Flaking History

Beneath the G(u)ilt of Bad Information

DISCLAIMER: The following essay reflects my views alone and should not be considered to reflect the views of any organizations with which I am affiliated.

Gilt is a thin, decorative layer of gold or silver painted over a basic piece of metal or wood. The purpose should be obvious. Take something rather ordinary or even ugly and make it much more attractive.

The problem with gilt: if not reapplied at intervals, the rough base is uncovered.

Sometimes, we like a bit of patina - that weathered look revealed by use and time and wear. Patina adds character, maybe value, to certain things. At the very least, it tells a story. Beautiful as some examples may be, not all are and some that are endearing aren't always what they seem.

The patina of rust on an old cast-iron skillet may be attractive if the skillet is used for decoration. However, few, if anyone, would want to cook with such a pan.

Gilding can be deceptive without wear, showing its ugliness in unexpected ways. Plated (gilded) jewelry will often leave a greenish ring on skin. A completely natural process but a disappointing and maybe offensive one. If a wedding ring were presented as gold but turned out not to be... well, need I say more.

In another natural process, gilding applies to history. With enough applications, the gilt over ugly eras and instances may remain in place. With the patina of time and distance, what might be reviled may be romanticized. Regardless of intent, both appearances inevitably cause damaging issues in the present.

Examples in Translation

What modern folk speak and understand as 'English' became most recognizable around the later 1700s and beginning of the 1800s. We would definitely understand most written English going back into the late-1400s. But earlier than this would stump many. That's to say nothing of the spoken version with it's very different pronunciations and turns of phrases.

Why does this matter? Two reasons.

One: a language changes due shifts in the society which speaks, reads, and writes it. Where some things are gained, others are always lost. Words, definitions, ideas. Another way of understanding the world. With each major change in a language, the carry-over from the old requires fresh translation.

Two: English borrowed heavily from French and Germanic roots. The more English societies made the language their own, the more ideas represented by those other languages were altered or left behind.

An Easy Example

yyue to vs this dai oure `breed ouer othir substaunce; and foryyue to vs oure dettis, as we foryyuen to oure dettouris

If I just throw this phrase from 1382 at you, especially if I just speak it, you'd probably look at me as if I'd grown another head. But, if I give it to you circa 1611:

Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.

It becomes crystal clear and, for many, absolutely recognizable.

For the unfamiliar: the above is a passage from 'The Lord's Prayer' in the Wycliffe and King James Versions of the Bible, respectively.

Example: Wycliffe Bible (1382), Gospel of Matthew

Still, notice that "ouer othir substaunce" (or) "our other substance / sustenance" has been cut. Two sentences, seventeen modern words, twenty-two middle English words. The essence is the same. Yet, the entirety of a specific ideal -- a plea for more than bread on which to live -- has been lost.

Extrapolate this type of change to an entire collection of books at approximately 800,000 words. (Word count excludes The Apocrypha.) Consider, what deviations, misunderstandings, reflections of bias, and errors of translations occurred since the earliest known manuscripts (~ 200 BCE - 300 CE) with these sprouting from oral traditions dating a couple thousand years older?

The only way to not have to wrestle with what this means is to apply the gilt that such texts are inspired by an all-knowing god whose will cannot be impeded by humans.

Soft Gilding

Medieval England provides a nice, seemingly innocuous example of gilded history.

Earth-tone fashion, impoverished and ignorant peasants, dutiful lords and ladies, jaunty wagon travels, exhilarating journeys by ship, riveting battles with cavalry and swords and bows, genteel traveling monks.

It's a Robin Hood-view of history. Fictionalized to the point of being unrecognizable by the people actually living during those times. Let's look at one example of this soft gilding: ships.

Except for the portrayal of prisoners, slaves, and sometimes royalty, we're rarely given an accurate picture of ship travel. I call this the "nobody shits" rule of fiction. In truth, your terracotta piss pot was bound to spill over during the night. The pitch black and tossing seas made going to the external 'head' a potentially life-threatening affair. Like most inns, the ship was a stinking, sweltering hot mess. Unlike inns, you couldn't just leave if it all got to be too much.

If you lost your head enough to take the life of another, you likely wouldn't just be chained somewhere in a ship's bowels. You'd likely be tied to the corpse of the one you killed and tossed overboard. Even a fist fight warranted a (hopefully) unfatal dunking.

Resonating Examples

The American Revolution

British colonists turning against their native country to form the United States is an example of hard-gilded history. Most Americans hold a basic, high-school understanding of the Revolution. They've been fed the conflict from a 10,000-foot view during a limited time frame, involving a limited number of famous historical figures.

This makes for riveting depictions in historical fiction. It wreaks havoc on historical accuracy.

Complex grumbling and appeals for relief began in the early 1760s. This was accompanied by various acts of sedition and violence within the colonies. To the point of the Declaration of Independence, most colonists didn't consider ceding the most viable or desired option. (Even then, one can argue the average person didn't want blood running in the streets for nearly a decade.)

Even as Yorktown (1781) ended major conflicts. Effective treaties with England took two more years. Infighting within the colonies and violent coercion continued. At most, we might say the Revolution fully ended in 1791 with the adoption of the Bill of Rights to the Constitution.

We've applied a gilt which hides a far-less-rosy truth. A civil war morphed into a rampageous revolution (lost without the aid of France) and ended with a tenuous union between very factional states.

Print from woodcut of the Battle of Newton during the Sullivan-Clinton Campaign of 1779

What further gilt can we remove if we consider that Patriots and Loyalists:

• Persecuted civilians by: the burning of homes, summary executions, forced displacement, sexual violence, etc.

• Destroyed indigenous homelands

• Used enslaved people as military assets

• Etc.

A Continuing History

With each technological liberation of information: printing press, radio, television, internet, we receive(d) an opportunity to better sand away the gilt to what lays underneath. To a large degree, we've done so. Yet, the intentional use of these technologies to spread misinformation has always existed alongside them. From the 'Lost Cause of the Confederacy' campaigns to the AI deep fakes of today, gilded falsities persist.

As real history and news becomes buried under SEO-targeted slop (M-W's 2025 word of the year), we run the risk of entire alternate histories being normalized and taken as fact.

No one, no group of people, no country wants to acknowledge less than ideal presentations of themselves. This expands exponentially to atrocities. Gilding history and reason persists on these grounds. It can be the victors' writing of history and the aggrieved's attempt to feel less isolated and beaten. Both can be wrong if they varnish over the truth.

Yet, if we don't know better, we can't do better.

Many pernicious gildings lay across history. Not contained by time or place, they discolor our perceptions of what came before now. And, more frighteningly, who we should be moving forward.

If we don't want patina to give us the green finger, we must scrape below the gilt and examine the pitted, scared, and often ugly base layer. Only then can education, understanding, reckoning, and possibly atonement occur.