Most countries fabricate at least some of their history; or they simply whitewash the bits that do not match their heroic idea of themselves. My own country, for example, invented much of what it means to be British in order to accommodate Scotland in the eighteenth century to the idea of rule from England, and to persuade the whole of the United Kingdom that it should not object to being ruled by German kings.
大多数国家都至少编造了它们历史的某些部分，或者对那些不符合它们自己英雄观念的事情加以掩饰。比如我自己的国家在英国意味着什么的问题上编造了很多事情，以便将十八世纪的苏格兰说成是在英格兰的统治下以及劝说整个联合王国不应反对受到日尔曼国王的统治。