Meaning literally, 'thus always to tyrants'. Perhaps it is better translated as 'this is what always happens to tyrants in the end'. It was supposedly said by Marcus Brutus at the assassination of Caesar in 44 BC, although he probably never actually said these words.
This seems to me to be a general truth through history - in the end. Just as the Velvet Revolutions of 1989 saw Communist Europe fall relatively peacefully, so it was that the ending was not so quiet for Ceausescu in Rumania - probably the worst of the dictators.
And so it is with the 'Arab Spring'. This seems a strangely appropriate quote today, with the demise of Muammar Gaddafi.
I wonder what the future holds for the Assads in Syria?
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