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Here's what most of us know about Vincent van Gogh: (1) He was a great painter, and (2) he cut off his own ear.

There's no disputing (1) … although you could probably find art critics who would. But as for (2) — did van Gogh really cut off his ear? More specifically, how much of his ear did he cut off?

There is a definitive answer, thanks to Bernadette Murphy and her book "Van Gogh's Ear." And PBS has turned that into a fascinating hour of "Secrets of the Dead" titled — you guessed it! — "Van Gogh's Ear" (Wednesday, 9 p.m., Ch. 7).

No one doubts that van Gogh cut off at least part of his ear. There were plenty of eyewitnesses to the aftermath, and the artist himself painted self-portraits with his head bandaged.

But did he really slice off his entire ear with a razor? Or did he, perhaps, slice off just his earlobe? (Not that that wouldn't have been gross enough.)

"Van Gogh's Ear" — the book and the "Secrets of the Dead" episode — provide a definitive answer. But (NON-SPOILER ALERT), I'm not going to tell you and ruin the program.

The hour is centered on the whole ear thing, but there's more to it than that. It's an illuminating portrait of a man who, it turns out, was not who most people think he was.

"Everybody thought he was this lonely, solitary character with no money — starving artist in the garret-type cliché," Murphy said. "And, in fact, none of that turned out to be true. He was a very friendly, lively man.

"He was a very enthusiastic person, and he had other artistic friends. He had plenty of money."

Not that van Gogh was making a lot as a painter. He was being supported by his brother. But the painter was, according to Murphy, the kind of guy who would give you the shirt off his back.

"I don't think I was prepared for what an incredibly generous, kind man he was," she said. "He really was an incredibly sweet human being. Crazy, for sure. But, nonetheless, a very sweet, kind man."

The ear incident occurred Dec. 23, 1888; van Gogh shot himself in the chest on July 27, 1890, and died two days later.

"Van Gogh's Ear" plays out like a detective story, with Murphy as the unlikely investigator.

"I was never, really, a big van Gogh fan before," she said. "I was just intrigued by the discrepancies in the story."

Discrepancies in his biography (outlined in the "Secrets") that didn't initially have anything to do with the severed ear. But "once you know that a couple of things are wrong, then you say, 'I can't do anything else. I have to be a detective here, ignore everything that's been written and start all over again.' "

She ended up devoting seven years to the project.

And, in a moment that brings tears to Murphy's eyes, the answer to the severed-ear question turns up in "Lust for Life" author Irving Stone's papers at Cal Berkeley's Bancroft Library.

"It's so incredibly small. It fits on my hand," Murphy said. "And it was folded in half, and that's why nobody had come across it. Who is expecting to find something major, a major discovery on Vincent van Gogh, in the United States?

"It changes absolutely everything."

It's fascinating stuff, even if you're not at all familiar with van Gogh. There's even a strange tie between van Gogh, the young woman to whom he delivered his ear (or ear lobe?) and Louis Pasteur.

This is the kind of stuff you'll only find on PBS.

Scott D. Pierce covers television for The Salt Lake Tribune. Email him at spierce@sltrib.com; follow him on Twitter @ScottDPierce.