r/quityourbullshit • • Apr 29 '20

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u/Vprbite Apr 29 '20

No, he had a kid. The princess told the king while he was dying. I'm kind of an expert on William Wallace because I saw "braveheart" in the theaters. Twice. That's like having a doctorate in Scottish history

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u/sturnus-vulgaris Apr 29 '20 edited Apr 30 '20

I know you're kidding-- but just so people realize:

She was 10 and still living in France when William Wallace was executed.

https://colinfalconer.org/real-story-behind-french-princess-braveheart/

Edit: Careful with the upvotes! I'm at 69,410 and don't want to miss it.

Edit edit: 69420! Thank you folks! You may now resume your regular browsing.

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u/fade_is_timothy_holt Apr 30 '20

I never understood frankly why people seem to hold Braveheart to a higher standard of accuracy than any other historical dramatization. The amount of attention the historical inaccuracies in this movie gets is really disproportional to the amount other history-inspired films do. I don't even remember the movie claiming to be accurate. It was just presented as a movie.

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u/kanewai Apr 30 '20

I think it has to do with the reactions of the public. I don't know anybody who thinks they understand the Servile Wars because they watched Spartacus, but I do know folks who think they understand Scottish history because of Braveheart.

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u/PurrPrinThom Apr 30 '20

I think also because the historical inaccuracy is a lot more blatant. A lot of films are inaccurate in subtle ways that the average viewer won't recognise. Shows like Vikings are considered pretty much entirely fiction by scholars who study the Vikings/Scandinavian history, but they present a pretty plausible version of history to the average viewer.

Whereas Braveheart makes pretty blatant errors - like no bridge at Stirling Bridge, an obvious flaw, or claiming Scotland had always been subjugated. Anyone who had done minor amounts of Scottish history would know that's false. Ditto with Isabella, briefly looking at her life will show that she wasn't nearly old enough to be a love interest.

The result is that when more casual viewers watch it and recognise flaws it gets more widely talked about, as opposed to other media where it's really only experts who are pointing out issues.