Part 4: On perseverance, industry, resilience, self-confidence, self-reliance, resourcefulness, daring, fortitude, and invulnerability

Edot

The consumption of sacrificial offerings will not kill the vulture.

A thousand ants cannot lift “a cube of” sugar; they can only mill around it in vain.

A thousand fishes will not overload a river.

A cat's back never touches the ground.

The lawyer argues other people's cases, much more his own.

An apprehender does not apprehend a masquerader.

The larkheeled Cuckoo vows that rather than not being delicious in the stew, it will crush its arms and legs in pursuit of that end.

It is the Ẹ̀lukú masquerader without a matchete that is hacked to death by its colleagues.

Whoever has a job should not malinger; if Providence smiles on one one can hardly fail.

Whoever is used to eating full-grown he-goats will eat lambs that have sprouted horns.

The same person who weeds the road to Ìjẹ̀bú without carrying off the weeds will eventually remove them.

The person who takes one's wife cannot stop one's locust bean seeds from fermenting.

Whoever wishes to eat heartily must lock his door firmly.

Whoever wishes to see a crab go to sleep will stay long by its hole.

Whoever will eat the honey in a rock does not worry about the edge of the axe.

Whoever wishes to see ducks go to sleep will go into debt paying for (fuel) oil.

Ògún is on the side of the swift.

Whoever is shunned by people should rejoice; whoever is shunned by God should look out.

Whoever dies from poverty dies a miserable death; whoever dies from work dies a noble death.

The person who plants a hundred yam seedlings and says he planted two hundred, after he has eaten a hundred truths, he will come to eat a hundred lies.

It is for the person who sweeps the floor that the floor is clean.

It is the industrious person that wins the spoils.

The person being chased by a masquerader should persevere; just as an earthling tires, so does the being from heaven.

Whoever dives head first to the ground has made a creditable attempt at suicide.

A person fed by others is never aware that there is famine.

Whoever leaps up decapitates dance.

A person dying from overwork is better than a person dying of destitution.

Those who arrive late are the ones who find the watery residue of the stew awaiting them.

The man who “claimed to have” killed six people during the Ọla war: people exclaimed in disbelief, “Ha, ha, ha!” He asked them to bring an ayò board, and he won six games. He said, if there were no witnesses for what happened in the secluded forest, aren't there witnesses for what happens in the house?

The person digging a grave is the one performing his or her funerary duties; the person crying is merely making a noise.

Only a person who looks at the bride's face knows that the bride is crying.

Whoever likes fineries should engage in a trade; it is the person blessed by riches that is wise.

Only those whose livelihood depends on Jẹgẹdẹ call him a silk cotton tree.

Whoever assigns a task to Ìgè Àdùbí assigns it to himself or herself; Ìgè Àdùbí will neither agree to do the task nor will he refuse.

A person whose greetings do not fill one's stomach cannot cause one to starve by withholding the greetings.

It is at one's occupation that one proves oneself an idler.

Empty mouths do not make chewing noises.

The mouth cooks vegetable stew most expertly; the hand emulating a machete cuts a field most effortlessly.

The forest knows no fear, and neither does the river know fear; the grind-stone never shows fear in the face of pepper.

The head is never so frightened that it disappears into the shoulder.

Fear of battle never afflicts a warrior.

The feet are never so heavy that the owner cannot lift them.

Slowly slowly is the way a snail climbs a tree.

One does not refrain from mounting a horse that has thrown one.

A horse does not get loose and stop to free its companion.

Disgrace comes upon the shiftless.

A bird does not tell a bird that a stone is on its way.

19. This is a reference to the cat's ability to always right itself and land on its feet however much one tries to drop it on its back. The saying is most often used by wrestlers as an incantation to prevent their opponents from throwing them.  [Back to text]

20. Ẹ̀lukú or Àlukú is a fearsome masquerader, one of whose props is a matchet supposedly used indiscriminately as a weapon.  [Back to text]

21. The proverb is probably based on the commercial importance of the route, which ensures the keen interest of the authorities (of Ìbàdàn presumably) in seeing that whoever is responsible for keeping it open and clean does so efficiently.  [Back to text]

22. Irú is the fermented condiment derived from the seeds of the locustbean tree. The suggestion seems to be that the man deprived of a wife can still cook his stew, since his irú can still ferment even in the absence of a wife (who would normally cook the stew).  [Back to text]

23. The proverb is based on the fact that crabs' eyes never close, since they have no lids.  [Back to text]

24. This proverb is based on the supposition that ducks never sleep. Àdín is oil made from palm kernels, used to fuel lamps, and as a body lotion.  [Back to text]

25. The expression Ilẹ̀-ẹ́ mọ́ means both “the floor is clean” and “morning has broken.” The proverb thus also carries the suggestion that a new day, supposedly an auspicious day, dawns for those who sweep the floor, especially since sweeping is one of the first orders of duty for conscientious housekeepers every morning.  [Back to text]

26. Ìtara (industry or sharpness) is equated here with àtètèbá, a charm ensuring that the user will be the first to come upon a valuable thing.  [Back to text]

27. Eégún (masqueraders) are believed to be reincarnated dead ancestors, hence ará ọ̀run “heavenly beings.” Some chase people and belabor them with whips.  [Back to text]

28. A dancing leap is regarded as the supreme figure in dance.  [Back to text]

29. The humor, even the wit, of the proverb resides more than in anything else, in the play on “pa,” which in the context of an ayò game means “to win,” but in the context of a war means “to kill.” The stalwart in question settles the argument about whether he could have killed six people in a war by winning six ayò games.  [Back to text]

30. Traditionally brides cried, as a matter of form, on their departure for their future homes. Onlookers make light of their tears, which are supposedly crocodile tears.  [Back to text]

31. Àràbà, the silk cotton tree-Ceiba Pentandra (Bombaceae)-is the largest African tree (see Abraham: 61-62), while the sound of the name Jẹ́gẹ́dẹ́ suggests someone of insubstantial physical stature.  [Back to text]

32. Ìgè is the name usually given to a child born feet first, and Àdùbí means someone everyone would like to have given birth to. The suggestion is that the child so named is excessively pampered, and can therefore get away with anything.  [Back to text]