History Main / MonumentalDamage

* The very first missile shot by the [[{{Ghostapo}} Millennium]] assault force in ''Manga/{{Hellsing}}'' as they invade London soars through the sky... and blows up the Parliament Clock Tower.
** The Major [[InvokedTrope orders]] the Millennium soldiers to destroy all the other landmarks, too.
** In ''WebVideo/HellsingUltimateAbridged'' the Major also orders this, but explicitly forbids destroying the Holocaust Museum as there will be no denying what they did.
*** [[{{Mook}} Hans]] burnt down London Bridge while singing "London Bridge is Falling Down".

* In ''Anime/MacrossII'', the main characters go for a date in a place called "monument park," a collection of world monuments almost identical to the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' exampl, below. It is promptly attacked by aliens.

* In general, superhero comics and other superhero-related media will often show their own fictional, yet still iconic, monuments being damaged instead of real ones. [[ComicBook/{{Superman}} The Daily Planet]], [[ComicBook/{{Batman}} Wayne Tower]], and [[ComicBook/IronMan Stark Tower]] are frequent victims, with the Daily Planet in particular having its giant globe knocked off practically every week.

* In ''ComicBook/UltimateXMen'', where do the newly-formed Brotherhood of Mutants strike first? Why, London's [[ClockTower Big Ben]] of course!

[[folder:Real Life]]
* Out of the [[UsefulNotes/SevenWondersOfTheWorld Seven Wonders of the Ancient World]], only the Great Pyramid of Giza is still with us, and even then most of its outer limestone has been looted or eroded. The others had all been destroyed by the year 1500:
** The Hanging Gardens of Babylon may or may not have actually existed, but they're definitely gone now.
** The Colossus of Rhodes was destroyed in an earthquake in 226 BC, after standing for only 54 years.
** The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus was destroyed twice. First, it was burned to the ground by [[AttentionWhore some idiot]] named Herostratus in 356 BC. The guy's self-proclaimed only goal was [[FameThroughInfamy to be remembered by history forever]], and since we're talking about him over 2,000 years later, it obviously worked. Nevertheless, the temple was rebuilt, only to be sacked by Goths (not [[{{Goth}} that kind]]) in 262 AD.
** The fate of the Statue of Zeus at Olympia is unclear. It may have been destroyed in 426 AD when Byzantine emperor Theodosius II ordered its temple destroyed for [[MoralGuardians being all pagan and everything]]. However, the statue itself may have earlier been carried off to Constantinople (present-day Istanbul) because Constantine the Great decided he wanted it. According to this theory, the statue was destroyed in 475, when much of the city was wrecked by a great fire.
** The Lighthouse of Alexandria was damaged by a series of earthquakes between 956 and 1323. Finally, in about 1480, the Citadel of Qaitbay was built on the ruins.
** The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus was also destroyed by a series of earthquakes. Bodrum Castle was built on the ruins in 1494.
* The Library of Alexandria, one of the largest collections of written knowledge in the Classical Mediterranean, was accidentally burnt down during UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar's invasion of Egypt. The Romans rebuilt it, but it was burnt down again during the Third Century Crises.
* The Art/{{Great Sphinx of Giza}} is missing a few of its original features, most notably its nose. Although some apocryphal stories attribute the loss to Napoleon's soldiers using it for target practice with cannons, they are false, as artistic depictions of the monument dating to the mid-18th Century also show it without the nose. One of the more likely theories pins the blame on Muhammad Sa'im al-Dahr, a Sufi Muslim from the 13th Century who defaced the Sphinx's face in an act of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iconoclasm iconoclasm]]. And, according to some local legends that persisted after the ignoble deed, there was a noticeable increase in the amount of sand around the Giza Plateau after the Sphinx's nose was removed, [[CurseOfThePharaoh presumably as a vengeful curse to punish al-Dahr.]]
* The Turks used the Parthenon in Athens, Greece as a gunpowder magazine during the 1687 Morean War; the Venetians hit it with artillery fire and BOOM! The Turks ''knew'' the risk, because they'd accidentally blown up the Propylaea a few years earlier with stored ammunition, but they still used the Parthenon to store gunpowder ''and'' civilians. The Ottomans believed that the Venetians [[LikeYouWouldReallyDoIt wouldn't attack the Parthenon]]. The roof of the Parthenon and supporting structures collapsed and 300 Turkish civilians died and the ruins were looted by the Venetians.
* During the UsefulNotes/WarOf1812, the British burned Washington, DC. They explicitly targeted government buildings, including the Capitol and the White House. Urban legends state that the British generals sat down in the Capitol and voted on whether they should burn the place down.
* During the Greek War of Independence, Lord Elgin claimed that he obtained permission from Turkey to ''take'' several vital statues and relics from the Parthenon to England. He also used the fighting between Greece and Turkey during the Greek War of Independence as justification, claiming that he was protecting the relics from wartime damage. Many critics disagreed, including Creator/LordByron (who fought and later died in the Greek War of Independence) who felt that Elgin was a mere looter. The incident remains contentious in the 21st Century where the likes of Creator/StephenFry, Creator/GeorgeClooney, and Creator/MattDamon arguing that the marble structures be returned to Greece.
* In the Second Opium War, when a British delegation and escort was sent to the Emperor under truce to negotiate a surrender, they were captured, imprisoned, and tortured, and twenty of them killed. In retaliation, Lord Elgin ([[LikeFatherLikeSon son of the Lord Elgin who took possession of the marble pieces from Greece]]) ordered the destruction of the Old Summer Palace (where looting had already begun before the incident), held to be one of the oldest and most beautiful examples of Ancient Chinese architecture. It took 3500 British and French soldiers three days to set fire to the complex, much larger than Vatican City and remains a contentious issue to this day.
* The St Mark's Campanile in UsefulNotes/{{Venice}} completely collapsed in 1902. And before you are wondering now why then it can still be seen on present-day photos (or when you are in Venice yourself) - well, it simply got rebuilt exactly as before.
* The Bolsheviks destroyed Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior in 1931 in order to make room for the Palace of the Soviets, a totally epic structure which would have been the tallest building in the world at the time (for perspective, imagine the Empire State Building, then crown it with a standing Lenin the size of the Statue of Liberty). They got as far as digging the foundation, but UsefulNotes/WorldWarII intervened and derailed the project. Construction wasn't resumed after the war and, eventually, they just filled in the foundation with water to create a giant swimming pool. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the cathedral was reconstructed and today exists as it did before communism.
* World War II, the most destructive and extensive war in all of human history, has no shortage of examples of Monumental Damage, whether accidental or deliberate.
** Hitler had a bone to pick and didn't hesitate to lord over the French for World War I after France's surrender in 1940. The French memorial park for WWI was destroyed on Hitler's orders, and the carriage in which the 1918 Armistice was signed was taken to Berlin. All that Hitler left standing was the statue of the French General Ferdinand Foch, who was left to look over the wasteland. A repeat of the trope on a much wider scale against many cultural sites in the city was averted in 1944 as the Allies closed in on Paris; General Dietrich von Choltitz was ordered by Hitler to destroy the city as he retreated, but the order was never carried out. There is debate about why this did not happen -- Von Choltitz claimed he refused due to his love of the city as well as its pointlessness from a military perspective; others, remembering his prior atrocities, have found the prior point unconvincing. Still, others believe the Germans weren't capable of that level of destruction by that point in the war, but many museums, bridges, etc. ''were'' found to have been wired with explosives.
** The British bombing of Lübeck, which was targeted not because of its military value but because it was filled with historic wooden buildings dating from the Hanseatic period that were easier to destroy than more modern buildings common in other cities, and the Nazi retaliation in the form of the Baedeker Blitz against Exeter, Bath, Canterbury, Norwich, and York, none were strategically important but all held many famous architectural buildings which were specifically targeted because of them. The latter was called the Baedeker Blitz after a comment from the German Foreign Office made a quip that the Luftwaffe would specifically target all the buildings in Britain given three stars by the Baedeker tourist guide.
** The German bombing of Coventry was at least somewhat justified, as the city was a hub of the British automotive industry, and also hosted companies manufacturing aircraft, artillery shells, and machine tools. Still, the destruction of St. Michael's Cathedral shocked and enraged the nation. It didn't help when [[PropagandaMachine Joseph Goebbels]] invented a new word, ''coventriert'' [[PersonAsVerb (coventried)]] to describe how the city was destroyed and bragged how the ''Luftwaffe'' would "coventry" other British cities. The roofless walls of the cathedral remain as a memorial, and the replacement cathedral next door was consecrated with the premier of Benjamin Britten's ''War Requiem''.
** Warsaw suffered ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_destruction_of_Warsaw heavily]]'' from this trope after the failure of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_uprising its uprising against the Nazis]] in UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. In fact, in order to rebuilt its monuments landscapes of the city dating from the 18th century needed to be used as a model.
** Close on Warsaw's heels in terms of wartime destruction, among Allied cities at least, is UsefulNotes/{{Manila}}, capital of the UsefulNotes/{{Philippines}}, which itself was subjected to a ''monumental'' (pun intended) case of this during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII when extreme American shelling and ferocious Japanese house-to-house fighting practically levelled the old, Spanish/American colonial metropolis. Within the walls of Intramuros (its CitadelCity core) alone, almost all of the grand old colonial-era churches and government buildings were mostly, if not completely, obliterated; only the San Agustin cathedral survived it mostly intact. The comparisons to Warsaw among destroyed Allied cities are well-known and often-shared. Unlike with Warsaw, though, Manila's record of restoring prewar architecture is ... largely hit-and-miss.
*** In all fairness, however, this isn't entirely new to Manila (or many other Philippine cities for that matter); they and the entire archipelago they're on lie smack along the Pacific Ring of Fire, which means periodic volcanic eruptions and earthquakes galore. Many of those same, iconic Manila churches and public buildings, even before WWII, already have a prior record of cyclical destruction and rebuilding. (As recently as 1863 and 1880 there were major earthquakes, already with photographic evidence, that laid low belfries and even caused the total redesign of some churches.)
*** Going further back to early Spanish rule, the frequent and destructive earthquakes forced revisions to colonial building codes and led to the development of the unique, hybrid ''bahay na bato'' style, consisting usually of a stone ground floor and wooden upper floors. (''Bahay na bato'' literally means "stone house" in Tagalog, but it's applied as well to those hybrid houses.) On the other hand, other colonial buildings were made exceptionally strong and durable, with squat profiles and detached belfries, in even more earthquake-prone locations; see the Ilocos region, where most colonial houses and churches are at their sturdiest.)
** Shuri Castle, the political center of the Ryukyu Kingdom on Okinawa for four and a half centuries, was destroyed five times since it was first built, two of those times in the years after said kingdom had been annexed by Japan. During the Battle of Okinawa, with its underground complex being used by the defending Imperial Japanese Army as a headquarters, it was shelled for three days by the United States Navy and caught on fire for several days before United States Marines captured it. After the war the complex was eventually rebuilt and reopened to the public as a park in 1992...and then burned down again in 2019, this time by accident.
** The Nazis anticipated this would happen to Munich during the war, and took extensive photographs of the city so it could be rebuilt to its former glory. In reality, Munich's postwar rebuild is rather Zigzagged. The city was bombed so much, that the reconstruction of the Bavarian Palace is still ongoing and is expected to be completed in the 2040s. Despite this, the four tallest pre-War structures still stand with only one taking minor damage (from an Allied Plane crashing into the spire, knocking the top part off). This is because they were aligned in the cardinal directions and Allied bombers would use the building as a compass to their target in the city, and purposely avoided this trope. The U.S. was able to find all the documentation of Munich in a bunker after the war and was able to rebuild it.
** One side effect of the war is that over half the historical buildings in Germany will usually be replicas of the actual buildings that ended up destroyed in the war.
** Berlin's monuments were not spared either. If you look closely you can still find bullet holes in the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag building, which were heavily fought over during the Battle of Berlin.
** Much of the Nazis' own monumental architecture was built in order to Exploit this trope. Nazi architect and urban/industrial planner Albert Speer called it [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruin_value "ruin value"]] and argued that should the [[TemptingFate Thousand-Year Reich]]'s millennium run out prematurely, the ruins of what they built should continue to serve as symbols of the glory that was Germany for thousands of years more, citing the ancient ruins of Greece, Egypt, and Rome (much of which are also listed here) as examples.
* The UsefulNotes/IraqWar claimed numerous artifacts and buildings, some dating back to the earliest human civilizations:
** While the U.S. didn't bomb the Iraqi National Museum during the initial invasion, they neglected to secure the museum in the massive wave of looting that took place after the fall of Saddam's regime. Thousands of statues, vases, steles, friezes, and pieces of pottery were stolen or broken, while the Harp of Ur and an ancient Mesopotamian calendar considered to be ''the oldest written calendar in the world'' were destroyed. To date, only a fraction of the missing pieces have been recovered.
** Al-Askari Shrine in Samarra, built in 944 AD and one of the most important Shia Muslim shrines in the world, was bombed twice by extremists in February 2006 and June 2007. Fortunately, the shrine's golden dome and minarets were restored relatively quickly and the building was reopened in 2009.
* On February 18th, 1965, 3 members of the Black Liberation Front [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg (and one white French-Canadian women, a supporter of Quebec liberation from Canada)]], were arrested in New York for a terrorist conspiracy to [[http://www.sigloxxi.org/Archivo/terrorist-connectec.htm destroy the Washington Monument, the Liberty Bell and the Statue of Liberty. The suspected mastermind of the attack was Che Guevera.]]
* Averted in the case of the Abu Simbel temple complex in Egypt, which was disassembled and relocated in 1968 to prevent it from being submerged following the construction of Aswan High Dam.
* The 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake damaged the upper deck of the eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, as well as causing the Cypress Structure, a double-decker freeway in Oakland, to collapse. The hated Embarcadero Freeway along the San Francisco waterfront was so heavily damaged that it was demolished, with the city redeveloping the area with vintage streetcars.
* In 1992, a political rally of Hindu Right-Wing extremists attacked and destroyed [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babri_Masjid the Babri Masjid]], a four hundred and sixty-five hundred-year-old structure and an example of early Mughal architecture.
* The Giant Buddhas of Bamyan (Afghanistan) were destroyed by the Taliban in March 2001.
* The fall of the World Trade Center in New York City on 9/11, as well as the attack on the Pentagon (which unlike the Twin Towers managed to be rebuilt) and the planned attack on either the White House or the Capitol building. These targets were chosen specifically because they were highly recognizable landmarks that served as symbols of American power. This is a popular trope with terrorists in RealLife, as such landmarks are usually popular tourist destinations as well as having great sentimental value -- successfully blowing one sky-high is a very effective way to get people's attention.
** Even when the cause isn't terrorism, planes flying into buildings isn't unheard of. In 1945, a B-25 bomber accidentally flew into the 79th floor of the Empire State Building after becoming lost in fog. Ultimately averted, however, in that the crash did not seriously damage the building, although fourteen people were killed (including the crew).
** In April 2002, just a few months after 9/11, a single-engine plane flew into the iconic Pirelli Tower in Milan, Italy, in what was later determined to be possible suicide.
* The Old Man of the Mountain in New Hampshire was a large granite cliff edge that resembled the profile of an old man's face. The formation was a famous landmark for centuries and a subject of SigilSpam for New Hampshire, appearing on highway signs, toll tokens, license plates, and the state's quarter. Years of erosion took its toll on the cliff and the formation collapsed in 2003, much to the state's heartache. A memorial for the formation opened in 2010.
* The [[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ce/Haitian_national_palace_earthquake.jpg collapsed National Palace of Haiti]] (basically the Haitian White House) after the 2010 earthquake. To give you an idea, [[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/87/Palacio_presidencial_de_Haiti.jpg this is what it looked like before]]. They say that the President was lucky he wasn't there when the earthquake hit.
* The August 2011 Virginia Earthquakes was felt as far north as New York and shook enough to cause damage to the Washington Monument, forcing it to close for almost three years as it underwent repairs.
* Big Tex, one of the [[UsefulNotes/DFWmetroplex Dallas area's]] most noted landmarks, was [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_ZymGBl1Zw destroyed by an electrical fire]] at the end of the 2012 Texas State Fair.
* At the height of its rampage in the mid-2010s, the Islamic State was notorious for destroying several ancient ruins in the lands it conquered. Sadly, this was among the ''least'' of their atrocities.
* On April 15, 2019, Paris' iconic Notre Dame Cathedral was severely damaged in a fire. The blaze engulfed much of the upper part of the cathedral and caused the central spire to collapse.
* ''Art/TheLastSupper'', despite being a world-famous painting, has suffered an astonishing amount of abuse over the centuries. With the combination of the unconventional painting techniques Leonardo used (making it less stable than a regular fresco) and severe environmental damage (moisture and smoke inside the chapel made the paint deteriorate; then there was the vandalism during the UsefulNotes/FrenchRevolution, bombing during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, multiple bungling "restoration" attempts, and some complete bozo ''cutting a door through Jesus' feet''), it's a wonder the painting has survived at all. The Other Wiki has [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Supper_(Leonardo_da_Vinci)#Damage_and_restorations the gory details]].
* Some monuments (like e.g. TheNoseless [[Art/TheSphinx Great Sphinx of Giza]] or the [[UsefulNotes/{{Rome}} Colosseum in Rome]]) have been in a damaged state since so long ago that said damage itself has become part of their iconic appearance. In fact, these ruins and others (such as the Parthenon) played a major influence on Albert Speer's theory of ruin value.
* By TheSeventies, the Hollywood Sign overlooking UsefulNotes/LosAngeles was falling apart. A picture of its dire state before its 1978 restoration serves as the page image for the MediaNotes/FallOfTheStudioSystem, showing it missing the last O, the first O having become a U due to damage, and the other letters all showing wear and tear, such that it looked like it said "Hullywo d".
* During the Israel-Gaza War of 2023, entire cities in the Gaza Strip were leveled. One of the more notable structures that fell victim to Israeli airstrikes was that of the Great Omari Mosque, the oldest mosque within the Gaza Strip.
* On March 26, 2024, the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore collapsed with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JebyNOvJmCM dramatic speed]] after a cargo ship struck one of its main support pillars, killing an (at this writing) undetermined number of people and disrupting sea traffic at the city's port.
[[/folder]]

** Coliseum (jets rammed through, reduced to rubble)

* Near the end of ''{{WesternAnimation/Minions}}'', during the final battle between [[spoiler: [[Attackofthe50FootWhatever a giant]]]] Kevin and [[BigBad Scarlett Overkill]], when Scarlett yanks Kevin into the air when he tries to grab her [[PoweredArmor rocket dress]], this also results in the dome of the St. Paul cathedral being destroyed in the process.

* MonumentalDamage/LiveActionFilms

** In ''Literature/TheWarOfTheWorlds'', it ends up with what the narrator describes as "a huge gaping cavity on its western side".

* James Lovegrove's ''The Age of Zeus'' features a whole series of these to punish the protagonists for their acts of insurrection. Zeus himself destroys the Sydney Opera House with a series of lightning bolts, Poseidon sweeps away the Golden Gate Bridge with a tidal wave, Hades (who has a death touch) and Dionysus (who can induce madness) team up to massacre the crowd in front of St. Peter's Basilica, Ares and Heracles smash the faces on Mt. Rushmore, and Hephaestus crumples the Eiffel Tower into a ball.

* In the ''Literature/WildCards'' book ''Aces Abroad'', the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro has been altered to depict the version of Jesus worshipped by [[FantasticReligiousWeirdness the Church of Jesus Christ Joker.]]
* ''Vixen 03'', Clive Cussler's fifth ''Literature/{{Dirk Pitt|Adventures}}'' book, features a rare attack on the Lincoln Memorial. The roof collapses and the columns are knocked down but the statue remains upright (five books later, [[CanonDiscontinuity Cussler had already forgotten about that]]). The EvilPlan involves terrorists (actually a FalseFlagOperation) using a decommissioned battleship to shell Washington D.C. It becomes a DiscussedTrope during the attack when it's pointed out that a car bomb that killed a few innocents would quickly be forgotten, but a warship raining down fire on the nation's capital causing MonumentalDamage would long be remembered.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'' [[Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse Expanded Universe]]:

** The [[Literature/DoctorWhoNovelisations novelization]] of [[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E1Rose "Rose"]] has the London Eye collapse when the Nestene Consciousness' lair beneath it is destroyed. (''Only'' the novelization, mind.)

** ''Literature/{{Changes}}'': Harry and his friends wreck part of Chichén Itzá when facing off against the Red Court vampires. Not surprising as this is [[DestructiveSaviour Harry Dresden]] we're discussing.

* ''The Execution Channel'' by Ken [=McLeod=] is set in an AlternateHistory where, instead of New York and Washington D.C., the 9/11 attacks occurred on American historical monuments in Boston and Philadelphia, specifically the Massachusettes State House, Faneuil Hall and Independence Hall. The Hancock and Prudential Towers were also demolished by a coordinated attack with [=SUVs=] packed with [=THX=].
* In ''Literature/TheLastShip'' an American ship steams up the Thames River to link up with friendly forces after a nuclear war. Through the irradiated fog can be seen the ruins of London and [[ClockTower Big Ben]].
* Jesus destroyed the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem at His SecondComing in the Literature/LeftBehind book ''Glorious Appearing''.
* ''Literature/LegacyOfTheAldenata'' - The Washington Monument comes under massive fire from plasma and HVM rounds, as a reaction to a human sniper using the monument as a firing point. The Lincoln Memorial also is destroyed, though by human forces.
* The Outrider series by Richard Harding had a Lincoln Memorial version, with the hero's arch enemy using Lincoln's [[RuinsOfTheModernAge vandalized statue]] as his throne in an AfterTheEnd America.

* Dark near-future thriller ''Literature/{{Victoria}}'' sees many iconic American monuments smashed as the nation descends into depression, disorder and civil war. Washington itself is ravaged by looters and rioters when the Federal Government evacuates to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and the halls of government are ruined and defaced much like those of Detroit in real life. Protagonist John Rumford comments bitterly:

* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'': ''Literature/CiaphasCain'' - Invoked by Ciaphas, Hero Of The Imperium, in ''Cain's Last Stand''. He mentions that he hopes that an attack on the capital city of Perlia managed to destroy a particularly hated monument to him (a clock that features him decapitating an orc every hour), but he's disappointed to learn it's still standing.

* ''Series/AftermathPopulationZero'': Famous monuments such as the Eiffel Tower and the Art/StatueOfLiberty begin to degrade from unaddressed rust decay and erosion after about a century. The Eiffel Tower eventually disappears in a new swamp that appears in the former Paris metropolitan area. The Statue of Liberty falls apart and its pedestal is ground down by the expanding Ice Age glacier in North America.
* The Seattle-based sketch comedy ''Series/AlmostLive'' did a parody of ''Independence Day'', which features the aliens blowing up various local landmarks.. that were all really ugly. The military is inclined to let the aliens carry on until the attackers make the mistake of destroying Dick's Drive-In, the town's perennial favorite LocalHangout. "Nuke 'em!!"
* ''The Big One: The Great Los Angeles Earthquake'' and ''10.5'', both all-star mega-earthquake movies, both feature the Hollywood Sign being destroyed.
** ''10.5'' also features the destruction of, among other landmarks, the Space Needle in Seattle and the Golden Gate Bridge.
** ''10.5: Apocalypse'', the sequel to ''10.5'', features more U.S. landmarks meeting spectacular fates, among them Mount Rushmore.

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E2TheDalekInvasionOfEarth "The Dalek Invasion of Earth"]]: Nelson's Column gets some "Dalek graffiti" on it[[note]]and the BBC got in some hot water when the chalk they used turned out to be more difficult to remove than previously thought[[/note]]. Elsewhere, landmarks such as Battersea Power Station had fallen to Dalek bombardment (the extent of the damage is much clearer in the Special Edition DVD).
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E4AliensOfLondon "Aliens of London"]]/[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E5WorldWarThree "World War Three"]] involves a convoluted alien hoax plot (well, a convoluted hoax perpetrated by aliens) where they deliberately crash their spaceship into Big Ben to put the world on high alert in order to get their claws on the UK's nuclear launch codes.

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E10InTheForestOfTheNight "In the Forest of the Night"]]: The sudden worldwide forest causes Nelson's Column to fall, nearly hitting the Doctor and Clara.

* In the ''Series/ForThePeople'' Pilot, Sandra is assigned to defend a young man accused of trying to blow up the Statue of Liberty.

* ''Series/FullFrontal''. A spoof of ''Film/IndependenceDay'' has a group of Australians [[ApatheticCitizens having a barbeque]] and watching with mild annoyance while the aliens are "destroying our national monuments". Cue a FlyingSaucer blowing up the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Pineapple Big Pineapple]] and showering them with pineapple slices.

* The History Channel's ''Series/LifeAfterPeople'' speculated, among other things, how long certain man-made structures would last were people to suddenly disappear. Every episode had to have at least one famous monument destroyed by the ravages of time, with said destruction always featuring in promos.

** In "Inconstant Moon", Professor Stan Hurst imagines UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity, with the Art/StatueOfLiberty and the World Trade Center in full view, being destroyed as a result of UsefulNotes/TheSun going nova.
** In "Dead Man's Switch", UsefulNotes/WashingtonDC is in ruins after the alien attack. TheWhiteHouse, the Capitol Building, and especially the Washington Monument are severely damaged.
** In "Final Appeal", [[spoiler: Ezekiel's cold fusion device detonates in the Supreme Court Building and the blastwave destroys the Capitol Building and the Washington Monument within seconds. Assuming Ezekiel was telling the truth about its blast radius, half of the Eastern Seaboard is devastated by his device.]]
* In TheNineties remake of ''Series/TheProfessionals'', a scientist who worked on the Star Wars program is selling control of a secret KillSat to an ArmsDealer, who says that for the price he's asking, the buyer would want a demonstration of its full power. The scientist tells him to let the buyer name the target--the Empire State Building or Buckingham Palace--and he can see the results on the news. He chooses the Eiffel Tower, but the scientist has a last-minute change of heart because there will be hundreds of innocent people there (like the first two options don't?).
* In ''Series/{{Smallville}}'', "Salvation", Zod and his minions burn the crest of Zod onto the Great Wall of China, Temple of Athena, a pyramid, and the Washington Monument.
* ''Series/SleepyHollow'' averted the "don't damage the Lincoln Memorial" thing. The head got blown off the statue while the characters were fighting the demon that possessed John Wilkes Booth in the series lore.
* The Golden Gate Bridge was pretty messed up in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' when the Breen attacked Earth. [[http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/File:San_Francisco_attacked2.jpg "The Changing Face of Evil"]]. As in Film (above), this isn't just wanton destruction, as Starfleet Headquarters is in the Presidio right next door.

* ''Series/TheStrain'': In the [[WhamShot closing scenes]] of the Season 3 finale, [[spoiler:the Master's stolen nuclear bomb is detonated on Liberty Island, destroying the Statue of Liberty]].
* One episode of ''Series/{{Ultraman}}'' had Osaka Castle get completely plowed down by the MonsterOfTheWeek Gomora.
** in a later season, ''Series/ReturnOfUltraman'', Ultraman Jack has to battle the beetle kaiju Nokogilin in Tokyo. During battle Jack dodges Nokogilin's antenna-ray, which ends up hitting the Tokyo Tower and bending into half.

* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'': During ''[[Recap/RickAndMortyS5E6RickAndMortysThanksploitationSpectacular Rick and Morty's Thanksploitation Spectacular]]'', Morty mishandling a laser while helping Rick steal the Constitution ends up destroying it, the Lincoln Memorial, the Liberty Bell and the Statue of Liberty (as well as unleashing a [[HumongousMecha gigantic]], [[{{Steampunk}} steam powered]] robot assassin hidden inside the last as a TrojanHorse by the French). Later in the episode, the Washington Monument gets converted into a weapon to [[ItMakesSenseInContext turn all of America's turkeys into super-soldiers]] and Morty ends up destroying it and the Lunar Flag Assembley.

* By TheSeventies, the Hollywood Sign overlooking UsefulNotes/LosAngeles was falling apart. A picture of its dire state before its 1978 restoration serves as the page image for the UsefulNotes/FallOfTheStudioSystem, showing it missing the last O, the first O having become a U due to damage, and the other letters all showing wear and tear, such that it looked like it said "Hullywo d".

* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': Since Ladybug's [[ResetButton restoration power]] allows her to repair any damage done fighting the villain, monuments get destroyed on a semi-regular basis.

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[[caption-width-right:350:[[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Aliens, pixels, explosions and pies.]] They sure love wrecking famous monuments.[[note]] L - R, top to bottom: ''Film/WarOfTheWorlds2TheNextWave'', ''Film/{{Pixels}}'', ''Film/WhiteHouseDown'', and ''WesternAnimation/CloudyWithAChanceOfMeatballs''[[/note]]]]

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* Averted in ''Anime/DigimonAdventure'', when the very climactic battle against Myotismon takes place on top of Fuji TV Headquarters (known for its unique design by the architect Kenzo Tange) but neither the building nor its massive metal ball is (seriously) harmed. Incidentally or not, Fuji TV is the channel that broadcasts ''Digimon'' in Japan.

* The ''Anime/ReadOrDie'' OVA has Gennai Hiraga blowing up the White House, with a [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed so-not-George Bush lookalike]] being dragged out just in time.
* In ''Anime/MacrossII'', the main characters go for a date in a place called "monument park," a collection of world monuments almost identical to the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' example, below. It is promptly attacked by aliens.
* From ''Manga/CannonGodExaxxion'':
-->Humanity's gotta take one to the gut, here! Knock some sense into the damn peaceniks! And showing them ol' Mount Fuji going boom ought to do the trick!
* In the Mazinger series:
** In the ''Anime/MazingerZ vs Great General of Darkness'' feature film, ''[[Anime/GreatMazinger the Mykene army]]'' struck Paris, London, New York, Moscow and Tokyo. During their attacks, the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, the Empire State Building, and the Tokyo Tower got wrecked.
** In the ''Anime/{{Mazinkaiser}}'' movie, the first shot features Paris and the Eiffel Tower burning. The next scenes depict the main characters trying to fight the Mykene [[{{Robeast}} War Beasts]] in different locations. During the attack on New York, the Art/StatueOfLiberty is shown as having been decapitated. Just to add insult to injury, Great Mazinger is knocked through the remains of the statue and falls on the head. Elsewhere, the Great Pyramids, Sydney Opera House, and Great Wall are also damaged by SuperRobot / {{Robeast}} combat. Mount Fuji also takes damage from the final battle between Mazinkaiser and Ankoku Daishogun, first as collateral damage from Mazinkaiser's [[BreathWeapon Rust Tornado]], and again when Daishogun rams Mazinkaiser with his AirborneAircraftCarrier. During the end credits of the movie, the heroes can be seen ''fixing'' it afterwards.
** In the first appearance of Great General of Darkness in ''Manga/ShinMazingerZero'', he split the Mount Fuji into two halves with a single stroke.
* In ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamSEEDDestiny'', when the [[ColonyDrop falling Junius Seven]] is destroyed by the ''Minerva's'' WaveMotionGun, fragments of it scatter randomly around the world. One of them still manages a direct hit on the Parthenon in Greece.
* ''Anime/FutureWar198X'': The White House, The Art/StatueOfLiberty, Tokyo Tower, and the Eiffel Tower all are destroyed in a chain of nuclear blasts killing 13 million people planned by DirtyCommunists.

* In-universe example: ''[[Manga/{{Boruto}} Boruto: Naruto Next Generation]]'' begins by showing [[spoiler:The Hokage Mountain, the most easily recognizable landmark of Konoha Village, completely smashed alongside with the rest of the village]].
* ''Manga/YokohamaKaidashiKikou:'' In this CosyCatastrophe, the top of Mount Fuji is no longer symmetrical. Like much else in the series, this goes unexplained.
* ''Manga/IAmAHero'' subverts this. Buildings are usually left standing [[spoiler:possibly because the Infected are an attempt to wipe out humanity but not its infrastructure]]. La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona and Sunshine 60 in Tokyo aren't destroyed, but [[spoiler:are transformed by Hives into a part of their structure]].

* ''Anime/LycorisRecoil'': The Tokyo Skytree ended up being destroyed in [[NoodleIncident in a past incident]] (for which the protagonist Chisato is apparently responsible), and its partially standing wreckage still remains as a monument to peace.
* In the ''Anime/{{Moldiver}}'' episode "Overzone", Space Shuttle ''Discovery'' is destroyed [[spoiler:after Mirai Ozora's sky battle with Jennifer and ''Akron'''s satellite causes the latter shuttle to crash into the space museum]].

* In ''ComicBook/TheUltimates'' - some super-powered soldiers push over the Art/StatueOfLiberty. Later, some superheroes pull it back up again. Averted in the same story where [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica Ultimate Cap]] and [[EvilCounterpart The Colonel]] duke it out along The Wall (the Vietnam War Memorial) and it is not damaged.
* In the ''ComicBook/CaptainCarrotAndHisAmazingZooCrew'' the giant monster frog villain Frogzilla pulls up from its foundation the Statue of Ribbity (Earth-C's Art/StatueOfLiberty) and takes it with him into Gnu York (Earth-C's New York), thinking the statue was a real person (and trying to hit "her" up for a date).

* In ''ComicBook/UltimateXMen'', where do the newly-formed Brotherhood of Mutants strike first? Why, London's [[ClockTower Big Ben]] of course!

* ''ComicBook/{{Kamandi}}: The Last Boy on Earth'': The first issue's cover prominently shows a fractured Art/StatueOfLiberty listing in floodwaters.
* During the ''ComicBook/Inferno1988'', the villains take over the Empire State building and turn it into their demonic EvilTowerOfOminousness.

* ''ComicBook/JudgeDredd'':
** In ''America'', pro-democracy terrorists attempt to blow up the already degraded Art/StatueOfLiberty as a symbol of protest against the oppressive rule of the Judges.
** During ''Day of Chaos'', the Statue of Justice is destroyed in a missile attack. Done for both symbolic and practical reasons; as the building also functioned as a surveillance center, it crippled the eyes and ears of Justice Department.
* ''ComicBook/GodzillaInHell'' features an apocalyptic battle between Godzilla and Space Godzilla in Rio de Janeiro where "Christ the Redeemer" is one of the last things standing before it too ends up demolished [[spoiler:and the Earth is blown up]].
* In the ''ComicBook/GreenArrowRebirth'' storyline "Rise of Star City", the villains, discussing their plan to remould Seattle in their image, explain how every city has a heart, and if you cut that out you demoralise the populace. Cut to the Space Needle collapsing.
* ''ComicBook/{{Irredeemable}}''. Qubit forces the supervillain Plutonian to help him clean up the radiation that's been dispersed across the Earth by having Plutonian create giant spears of [[AppliedPhlebotinum radiation-absorbing metal]] and drop them in various places. Plutonian agrees not to drop them on InnocentBystanders, but [[ExactWords drops one on]] Art/TheSphinx [[EvilIsPetty just to piss Qubit off]].

* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'':
** In one storyline, the Eradicator, in his "Krypton Man" persona, alters the Lincoln Memorial so that Honest Abe is instead standing and wearing Kryptonian robes.
** ''ComicBook/TwoForTheDeathOfOne'': The nose of the Great Sphinx of Giza gets crushed into dirt during the final battle between Superman and Lord Satanis (time travel was involved).
** In ''ComicBook/StrangersAtTheHeartsCore'', Klax-Ar wants to begin his planet-wide destructive rampage by blowing the Statue of Liberty up, but his weaponized flying sled malfunctions before he can do so.
** At the start of ''ComicBook/SupermanVsShazam'', the Brooklyn Bridge gets shattered, and Captain Marvel and ComicBook/MaryMarvel must stop it from crumbling down. Later, [[BigBad Karmang]]'s visions include a tsunami sweeping over the Big Ben and a lightning storm battering Saint Basil's Cathedral in Moscow.
** ''ComicBook/TheSuperDuelInSpace'': Brainiac shrinks and bottles Rome, Paris, London and New York. Then, Brainiac uses a pair of tweezers to rip the George Washington Bridge, the Eiffel Tower and other monuments loose, using a pair of huge tweezers, to examine them under a magnifying glass.
** In ''ComicBook/TheStrangeRevengeOfLenaLuthor'', ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} and Blackrock almost completely destroy the Washington Square Arch while fighting.
** In ''ComicBook/TheHuntForReactron'', Flamebird puts a dent in the Eiffel Tower when she smashes Supergirl into it.
** "ComicBook/TheSuperSteedOfSteel" Comet is mind-controlled by villain Vostar into destroying the Hoover Damn, beheading the Statue of Liberty, knocking the Washington Monument down and sabotaging the Panama Canal.
* Recurring in ''ComicBook/{{Uber}}''
** During the retreat from Paris, the Allies are forced to destroy many landmarks to keep the Nazis from using them as vantage points; the Eiffel Tower is shown exploding.
** During the invasion of London, [[DarkActionGirl Sieglinde]] decapitates Nelson's Column [[spoiler:and [[DecapitationPresentation places Churchhill's head on top]]]].
** The cover of the first issue of ''Invasion'' shows the Statue of Liberty with its face partially melted off. In the comic proper, Siegfried begins the invasion by [[MindOverMatter reshaping the White House into an enormous swastika]].
** A later issue of ''Invasion'' shows the Statue of Liberty's head reshaped into a swastika as well.
* ''ComicBook/PacificRimTalesFromYearZero'': Unlike in the film where this is glossed over, Tendo's flashback to K-Day devotes several panels to the kaiju plowing through the Golden Gate Bridge.
* ''ComicBook/TheImmortalThor'': Toranos announces himself by blasting the Statue of Liberty to pieces with a single lightning bolt.

* In a flashback from ''Fanfic/JustAnUnorthodoxThief,'' Goemon ''cuts down the Golden Gate Bridge'' so that Lupin can escape Kiritsugu and Zenigata alike after the former attempts to assassinate one of Lupin's clients and he elects to stop the Magus Killer, as it would be "bad for business."

* Played for laughs in ''WesternAnimation/CloudyWithAChanceOfMeatballs'', as giant food items start falling on various national monuments in an ironic fashion - a sandwich skewered on the Eiffel Tower, fortune cookies on the Great Wall that predict what will hit it next, pies hitting Mount Rushmore, and so on. The newscaster even [[LampshadeHanging lampshades it]] by explicitly saying that the food storm is hitting monuments first. [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything Naturally]], only [[HistoricalInJoke Lincoln's]] gets hit in the ''[[CrossesTheLineTwice back]]'' [[CrossesTheLineTwice of the head]].

* Downplayed in ''WesternAnimation/DespicableMe3'', not only does the 'Hollywood' Sign only get partially destroyed (and not Roland Emmerich like) by Bratt's robot, the Capitol Records Building (named the World Records Building), while it does collapse, we only get to briefly see the top part of it fall onto the ground. As for the rest of Hollywood? It's sadly offscreen.

* Played with in ''WesternAnimation/Home2015''. We see several Earth monuments, but many aren't really damaged, just floating in air. [[spoiler:The ones with faces have been modified to look like Captain Smek. In the end, the Boov fix it]].

* ''Literature/{{Campione}}'''s protagonist Godou will accidentally destroy in the process of fighting ''any monument'' that is introduced in the story. So much that you could probably make a DrinkingGame out of it.
* In the ''Literature/WildCards'' book ''Aces Abroad'', the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro has been altered to depict the version of Jesus worshipped by [[FantasticReligiousWeirdness the Church of Jesus Christ Joker.]]
* ''The Execution Channel'' by Ken [=McLeod=] is set in an AlternateHistory where, instead of New York and Washington D.C., the 9/11 attacks occurred on American historical monuments in Boston and Philadelphia, specifically the Massachusettes State House, Faneuil Hall and Independence Hall. The Hancock and Prudential Towers were also demolished by a coordinated attack with [=SUVs=] packed with [=THX=].

* In general, superhero comics and other superhero-related media will often show their own fictional, yet still iconic, monuments being damaged instead of real ones. [[Franchise/{{Superman}} The Daily Planet]], [[Franchise/{{Batman}} Wayne Tower]], and [[ComicBook/IronMan Stark Tower]] are frequent victims, with the Daily Planet in particular having its giant globe knocked off practically every week.

* Rare exception to the "Nothing harms Lincoln" rule: During the ''ComicBook/AmazonsAttack'' miniseries, Hippolyta decapitates the memorial. Possibly referenced in the 2009 ''{{WesternAnimation/Wonder Woman|2009}}'' animated movie, where an angry Steve Trevor rushes to the defence of the memorial declaring "no-one messes with Lincoln!"
* In ''Recap/AsterixAndCleopatra'', Obelix climbs Art/TheSphinx and breaks its nose.

* DC Comics ComicBook/{{Steel}} and [[AudienceAlienatingEra Non-Green-Lantern-Guy-Gardner-But-Rather-Warrior]] fought Sledge (DC villain that is somewhat [[ComicBook/XMen Juggernaut-lite]]) and couldn't put him down until the Washington Monument fell on his head.
* ''ComicBook/{{Kamandi}}: The Last Boy on Earth]]'': The first issue's cover prominently shows a fractured Art/StatueOfLiberty listing in floodwaters.

* In the ''Anime/{{Moldiver}}'' episode "Overzone", Space Shuttle ''Discovery'' is destroyed [[spoiler:when Mirai's sky battle with Jennifer and ''Akron'''s satellite causes the latter shuttle to crash into the space museum]].

* ''The Execution Channel'' by Ken McLeod is set in an AlternateHistory where, instead of New York and Washington D.C., the 9/11 attacks occurred on American historical monuments in Boston and Philadelphia, specifically the Massachusettes State House, Faneuil Hall and Independence Hall. The Hancock and Prudential Towers were also demolished by a coordinated attack with [=SUVs=] packed with [=THX=].

* The Art/{{Great Sphinx of Giza}} is missing a few of its original features, most notably its nose. Although some apocryphal stories attribute the loss to acts of vandalism by Napoleon's army, they are false, as artistic depictions of the monument dating to the mid-18th Century also show it without the nose. One of the more likely theories pins the blame on Muhammad Sa'im al-Dahr, a Sufi Muslim from the 13th Century who defaced the Sphinx's face in an act of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iconoclasm iconoclasm]]. And, according to some local legends that persisted after the ignoble deed, there was a noticeable increase in the amount of sand around the Giza Plateau after the Sphinx's nose was removed, [[CurseOfThePharaoh presumably as a vengeful curse to punish al-Dahr.]]

* The Bolsheviks destroyed Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior in 1931 in order to make room for the Palace of the Soviets, a totally epic structure which would have been the tallest building in the world at the time. They got as far as digging the foundation, but UsefulNotes/WorldWarII intervened and derailed the project. Construction wasn't resumed after the war and, eventually, they just filled in the foundation with water to create a giant swimming pool. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the cathedral was reconstructed and today exists as it did before communism.

* ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'':

If you plan on attacking all over the world make sure you target a wide range of easily identifiable landmarks throughout. Due to SmallReferencePools, no one will take you seriously unless you get the Pyramids, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, the Sydney Opera House, the Westminster Clock Tower ("[[IAmNotShazam Big Ben]]", that is), or in works made before [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror 9/11]], [[HarsherInHindsight the World Trade Center]]. Japan's Tokyo Tower gets this so often its joked by fans as 'Just another bad day for Tokyo Tower.'

(A weird exception is that it's very, very rare for any monument-destroying force to harm the Lincoln Memorial. It's not ''unknown'', but the Great Emancipator's [[{{Sculptures}} statue]] takes significantly less damage than you might expect.)

So you're a marauding monster, invading alien force, overblown natural disaster, fanatical terrorist, or anything that has a tendency to cause massive collateral damage. But you are not going to destroy ''any'' random building, are you? No, where is the fun in that? You're going to behead the Art/StatueOfLiberty, or blow up the White House, or anything recognizable enough that by destroying it, you can show the world that you mean business.

If you plan on attacking all over the world make sure you target a wide range of easily identifiable landmarks throughout. Due to SmallReferencePools, no one will take you seriously unless you get the Pyramids, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, the Sydney Opera House, the Westminster Clock Tower ("[[IAmNotShazam Big Ben]]", that is), or in works made before [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror 9/11]], [[HarsherInHindsight the World Trade Center]]. Just killing people throughout the world won't cut it.

A weird exception is that it's very, very rare for any monument-destroying force to harm the Lincoln Memorial. It's not ''unknown'', but the Great Emancipator's [[{{Sculptures}} statue]] takes significantly less damage than you might expect.

On the flip side, Japan's Tokyo Tower gets this so often its joked by fans as 'Just another bad day for Tokyo Tower.'