They were intoxicated with a neurotoxic plant known as the "sardonic herb" (which some scientists think is hemlock water-dropwort) and then dropped from a high rock or beaten to death.
[2][3] During the Roman Republic, the Tarpeian Rock, a steep cliff at the southern summit of the Capitoline Hill, was used for public executions.
Tiberius would execute people, most notably boys whose sexual company he had grown tired of, by having them thrown from a cliff into the sea while he watched.
In pre-colonial South Africa, several tribes including the Xhosa and the Zulu had named execution hills, from which miscreants were hurled to their deaths.
It is alleged that during the Namibian war of independence numerous, SWAPO rebels were dropped from South African helicopters over the sea.