An unfunny thing happened on the way to the Forum, thanks to an American vandal

In the latest in his series of reflections on memorable places and pathways, Will Gore considers an incident of historical theft

It is sometimes hard to know whether humans are better at destroying the past, present or future (Getty)

All roads lead to Rome.

Well, they did 1,900 years ago anyway. By the time you glimpsed the Colosseum, the chariot traffic was dreadful.

On my only visit to the city, I arrived by train. We had been in Pompeii, where a friend was working as an archaeologist; it was a full-on Roman history trip.