The 25 Worst People Ever

Attila was not just any Hun, he was the leader of the Huns, and under his rule, the Hunnic empire consisted of almost anything that didn’t fly a Roman flag. It has been said that there is no surviving first-person account of his appearance, which is not surprising considering the fate of most people who interacted with him.

Clearly, however, he was a man with a passion for invasion. In fact, it was a passion so great that on his way to pick up his bride, Honoria, he decided to stop in Italy…and destroy it. Razing a country on the eve of your wedding? Outstandingly wicked.

Generally speaking, revolutionaries tend to be lauded for their courage and willingness to take a stand. Max, however — although being a leader in the French Revolution — decided that he would rather live on in infamy and instituted what has come to be known as the Reign of Terror.

As we all know, anyone who starts something called a Reign of Terror belongs on a list of bad people…period.

Imagine your name being prefixed by the word “bloody”. That in itself should be enough to reserve a spot on our list. But how does that even happen? Mary I of England, it turns out, had a passion for burning people at the stake, particularly people who opposed her ideologies, hence the nickname.

This Japanese Emperor was the mastermind behind something that came to be known as the Rape of Nanking (what was the capital of China). Raping the capital city of the most populous nation on Earth? This list is for you.

Founded what would eventually become the largest contiguous empire in history and nearly managed to conquer not just one but two continents. Compared to many people on this list he was relatively benign, however, at least offering up the chance to surrender before proceeding to destroy everything in sight.

Just to paint a picture of what that could look like, some historians have estimated that the Iranian population didn’t return to pre-Mongol levels until sometime in the late 20th century.