The practice, in Roman history, is known as damnatio memoriae and involves the deliberate condemnation of someone to have their memory,, as much as possible, wiped from the record. Of course, it is historically impossible to show that this was ever done completely successfully since it would not be successful if it were complete.

Three emperors received an official damnatio memoriae - Domitian, Publius Septimius Geta, and Maximian. Other Roman senators also suffered this penalty in the official legal sense. It involved seizure or property, destruction or re-utilisation of statues and other monuments, and the like.

I would tentatively suggest that in the Roman context it is tied to an idealisation of "legacy", and so what is worse than death is to have that legacy and memorial destroyed.

A similar practice emerges in early Church history, where theologians and writers deemed (even centuries later) to be heretical, are censured and their works actively destroyed in order to not only halt their influence, but erase their presence.

I can go into some more detail if you'd like, but perhaps one of the Roman specialists will turn up and elaborate on the Roman legal practice.

edit: as two commentators have noted, I should also add that damnatio memoriae is indeed a modern term for the practice. Also that it did not only apply to emperors. Apologies for not making this more clear in my original text.

An entire period from Ancient Egypt along with its probable five Pharaohs was "erased" from history: (Amenhotep IV) Akhenaten, Smenkhare, Neferneferuaten, Tutankhamun (King Tut), and Ay of the Amarna Period

(Amenhotep IV) Akhenaten started off this period, but most people are probably more familiar with his son King Tutankhamun (King Tut), and his wife Nefertiti because of the incredible works of art they're associated with and the stories of their discoveries.

Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten and moved the capital city from Thebes, where it had been for almost 300 years, to Akhetaten a new city. He radically changed the religious system of Egypt from polytheistic to one focusing on the worship of Aten, the sun disk (to the near exclusion of all other gods). His reign was one of extreme richness and the art style changed pretty dramatically. But the new religion created a lot of tension / chaos / hatred and his line of succession was messy. After his death, the newly reformed religion reverted back to what it was before.

After a few successors came and died, Horemheb became pharaoh and wanted to distance himself from the past, unpopular Akhenaten. So the entire city of Akhetaten and all its temples was destroyed and abandoned. The capital moved back to Thebes. Akhenaten's name was erased and replaced with simply "the enemy" in places, and Horemheb erased the probable five pharaohs of the period from the record books. He extended the dates of his reign to make it seem as if he succeeded directly from Akhenaten predecessor.

Much of what we know about the Amarna period is possible because the city and temples were not fully destroyed before they were abandoned and because many temples and buildings were taken down and their stones reused. Many carved stones were simply turned around so that their faces were covered and re-carved. Others were just dumped in quarries or were crudely broken and have been reconstructed. The pieces of the puzzle are still being put back together today, for example this from late 2012 about the life/death of Nefertiti: http://www.dayralbarsha.com/node/124

/u/Georgy_K_Zhukov would be a good guy to ask on this. Zhukov was not erased per-se but a major attempt to play down his role in WW2 was made in the post-Stalin era. Mod Zhukov did a rather long post on it a while ago but i forgot what the question was.

EDIT: Thanks to caffarelli for finding the question: http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1mera8/do_we_know_what_georgy_zhukovs_thought_of_the/

There was a serious effort to erase a man named Herostratus from the historical record.

Herostratus burned down the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus. The Temple was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world and was the favorite of the man who made the first list of the seven wonders:

I have set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon on which is a road for chariots, and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus, and the hanging gardens, and the colossus of the Sun, and the huge labour of the high pyramids, and the vast tomb of Mausolus; but when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds, those other marvels lost their brilliancy, and I said, "Lo, apart from Olympus, the Sun never looked on aught so grand".[2]

• The Antipater of Sidon

The temple was not only the pride of Ephesus, it seems like they had somewhat of a tourist economy built around it. Herostratus burned the temple because he wanted his name to live forever.

The authorities of Ephesus banned his name from being spoken under the penalty of death. Their plan would have worked if it wasn't for the meddling Theopompus who as far as I know was the only one to record Herostratus's name in his history.

Theopompus's works became well known, and he dragged Herostratus along with him. He probably would have been erased without Theopompus. We still would have known that someone burned down the temple, but not his name and probably not other details as well.

Thuthmose III tried to have his stepmother and co regent Hatshepsut erased from history by literally chiselling her name and image of walls and having her statues destroyed. That said the campaign was haphazard at best and we know plenty about her, although not as much as we would like about Egypt's only female Pharaoh. It certainly didn't help that all the images tat show her show her as a man in the dress of a male Pharaoh but all the epithets are feminine. Gave the first people to decode the hieroglyphics a real headache since they could find no record of her in the lists of royal names.

The Aztec ruler Itzcotl and his adviser Tlacaelel tried to erase from history all memories of a pre-Aztec Past, including the memories of the nomadic Mexicas who first founded their capital city of Tenochtitlan.

Shortly after the formation of the Triple Alliance, Itzcoatl and Tlacaelel instigated sweeping reforms on the Aztec state and religion. Tlacaelel ordered the burning of most of the extant Aztec books, claiming that they contained lies and that it was "not wise that all the people should know the paintings". He thereafter rewrote the history of the Aztec people, placing the Mexica in a more central role.

Tlacaelel recast or strengthened the concept of the Aztecs as a chosen people, elevated the tribal god/hero Huitzilopochtli to top of the pantheon of gods,[4] and increased militarism.[5] In tandem with this, Tlacaelel is said to have increased the level and prevalence of human sacrifice, particularly during a period of natural disasters that started in 1446 (according to Durán).

To strengthen the Aztec nobility, [Tlacaelel] helped create and enforce sumptuary laws, prohibiting commoners from wearing certain adornments such as lip plugs, gold armbands, and cotton cloaks. He also instigated a policy of burning the books of conquered peoples with the aim of erasing all memories of a pre-Aztec past.

This was most likely done by Tlacaelel in an attempt to establish the Aztec Empire as the dominant regional power. He did this by bolstering nationalism and removing any reminisce of the old and weak nomadic-Aztec past.

Can anyone comment on the supposed Nazi punishment where apparently should one commit a heinous enough crime then ones family and extended family would be killed and their records erased?