Monday, February 2, 2026

Greek Proverbs

Here are today's Greek proverbs with LOLCats! These are repeats of previous proverbs, but now with illustrations (and there are always more proverbs at the blog):

Ἀνδρὶ σοφῷ πᾶσα γῆ βατή.
The whole world is open to the wise man.
This is a fragment of the philosopher Democritus, the idea being that wisdom removes all obstacles. The word γῆ gives us English geology and geometry. The word also appears in the form γαῖα, as in the name of the Earth Goddess; find out more at Wikipedia: Gaia.



Κύριε, ἐλέησον.
Lord, have mercy.
The word ἐλέησον is a different kind of imperative; this is an aorist imperative from the verb ἐλεέω. The sigma is a clue that you are dealing with an aorist imperative; like most contract verbs, ἐλεέω has a sigmatic aorist: ἠλέησα (stem: ἐλέησ-). This phrase from Christian Greek is also found in Christian Latin: Kyrie eleison, or simply Kyrie. You can find out more at Wikipedia: Kyrie.



Σκιὰ ἀντὶ τοῦ σώματος.
A shadow instead of a body.
This saying was applied to people who might appear to be powerful but who have no power at all, like a shadow. From the root of Greek σῶμα we get English somatic.



Λάθε βιώσας.
Escape notice as you live your life.
As Erasmus explains, this saying praises the humble life, living unnoticed, not seeking fame. The Greek verb λανθάνω means, in the active voice, "escape notice" or "be unnoticed" (λάθε is the aorist active imperative). In the middle and passive forms, it means to "let something escape notice, " i.e. "forget." You can see the same root in the word Λήθη, the river of forgetfulness in the underworld; for more, see Wikipedia: Lethe.



Βατράχοις οἰνοχοεῖς.
You're pouring wine for frogs.
This is one of those proverbial "fool's errands," a bit like "pearls before swine." Because frogs don't drink wine, only water, you are wasting the wine that you pour for them.



And to finish up, here's a random proverb and a random LOLCat too:




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