasthan state on November 12, 2021. (Photo by Himanshu Sharma/AFP Photo)

An Afghan Hound in the grooming tent at the 147th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in Queens, NY on May 8, 2023. (Photo by Peter Fisher for The Washington Post)

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.

In this photograph taken on August 9, 2023, children make their way along a street during heavy downpour in Kilinochchi. (Photo by Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP Photo)