History Main / ArtifactOfAttraction

* The Holy Grail had this effect in ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheLastCrusade''. It's the source of the divide between Indiana Jones and his father, who spent his whole life studying it. Meanwhile, the grail's allure drives both villains to their doom. First, Walter Donovan drinks from a decoy grail, causing him to age to death. Then, Elsa Schneider attempts to take the grail out of the temple with disastrous results. In a LiteralCliffhanger moment, she's so tempted to reach for the grail instead of Indiana's hand that she loses her grip and falls to her death. Indy nearly suffers the same fate trying to reach the Grail, but his father convinces him to let it go.

* The legendary Hope Diamond started out as the biggest blue diamond in the world and even after being cut down a few times is still [[WesternAnimation/AmericanDad ginormagantuan]]. The story is that it was stolen from a temple in India and the god who was robbed laid a terrible curse on the gem. Every owner of the Hope has suffered immense tragedies; deaths of family and friends, collapsing businesses, ruined reputations, all that. And yet there was always someone who was willing to chance the curse just so they could say they owned the Hope. The last owner donated it to the Smithsonian and so far nothing bad has happened to them. The ''actual'' story of the Hope Diamond is quite the opposite. Very few of the supposed "mysterious deaths" or other misfortunes attributed to the diamond were those of people to have ever actually owned it.

** The title Silmarils in ''Literature/TheSilmarillion'' are a prime example of Artifacts of Attraction. They don't confer any special powers and possessing them provides the owner with no benefits whatsoever. But when Finwë (the creator Fëanor's father) is murdered and his murderer Morgoth (the local Devil stand-in) takes them with him just because they looked interesting, Fëanor swears revenge and makes an oath that he, his sons, and their people will not rest until the murder is avenged and the three jewels returned to their rightful owners. 500 years and no less than seven battles of epic proportions later, almost the entire High Elven nobility has been wiped out one after another, thousands if not millions of elves have been killed by orcs or other elves, and the entire region of Beleriand has been swallowed by the ocean, just because eight elves did not KnowWhenToFoldEm.\\\
And all of the Silmarils end up where mortals (and immortals alike) can no longer reach them, [[ShootTheShaggyDog by the way]]. One was sunk into the depths of the sea, one was thrown into a fissure into the core of the Earth, and the final became the planet ''Venus''. Though that might have been the only way to end the whole mess. The Silmarils were so attractive that Morgoth wore them in a crown even though their light burned him. The burns were severe enough that they would never heal, but he kept the Silmarils anyway.
** The One Ring in ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' has this power. Everyone who loses the ring wants to retake it. Even worse, anyone who brings the Ring to the one place that can [[NoManShouldHaveThisPower destroy the Ring]], then decides to keep the Ring. This property of the Ring is what ultimately brings about its downfall: when two people it had ensnared arrive at Mount Doom at the same time, their fighting over it is what causes it to fall into the volcano.

* There's an inversion in ''Franchise/GreenLantern''. Larfleeze, the Orange Lantern of the light of avarice, is the greediest being in the cosmos. How greedy? Everything and even everyone he sees become Artifacts of Attraction for him. He hoards precious and useless things and he even "steals" the people he kills by turning them into "[[LivingMemory ghosts]]" under his control, making up the Orange Lantern Corps. He's the sole member of the Corps because aside from the Orange Light growing weaker if there's more than one wielder, he's far too greedy to ever share any of his power.

* The Golden Helmet from Creator/CarlBarks' ''WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck'' comic of the same name is a headgear version of the One Ring. Using an ancient edict, an AmoralAttorney has come up with some legal mumbo jumbo that declares anyone who owns the helmet becomes legal king of North America, and one by one, the heroes succumb to the temptation and decide they don't just want to keep it away from the villain, they want to rule North America themselves! They eventually manage to throw it into Mt. D-- sorry, the ocean, only for it to reappear courtesy of [[BornLucky Gladstone Gander]] in a sequel by [[Creator/DonRosa Keno Don Rosa]].
* Franchise/XMen student Tag has this trope and its inversion as his mutant ability. He can make whatever he touches telepathically compel people to flock to it or run away.

[[folder:Live-Action TV ]]

* The Sword of Kahless in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine''. Kor starts seeing it as a way to reclaim his glory days in the Empire and Worf nearly lets Kor fall to his death (he claimed there was a ledge that Kor could reach below, but Kor couldn't see one, while Dax saw it but could tell it wouldn't support Kor's weight) in an attempt to keep the sword for himself. Eventually, Dax has enough of Klingon posturing and [[NoNonsenseNemesis stuns them both]] just to get them to shut up. The writers resisted any attempt to say that the sword or the air or whatever had any kind of mind-altering effect and that it was simply the idea of having the sword once possessed by Kahless himself that made them act like they had. In this case, simple lust for power is a likely culprit, as both Klingons contend that ownership of the sword would give the holder a solid claim to leadership of the Klingon Empire. Considering the holy status of Kahless, this is a pretty reasonable argument. Similar to the Hope Diamond solution, they eventually decide that bringing it back to Klingon society would only cause even more power lust and bloodshed over holding it, and decide to "hide" it by beaming it into empty space to wait for another age before being found.
* ''Series/The10thKingdom'' has magical shoes that make the wearer invisible, but the longer you have/wear them, the more you want to keep wearing them...

* [[Webcoming/FateGagOrder Fate/Gag Order]] has Mandricardo entertain the idea that Durandal from ''Literature/OrlandoFurioso'' is one of these, as it's changed hands to the doom of its current wielder (save Charlemagne who never used it), as they are felled or betrayed by those who desire it next. Hektor, its original wielder, doesn't think it's legitimately cursed though.