Seventeenth-century missionaries declared India, China, Japan, and America Hebrew colonies.

Evidence

It is extraordinary that in the seventeenth century a Congregationalist missionary, Cambridge educated, could announce that “fruitful India are Hebrewes, that famous civil (though Idolatrous) nation of China are Hebrewes, so Japonia, and those naked Americans are Hebrewes, in respect of those that planted first these parts of the world.” — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 305

Categorization

• CANDY: A single outrageous quotable line that lands a surprising historical claim in one breath.