While there are a lot of people we could have included on this list, we were limited to only 25 slots. In many cases our decision was seemingly made for us due to the heinous nature of the individuals crimes. Moreover, there seemed to be a general consensus about what constitutes badness in a human. People like Hitler and Stalin are always on these types of lists (yes, they are on ours as well). The real challenge came, however, in determining who was the worst among the worst. Many times the individual’s infamy has become immortalized in legend, even to the point of rewriting history. So, we acknowledge the subjective and controversial nature of such a task and we encourage you to leave your own opinions in the comments below. At any rate, we present to you our list of 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.Sometimes it seems that being a Roman emperor was incongruent with maintaining your sanity. Case in point – this guy. What started with a little gambling and wasteful spending quickly turned into a circus of bloody mayhem. But not only did killing become his favorite pastime, he also concluded that he was God and therefore should have a statue of himself erected in the Temple of Jerusalem for people to worship. No wonder Rome burned to the ground.Issuing solders Viagra to help them rape and kill women, indiscriminately executing his own people, and sponsoring international terrorists, he was only the second still-serving state leader in history to have arrest warrants issued against him. Translation: he was really, really bad at his job. So bad in fact, that even Fidel Castro once described him as being reckless.Although the ruthlessness of this man never ceased to astound the modern world, we at List25 were not surprised by his lack of good behavior. How do you expect your parents to discipline you with a name like Ayatollah As-Sayyid Ruhollah Mostafavi Musavi Khomeini?Not only did he kill 17 men and boys, the murders all involved rape, dismemberment, necrophilia, and cannibalism. To make things worse, he somehow got the idea that he could turn his victims into submissive “zombies” by drilling holes in their skulls and filling them with boiling water while they were still alive.Yet another deranged Roman Emperor. It’s hard to be worse than having your own mother executed and poisoning your stepbrother. Oh wait, how about burning prisoners in your garden at night as a source of light?The leader of the People’s Temple, a cult that was forced to relocate from San Fransisco to the jungles of Guyana where he managed to convinced over 900 of its members to kill themselves with cyanide. That’s the largest loss of American civilian life in one event prior to 9/11.For over twenty years Saddam served as the President of Iraq instituting genocidal campaigns against the Kurds, Shabaks, Yazidis, Assyrians, and Mandeans. What’s more, he seemed to have an impulsive desire to randomly invade neighboring countries and when things didn’t go his way he would just take out his frustration on his own people…with poison gas.Its impressive that from such a small country could come such a colossal tyrant. Deciding that his country wasn’t big enough Leopold did what any leader would do and went to Africa…to start his own. In what is present day Democratic Republic of the Congo, he managed to enslave, torture, and kill over 3 million people just so he could sell some ivory.As the face of modern terrorism and the founder of al-Qaeda he lived a good portion of his life with a $25 million dollar bounty placed on his head by the FBI. In spite of that, he managed to evade capture for the better part of three presidential administrations before tasting American steel.“Revolution is not a dinner party, nor an essay, nor a painting, nor a piece of embroidery; it cannot be advanced softly, gradually, carefully, considerately, respectfully, politely, plainly, and modestly. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another. ”Well said Mao…exactly why we made sure to reserve an extra spot on our list.1 2
How about bad, bad, Leroy Brown.
Too opinionated, lacking historical context, judging by modern standards, etc.
Most of those mass muders on the list [at the time] truly believed that they were doing the right thing…
As for others, what they did was rather normal during their time period.
The truly evil people are the ones who knew what they are doing is wrong, does not have any justification for theirr actions, and enjoy the evil they did.
Forgot to mention “Israeli Peolple” for killing thousands of palestinians
touche!
As my friend Billy just told me, none of the people you chose did ALL of the following.
1) Succeed in committing total genocide of a people
2) attack and torture people who were not his enemies or who he even knew and slaughter them for fun
3) torture and rape children with their parents present, then cut their arms off and laugh as he burned them alive.
4) use them as slaves and sell them off as merchandise while a third of them starved to death and their corpses thrown overboard as they were being transported.
5) Force an entire land of people to kill their own children and then take their own lives rather than have their people suffer the horror of living under his sadistic tyranny
6) Participate in all these atrocities himself, making sure he surpassed all his friends in number of people he destroyed with his own hands, and the number of little girls he raped and murdered.
7) wrote a journal about all this in his own words where he advertised how wonderful he felt when he committed these atrocities, bragging about how much cruelty he could get away with without anybody being able to defend against him.
This man was Christopher Columbus. The only reason he only killed tens or hundreds of thousands instead of millions is because there weren’t any more people to kill where he went. He killed them all.
I think everyone here must agree that he should at least be ahead of Jeffrey Dahmmer, Am I wrong?
Also, your list is filled with ridiculous inaccuracies. Probably the worst is the “60 Million” people Stalin killed. The guy was horrific, but the biggest number ever associated with him was 28 million OVER 40 YEARS–INCLUDING THE 15 million who died defeating Germany in WW2. That’s nothingcompared to Hitler’s pace in a country one fifth the size and only in a decade’s time. thx
There is only one human not on this list who committed every heinous diabolical crime I can think of (mass murder, kidnapping, mass torture, rape and murder of women and children, slavery, genocide, terrorism, and pillaging and looting, and who both ordered others and participated himself in all of it, and bragged about it in his writings: Christopher Columbus. Columbus didn’t have the opportunity to kill as many people as Stalin or Hitler, but he was much more sadistic and cruel than any of the others
Judas? Really? I mean yes he betrayed Jesus (I am catholic) but I don’t think he’s worse than any of the people before him. Especially vlad the impaler.
Where’s
-O.J. Simpson
-Casey Anthony
-Jerry Sandusky
on this list?
I think Obama and Bush aren’t included due to the immense amount of political backlash the comment section & website would get.
you sound like a dumb ass
casey anthony, jerry sandusky, and oj simpson did NOTHING compared to these people on the list. serioulsy? Obama and Bush never even killed anyone or did anyhting in that matter, to be put on this list so dont be retarded
stupid american
Couldn’t have said it better myself
How cab Himmler be worse than Hitler?
This list is 100% flawed and bogus. Not one single Khazarian Jew on the list, and they’re the most evil people of all. Who do you think is behind more than 75% of the people on this so called list. All you did was out the figureheads, good job simpleton. It’s writing like this that has allowed for the repeat of such atrocities throughout history. WAKE UP, DO SOME RESEARCH, STOP SPREADING “Their” VERSION OF HISTORY. Of course, there’s the high probability that the poster IS a Khazarian. To all you sheeple that responded favorably to this list, you should be ashamed of your ignorance. Ashamed…
Guys, stop! Let’s just say that Obama and Bush are equally terrible people. But seriously, both of them are not as bad as all of these guys. I personally think Mao should be higher, but that’s my biased opinion.
The only thing I disagree with is Hirohito. He wasn’t even really part of the war, and when it was over and Japan got their sorry asses kicked, he tried his best to rebuild that trust with the world. If anything, he’s kind of a cool guy.
Respect to all fellow Americans, but posts like this make you look stupid outside your country….
exactly
this list should include every citizen of Afghanistan Pakistan and Iraq on first place . Rest of the place should be filled with other jihadis racist and illiterate radical people
I agree!
Sure! Because thinking all the eastern people are terrorists and should be included in this list is definitely not racist… You show a good example of your kind….
Here’s a good example of my kind: you are on the internet, created by FUCKING AMERICA! ENTIRELY BY AMERICA! VERY GOOD EXAMPLE!
Seriously? I’m an American (if that even exists), and I think both of you are freaking ridiculous. You accuse every citizen of a supposed ‘terrorist country” on your list, and later you say something about racists. I literally smacked my head onto the table reading your comment, Henry. And Bigfoot, how could you agree to that? And by the way, the Internet is a world wide organization. We have now edited the Internet simply by commenting here right now. Without our comment, the Internet wouldn’t be entirely the same. So entirely by Americans? Completely bullshit.
Sorry about the rant, I really hate it when people give Americans a bad image….
I agree. idiots like you give America a bad name. As a vet im very proud to be an American. But you idiots are embarrassing. You guys are the racists. to you an American is only considered that if they are white christian. when in reality there is no such thing as a typical American. I love this country. I put this country before my life. But when i read or hear idios like you spread hate it makes me ashamed that you are my brothers. May you find peace in your lives and acceptance in your hearts.
America didn’t create the Internet, awkward. Tim Berners-Lee, a Brit, did. Stupid American moron.
You put Queen Mary Tudor on this list but you didnt put Queen Elizabeth I. Queen Elizabeth killed much more Catholics than Mary Tudor killed Protestants and even is not sure that she killed that much. But we all know, that Protestant is always more important than Catholic and that life of one Protestant is like lives of 100 Catholics.
Where are Henry VIII and Suleiman The Magnificent? Both were monsters. Henry killed his wives and thousand of innocent Catholics and Protestants and Suleiman killed his own children and grandchildren.
Sulayman the magnificent only killed his son to avoid a civil war
This was the thing all the sultans of the Ottoman Empire did to avoid a civil war they would have all their cousins, brothers strangled
And him killing his son was none of his disition his new wife roxelana a Ukrainian widow talked him into killing his son from his first wife.
Anna why the hell do think he has the named the magnificent Sulayman saved thousands of Spanish Jews and Muslims from being hung in catholic Spain. There was no greater leader than Sulayman the magnificent he let millions of orthodox chritians live in his Muslim empire even the Orthodox Church was in his empire. Unlike European empires who persecuted their own people because of religion he let people from various religions live in his empire he let them teach with their own schools make their own courts and do what ever they want. And because of this the Ottoman Empire was the boiling pot during the renaissance.
By the way go learn some history before posting stupid comments
Why isn’t Joseph Kony on there? Does anyone know who that guy IS?
Hirohito, Ghaddafi and Dahmer shouldn’t be on this list. Hirohito was barely involved in the war, he should be replaced by Tojo or another high ranking Japanese officer. As far as dictators and war criminals go Gadafi was deffinatly not the worst, he could be replaced by any US president (especialy Andrew Jackson and Harry Truman), the Shah of Iran, King Herod, Suharto, any Pakistani leader since Bhutto, any Indian prime minister,nany leader of Israel or Saudi Arabia, one of the Kims of DPRK, Suharto, Enver Pasha, Pope Alexander VI, Emporer Bokassa, Papa Doc or Baby Doc, Rafeal Trujillo, Augusto Pinochet, Nicolae Casescu, and Ngo Dinh Diem among others. Dahmer could be replaced by almost any serialnkiller since Dahmer was genuinely remorseful for his murders.
to those of you saying that bush and cheney should be on the list, i completely agree. but your forgetting one, Karl Rove, the amoral puppetmaster behind Bush.
and to those of you saying people like Obama should be on the list, why don’t you add Jesus to that list while your at it? (that was sarcasm, I love Obama. however, I am Jewish, so I have no belief in Jesus. I just put him since most of you are likely christian)
Why didnt Obama make Number 1
Obama continued all of Bush’s wars and injustices and started quite a few of his own, he supports several dictators worldwide and helped to begin the genocide of blacks and Christians in Libya, now he’s arming al-Qaeda in Syria. Open your eyes.
We need a list to include all the pricks that are still around having stuffed or are stuffing up the world for greed or self gain.
The list would include past USA presidents, Agency Heads, Government officials. Oil Magnates, the actual people that where involved in 911, certain family’s, you name it. This way if anyone wants to get even they can do it to the people that have indirectly or directly screwed them instead of innocent victims.
Anyone game enough?
You Americans cannot even investigate the 911 thiasco. Hopeless Absolutely Hopeless.
And you let the banks rip youo off.
HAHAHAHA
SukkerZ
Learn to spell and use proper grammar, and maybe “we Americans” would be more upset about being insulted. Unfortunately for you…we’re not.
Firfirst of all Miriam your name is an Arabic name
Miriam is Arabic for Mary how can you convince me into believing your an American
Why is George Bush, Cheney, Lowie and Silverstein not in here. They should be before Saddam Hassein.
They should be at the top of the list
Because they aren’t evil. This is the list of people who are evil. George W. Bush was one of the best presidents who ever lived. If someone comes and drives airplanes into your most important buildings and almost drives one into the White House (they were going to) and you start a war, who’s really starting the war? Dick Cheney was just a V.P., nothing else. I don’t know exactly who the last two are but I’ll tell you one thing, Bush & Cheney would get my vote if they could get a 3rd term. They’re better than your liberal ass.
Assuming George W. Bush didn’t know that planes were flying into his buildings before hand. Watch the video of him reading along with school kids when he gets the news….and what does the self proclaimed leader of the free world do, knowing his country is under a terrorist attack??? Why he just keeps on reading.
if he stopped reading the kids would get sad and that would make a bad impression.
your head shall explode now.
“bigfoot” You seem like one of those people who simply believes what he is told and fails to inquire about any sort of truth beyond what the media spews. Dick Cheney wanted to build a pipeline through Afghanistan. Money is on his mind. How could he achieve this? By starting a war in Afghanistan.
erm im not sure how accurate this list is. some of the facts i know are wrong and there’s not much detail. the suject of the article is very interesting though hence why i clicked on it but not too impressed not much information. i’d read one and think wait you havent actually explained who this person was or what they did..
Everybody would list different killers in his own list, so the list will always be dissapointing for other people. Anyway, I agree with the fact that american presidents killed nearly as close humans as hitler. But as media suggest every day, america is the heaven and what americans do is never wrong.
And if there are some taff americans (wikileaks stuff) who wants to show the scandals of the american regime, they will get executed.
But the serial killers living under us are scaring me the most. Not the big dictators.
@ Free Human
George W. Bush isn’t anywhere near this list dumbass. Look at what Obama’s doing to our country. Wake up.
Coming from a conservative, you are wrong. George Bush did much more harm to our country than Obama ever could.
Obama prefers to harm other countries. He’s bombed more countries in four years than Bush bombed in eight
Oh really? That’s why in late 2008 the economy crashed but before that everyone was happy. That makes sense I guess.
Robespierre should not be anywhere on this list. If the person responsible for compiling it had actually done their research instead of blindly inhaling Thermidorian propaganda, they would know that. Robespierre did not “institute” the Reign of Terror, in fact, he actually died trying to stop the senseless killing that went along with it.
how did you said that?did you ask any population?or this is something made by your own mind?how imam khomeini can be one of worst people in history?where are u.s.a presidents?
sheron, bush senior,bush junior,ahud barak,maladowich,najeeb ulah,indra gandhi,bal thakre,
where’s obama?
Obama’s kill count isn’t anywhere near bush’s nor Truman’s.
Washinton, D.C., currently.
how is it that NO Amercian president made the list, despite the fact that BOTH Bushs are responsible of killing millions of people in Iraq and Afghanistan?
if both the bush’s are so is obama because he didn’t end the war…he’s in office and people are still dying over there
Uhhhhh… I’ve made like 3 posts defending Bush but uh, sorry to break it to you but, the war ended 2 years ago. Uh, yeah. Can’t believe you didn’t know that. Gee.
Your made at least one inaccuracy. Mao and Stalin were both responsible for more deaths than Hitler – but you listed Hitler as responsible for “more deaths than anyone else in history.
lol@you, that picture of Bathory is Lucrezia Panciatichiova by Agnola Bronzina
Wasn’t it Hideki Tojo who was responsible for Nanking, not the emperor?
I think you will have to redo this list after we find out whose responsible for killing these indians and enslaving these afro americans
If its just numbers of killing: president truman for ordering a tactical use of the atomic bomb… might as well. this list is so full of crap anyways.
This was a major disappointment.
Also, it was obviously written by a Christian considering Judas (someone whose deed was technically very miniscule when compared to the other seemingly randomly chosen evil-doers on this list) was on the list. And Queen Elizabeth I… really? I mean, there weren’t very many earlier monarchs who didn’t have some sort of atrocious practice. But Elizabeth I is incredibly respected overall. Whoever wrote this failed horribly. DO A LITTLE RESEARCH NEXT TIME, MAYBE?
funny how this clown doesn’t respond to anyones comments eh?
He probably doesn’t reply because it’s just a silly list for entertainment purposes and most of you psychos commenting here are acting like the blogger belongs at the head of this “worst people” list just for posting it.
It was Queen Mary I, not Elizabeth.
You have some HUGE historical inaccuracies here. Before you make a list like this you may want to do some research, even wiki. Try reading a book or two, maybe get some historical context and include some truth as opposed to fabrication for the sake of sensationalism.
I think Dr Harold Shipman deserves a (dis)honourable mention
Shouldn’t Kim Jong-Il be on here?!
Where’s John Howard????
Where is Snezzle? Oh, it’s worst people, not wankers who live with their heads up their arses. If you’re so great why don’t you run for parliament or is typing “Where’s John Howard????” the only thing you can do? Fucking communist I bet.
I can’t believe this list, it’s so inconsistent – some of the facts aren’t verified and it weirdly ignores lots of crimes committed by Western World leaders…
Hitler was a pansi! He’s infamous for killing 6 million Jews in his pathetic “holocaust.” Well, America slaughtered 7.5 million totally innocent people in its last two completely bogus wars, out of corruption and greed alone, and the average American today is in complete denial over it, or more likely, never heard of it! How bad is that? Almost anyone in the world today knows without a doubt (including our own solders who regularly commit suicide because to them life has grown too crazy) that G W Bush was a lying, mass-murdering bigot who was too stupid to even cover his tracks, and he is not on this list at all! Go on, ask the next high school student what is important to know about the Vietnam war. See the blank expression he gets on his face? That in a country that calls itself a democracy! American nobodies are represented on this list, but not an American leader – absolute rubbish!
Holy crap man, you are an idiot
absolutely true, I think these think does not fit into the empty brains of some ignorant people
I find it hard to believe that someone would post this while having clue the history of some of the people. Attila the Hun didn’t pillage Italy for the fun,Idi Amin Dada beat Mao even though Mao is responsible for around 22 million deaths, Stalin didn’t have 60 million close friends (ha wording error), Himmler beat Hitler? Hitler was his boss and told him what to do. I’m a history major (not saying I know everything) but this list make people like me who want to teach history REALLY want to teach history to teach the truth.
where is abdullah ocalan,the leader of terrorist organization pkk?and the latest prime ministers of israel,which is the terrorist country of middle-east
where is Georg W. Bush ?
“He stabbed God…”
He is the son of God, not God. I thought this site was cool until it praught christianity. Oh, I am atheist by the way.
“He was the first of the Tsars…”
Whaat? The first man who claimed the title tsar was Simeon I of Bulgaria. The man that officially got recognized as tsar was Peter I of Bulgaria. Of course, before the russian tsars there were many bulgarian,serbian and even wallachian rulers who claimed to be tsars.
“To start with, he actually managed to starve an entire country (The Ukraine)”
Ukraine is not and acronym of some sort so it shouldn’t've ‘the’ in front of it.
thanks for saying it for me. i’m done with this site…
Why a great Freedom fighter (Khomeini) did in the your list?
stalin killed 60 million people? tops was 20. Big difference, cant give that much leeway. OH and judas betrayed a man. not a god.
You are wondering where George W. Bush is? Well for starters this is a list of the 25 WORST people ever. Comparing Bush to a serial killing, messed up rapist cannibal like Dammer, or a Jew killing, poison gassing dictator like Hitler, leaders of a terrorist cooperation, or even a God killer is completely absurd. George Bush, whether you agree with his political policies and actions, does not come even close to any of these people on this list. Yeah, I agree he won’t go down as the greatest president America has seen, but in no way does he compare to a single person mentioned above. You are all idiots, and , if you are from America, you are the reason why more than half of this world hates our country. You give Americans a bad rep, and with that said, on behalf of the rest of this country that use our brains, I thank you.
It’s interesting how you say Adolf Hitler was responsible for more deaths than anyone else ever but then you attribute 10 million of them to Heinrich Himmler, further more you cite Stalins death toll at 60 Million, six times what the Nazi’s managed. Firstly, consistency? Secondly, the highest i have ever heard an estimate of Stalins death toll in academic publish was 28 million, and thirdly, you forgot to mention Stalin had his own son killed as part off a mass killing.
A list where serial killers and biblical myths appear alongside some of the worst people in the world? How about the Americans responsible for the genocides and forced relocation of native tribes? And for god’s sake, use Wikipedia if only to spell check. Atilla? Heinrick? Adolph? Dammer?
I also found it a bit curious that Osama landed on here. Considering he didn’t actually DO anything except make videos and spread hate (so pretty much what the conservative right does).
Whoever made this list is
A) an idiot, B) Doesn’t know much about history.
List is decent but could not agree more on the fact they don’t know much about history.
At my school, for years there’s been a rumor that bloody marry is a gohst who went to our school, and now haunts the girls bathroom. Turns out she was from Englande and liked to burn people. Now I know who she was! Thankyou!
Yeah where is George W. Bush and his “NUCULAR WEAPONS” LOL
where is Georg W. Bush ?
yeah, he should be no.1
You don’t like giving much detail on why these people made the list other thn names they where called do you?
The only reason for adding Ayatulah Khomeni’s name to this list is because of his NAME?! The reasons given for him making the list were pretty shallow and superficial.
Patrick Manning, the former prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago is also one of the worst.
And this list gets to the top of “the 25 worst lists ever” list.
Where is Georg W. Bush ???
Not sure where you got your info about 900 people being the most Americans killed in one incident. Just to name a few that have more deaths, Pearl Harbor, D-Day, pretty much every Civil War battle….etc. Other than that, the list was pretty interesting.
The post specified “civilian” casualties. You mention wars or battles where the majority of the deaths were military members. Not that you aren’t correct on the large numbers of casualties, but civilians were in the minority.
Thanks for this post,but i think you dont know Ayatollah Khomeini,so i dont agree with you about him,please research about him on independent sources.
good job ALIREZA im on ur side