History repeats itself

History, we know, is apt to repeat itself.
[1858 G. Eliot Janet's Repentance in Scenes of Clerical Life II. x.]

History, it is said, repeats itself. ‥Few but are reminded almost every day‥of something that has gone before.
[1865 H. Sedley Marian Rooke III. v. i.]

History tends to defy the familiar aphorism; whether national or personal, it seldom repeats itself.
[1957 V. Brittain Testament of Experience 11]

Maybe history repeats itself—but I have to have facts.
[1971 A. Price Alamut Ambush xiii.]

Related to: past

Bibliography of major proverb collections and works cited from modern editions is available here.

Express oneself in the same way or with the same words, as in Grandma forgets she has told us this story before and repeats herself over and over, or This architect tends to repeat himself--all his houses look alike. A well-known version of this idiom is the proverb History repeats itself, first recorded (in English) in 1561. For example, Her mother also married when she was 18--history repeats itself. [Mid-1800s]