Chapter Tannhauser to Tarring and Feathering of T by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Tarpaulins or Tars. Sailors, more frequently called Jack Tars. Tarpaulins are tarred cloths used commonly on board ship to keep articles from the sea-spray, etc.
   The more correct spelling is tar-palling, from pall, Latin pallium, a cloak or cloth.

Tarpeian Rock So called from Tarpeia, a vestal virgin, the daughter of Spurius Tarpeius, governor of the citadel on the Capitoline Hill. Tarpeia agreed to open the gates to the Sabines if they would give her “what they wore on their arms” (meaning their bracelets). The Sabines, “keeping their promise to the ear,” crushed her to death with their shields, and she was buried in that part of the hill called the Tarpeian Rock. Subsequently, traitors were cast down this rock and so killed.

“Bear him to the rock Tarpeian, and from thence
Into destruction cast him.”
Shakespeare: Coriolanus, iii. 1

Tarred All tarred with the same brush. All alike to blame, all sheep of the same flock. The allusion is to the custom of distinguishing the sheep of any given flock by a common mark with a brush dipped in tar.

Tarring and Feathering The first record of this punishment is in 1189 (1 Rich. I.). A statute was made that any robber voyaging with the crusaders “shall be first shaved, then boiling pitch shall be poured upon his head, and a cushion of feathers shook over it.” The wretch was then to be put on shore at the very first place the ship came to. (Rymer: Fœdera, i 65.)