A local resident rests on a bench as Mount Bromo volcano erupts in the background in Ngadisari, Probolinggo, East Java, Indonesia January 5, 2016. (Photo by Darren Whiteside/Reuters)

U.S. Air Force pilots with the Thunderbirds perform the calypso pass maneuver in F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft during a practice session prior to the Gunfighter Skies air show at Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, September 19 and released September 24, 2014. (Photo by Tech. Sgt. Manuel J. Martinez/Reuters/US Air Force)

A riot policeman uses a baton to hit a rioting University of Nairobi student in Kenya's capital Nairobi, in this May 20, 2014 file photo. (Photo by Noor Khamis/Reuters)

A lightning strikes St Peter's dome at the Vatican on February 11, 2013. Pope Benedict XVI announced today he will resign as leader of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics on February 28 because his age prevented him from carrying out his duties – an unprecedented move in the modern history of the Catholic Church. (Photo by Filippo Monteforte/AFP Photo)

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)

A masked reveller poses in San Marco Piazza during the Venice Carnival, January 30, 2016. (Photo by Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters)

Members of the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Marching Band and Twirling Corps do their thing down San Francisco's Market Street, June 27, 1982. Police estimate the crowd to be 300,000 for the Lesbian/Gay Freedom Day parade and rally. (Photo by Carl Viti/AP Photo)