PROVERB

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does proverb mean? 

• PROVERB (noun)
  The noun PROVERB has 1 sense:

1. a condensed but memorable saying embodying some important fact of experience that is taken as true by many people

  Familiarity information: PROVERB used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PROVERB (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A condensed but memorable saying embodying some important fact of experience that is taken as true by many people

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

adage; byword; proverb; saw

Hypernyms ("proverb" is a kind of...):

expression; locution; saying (a word or phrase that particular people use in particular situations)

Derivation:

proverbial (of or relating to or resembling or expressed in a proverb)

 Context examples 

How true the old proverbs are.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

I was quite a proverb for it at Maple Grove.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Songs and proverbs, all talk of woman's fickleness.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

The captain understood my raillery very well, and merrily replied with the old English proverb, that he doubted mine eyes were bigger than my belly, for he did not observe my stomach so good, although I had fasted all day; and, continuing in his mirth, protested he would have gladly given a hundred pounds, to have seen my closet in the eagle’s bill, and afterwards in its fall from so great a height into the sea; which would certainly have been a most astonishing object, worthy to have the description of it transmitted to future ages: and the comparison of Phaëton was so obvious, that he could not forbear applying it, although I did not much admire the conceit.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

My quickness of apprehension seemed to please him, and he went on: “Now I consider this is principally on account of her being in an unsettled state, you see. We have talked it over a good deal, her uncle and myself, and her sweetheart and myself, after business; and I consider it is principally on account of her being unsettled. You must always recollect of Em'ly,” said Mr. Omer, shaking his head gently, “that she's a most extraordinary affectionate little thing. The proverb says, “You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.”

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Her own family were plain, matter-of-fact people who seldom aimed at wit of any kind; her father, at the utmost, being contented with a pun, and her mother with a proverb; they were not in the habit therefore of telling lies to increase their importance, or of asserting at one moment what they would contradict the next.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

We are each of an unsocial, taciturn disposition, unwilling to speak, unless we expect to say something that will amaze the whole room, and be handed down to posterity with all the eclat of a proverb.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Nay, friend Jonathan, he said, in this, the quickest way home is the longest way, so your proverb say.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

There is an air of truth apparent through the whole; and indeed the author was so distinguished for his veracity, that it became a sort of proverb among his neighbours at Redriff, when any one affirmed a thing, to say, it was as true as if Mr. Gulliver had spoken it.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)