To be in exile means being away from your home (i.e. city, state or country) and being either explicitly refused permission to return or being threatened by prison or death upon return.
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Exile has historically been used as a form of punishment, particularly for political opponents of those in power. The use of exile for political purposes can sometimes be useful for the government because it prevents the exilee from organizing in their native land or from becoming a martyr.
Exile represented a severe punishment, particularly for those, like Ovid or Du Fu, exiled to strange or backward regions, cut off from all of the possibilities of life as well as their families and associates. Dante describes the pain of exile in the Divine Comedy:
«. . . Tu lascerai ogne cosa diletta
più caramente; e questo è quello strale
che l'arco de lo essilio pria saetta.
Tu proverai sì come sa di sale
lo pane altrui, e come è duro calle
lo scendere e 'l salir per l'altrui scale . . .»
". . . You will leave everything you love most: this is the arrow that the bow of exile shoots first. You will know how salty another's bread tastes and how hard it is to ascend and descend another's stairs . . ."
Paradiso XVII: 55-60
Exile has been softened, to some extent, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as exiles have received welcome in other countries and have either created new communities within those countries or, less frequently, returned to their homelands following the demise of the regime that exiled them.
During a foreign occupation or a coup, a government in exile of a country may be established.
When large groups, or occasionally a whole people or nation is exiled, it can be said that this nation is in exile, or Diaspora. Nations that have been in exile for substantial periods include the Jews, who were deported by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon in 597 BCE and again in the years following the destruction of the second Temple in Jerusalem in the year 70.
A wealthy citizen who departs from a former abode for a lower tax jurisdiction in order to reduce his/her tax burden is termed a tax exile.
(Listed alpabetically by last name)