Nigerian Proverbs (440 Proverbs)
- A goat owned by two people sleeps outside.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A man who walks alone carries a load of palm-fronds.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A speedy wrestling and a bad fall go hand in hand.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Beetles that roll balls out of human faeces demand to be hidden away from the rich man, because there is nothing he wouldn't buy.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Everybody joins to blame or condemn a child who overthrows the pot of soup.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If a greedy eater is near a patient, such a patient can never survive.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If you have one finger pointing at somebody, you have three pointing towards yourself.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is one person in a street that kills a dog and the street is named a street of dog killers.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is wisdom to prevent someone from whom one cannot accept repayment to have access to one's valuable possessions.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- One can only try to get what one can from the head of an elephant, no one ever carries it home.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Sleep and indolence are not cousins of a good harvest.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The fly that has no one to advise it follows the corpse into the grave.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The Rhinoceros never dances with the monkey.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Two footsteps do not make a path.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When a man finds that he was wrong to have refused to eat, he should leave his anger and play a harp to call for harmony.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When the elderly ones in a house travel, the younger ones quickly grow in experience.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A child is what you put into him.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A good name is better than gold.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A masquerade does not perform to an outside audience until he performs well at the home base.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A strong man is remembered on the day of the fight, and a gluttony on the day pounded yam is surplus.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Being happy in one's home is better than being a chief.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Flog my erring child comes from the lips, "don't hurt him/her" comes from the bottom of the heart.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If a man is not clean and smooth, there is nothing he can really do about pride.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If you neglect the pot, it boils over and extinguishes the fire.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is one word of advice that one needs to give to a wise man, and that word keeps multiplying in his mind.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It takes a whole village to educate a child.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- One cannot go back to the farmer from whom one borrowed seed-yams to plant to say that the beetles have eaten up the seed-yams.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Sometimes the rain might force a man more than once to seek shelter under the same tree.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The fowl perspires, but the feathers do not allow us to see the perspiration.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The spider that knows what it will gain sits waiting patiently in its web. The praying mantis is never tired waiting all day.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Two men quarreling do not share the same seat on a canoe.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When a man loses his prestige, he does not regain it by going to where he is not known.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When the laborer is praised, his cutlass begins to cut more keenly.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A child who fears beating, would never admit that he played with a missing knife.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A herbalist that refuses to ask laymen what leaves he looks for in the bush, must have difficulties getting what he wants.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A masquerade is not a spirit only because of its mask.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A thorn that pierces the toe should be burned by the light of a new moon lest the devil possess the foot.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Better a single decision maker than a thousand advisors.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- God keeps away flies from the tailless cow.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If a person who curses another is not better than the person he curses, a request is never made of him to rescind the curse.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If you wait for tomorrow, tomorrow comes. If you don't wait for tomorrow, tomorrow comes.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is only the toad that gets up from its knees and falls back again on its knees.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Jealousy is as ash.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- One does not become a master diviner in a day. A forest is not made in a season. The swoop of an eagle has seen many seasons and floods...
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Stupidity is the lover of ignorance.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The glow-works light the nights, but more so the night that their mother prepares porridge.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The spirit that keeps one going when one has no choice of what else to do must not be mistaken for valor.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Two raindrops do not make a pool.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When a palm-branch reaches its height, it gives way for a fresh one to grow.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When the right hand washes the left hand and the left hand washes the right hand, both hands become clean.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A child who has no mother will not have scars to show on his back.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A housewife who complains that there is not enough foodstuff in the market should remember that if her husband adds to what is already available, there would be more for everyone.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A mouse that removes the palm-nut that turns out to be the bait of a trap, would already have known that the palm-nut does not ripen on the ground.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A toad does not jump around in the daytime, unless something is after its life.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Black goats must be caught early, before it gets dark.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Greatness and beauty do not belong to the gods alone.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If a soup is sweet, it is money that cooks it.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If your parents take care of you up to the time you cut your teeth, you take care of them when they lose theirs.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is only the tortoise that moves and carries its shell about, which it calls its house.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Languages differ but coughs are the same.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- One finger cannot remove lice from the head.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Success is 10% ability, and 90% sweat.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The gods may still send a gentle breeze when they want to bless us.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The thirsty fig sits waiting patiently, waiting for the arrival of the rains.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Until lions have their own historians, accounts of the hunt will always celebrate the hunter.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When a person regrets endlessly, he gets to pay more for what he regrets.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- When the roots of a tree begin to decay, it spreads death to the branches.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A child who is carried on the back will not know how far the journey is.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A hunter who has only one arrow does not shoot with careless aim.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A one-eyed person does not thank god until he meets a blind person at prayer.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- A woman possessed by demons dreams of toads in red dancing shoes.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- By being grateful, a man makes himself deserving of yet another kindness.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- He who digs a pit for others must invariably fall into it.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- If gold rusts, what will iron do?
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is a lazy man who says "it is only because I have no time that my farm is overgrown with weeds".
(Nigerian Proverb)
- It is the boast of every juju priest that unless he dies, no thief can ever come to steal his juju away.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Leopards lurk in dark corners.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- One must have to wait till the evening of one's life time to know what gratitude to pay to one's guardian spirit.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- Talks that are considered to be important must be made to drag on for so long as to make even the deaf begin to hear it.
(Nigerian Proverb)
- The gods only hear one wish at a time, and nothing more.
(Nigerian Proverb)
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