diff --git a/src/lib.rs b/src/lib.rs
index a331c25..ce3f991 100644
--- a/src/lib.rs
+++ b/src/lib.rs
@@ -392,7 +392,14 @@ impl ArticleScraper {
 
     fn strip_id_or_class(context: &Context, id_or_class: &String) -> Result<(), ScraperError> {
         let xpath = &format!("//*[contains(@class, '{}') or contains(@id, '{}')]", id_or_class, id_or_class);
-        let node_vec = Self::evaluate_xpath(context, xpath, false)?;
+
+        let mut ancestor = xpath.clone();
+        if ancestor.starts_with("//") {
+            ancestor = ancestor.chars().skip(2).collect();
+        }
+
+        let query = &format!("{}[not(ancestor::{})]", xpath, ancestor);
+        let node_vec = Self::evaluate_xpath(context, query, false)?;
         for mut node in node_vec {
             node.unlink();
         }