'Good King Wenceslas' of the English carol was never a king.
St Wenceslaus, killed in 935, was Duke of Bohemia; the royal title was given posthumously, and the carol was published in 1853.
More amazing facts
- 911 Legend says that when the Viking Rollo received Normandy in 911, he refused to kiss the French king's foot and sent one of his men instead.
- 916 The Russian word for China, Kitai, comes from a people who were not Chinese: the nomadic Khitans, who founded the Liao empire in northern China in 916.
- 918 The name Korea comes from Goryeo, the kingdom founded in 918 that united the peninsula for almost five centuries and under whose name the country became known abroad.
- 922 The Arab envoy Ibn Fadlan described the Rus as 'tall as date palms'. On the Volga in 922 he admired their build, fair hair and ruddy skin — then called them the filthiest of God's creatures for not even washing their hands after eating.
- 938 · 1288 The Vietnamese twice destroyed an enemy with the same trick on the same river.
- 949 Foreign envoys in Constantinople were met by roaring mechanical lions: the 'Throne of Solomon' in the Magnaura hall was said to be ringed by automaton trees with singing birds.