In search of specific national traditions nineteenth-century artists and scholars did not shy of manipulating texts and objects or even outright manufacturing them. The essays edited by János M. Bak, Patrick J. Geary and Gábor Klaniczay explore the various artifacts from outright forgeries to fruits of poetic phantasy, while also discussing the volatile notion of authenticity and the multiple claims for it in the age.

Contributors include: Pavlína Rychterová, Péter Dávidházi, Pertti Anttonen, László Szörényi, János M. Bak, Nóra Berend, Benedek Láng, Igor P. Medvedev, Dan D.Y. Shapira, János György Szilágyi, Cristina La Rocca, Giedrė Mickūnaitė, Johan Hegardt and Sándor Radnóti.