proVERBS

Translation:
To a hard log a hard hatchet

Equivalent:
A crabbed knot must have a crabbed wedge

Translation:
To a miserly father, an extravagant son

Equivalent:
After a thrifty father, a prodigal son

Translation:
Beyond the mountain there are also people

Equivalent:
Behind the mountains there are people to be found

Translation:
To the enemy that flees, a golden bridge

Equivalent:
For a flying enemy make a golden bridge

Translation:
To every bird its nest is beautiful

Equivalent:
Every bird likes his own nest best

Translation:
It's one thing to say, another to do

Equivalent:
Saying is one thing, and doing another

Translation:
You will have many friends as long as you are rich

Equivalent:
In time of prosperity friends will be plenty; in time of adversity, not one amongst twenty

Translation:
A reconciled friendship is like a badly healed wound

Equivalent:
A broken friendship may be soldered, but will never be sound

Translation:
A friend helped, an enemy declared

Equivalent:
Lend your money and lose your friend

Translation:
A fair weather friend changes with the wind

Equivalent:
When good cheer is lacking, our friends will be packing

Translation:
A friend of everybody, a friend of nobody

Equivalent:
A friend in the market is better than money in the chest

Translation:
Friend and wine like to be old

Equivalent:
Old friends and old wine are best

Translation:
Armed to the teeth

Equivalent:
Armed to the teeth

Translation:
Absence is the enemy of love, by how much distant from the eye, by that much from the heart

Equivalent:
Salt water and absence wash away love

Translation:
In times of need friends are known

Equivalent:
A friend in need is a friend indeed

Translation:
Two are needed to make a quarrel

Equivalent:
It takes two to make a quarrel

Translation:
One needs to make the garment according to the cloth

Equivalent:
Cut your coat according to your cloth

Translation:
Dog | snarling | and | not |compelled | woe | to | its | hide

Equivalent:
Quarrelling dogs come halting home

Translation:
Dog does not eat dog

Equivalent:
Dog does not eat dog

Translation:
I sing of him who gives me bread

Equivalent:
He is my friend that grinds at my mill

Translation:
One does not pay gold for one\'s own house

Equivalent:
There is no place like home

Translation:
To fall from the frying pan into the embers

Equivalent:
Out of the frying-pan into the fire

Translation:
It\'s a bad bird that fouls its own nest

Equivalent:
It is an ill bird that fouls its own nest

Translation:
Who loves me, loves my dog

Equivalent:
Love me, love my dog

Translation:
Se si parla inglese molto bene e italiano è la tua lingua madre, invia a me, Tony Randall, una e-mail per discutere la traduzione di questi venti proverbi

Equivalent:
Well begun is half done

Translation:
He who says what he wants, hears that which he would not wish

Equivalent:
He who says what he likes shall hear what he does not like

Translation:
He who does good has good

Equivalent:
Good finds good

Translation:
He who works hard in youth enjoys himself in old age

Equivalent:
For age and want save while you may, no morning sun lasts whole day

Translation:
He who has a good friend has a good morning

Equivalent:
A good neighbour, a good morrow

Translation:
He who endures it wins it

Equivalent:
Perseverance overcomes all things

Translation:
He who does not have a brain needs to have legs

Equivalent:
Little wit in the head makes much work for the feet

Translation:
He who offends does not pardon

Equivalent:
The offender never pardons

Translation:
He who offends, writes on sand; he who is offended, on marble

Equivalent:
Injuries don't use to be written on ice

Translation:
He who brings is always welcome

Equivalent:
They are welcome that bring

Translation:
He who mixes with wolves learns to howl

Equivalent:
One must howl with the wolves

Translation:
He who is about to drown even attaches himself to a piece of straw

Equivalent:
A drowning man will catch at a straw

Translation:
He who goes to a party and is not invited is likely to be chased away

Equivalent:
An unbidden guest knows not where to sit

Translation:
He who goes to the [osto?] loses his place

Equivalent:
Who loves to roam may lose his home

Translation:
He who wants peace should prepare for war

Equivalent:
If you wish for peace, be prepared for war

Translation:
Blow for blow

Equivalent:
Tit for tat

Translation:
He who wishes my wellbeing is my uncle

Equivalent:
He loves me well that makes my belly swell

Translation:
Heavy accounts, long friendship

Equivalent:
Even reckoning makes long friends

Translation:
Orlando could not prevail gainst two

Equivalent:
Not even Hercules could contend against two

Translation:
Ravens with ravens do not peck out the eyes

Equivalent:
Crows will not pick out crows' eyes

Translation:
There is for everybody room under the sun

Equivalent:
The world is a wide parish (place)

Translation:
From friends God looks after me; from enemies I look after myself

Equivalent:
God defend me from my friends; from my enemies I can (will) defend myself

Translation:
One ought not to say anything other than good about the dead

Equivalent:
Say nothing of the dead but what is good

Translation:
God moderates the wind to the shornlamb

Equivalent:
God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb

Translation:
Gifts of an enemy are not gifts

Equivalent:
Gifts from enemies are dangerous

Translation:
Where there is no danger there is no glory

Equivalent:
Too light winning makes the prize light

Translation:
Where drums are talking, laws fall silent

Equivalent:
Where drums beat laws are silent

Translation:
Where one is born, there the grass is green [pascere=to graze]

Equivalent:
East or west, home is best

Translation:
Two dogs, who have a single bone, with difficulty are at peace

Equivalent:
Two dogs over one bone seldom agree

Translation:
Hard with hard

Equivalent:
Diamond cut diamond

Translation:
The good name is better than all the roiches of the world

Equivalent:
A good name is better than riches

Translation:
And they from their swords shall make hoes

Equivalent:
They shall beat their swords into ploughshares

Translation:
They are tied together like the fingers of the hand

Equivalent:
They are finger and thumb

Translation:
Be like sheep: where one goes, all go

Equivalent:
One sheep follows another

Translation:
To smoke the pipe of peace

Equivalent:
To smoke the pipe of peace

Translation:
A glove-wearing cat never catches mice

Equivalent:
A cat in gloves catches no mice

Translation:
Friends are good in every piazza

Equivalent:
The friends of my friends are also my friends

Translation:
The absent are always wrong

Equivalent:
The absent are always in the wrong

Translation:
Birds pair up with their peers

Equivalent:
Birds of a feather flock together

Translation:
You scratch me and I\'ll scratch you

Equivalent:
Claw me, and I'll claw thee

Translation:
War of extermination

Equivalent:
War to the knife

Translation:
The smallest enemy can give you much trouble

Equivalent:
There is no little enemy

Translation:
The sun shines for all

Equivalent:
The sun shines upon all alike

Translation:
Se si parla inglese molto bene e italiano è la tua lingua madre, invia a me, Tony Randall, una e-mail per discutere la traduzione di questi venti proverbi

Equivalent:
Time is the best healer

Translation:
In a hundred years and a hundred months water returns to its own country

Equivalent:
It will be all one a hundred years hence

Translation:
They understand each other like pickpockets at the fair

Equivalent:
They agree like pickpockets in a fair

Translation:
Brothers\' anger, devils\' anger

Equivalent:
Between two brothers, two witnesses and a notary

Translation:
Hell is paved with good intentions

Equivalent:
Hell is paved with good intentions

Translation:
The man by the word and the ox by the horn

Equivalent:
An ox is taken by the horns, and a man by the tongue

Translation:
The hare stays willingly where it was born

Equivalent:
The hare always returns to her form

Translation:
One\'s homeland is where one feels well

Equivalent:
Where is well with me there is my country

Translation:
The law of retribution

Equivalent:
Measure for measure

Translation:
The monkey is always a monkey, even though dressed in silk

Equivalent:
An ape's an ape, a varlet's a varlet, though they be clad in silk or scarlet

Translation:
To get up in a bad mood

Equivalent:
To rise on the wrong side

Translation:
Anger blinds reason

Equivalent:
Anger is a short madness

Translation:
Anger without strength isn\'t worth a fig [bark, skin]

Equivalent:
Anger cannot stand without a strong hand

Translation:
Obedience is the first duty of a soldier

Equivalent:
Obedience is the first duty of soldier

Translation:
Hatres drives quarrels

Equivalent:
Hatred stirs up strife

Translation:
Order is bread, disorder is hunger

Equivalent:
United we stand, divided we fall

Translation:
Unity makes strength

Equivalent:
Union is strength

Translation:
Man is wolf to man

Equivalent:
Man is to man a wolf

Translation:
Better late than never

Equivalent:
Better late than never

Translation:
Better a lean agreement than a fat sentence

Equivalent:
A lean compromise is better than a fat law-suit

Translation:
A friend who is near is worth more than a brother who is far away

Equivalent:
Better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off (B)

Translation:
Neither mule nor mill nor lords for a a neighbour

Equivalent:
A great lord is a bad neighbour

Translation:
There is never something which is bad for one person that is not good for another

Equivalent:
One man's meat is another man's poison

Translation:
There is nothing new under the sun

Equivalent:
There is no new thing under the sun

Translation:
Bad news soon arrives

Equivalent:
Bad news has wings

Translation:
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth

Equivalent:
Eye for eye, tooth for tooth

Translation:
Today beans, tomorrow hunger

Equivalent:
Stuff today and starve tomorrow

Translation:
Se si parla inglese molto bene e italiano è la tua lingua madre, invia a me, Tony Randall, una e-mail per discutere la traduzione di questi venti proverbi

Equivalent:
Every pedlar praises his needles

notes:
Pedlars used to carry smal lbut valuable things for sale in a pack on their back

Translation:
Every like likes its like

Equivalent:
Like will to like

Translation:
Everyone is master in his own house

Equivalent:
A man's house is his castle

Translation:
A rare guest, a dear guest

Equivalent:
A constant guest is never welcome

Translation:
To pay him with the same currency

Equivalent:
To pay one in his own coin

Translation:
The envy of a friend is worse than the snare of an enemy

Equivalent:
Better an open enemy than a false friend

Translation:
Little gifts maintain friendship

Equivalent:
Small gifts keep friendship alive

Translation:
A loaf with love is worth more than a capon with sorrow

Equivalent:
Better an egg in peace than an ox in war

Translation:
Before choosing a friend you need to have eaten salt together for seven years

Equivalent:
Before you make a friend eat a bushel of salt with him

Translation:
As a bird is, so is its nest

Equivalent:
A little bird is content with little nest

Translation:
When there is burning nearby, bear water to your house

Equivalent:
Look to thyself when the neighbour's house is on fire

Translation:
Se si parla inglese molto bene e italiano è la tua lingua madre, invia a me, Tony Randall, una e-mail per discutere la traduzione di questi venti proverbi

Equivalent:
Whoso learneth young forgets not when he is old

Translation:
They are two souls in one nutshell

Equivalent:
Hand and glove

Translation:
Often he who laughs in the morning will weep in the evening

Equivalent:
Laugh before breakfast, you'll cry before supper

Translation:
To be like cats and dogs

Equivalent:
To agree like cats and dogs

Translation:
The pit her goes to the well so many times that it leaves there its handle or its ear [?]

Equivalent:
The pitcher goes so often to the well that it is broken at last

Translation:
So many countries, so many customs

Equivalent:
So many countries, so many customs

Translation:
As welcome as flowers in May

Equivalent:
As welcome as flowers in May

Translation:
The world is a theatre, and man a marionette

Equivalent:
All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players

Translation:
Se si parla inglese molto bene e italiano è la tua lingua madre, invia a me, Tony Randall, una e-mail per discutere la traduzione di questi venti proverbi

Equivalent:
To run with the hare and hunt with the hounds

Translation:
You hold the bag for me today and tomorrow I\'ll hold it for you

Equivalent:
Roll my log, and I'll roll yours

Translation:
Between two litigants a third person benefits

Equivalent:
Two dogs strive for a bone, and a third runs away with it

Translation:
Three thinhs chase a man from the house: smoke, leak and angry woman

Equivalent:
Three things drive a man out of his house - smoke, rain, and a scolding wife

Translation:
All they who will have taken the sword will perish by the sword

Equivalent:
All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword

Translation:
All the world is a village

Equivalent:
The sun shines everywhere

Translation:
To kill the hen that lays the golden egg

Equivalent:
To kill the goose that lays the golden eggs

Translation:
One donkey scratches the other

Equivalent:
One ass doth scrub another

Translation:
One nail drives out another

Equivalent:
One nail drives out another

Translation:
One service for another

Equivalent:
One good turn deserves another

Translation:
A couple and a pair

Equivalent:
Both of a hair

Translation:
One age goes away and another comes and the world remains perpetual

Equivalent:
One generation passes away, and another generation comes: but the earth abides for ever

Translation:
One hand washes another

Equivalent:
One hand washes the other

Translation:
A good friend is worth more than a hundred relarions

Equivalent:
A good friend is my nearest relation

Translation:
Four eyes see more than two

Equivalent:
Four eyes see more than two

Translation:
Nearness without a hedge brings enmity into the house

Equivalent:
Love your neighbour, yet pull not down your hedge

Translation:
Wine in, common sense out

Equivalent:
When wine is in, wit is out