A large number of historical events and developments have been falsified, transfigured and used for current, not least political, interests over time. The contributions to this volume examine and decipher such historical myths on the basis of written, archaeological and art historical sources and try to explain the genesis of historical images and legends. The topics range from the early Middle Ages to the 20th century, include the founding myths of cities, knowledge of foreign cultures in the Middle Ages as well as self-images of a population group, deal with enemy images and national symbolism, but also prejudices about eating habits, the effect of advertising and the content of historical novels . Well-known historians, archaeologists and museum experts wrote these articles on the occasion of the 75th birthday of the long-standing Hamburg museum director and novelist Jörgen Bracker.