Chapter one

1.1 Proverbs as a phraseological unit.

Proverb is a brief saying that presents a truth or some bit of useful wisdom. It is usually based on common sense or practical experience. The effect of a proverb is to make the wisdom it tells seem to be self-evident. The same proverb often occurs among several different peoples. True proverbs are saying that have been passed from generation to generation primarily by word of month. They may also have been put into written form. The Book of Proverbs in the Hebrew Bible or old Testament, is the most notable collection of such sayings.

Who supposedly could early on a sensible conversation for a whole evening in nothing, but proverbs. Benjamin Franklin used many proverbial axpressions in his Poor Richard’s Almanac, issued every year from 1733 to 1758 Franklin wrote many of them himself, and took the rest from other sources.

Proverbs, Book of is a book of the Hebrew Bible, or old Testament. It is also known as the Proverbs of Solomon because according to tradition king Solomon wrote it. However scholars believe that the book’s assortment of moral and religious saying, poems and warnings come from various periods in the history of ancient from until after the period of the Babylanian Exile, which ended in 538 B.C.

Proverbs were always the most vivacious and at the same time the most stable part of the national languages, suitable competing with the sayings and aphorisms of outstanding thinkers. In the proverbs and sayings picturesqueness of national thinking was more vivid expressed as well as their features of national character. The proverbs and sayings are the paper of folklore which is short but deep in the meaning. They express the outlook of the amount of people by their social and ideal functions. Proverbs and sayings include themselves the some certain features of historical development and the culture of people.

The semantic sphere of proverbs is very wide and cannot limit them. The proverbs describe the every branch of people's life. The fact is that proverbs and sayings are similar in meaning in spite of their diversity in form and language. To prove the said above some examples:

A bird in hand is worth two in the bush.

Лучше синица в руках, чем журавль на небе.

Even if the form, the word structure and the stylistic structure of these proverbs are different they have the same meaning. The proverbs change their meaning and form very rare, they have long living features. The spreading of any proverb among people is implemented as slow as it is created. Proverbs are retest by geographic area which is going to admit it only after that the proverb can become its property.

Many scholars tried to do the researches to show the differences between proverbs and sayings in order to point out their border of limit. One of the outstanding Russian scholars the author of "dictionary of vivid Russian language'' and ''the proverbs of Russian nation'' V.I. Dal wrote: saying is the bud and proverb is the fruit. So from this point of view we can see that proverbs express the full finite meaning and saying is a phrase which expresses the fugitive meaning. The sayings are considered to be the half part of the proverbs. We can also add that proverbs and sayings are separate genres which are different from each other.[12]

There are some features that can be helpful in identifying the proverbs from sayings.

1. When there are two logical counters became complete composition the brief summarizing thought appeared. That explains the lack of spare word or description.

2. To express the idea straightly and logically proverbs are characterized by their features. Every proverb values or appreciates any event both positively and negatively. Such kind of features serve to make the proverbs popular among people.

3. Proverbs express wise and complete idea and sayings express the description of something but do not give complete meanings. They consist of one compositional composition.

4. Proverbs can be used in neutral figurative meaning. This feature of proverbs widen the sphere of their usage thematically. That's why proverbs are famous among different nations and people. Sayings are characterized by limited usage in one or two nations who are near to each other geographically and in non related languages. For example in Russian ''заморить человека'' means to eat something has no equivalent or component in English language and translated by analogy.

5. The sayings are the means of devices or pointing in speech the function of proverbs is to prove any event or situation.

In spite of their own specific features proverbs have general sides which also belong to the other types of folklore. One of such features of the proverbs is that they are created in language in a very long time and disappear in a long period. It is connected with the formal feature of the content of the proverb. To turn some wise thoughts into proverbs some conditions are required. And this conditions may be the following: first of all the proverbs should describe the economic, social and politic life of the people. To the instruction to the dictionary of Dal, Shoiochov wrote that among all the proverbs which are closer and more important for them and reject those which are old and not suitable for them to build a new life. For example in Russian we can find the proverb ''Где хан, там и Орда'', ''Старших и в Орде почитают''; these kind of proverbs can be considered as old ones and are not used in nowadays, because they do not describe the nowadays life and politics. But such kind of proverbs could be changed and said ''Где царь, там и народ''.[12]

Secondary, the idea expressed in the proverb must have global character. It means that those proverbs that describe the characters related to the human beings are the same in all the languages.

Thirdly, the idea that can be used as sample and answers to the above conditions must be complete in literary Christianized form. When the pattern idea answers these three questions it turns to be a proverb. Also it should be pointed out that the character of immediate creation of proverbs are connected with sociable structure, the dominance and non dominance of politic, cultural, social - economic life. The content expressed in proverb changes depending on the change in social life.

It can be approved from the above mentioned proverb about '' хан'' and ''Орда''. It either widens or narrows and it gives completely another meaning. In this we can see that second feature of the proverb is that it is connected with social life, and it is close to people's way of living. Proverbs serve as rare base in researching or studying of people: the level of their cultural, politic, economic life in ancient time or periods. As proverbs reflect the life practice of people over different periods and also they reflect moral norms and religious faith of nation. One more feature of proverbs is that proverbs are often used in colloquial speech of people and are extended in varied forms.

Date: 2015-01-29; view: 1541