Police are investigating after a Swiss girl carved her initials into the iconic Colosseum in Rome less than a month after a similarly moronic defacement of the ancient landmark.
Italian tour guide David Battaglino captured a video of the unidentified 17-year-old girl carving the letter “N” into the wall, according to newspaper La Repubblica.
The footage posted on Twitter by Italian news agency ANSA shows the girl, whose face is blurred, using an object to carve the letter before she backs off.
ROME, ITALY—A tour guide has filmed a 17yr old Swiss tourist vandalising a wall of the Colosseum, today.
It seems lessons from last month will be hard learning for this young woman, who faces heavy fines and possible jail time for this narcissistic trend.
🎥: @Agenzia_Ansa pic.twitter.com/oKBbbAOVvk
— Bree A Dail (@breeadail) July 15, 2023
“It is the first time I have managed to film an act of vandalism at the Colosseum but in six years I have seen dozens,” he told the local news outlet.
The teen could face up to five years behind bars and a fine of up to almost $17,000 -- for damaging cultural property, according to reports.
The guide said he kept talking to his tour group as he recorded the clueless teen defacing the Colosseum.
“After a few seconds, my group applauded me. To her, in English, I said, ‘Do you want applause?’ The young girl understood that she had ended up in the crosshairs of those who protect art and turned away to go toward her family,” Battaglino told La Repubblica.
He said he told the girl’s parents that what she had done was illegal and claimed they blew him off with a “gesture of annoyance,” according to news outlet Italy24.
The incident marks the second time in less than a month that the ancient landmark has been vandalized.
Battaglino said he snapped a photo of the whole family and notified authorities, who questioned them at police headquarters.
The incident comes on the heels of a similar act of vandalism at the site. Ivan Dimitrov, a 27-year-old Bulgarian-born fitness trainer living in Bristol, England, was caught on video.
He allegedly used a key to etch “Ivan + Hayley 23” into the 2,000-year-old UNESCO World Heritage site.
He later offered an apology to Mayor Roberto Gualtieri in which he begged for forgiveness and claimed he did not know how old the Colosseum, completed by Emperor Titus in 80 AD, was when he committed the act.
“It is with deep embarrassment that only after what regrettably happened did I learn of the antiquity of the monument,” Dimitrov wrote. “Through these lines, I would like to address my heartfelt and honest apologies to the Italians and to the whole world for the damage caused to an asset which, in fact, is the heritage of all humanity.”
