No man can outwit their ancestors.

More African Proverbs

• Wood already touched by fire is not hard to set alight.
• True love means what’s mine is yours.
• To get lost is to learn the way.
• Do not treat your loved one like a swinging door: you are fond of it but you push it back and forth.
• A happy man marries the girl he loves; a happier man loves the girl he married.
• If you heal the leg of a person, do not be surprised if they use it to run away.
• Tomorrow belongs to people who prepare for it today.
• Let your love be like the misty rain, coming softly but flooding the river.
• If a woman doesn’t love you, she calls you brother.
• A home without a woman is like a barn without cattle.
• When you marry a monkey for his wealth, the money goes but the monkey remains.
• It is better to be loved than to be feared.
• Truth should be in love and love in truth.
• In a family if you have somebody who is troublesome it’s the family members who are more worried than the troublesome member.
• The axe forgets but the tree remembers.
• Knowledge without wisdom is like water in the sand.
• Where there are many, nothing goes wrong.
• The old woman looks after the child to grow its teeth and the young one in turn looks after the old woman when she loses her teeth.
• One falsehood spoils a thousand truths.
• When an old man dies, a library is burned with him.
• A child does not laugh at the ugliness of his mother.
• No person is born great. Great people become great when others are sleeping.
• Rain does not fall on one roof alone.
• A child is what you put into him.
• The wise create proverbs for fools to learn, not to repeat.
• In the moment of crisis, the wise build bridges, and the foolish build dams.
• By the time the fool has learned the game, the players have dispersed.