From ancient artifacts to priceless historical sites, humanity has a remarkable talent for destroying irreplaceable pieces of history. Join us as we explore the most shocking and heartbreaking examples of historical objects ruined by human stupidity, carelessness, and pure ignorance.
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00:00The temple that stood for 2,000 years, tonight, a pile of rubble.
00:05Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the priceless historical artifacts and sites that have been damaged due to human error.
00:1230. William Shakespeare's House
00:27Changes made to historical sites are not ideal, especially those done out of spite.
00:32After Shakespeare's death in 1616, his final home, New Place, was initially passed down to his family.
00:38It maintained its original look until 1702, when it was later bought and renovated into a contemporary style.
00:44Things went from bad to worse when it was bought by Reverend Francis Gastrel.
00:47He grew tired of fans coming to view the property, leading to him removing a tree supposedly planted by the playwright.
00:53Tensions between Gastrel and the town escalated until he demolished the property in 1759.
00:59He was swiftly driven away, and while the remaining land has been preserved, nothing has been built on it since.
01:0629. Rock art of Lake Mead National Park
01:09What seems like innocent fun can still result in destruction.
01:12While shooting paintballs in 2010, a man set his sights on several glyphs created by the surrounding Native populations centuries beforehand.
01:20He littered both them and the surrounding rock faces with paint, creating an eyesore.
01:24He was quickly caught and given several citations for the crimes he committed.
01:28After being tried and found guilty, he received 15 months in prison, community service, and just under $10,000 in fines.
01:36It served as a reminder to all paintball enthusiasts to be respectful of where they shoot or face the consequences.
01:4228. Aboriginal artwork
01:45Signs of civilization's earliest humans are precious to many, but not everyone seems to agree.
01:51Until 2016, the art found in Tasmania's Nermena Nala caves remained untouched by modern humans.
01:57In May of that year, it was discovered that the ancient drawings had been mindlessly scratched.
02:02One of the destroyed pieces was a stencil of a hand, vital work that gave insight into the minds of our predecessors.
02:088,000 years of respect being violated in a moment of pure selfishness is already a slap in the face,
02:14but what added insult to injury is that it was found just before a day remembering the colonialism faced by the Aboriginal people.
02:21To this day, the vandals have yet to be found.
02:2427. Qing Dynasty vases
02:26In a split second, everything can change.
02:29Nick Flynn learned this the hard way after visiting the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England.
02:33For the last 50 years, they've stood on the now infamous windowsill at the Fitzwilliam Museum.
02:39After realizing he had taken the wrong staircase, he attempted to correct himself,
02:42and a combination of untied shoelaces and a lack of a railing resulted in him landing directly onto a set of Qing Dynasty vases.
02:50All three were broken, but he didn't seem to care, given that he later left without saying a word.
02:55He was eventually arrested a few months afterwards, but managed to evade any legal or financial repercussions.
03:01Even after the national outcry, he maintained that the incident was not his fault.
03:06They will, though, make a brief appearance before then at an exhibition here on conservation entitled Mission Impossible,
03:12a chance for Nick Flynn to take another look at this work in progress.
03:16Hopefully this time, though, he'll pay more attention to his footwear.
03:1926. Goblin Valley Hoodoo
03:22Sometimes, a code of honor is nothing more than words on a piece of paper.
03:26While the Boy Scouts of America claims to teach its members about making good choices,
03:30some of their leaders seem to have missed the memo.
03:32This video touched off a criminal investigation into the toppling of the Jurassic-era boulder at a Utah park.
03:39In 2013, a troop leader was filmed by his friends intentionally toppling a natural rock formation called a hoodoo at Goblin Valley State Park.
03:47The delicate rock formation, which was thought to have been standing for 165 million years,
03:52fell victim to the men's ignorance as they claimed it was a danger to other park-goers.
03:57It's all about saving lives here at Goblin Valley.
03:59As a result, two of the men were removed from the Boy Scouts,
04:02and they were hit with fines and a year of probation, both of which paled in comparison to their original offense.
04:0925. The Amber Room
04:11War can lead to countless acts of senseless destruction, with nothing being seen as off-limits.
04:16The legendary Amber Room, an entire room carved from amber, the gold of the Baltic.
04:23Spectacular, priceless, and missing without a trace for more than 80 years.
04:29This was unfortunately the case for the Amber Room, a structure constructed of gold leaf and precious gemstones.
04:35It took years to build, and was eventually installed within a Russian palace during the 18th century.
04:40They weren't the only ones who saw immense value in it.
04:43When German soldiers invaded the Soviet Union during World War II,
04:46curators attempted to protect the aging room, but their efforts were unfortunately squandered.
04:51Within three days, it had been taken apart.
04:53The Germans found it very quickly and did what they called securing, which is nothing other than looting.
04:59Even after the war ended, the full contents of the room were never found,
05:03and the search is still ongoing to this day.
05:0624. Jukin Gorge Caves
05:08A legal loophole is all it took for a piece of history to be destroyed.
05:12The traditional owners' concerns about the mining activity in the area couldn't be clearer,
05:17and yet late last month, two rock shelters at the 46,000-year-old site were obliterated by Rio Tinto
05:24to allow for the expansion of the Brockman IV iron ore mine.
05:28As per mining law in Australia, once a company has been given permission to work on a site,
05:33new information cannot prevent it from occurring.
05:36Even though the significance of the Jukin Gorge Caves was well-known for years,
05:40Rio Tinto was still given permission to mine in 2013.
05:43Many protested that the caves were of significant importance,
05:46being over 4,600 years old and containing items of archaeological and scientific relevance.
05:52The company still went through with their demolition in 2020.
05:55It resulted in immediate public backlash and a national inquiry,
05:59eventually forcing the corporation to apologize.
06:02We were very, very heartened to hear and see that people were very, very upset about what happened.
06:12Number 23. The Luxor Temple
06:14Something of historical importance being destroyed in an accident
06:17stings but can potentially be forgiven. Something wrecked out of pure ignorance is not.
06:22The photograph triggered heated discussion online after it was posted on Friday evening last week.
06:28Many condemned the act as a priceless act of vandalism and disrespectful to cultural relics.
06:34The Luxor Temple in Egypt has been standing for over a millennium
06:38and was the crowning location of several pharaohs.
06:40In 2013, a 15-year-old from China scratched a message into one of the engravings there.
06:46The vandalism went viral in his home country, leading to him being doxed.
06:50A Chinese tourist who defaced an ancient Egyptian monument in Luxor
06:54was hunted down by internet users who urged his parents to apologize
06:59after they posted the family's personal detail in an online shame campaign.
07:03While his parents apologized, the next day,
07:06his school's computers were hacked to showcase his misdeed.
07:09Luckily, his engraving was removed and the outcry from internet users
07:13and various Chinese spokespeople served as the perfect punishment.
07:16Number 22. The Virgin Mary's Finger
07:19There are some actions so poorly thought out that you have to wonder
07:22why they were attempted in the first place.
07:24Outrage at a Florence museum after an American tourist snapped the finger off
07:29a 600-year-old marble statue of the Virgin Mary.
07:32Believed to have been created by Giovanni d'Ambrosio six centuries ago,
07:36the statue of the Virgin Mary had become a cornerstone
07:39of Florence's Museo dell'Opera del Duomo.
07:41In 2013, a tourist visiting from the United States
07:45attempted to measure his hand against the sculptures.
07:47In the process, he managed to snap off its pinky finger.
07:50Although he expressed remorse over the error, the damage was already done.
07:54It serves as a perfect reminder of why museums have strict rules on touching the exhibits.
07:59A museum spokesperson said that the fundamental rules
08:02for visiting a museum had been forgotten.
08:04Number 21. The Elgin Marbles
08:07Colonialism has resulted in several countries' artifacts being taken
08:10and represented in another country's museums.
08:12The Elgin Marbles, a series of sculptures removed from the Parthenon
08:16and other parts of the Acropolis in the 1800s, is a prime example of this phenomenon.
08:21I think it obviously has always been a topic of debate
08:23ever since the objects came to London and into the British Museum.
08:27It's not a new debate.
08:28Unfortunately, along with being stolen,
08:30they and the Parthenon itself were also inadvertently damaged.
08:34In an attempt to restore the artwork so it could be displayed,
08:37several chemicals and tools were utilized in order to clean it.
08:40It did damage some of these pieces.
08:42It was to expect it.
08:45However, the abrasive material of the latter
08:47resulted in many of the statue's distinctive details being erased.
08:50The level of damage has been debated for years,
08:53but even if the damage due to cleaning was overblown,
08:56incidences of casual vandalism from visitors is not.
08:59Number 20. The Statue of the Two Hercules
09:02We've seen a spate of selfie mishaps in the early 21st century,
09:06from costly accidents to tragic deaths.
09:09It seems like people will do anything to get the perfect snap.
09:12A 300-year-old statue featuring two depictions of Hercules
09:15has long been a symbol of the city of Cremona, Italy.
09:19But the legendary hero's statue was no match
09:21for the selfie obsession of two tourists
09:23who decided to climb it for a quick photo.
09:26The men toppled and shattered the marble crown
09:29on the emblem held by the pair of Hercules figures.
09:32And unfortunately, this wasn't even the first time
09:34holidaymakers have damaged historical Italian monuments.
09:38It's like a historical piece. Why do you need your name in it?
09:42You didn't build it.
09:43Number 19. Dunster's Cobblestone Paths
09:47Dunster's Somerset is known for being an extremely well-preserved example
09:51of a medieval English village.
09:52It houses a 1,000-year-old castle
09:55and contained beautiful cobblestone paths that dated back to the Bronze Age.
09:59However, after numerous reports of people tripping on the ancient stones,
10:03the village's council decided to rip up the millennia-old cobblestones
10:07and replace them with smoother paving stones.
10:09The villagers, who initially supported the idea,
10:12then showed their intense hatred of the new paving stones
10:14by complaining to the media.
10:16The council then decided to rip up the slabs at significant cost
10:20and replace them with stones that fit more with the village's aesthetic.
10:24Number 18. An Ancient Chinese Vase
10:27Ever looked at Chinese porcelain hundreds of years old
10:30and thought, man, this would sure make a nice table lamp?
10:33Well, that's what must have happened
10:34before someone drilled a hole in this Qing Dynasty vase
10:37to push an electrical cable through.
10:39Decades later, a woman who had inherited the vase took it to be valued,
10:43only to be told that the hole had dramatically decreased its value,
10:47down from a potential 50,000 pounds to a few thousand.
10:51So before repurposing some old vase that's been lying around the house forever,
10:55go get an appraisal.
10:57Number 17. A 126-Year-Old Statue of Dom Sebastian I
11:03And here we have another tragic case of a selfie ruining a beloved piece of art.
11:08A child-sized statue of Portuguese King Dom Sebastian I
11:12stood outside the Rocio railway station in Lisbon, Portugal.
11:15The statue lasted for 126 years before it literally fell to a selfie.
11:20A 24-year-old man climbed the facade outside the Rocio station
11:24to take a picture with the statue.
11:25However, he accidentally knocked the statue over,
11:28and it shattered to pieces upon contact with the ground.
11:31The man tried to run away, but he was apprehended by police
11:35and faced prosecution for destroying a century-old artifact.
11:39Number 16. The Star-Spangled Banner
11:46At the Battle of Baltimore during the War of 1812,
11:49the British Navy bombarded American forces at Fort McHenry through the night.
11:54Detained on a British troop ship, American poet Francis Scott Key watched in dismay
11:59as the heavens seemed to rain down a sea of fire.
12:02But at dawn, an enormous American flag was raised defiantly over the fort,
12:07a moment that inspired him to pen the American National Anthem.
12:10This iconic flag came into the possession of one Georgiana Armistead Appleton,
12:15who cut off snippets as gifts before the remains were whisked away to safety
12:20by the Smithsonian Institution.
12:22It sort of freezes them for a moment, and that's a truly wonderful thing.
12:27Number 15. A Monet Painting
12:30Ever struggled to get art? Maybe Irish vandal Andrew Shannon felt frustrated
12:35about a Claude Monet painting hanging in the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin.
12:39Valued at 10 million euros, the Impressionist work
12:43Argenteuil Basin with a Single Sailboat depicts an idyllic scene on the Seine River.
12:48But it apparently enraged Shannon, who in 2012 punched a hole right through the canvas.
12:54He initially told cops he was trying to, quote,
12:57get back at the state, but would claim in court that it was an accident
13:01and that he stumbled due to a health condition.
13:03Witnesses claimed otherwise, and he served five years in the slammer.
13:08Thankfully, the painting was later restored after 18 painstaking months of work.
13:14Number 14. Chilean Geoglyphs
13:17The Dakar Rally, the annual off-road race where affluent drivers tear through untouched wilds.
13:23Before moving to South America in 2009, the rally took place in Africa,
13:28where it attracted criticism for its impact on locals and the environment.
13:32Archaeologists in Chile have also condemned the event.
13:35The route through the Atacama Desert damaged protected sites,
13:39including ancient geoglyphs, which are works of art that are carved into the ground.
13:43Some of these are well over a thousand years old.
13:46It doesn't seem to matter to these off-road enthusiasts,
13:49some of whom think nothing of driving across these priceless artifacts from another era.
13:54Number 13. The Nazca Lines
13:57The Nazca Lines are brilliant artistic designs made in the desert grounds of southern Peru.
14:02The designs were created between 500 BC and 500 AD,
14:06and range from geometric patterns to depictions of human, animal, and natural life.
14:11These can stretch over 1,000 feet in length,
14:14and can clearly be seen from the air and from nearby hilltops.
14:17However, many of the lines have been damaged in recent years by squatters,
14:21construction machinery, careless Greenpeace activists who walked over the site with sneakers,
14:25off-road vehicles, and a truck driver who accidentally drove over numerous lines.
14:30Number 12. King Tut's Beard
14:43Chalk this up to Tutankhamen's curse. Tutankhamen was an Egyptian pharaoh who
14:47ruled from 1332 to 1323 BC. His tomb was finally discovered in 1922,
14:53and the mummy of Tutankhamen was uncovered three years later.
14:57While the chin was initially found broken off his death mask,
15:00it was permanently reattached in 1944, or so everyone thought. In 2014, it was accidentally
15:06broken off and hastily glued back on, a process that caused irreparable scratches to the beard.
15:12After people began to notice the botched glue job, the mask was professionally fixed,
15:17and eight people faced criminal charges for their negligence in
15:20repairing the priceless mask with superglue.
15:23Number 11. The Senator
15:30It was one of the oldest trees in the world, predating Jesus by 1500 years.
15:35This bald cypress towered 125 feet high in Big Tree Park, Florida,
15:40and was a landmark for Native Americans and early settlers. But in 2012, 26-year-old Sarah Barnes,
15:47who proclaimed herself a, quote, nature enthusiast on her modeling page,
15:52lit a fire to better see the methamphetamine she was about to smoke. Things got a little
15:57out of hand, and today, a charred stump of wood is all that remains.
16:03Number 10. A 5,000-year-old rock carving
16:07Well, we suppose they had good intentions. The Norwegian island of Trø houses a 5,000-year-old
16:12rock carving depicting a man on skis. This carving is one of the world's earliest indications of
16:17skiing, and it inspired the symbols of the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics. However, it was ruined in
16:232016 when two teenagers carved over it in an attempt to make it appear brighter and clearer.
16:28The teenagers, not realizing what a serious infraction they'd committed,
16:31turned themselves in amidst the intense media frenzy. The two then faced criminal
16:35charges and prosecution under the country's Cultural Heritage Act.
16:40Number 9. Ancient Chinese Tombs
16:43Construction crews strike again. In 2007, workers building an IKEA branch in Nanjing, China
16:49destroyed 10 ancient tombs dating back almost 1,800 years. It was claimed that this was all
16:56a mistake and that the crews didn't know about the tombs. Okay, but in 2013, contractors working
17:03on a metro line in Guangzhou demolished imperial tombs, which had been clearly cordoned off by the
17:09Guangzhou Archaeology Research Center. Some of the tombs were 3,000 years old. The destruction
17:15of all these tombs is a huge loss for those seeking to better understand China's history.
17:21Number 8. A 5,000-Year-Old Cave Painting
17:25Thousands of years ago, one of our ancestors drew this mysterious long-armed figure in Los
17:30Escolares Cave in southern Spain. Hidden away from modern eyes until its rediscovery in 1973,
17:36it withstood the ravages of time for millennia as civilizations rose and fell. But it couldn't
17:42survive the shoddy work of thieves, who in 2014 sheared away part of the artwork in an attempt
17:48to steal it. This is a huge blow as the damage is irreparable, but it also points out another
17:54problem. Although the cave system housing the picture is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site,
18:00there's no practical way to protect it against such acts.
18:04Number 7. A Mayan Pyramid
18:06Belize is rich with relics left by the Mayans, whose civilization flourished in Central America
18:11for centuries until beginning a serious decline after 950 A.D. But in 2013, the country lost one
18:19of these riches when construction crews used the stones of an ancient pyramid for road fill.
18:24The pyramid, called Nomul and built in 250 B.C., stood almost 60 feet tall but was quickly broken
18:31down by the crew, the members of which were later charged and fined. Such destruction isn't
18:37uncommon in Belize, where Mayan mounds are tempting targets for construction workers.
18:46Number 6. The El ParaÃso Pyramid
18:48This pyramid would sure make a great spot for a swimming pool. Well, maybe that's what property
18:52developers were thinking when they illegally bulldozed a 20-foot tall, 4,000-year-old pyramid
18:58at El ParaÃso, Peru. They then lit the remains on fire for good measure.
19:03The site is one of the oldest and largest archaeological sites in Peru. As a matter of
19:07fact, it predates the rise of the famous Incan Empire. Onlookers prevented them from destroying
19:12other pyramids, and the developers were hit with criminal charges.
19:23Number 5. A Neolithic Tomb
19:25In 2015, workers in the Spanish town of Cristóbal de Cea accidentally filled in a
19:316,000-year-old tomb with concrete and topped it off with a picnic table.
19:36They thought the tomb's slabs were a stone bench that had fallen into disrepair,
19:40so they wanted to erect a fancy picnic table in its place. The town's mayor said that he
19:44wasn't aware of the site's historical significance, and the site wasn't marked or protected in any way.
19:49People better have some damn good picnics on that bench because it cost history a 6,000-year-old
19:54tomb to put it there.
19:55Number 4. Troy
19:58Troy is an ancient city depicted in Homer's Iliad, said to be the site of the famous Trojan War.
20:03The historical city of Troy is located in modern-day Turkey, and was partially excavated
20:08by Heinrich Schliemann in the 1870s. However, Schliemann wasn't a great archaeologist, and he
20:14proceeded to blast away the walls and layers of Troy and carved massive trenches in the ground
20:19that remain to this day. As one scholar stated, Schliemann, quote,
20:23"...destroyed a phenomenal amount of material."
20:26And this is why inexperienced archaeologists are not allowed to excavate millennia-old cities.
20:32You violated my command. No, my lord. That was a mistake.
20:36Number 3. The Second Temple of Artemis
20:40While the original Temple of Artemis was destroyed in a flood,
20:43it was rebuilt in a more extravagant manner around 550 BC. It stood nearly 400 feet long
20:49and 150 feet wide, contained 40-foot-tall columns, and was allegedly the first Greek
20:55temple to be made from marble. It was a notable attraction for almost 200 years,
21:00but it was burned to the ground in 356 BC by some snot-nosed punk named Herastratus,
21:06who simply wanted to be famous. He was subsequently tortured on the rack and executed,
21:10and his name was banned from being spoken or written with the intention of erasing him from
21:15history. It didn't work.
21:17Number 2. The Buddhas of Pamyan
21:20The Buddhas of Pamyan were two enormous statues of Buddha that were carved out of a cliffside
21:25in Afghanistan. The statues were carved in the 6th century, and they were reportedly decorated
21:30with elaborate jewelry by the year 630. The statues persisted for over 1,000 years until
21:36they were destroyed by the Taliban in March of 2001. The statues were bombarded with anti-aircraft
21:41weaponry, dynamite, artillery, and mines before the Taliban repelled down the cliff
21:46and placed explosives inside the monuments. The commander of the Taliban, Muhammad Omar,
21:51stated that, quote,
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22:23Number 1. Mosques, Mausoleums, and More
22:26Since 2014, ISIS has destroyed numerous historical monuments and artifacts
22:31in their war against other faiths and denominations. These include religious
22:35sites such as the Mosque of the Prophet Jonah in Mosul, Iraq, and the ancient temples of
22:40Bel and Belshameen in Palmyra, Syria. In Palmyra, they also vandalized a Roman theater and demolished
22:47a tetrapylon monument. Sadly, it doesn't stop there. Their efforts to destroy the region's
22:53cultural heritage have also included bulldozing the historic Assyrian cities Nimrud and Nineveh
22:58in Iraq, which was at one point the largest city in the ancient world. Which of these historical
23:04losses do you think is the most devastating? Let us know in the comments below.
23:34And don't forget to subscribe to our channel to be notified about our latest videos.