10 of the biggest lies in history

Deceit has always held the key to money, fame and power. These are the biggest lies on record: 1. The Trojan Horse – This is the most forgivable of the big lies since all is fair in love and war. The Greeks fooled the Trojans by taking the horse inside the fortress as a peace offering. 2. Han Van Meegeren’s Vermeer Forgeries – Han Van Meegeren was an artist who thought he was under appreciated and wanted to trick art experts into admitting his genius. He forged the painting of Vermeer, titled ‘The Disciples at Emmaus’, even faking the cracks and the aged hardness which made the experts to hail the painting as authentic. 3. Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi Scheme – He pulled off the biggest financial scheme in history. He admitted later that his investment firm was one big lie. He conned about fifty billion dollars from investors who trusted him with their savings. 4. Anna Anderson posing as Anastasia – After the execution of Csar Nicholas II and his family in Russia, rumours floated that certain members of the royal family had escaped and survived. Anna Anderson was the most famous of the impostors as she had a resemblance to the Russian family. 5. Titus Oates with the plot to kill Charles II – In 1678, Titus Oates, a Protestant preacher, concocted a plot that the Jesuits were planning to murder King Charles II. This led to panic and anti-catholic sentiments with about thirty five people being executed. 6. Piltdown Man – When archaeologist Charles Dawson unearthed a missing link in 1910, he linked it to Charles Darwin as one of the biggest hoaxes in history. The discovery was the Piltdown Man. The skull was manipulated by filing down and staining the teeth. 7. The Dreyfus Affair – Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish officer, was accused of selling military secrets to Germany in the late nineteenth century when all the evidence against him was forced by a Major Esterhazy. This scandal changed the face of politics in France. 8. The Clinton Lewinsky Affair – Clinton publicly denied the allegations. This became an example in perjury. The truth came out when related sexual harassment and sexual affairs victims came out and testified against Clinton. 9. Watergate Scandal – President Nixon was caught in a web of lies. He had given the orders to burglars to plant wiretaps on the phones in the Watergate Hotel after breaking in at the Democratic National Committee Headquarters. 10. The biggest lie was the Nazi propaganda cooked up by Adolf Hitler – Anti Semitism was presented by Hitler as one of the final solutions to the age old hatred against the Jews. A massive campaign was launched by him to convince the German people that Jews were their enemies.