Exactly my point. That's why I provided a link to an article about the historical Wong Fei Hong. I love the films Jet Li did with Tsui Hark, but I am under no illusion that these portray actual events from Wong Fei Hong's life.

Westerners generally assume that a film about a historical figure is going to be reasonably accurate, with only some dramatic license being taken, unless the film is explicitly based on a piece of historical fiction, like one of Shakespeare's "history plays."

So these historical figures are, in many ways, folk tales much in the way that Robin Hood or King Arthur (for whom we have even less genuine historical evidence) are for the Britons.