The iron maiden, the medieval torture device consisting of a hinged cabinet with a spike-lined interior, seems to have been a myth. There’s no mention of it before the 19th century.

Bielefeld University legal historian Wolfgang Schild suggests that enterprising exhibitors may have pieced together the first specimens using artifacts gathered from museum collections, to attract paying customers. It’s possible that German philosopher Johann Philipp Siebenkees invented a history for the device — in his writings he claims that it was first used on Aug. 14, 1515, to execute a coin forger. But there’s no reliable evidence for it in the Middle Ages.