Proverbium - Yearbook

FROM TRANSLATION TO PROVERB

Adina Chirilă — 2025-07-25

This research examines the genesis of a well-known Romanian proverb from both philological and translation studies perspectives: Cine sapă groapa altuia cade singur în ea / Whoever digs a pit for others will fall into it. The aim of the research is to determine in which historical period of the cultural development of the Romanian literary language it is possible to ascertain the existence of a popular proverb with an existence independent of the biblical prototype from which it originates. The primary methodology is drawn from diachronic linguistics, more precisely the comparative-historical method, supplemented by linguistic and stylistic textual analysis. By studying both concordances and divergences, it is possible to identify and interpret an important moment in the cultural context of the 17th century. This is the period in which the translators of biblical and popular literature of the time became aware of the emergence of a proverb that follows a different cultural trajectory from that of the biblical translations. Furthermore, the research argues in favour of the idea that proverbs are not fixed-form constructions, but miniature texts of wisdom, whose form and meaning vary from one era to another.

THE DICTIONARY OF MODERN PROVERBS

Wolfgang Mieder — 2025-07-25

This is the fifth supplement to The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs (New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2012), edited by Charles Clay Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder, and Fred R. Shapiro. It registers 49 additional modern Anglo-American proverbs with historical dates and contextualized instances.

DO THE BIG FISH EAT THE LITTLE ONES?

Erzsébet Drahota-Szabó — 2025-07-25

This paper, with its provocative title, serves as a small experiment, a case study intended to spark further scholarly discussion. The central question is: Who handles the translation of proverbs more successfully – professional translators or ChatGPT? The author compares excerpts from Hungarian literary works with their German and English translations. Both human translations and those of generative artificial intelligence are critically analyzed. The source texts selected for the study contain proverbs that are constitutive of the text, i.e., they have a particular translation relevance. The primary evaluation criteria for analyzing the translations are: Who, the human or ChatGPT, can better assess the translation relevance of the respective proverb? Who can – based on translation relevance – choose an adequate translation procedure? In an exaggerated form, the question is whether or for how long translators (humans) are still needed when translating literary works.

PROVERBS IN THE PHRASEOLOGICAL DICTIONARY FROM THE WORKS OF CORNELIUS TACITUS

Ana Lehocki-Samardžić — 2025-07-25

Based on 128 proverbs and sayings attributed to the Roman historian Cornelius Tacitus, as listed in the Latinum in aeternum collection (Marević 2002), this paper explores the connection between the semantic categories of the quoted phrases and their syntactic structures and aims to prove that, despite the possibility of learning Latin sayings formulaically without surface understanding of Latin grammar, their acceptance and reproduction by Croatian speakers are influenced not only by their semantics but also by their deep structural clarity. For this purpose, all the quoted phrases were subjected to an extensive search for their occurrence in the corpus of the Croatian Language Repository (HJR) of the Institute of Croatian Language and Linguistics. The study tested the representation of various Latin surface structures in the HJR corpus, including accusative with infinitive (ACI), nominative with infinitive (NCI), ablative absolute (ABL.APS.), independent finite sentences in the indicative and subjunctive moods, various nominal and verbal collocations or syntagms and the so-called historical infinitives. The paper has established that phrases from Cornelius Tacitus and other Roman and Latin authors with an indisputable depth structure are accepted and present in the HJR corpus, while those with an unclear depth structure, such as the so-called historical infinitives, are completely absent.

THE SEMANTICS OF PROVERBS

El Mustapha Lemghari — 2025-07-25

The paper aims to pursue the debate on the semantics of proverbs. The focus is on the distinction between metaphorical proverbs and literal proverbs, as conceived and supported by Kleiber in a number of recent works. Kleiber’s main import consists in considering the mechanism he calls “superordinate and cross-domain figurativity” a prerequisite for proverbiality. Its operation as such on both kinds of proverbs results in two essential defining characteristics: (1) proverbial meaning is superordinate in character, and (2) it applies in an indirect way to instantiating cases. In view of this double characteristic, the distinction runs into a serious difficulty regarding the functioning of literal proverbs. It turns out to be hard to understand in this sense how literal proverbs can apply, despite their intrinsic literality, to a range of specific situations. We will argue from the perspective of class-inclusion theory for the metaphoricity of both kinds of proverbs, if only because of their similar functioning: every proverb is metaphorical in terms of both its superordinate meaning, which is quite different from its literal meaning, and its indirect cross-domain application.

PROVERBS AND PROVERBIAL THINKING WITHIN LOUISE BENNETT’S POETRY

Aileen Lobban — 2025-07-25

This article examines the poetry of Louise Bennett (1919 – 2006) using the concept of proverbial thinking to explore the impact of the proverbs in her poems. Proverbial thinking is used as a broad term referring to diverse methods of using, collecting, and preserving proverbs, which in turn activates a sense of urgency surrounding the need to preserve and protect a body of knowledge. Looking at proverbial thinking is also about pointing out elements of proverbial use and knowledge that are not always obvious and that become even more interesting when analysed. Bennett’s own collection of proverbs, here entitled the Proverb Manuscript, serves as a means of expanding the interpretations of the proverbs. The moral and thematic headings under which Bennett places each proverb in the Proverb Manuscript are considered integral to understanding the malleability of the proverb form. The openness of the concept of proverbial thinking also allows for discussion of many of the central topics which surround Bennett, whose career crucially straddles the shifting cultural moment when Jamaica gained independence in 1962. Overall, the article illustrates the multiplicity of proverbial thinking that reflects the layers of complexity within Bennett’s poems, which are written exclusively in Creole.

“WHAT FATWOOD DECAYS, WHAT WORD DECAYS”

Mawonthing Ng — 2025-07-25

This paper examines the data drawn from a survey conducted in 2020 among Tangkhul diasporic students in Shillong, Meghalaya, regarding their familiarity with and use of some traditional proverbs and proverbial phrases. This is in response to the growing concern in the community regarding the cultural competence of the younger generation. Given their status as repositories of ancestral wisdom, proverbial usage in contemporary communication must have very specific modes of operation. The aim of this study is, therefore, twofold: firstly, to gauge the proverbial literacy of younger Tangkhul diasporic speakers and to try to understand the contemporary currency of Tangkhul fixed expressions among a globalised youth. The proverbial literacy of 129 college-educated urban Tangkhul youth aged between 19 and 33 years was tested using snowball sampling to determine the contemporary relevance of these proverbs among the young diaspora. While the small sample size inhibits the establishment of a paremiological minimum, the findings are useful for the understanding of cultural continuities and shifts among the Tangkhul Naga, especially given the UNESCO status of the language as endangered. The findings show that although over 50 percent of speakers have low proverbial literacy, a significant number do possess active knowledge. These insights contribute not only towards establishing a paremiological minimum for Tangkhul, but also potentially address questions of cultural influence, diasporic identities, and the ability of fixed expressions to survive even in the absence of current cultural referents.

IS AN ALBANIAN MAN’S BESA HIS BOND?

Fatma Shijaku — 2025-07-25

“An Englishman’s word is his bond”. What about the Albanian concept of besa? Besa, regarded as the holiest word and a precious value in Albanian culture, is reflected in Albanian personal names, legends and ballads, customary laws, and the works of both English and Albanian writers such as Edith Durham and Ismail Kadare. It is also present in museums dedicated to the rescue of Jews during the Holocaust, in cultural and political events, and in media coverage, such as the BBC article “What can Albania teach us about trust?” Considered the cornerstone of the Albanian code of honour in past centuries and a defining virtue of Albanian identity, besa has generated a rich corpus of proverbs. This study explores proverbs about besa in the Albanian language, as depicted in Albanian written sources, primarily dictionaries such as “Fjalë të urta të popullit shqiptar” (“Wise sayings of Albanian people” by Jorgo Panajoti and Agron Xhagolli, 1983) and “Fjalor i Shqipes së Sotme” (Dictionary of Current Albanian Language, 2002). The aim is to portray the many nuances and attitudes encapsulated by besa in these proverbs. The discussion highlights the richness of Albanian proverbs about “trust, troth, the pledged word, honour, the solemn promise and bond”, i.e. besa, by examining their content and cultural significance.

“EVERY MAN HAS HIS DAY IN COURT”

Raymond M. Summerville — 2025-07-25

This essay explores some of the proverbs, sayings, and proverbial expressions used by Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice (1967). It argues that Marshall’s proverbial language use conveys several aspects of his worldview including his philosophy concerning race, class, and social justice in American society. The essay also aims to illustrate ways that Marshall’s multifaceted proverbial language use demonstrates the sound knowledge he possessed in the area of legal studies and the exceptional talent he possessed in the areas of rhetoric and deliberation. Furthermore, the essay reveals some of the ways Marshall used proverbial language to connect with other people as he incorporated various proverbs and phrases into his speech which would help make legal language more accessible to common folk (especially the people he would represent as an NAACP and LDF attorney) while also allowing him to capitalize on opportune rhetorical moments in the courtroom. The essay utilizes several Marshall biographies, interviews, and legal documents as source material. It also incorporates the scholarship of other paremiologists such as Wolfgang Mieder, Anna T. Litovkina, Sanda Eretescu Golopentia, Harvey Sack, and others to address issues concerning: categorization, definition, origin, meaning, interpretation, and context.

TOWARDS A LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS OF SUBSTITUTION IN ANGLO-AMERICAN ANTI-PROVERBS ABOUT MONEY

Anna T. Litovkina — 2025-07-25

The recent study is to be seen as a continuation of the author's previous research (conducted alone or with co-authors) which is concerned with the study of various techniques of proverb transformation. The study first addresses the background of anti-proverb research and terminology. It then looks at the most frequent themes covered in anti-proverbs, with a particular focus on proverbs about money. The main focus of this study is on the analysis of substitution, one of the most popular mechanisms of proverb variation in Anglo-American anti-proverbs about money. The Anglo-American anti-proverbs covered in the study were taken primarily from American and British written sources. The study lists many examples of these anti-proverbs and reveals a wide range of techniques employed in them. The study seeks answers to the following questions: What are the most frequent types of substitution; What components of the original proverb are replaced when an anti-proverb is created; How many items are replaced from these; Where are the replaced items; What themes appear in our anti-proverbs?

INTERNATIONAL BIBLIOGRAPHY OF NEW AND REPRINTED PROVERB COLLECTIONS

Wolfgang Mieder — 2025-07-25

INTERNATIONAL PROVERB SCHOLARSHIP: AN UPDATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Wolfgang Mieder — 2025-07-25

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF HAUSA PROVERBS STUDIES

Patryk Zając — 2025-07-25

Diana Stantcheva and Klaus-Dieter Ludwig. Nicht auf den Mund gefallen. Phraseologisches Wörterbuch Deutsch-Bulgarisch

Hrisztalina Hrisztova-Gotthardt — 2025-07-25

Aderemi Raji-Oyelade (ed.). Postproverbials at Work: The Context of Radical Proverb-Making in Nigerian Languages

Peter Unseth — 2025-07-25

Preface

Melita Aleksa Varga — 2025-07-25