Historical References: Fact or Fiction?

The lances contained a mixture of nitrate salt, sulfur and carbon that was tamped with jagged rocks, thistles and thorns. This is close to the recipe for gunpowder: potassium nitrate (saltpeter), sulfur and charcoal (carbon). Gunpowder was invented in 9th-century China and spread throughout most parts of Eurasia by the end of the 13th century.

“Condottieri” were the leaders of the professional military (or mercenaries) contracted by the Italian city states (Venice, Florence, and Genoa) and the Papacy in the 13th and 14th centuries to fight for them. The military-service terms and conditions were stipulated in a “condotta” (contract) between the city-state and the soldiers (officers and enlisted men), thus the contracted leader, the mercenary captain commanding, was titled the “Condottiere.”

The father of the twin boys, Charley and Marley, is named Charles Foley, and I selected his name for the game designer. I used the name Charles Foley as he is credited with being one of the inventors of the game “Twister.”

Henry VIII was King of England from April 21, 1509 to 1547. The six women who were married to Henry VIII were, in chronological order, including their outcome: 1) Catherine of Aragon (died under guard at Kimbolton Castle), 2) Anne Boleyn (marriage annulled, then beheaded), 3) Jane Seymour (died 12 days after giving birth to Edward VI), 4) Anne of Cleves (marriage annulled, outlived all the other wives), 5) Catherine Howard (beheaded), 6) Catherine Parr (widowed at the death of Henry VIII).

One rhyme to remember:
“King Henry VIII, to six wives he was wedded. One died, one survived, two divorced, two beheaded.”

Dermestid beetles—referred to as “skin beetles.” They are used in taxidermy and natural history museums to clean animal skeletons.

Word counts noted for the books and tablets vary depending on the version referenced for the Bible and Torah. However they are within 10–15% in being accurate. The Rosetta Stone was discovered in 1799, weighs 1,680 pounds, and is a fragment of a larger stele. It bears three inscriptions: the top register in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, the second in Egyptian Demotic script, and the third in Ancient Greek. None of the three texts are complete. Deciphering the Rosetta Stone is attributed to many scholars, however Jean-François Champollion is said to have spent 23 years solving the riddle of the text. Due to the many scholars who contributed to deciphering the stone between 1799 and 1850, how many years were actually spent on the effort is difficult to determine.

The Temple of the Tooth is a Buddhist temple in the city of Kandy, Sri Lanka, which houses the relic of the tooth of Buddha. It was smuggled to the island by Princess Hemamali and her husband, Prince Dantha, in 301–328 A.D. Since ancient times, the relic has played an important role in local politics because it is believed that whoever holds the relic holds the governance of the country.

Plutarch was a famous biographer of Greek and Roman figures and did write an ancient text entitled “Life of Alexander.”

All the characters at the bottom of the page are real people: Babe Ruth, Steve Jobs, George Washington Carver, and Johann Sebastian Bach. The characters on the following page are all fictional characters: Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Spiderman, James Bond, Harry Potter and Tarzan.

Pisaster ochraceus is the name of a starfish.

Rafflesia arnoldii and Titan arum are known as the “Corpse Flower” and give off a scent that smells like a rotting corpse.

Tapputi was a woman chemist from India credited with developing perfumes in the second millennium BC.

The Sacred and Imperial Monastery of the God-Trodden, Mount Sinai—St. Catherine's for short—does exist and it does house one of the world's finest collections of books and manuscripts. It was built by Emperor Justinian I in the 6th century AD to preserve knowledge. Animal skin parchment was used for writing and often they were rewritten over with new text. These erased texts are known as “palimpsests.”

Manuka honey does contain bee pollen, enzymes and propolis and is credited with having healing properties.

The first image of an angel appeared in a 4th-century painting.

Alexander the Great is a famous ruler and conqueror from Greece who lived between 300–323 BC. He did have a horse named “Bucephalus” that he rode for over 20 years. The story of his childhood and how he chose Bucephalus when he was 10 years old was recited by the Greek biographer Plutarch and is believed to be historically accurate. It offered the perfect historical reference for the Researcher to discover the first evidence of Terraloria on Earth.

The Antikythera Mechanism was found off the coast of Greece in 1960. It is a complex system of 37 dials, gears, and cogs that predicted and measured the movement and cycle of the planets in relationship to the sun, Earth and moon. It was an astronomical calculator used for traversing and navigating the oceans and seas.

All the inventors, and the inventions credited to them, are real: Alessandro Volta, Michael Faraday, Samuel Morse, Henry Ford, Nikolaus Otto, Orville and Wilbur Wright, and Guglielmo Marconi. The Titanic did sink in 1912, claiming the lives of 1,500 of its 2,224 passengers. Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of the radio, did miss taking the doomed ship.

Albert Einstein's equation E=mc² did lead to the development of the atomic bomb. J. Robert Oppenheimer contributed to the development of the first atomic bomb, named “Trinity.” Trinity was detonated on July 16, 1945.

David Packard and Bill Hewlett, founders of Hewlett-Packard (HP), and Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, founders of Apple, are real inventors and business founders.

Common green darners are dragonflies. Of North America's 331 dragonfly species, only nine make regular migratory trips down the shorelines. Adult darners only live 3 months.

All the attributes of the plants and venoms noted in the chapter are based on fact.

The antennae of the male silkworm moth can detect a single molecule of female pheromone in the air.

Humans have been killing birds at the rate of over 340 million a year just from moving vehicles. Olive fields in Greece and elsewhere place nets over trees to capture birds, and many die by flying into office building windows, power lines, and other man-made structures. Vast tracts of land are seeing fewer and fewer birds.

The Chalice of Abbot Suger is real and was used for more than six centuries for the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist at the Basilica of St. Denis in Paris, France. It is a fluted sardonyx cup carved in Hellenistic Alexandria around the year 100 BC. It was rescued from destruction during the French Revolution in 1789 and over the years found its way to a man named A. Lenoir. It now resides in a dark alcove in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. That the chalice employed the use of the screw in its making is fictional…but offered a great place for Terraloria to have been hidden for such a long period of time.

Metal screws were not used as fasteners in Europe until the 1400s.

“Mitten's Conjecture” — the original conjecture is called “Witten's Conjecture.” In algebraic geometry the Witten conjecture concerns the intersection numbers of stable classes on the moduli space of curves, introduced by Edward Witten in his 1991 paper. I used it to address class differences between people and how it worked in hiding Terraloria on Earth—and because it offered a scientific-sounding theory that fit the story.

“Houdini” was a famous magician and escape artist who lived from 1874 to 1926. He died from the effects of escaping from a tank of water, bound and chained.

The Smith Brothers invented the licorice cough-drop in 1880 and placed their bearded faces on the cough drop box for advertising.

Orville and Wilbur Wright are credited with inventing the first successful airplane. During the test flights at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Wilbur, the younger brother, suggested adding a tail rudder to stabilize the airplane in flight. The butterfly placed on the drawings is fictional.

George and Charles Parker are credited with inventing the game of Monopoly as well as the other board games listed. Later historical reference attributes the original idea to a woman named Elizabeth “Lizzie” J. Magie (1866–1948), a Quaker and the creator of the Landlord's Game, which bears a striking resemblance to Monopoly.

During World War II an unprecedented number of orphans were dropped off at a hospital in Poland. Many of the orphans had patches sewn into their blankets or garments by their mothers to help identify them when the parents returned. One hospital record indicated that of 16,282 infants admitted, only 152 were reclaimed. This fact was provided from an article on an exhibit at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.

The Stratford Find is real. The items were discovered in a field in Scotland and the quantity of the items noted in the chapter are correct.

Pathfinder Village is a real place. Located in Edmeston, NY (20 minutes from Cooperstown, NY, home of the Baseball Hall of Fame and Doubleday Field), it is one of the largest Down syndrome communities in the United States. Flora Bell is based on my younger sister Yvonne, who has Down syndrome and resides at Pathfinder Village.

“Banging the beehive” is an actual financial term that describes a practice traders use to place high-speed trades to trigger huge price swings before critical financial data hits the trading floor and affects a stock price.

A gene called MKRN3 is real. It provides instructions for making a protein called makorin ring finger protein 3 (MKRN3). This protein plays a role in directing the onset of puberty, which describes the changes in the body related to sexual development that normally occur in adolescence. Its exact function is unknown.

Caravaggio was a Baroque painter, and it is believed he used fine powder from dried fireflies to create a photosensitive surface onto which he projected images to be painted. Caravaggio's “Penitent Magdalene” is one of his paintings.

The Carrington Event occurred in 1859 and was caused by an extremely strong solar flare that disrupted electrical telegraph systems around the world. The scientific community is concerned that another Carrington-like event could destroy communication satellites and power stations on Earth and cause massive power outages.

Salvatore Capezio was a shoemaker in New York City who made fine ballet shoes. A sign reading “The Theatrical & Historical Shoemaker” advertised his shop in 1887. Capezio ballet shoes are still in production today.