Roman soldiers got paid in salt, hence the world 'salary'.
That's common knowledge, right? Yes. But also wrong (click). They usually got paid in coins, food and clothes. But yes, some of the money they used to buy salt and maybe that lead to the word 'salarium' aka 'salary'. The myth is based on an ancient text that lost some meaning in translation. But for years I took it as a fact. Chances are that you did too. Right? And that's okay because it's only human to simply take a piece of data for granted. If only repeated enough times.
Update: the idea that roman soldiers got paid in salt has been traced to a story (real or not) by Plinius about a Roman ruler who supposedly lived 600 years before Plinius. It was rumoured he paid people (not necessarily soldiers) to take salt from the coast to other parts of the country. And paid them in some sort of salted flower.
The same goes for Blue Monday, the third Monday in January. Blue Monday is supposed to be the most depressing day of the year. But instead of having its roots in actual science, it was nothing more than part of a marketing campaign (click) for a holiday company.
But still magazines, talkshows and magazines write and talk about it as if it is a real thing. And for advertising revenue because we love to read and talk about it.
What was it that you absolutely believed to be true and only later in life found out that it wasn't?
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