eli5 why ancient historical buildings haven’t been kept up? Why are buildings like the Parthenon and the Colosseum in such disrepair? Greece and Rome/Italy have existed the entire time?
In: 508
Having plenty is a relatively new thing. Having the resources to “waste” on preservation of monuments means you’re a very wealthy and successful society. Rome from 400-1400 was anything but prosperous. The city was basically completely abandoned for 100 years starting in the mid 500’s. Seriously the city went from 1.4 million people in the year 0, to less than 20,000 by the mid 500’s. The Catholic Church went to a lot of trouble of propping the city up again in the 700’s, and it did okay through the 700’s -1100’s. But then the church moved it’s headquarters to France for a while and the city basically fell apart again. In the 1400’s the church went back to Rome and has been there ever since. But there were a lot of *centuries* there that the city was very neglected.
Some monuments have been intentionally destroyed due to war or ideological differences. The ancient city of Palmyra was destroyed by ISIS back in 2018 because of, as I understand it, the existence of the city being an icon of western ideology. The library of Alexandria fell to the same fate some 2000 years ago. And as others have pointed out the acropolis was used as a base during a war and a mortar shell hit it.
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