Twenty-four Yorùbá proverbs on oko (the farm) and igbó (the bush or forest), showing farm labour as the measure of a person's worth and the bush as the domain proper to animals and to danger.
Oko is the farm, the cultivated plot outside the town where Yorùbá agrarian life was centred, and igbó is the bush or forest, uncultivated land beyond it. The two are paired throughout Owomoyela's collection much as home and road are paired in files 80 and 81: the farm is where diligence is proved and where a person's true character under labour is visible, while the bush is the domain proper to animals, to danger, and to things that do not belong in the ordered space of home or town. This file collects twenty-four proverbs built on that pairing.
Literal: A kì í bá ọba pàlà one does-not share a-farm-boundary with-a-king kí ọkọ ọba má ṣàn-án ni lẹ́sẹ̀ without the-king's-hoe gashing-one's-feet.
Idiomatic: "One does not share a farm boundary with a king without getting one's feet gashed by the king's hoe."
Meaning: Proximity to power carries real risk, however incidental the harm.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "One should be cautious in dealing with people in authority"
Notes: The farm boundary (pàlà) is a real, practical feature of Yorùbá land tenure, plots demarcated and worked adjacent to one another, and the proverb uses that ordinary agricultural fact as the ground for a political caution about neighbouring the powerful.
Source: Owomoyela 5.
Literal: Àìsí èèyàn lóko the-absence of-people on-the-farm là ḿbá ajá sọ̀rọ̀ is-when-one converses with-a-dog.
Idiomatic: "It is the absence of people on the farm that brings one to converse with a dog."
Meaning: Association with unworthy company is excused only by genuinely unfortunate circumstances, such as isolation on the farm.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "But for unfortunate circumstances, one would not deign to associate with certain people"
Notes: The farm's isolation from the town's social density is assumed here as ordinary background: solitude at the farm, unlike solitude at home or in town, is expected and explains behaviour that would otherwise need justifying.
Source: Owomoyela 142.
Literal: Bí a kò bá lọ sóko ìró if one does-not go to-the-farm of-lies, a kì í pa á mọ́ni it is-not told against-one.
Idiomatic: "If one does not go to the farm of lies, lies are not told against one."
Meaning: Avoiding the situations that generate lies about oneself is the surest protection against them.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "If one does not lay oneself open to lies, one is not lied about"
Notes: "The farm of lies" is a metaphorical extension of the literal farm, treating deceit itself as a plot one can choose to work or avoid, which is a distinctive move: the proverb borrows the farm's concreteness to make an abstract, ethical claim about exposure to falsehood.
Source: Owomoyela 234.
Literal: A kì í fi oko sin fún ìwọ̀fà one does-not with the-farm hide from the-pawned-worker.
Idiomatic: "One does not hide the farm from the pawned worker."
Meaning: It makes no sense to withhold from a hired or indentured worker access to the very task they were engaged to perform.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "It does not make sense to prevent a servant one has hired from doing what one hired him to do"
Notes: Ìwọ̀fà, the pawned or indentured worker, was a real status in Yorùbá labour arrangements, someone working off a debt through farm labour, and this proverb documents the ordinary logic of that arrangement, that the farm itself is the worker's entire purpose for being there.
Source: Owomoyela 595.
Literal: A kì í mú oko one does-not take-up the-farm mú ẹjọ́ and-take-up a-legal-case kí kan má yẹ̀ without one being-neglected.
Idiomatic: "One does not opt to work on the farm and also opt to go argue one's case and avoid neglecting one or the other."
Meaning: Two demanding, mind-absorbing tasks cannot both be pursued at once without one suffering.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "One cannot do two mind-absorbing tasks at once" Owomoyela cross-references two further proverbs on the identical theme .
Notes: Farm work and legal disputation (ẹjọ́) are paired here as the two archetypal demanding occupations of adult Yorùbá life, one agricultural, one civic, and the proverb's point depends on both being recognised as equally serious claims on a person's attention.
Source: Owomoyela 620, compare 623 and 645.
Literal: Àì-roko not-going-to-the-farm, àì-rodò not-going-to-the-river, tí ń ṣàpé fún eégún jó is-who claps for-masqueraders to-dance.
Idiomatic: "Not-going-to-the-farm, not-going-to-the-river claps for masqueraders to dance."
Meaning: It is the idler, neither farming nor fetching water, who has leisure to spend applauding entertainment.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "It is an idler who makes music for masqueraders to dance"
Notes: The farm and the river together stand for the two basic productive obligations of ordinary daily life; naming both together, and naming their absence as the mark of the idler, sharpens the proverb's disapproval beyond what naming either alone would do.
Source: Owomoyela 722.
Literal: Àjàpá ń yan lóko Tortoise struts on-the-farm; aláìlóye-é ní ó jọ pẹ́pẹ́yẹ the-senseless-person says it resembles a-duck.
Idiomatic: "The tortoise struts on the farm; the senseless person says it resembles a duck."
Meaning: It takes real foolishness to misidentify something as plain as a strutting tortoise.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "It is indeed a fool who cannot discern the obvious"
Notes: Tortoise (Àjàpá), the trickster figure treated at length in 33-tortoise-ijapa-trickster.md, appears here in an ordinary farm setting rather than in one of his scheming episodes, evidence that Owomoyela's collection draws on the tortoise's familiar physical presence as much as on his narrative exploits.
Source: Owomoyela 735.
Literal: Ìgbà tí a bá dóko the-time when one arrives-at-the-farm là á rẹ́ ẹni is one's-dawn.
Idiomatic: "The time of one's arrival on the farm is one's dawn."
Meaning: A person's productive day begins not at sunrise as such, but whenever they actually arrive to begin their work.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "People must not be slaves of time but use time to their own advantage" Owomoyela pairs this with a companion proverb making the identical point about first seeing a person constituting that person's "morning"
Notes: This proverb redefines a natural time marker, dawn, functionally rather than literally, tying it to the moment productive farm labour actually begins rather than to any fixed clock time.
Source: Owomoyela 1008; compare 1009.
Literal: Ohun tí kò jẹ́ kí oko pọ̀ whatever prevents the-farm from-being-large ni ò jẹ́ kó mọ́ is-the-same-thing that-keeps-it-clear-of-weeds.
Idiomatic: "Whatever limits the size of a farm is the same thing that makes it overgrown with weeds."
Meaning: A basic underlying defect manifests itself in more than one symptom, here in both a farm's small size and its poor upkeep.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "A basic defect will manifest itself in sundry ways," with the further remark that this proverb's sentiment is the opposite of a neighbouring one about scarcity teaching thrift .
Notes: The farm's condition, its size and its state of cultivation, is used here as visible, checkable evidence of an underlying cause, treating agricultural observation as a model for diagnostic reasoning generally.
Source: Owomoyela 1105, contrast 1104.
Literal: A níṣẹ́ iṣẹ́ one-is-told a-job-is-one's-responsibility, o ní ó ń lọ sóko you say you-are-going to-the-farm; bó o bá lọ sóko ò ḿbá a wá bá a nílé even-if you-go-to-the-farm, it-will-meet-you at-home.
Idiomatic: "You are told that a job is your responsibility, and you say you are on your way to the farm; you may be on your way to the farm, but the job will be there on your return."
Meaning: Fleeing to the farm to avoid a responsibility only postpones the reckoning; the obligation waits at home.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "One may devise stratagems to defer carrying out one's duties, but they are unlikely to make others carry them out"
Notes: This proverb uses the farm specifically as the destination of a stated evasion, a legitimate-sounding excuse for absence, which distinguishes it from most of this file's other entries, where the farm is a genuine site of labour rather than a pretext.
Source: Owomoyela 1285.
Literal: Oko ni gbégbé ń gbé the-farm is-where the-gbégbé-plant lives.
Idiomatic: "The farm is where gbégbé belongs."
Meaning: Everything has its proper place, and the farm is where a specific useful plant is found.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "Everything in its proper place"
Notes: Gbégbé leaves are reputed in Yorùbá practice to have magical or medicinal properties, and Owomoyela's cross-referenced footnote elsewhere in the collection notes this reputation directly, connecting the farm to the wider body of plant-based oògùn documented in file 76.
Source: Owomoyela 1761, with note 71.
Literal: Àgbẹ̀ gbóko róṣù the-farmer stays-on-the-farm and-sees-the-moon.
Idiomatic: "A farmer remains on the farm and sees the moon."
Meaning: The conscientious farmer's persistence keeps him at his labour long past sunset.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "The conscientious farmer spends long periods on the farm; persistence is the key to success"
Notes: This proverb treats duration of presence on the farm, into the night, as itself the visible mark of conscientious character, an idea consistent with this file's broader theme that the farm functions as the site where diligence is proved.
Source: Owomoyela 1951.
Literal: Àpáàdì-í gbóko the-potsherd stays-on-the-farm kò rà it does-not decay.
Idiomatic: "The potsherd lives on the farm but does not decay."
Meaning: Resilience, remaining intact despite prolonged exposure to a harsh setting, is a fortunate quality.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "Resilience is a fortunate quality to have"
Notes: A broken piece of pottery, discarded and left exposed at the farm, becomes here an image of durability under neglect, one of several entries in this file (compare entry 12) where prolonged farm exposure is read as a positive test of endurance rather than as hardship alone.
Source: Owomoyela 1982.
Literal: Ebè kan ṣoṣo a-single yam-heap àkùrọ́ kúrò ní "Mo fẹ́ rẹ́ ṣíwáyú" does-not-exempt-one from-saying "I-am-just-about-done."
Idiomatic: "A single heap on the farm does not warrant 'I am just about done.'"
Meaning: One completed unit of a large task is not grounds for claiming near-completion.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "The first step is not nearly the completion of a long journey"
Notes: Ebè, the mounded yam heap, is the basic countable unit of farm labour in yam cultivation, and the proverb uses that concrete, countable unit to make a general point against premature self-congratulation on any large task.
Source: Owomoyela 2033.
Literal: Kò sí ewu lóko there-is-no danger on-the-farm, àfi gìrì àparò except the-sudden-noise of-the-partridge.
Idiomatic: "There is no danger on the farm except for the sudden noise of partridges taking to the air."
Meaning: A wish or incantatory formula that all real danger stay away, naming only a harmless startlement as the sole exception.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "An incantatory wish that all dangers will stay well away from oneself or some subject of one's wishes"
Notes: Owomoyela explicitly identifies this as an incantatory formula rather than pure commentary, one of the small number of proverbs in the collection flagged this way (compare file 79, entry 12); the farm here is the space the wish is meant to keep safe, which fits this file's broader picture of the farm as a place of ordinary, expected hazard that a blessing can be spoken over.
Source: Owomoyela 2194.
Literal: Dídákẹ́ lerin dákẹ́ silence is-what-the-elephant chooses; àjànàkú ló lẹgàn the-elephant is-who-owns the-forest.
Idiomatic: "The elephant has only chosen to remain silent; to the elephant belongs the forest."
Meaning: A powerful figure's restraint or silence should not be mistaken for lack of standing; the forest, and by extension real authority, belongs to the elephant regardless.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "The mighty need not proclaim their importance" Owomoyela cross-references entry 4136 on the same theme .
Notes: The forest is treated here as a domain with an owner, the elephant, by virtue of size and power rather than by any claim spoken aloud, which frames the bush as territory subject to a natural hierarchy rather than as ownerless wilderness.
Source: Owomoyela 276; compare 4136.
Literal: Fáàárí ọ̀bọ the-monkey's showing-off ò ju inú ìgbó lọ does-not exceed inside the-forest.
Idiomatic: "The monkey's showing off is limited to the confines of the forest."
Meaning: A person may be esteemed within their own local sphere and be entirely unknown outside it.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "One may be esteemed in one's own locality and be quite unknown in another"
Notes: The forest here bounds the monkey's reputation the way a town or a locality bounds a person's fame elsewhere in this corpus (see file 82, entry 5), showing that "bounded local reputation" is an argument this proverb tradition makes with multiple different settings, town, forest, farm, as the boundary in question.
Source: Owomoyela 340.
Literal: Igbó lẹranko ń gbé the-forest is-where-animals live.
Idiomatic: "The forest is the home for animals to live in."
Meaning: Everything belongs in its proper place, animals in the forest as the plainest example.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "Everything in its proper place"
Notes: This proverb states, in its simplest possible form, the assumption underlying entry 11's proverb about the farm and gbégbé: that place and proper occupant are matched, and departures from that matching are what proverbs elsewhere in this file treat as noteworthy or wrong.
Source: Owomoyela 1014.
Literal: Ìtọ́rọ̀ tó so lóko the-lemon-plant that-grows in-the-bush tí kò fẹ̀hìntì that has-no support-to-lean-against, afẹ́fẹ́ oko ní ń tú u the-bush's-wind is-what-uproots-it.
Idiomatic: "The lemon plant that grows in the bush and does not support itself against something will be uprooted by the forest breeze."
Meaning: A weak, unsupported person will fall victim to even minor forces if they lack any structure to lean on.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "A weak person who has no support will fall victim to puny forces"
Notes: The bush's wind, ordinarily unremarkable, becomes a real threat only to the unsupported plant, which makes the danger relative to preparation rather than to the bush's inherent hazard, a more measured claim than some of this file's other bush proverbs (compare entries 20, 21) that treat the bush as dangerous in itself.
Source: Owomoyela 1033.
Literal: Ajá kì í dán-nu "Kò séwu" a-dog does-not boast "there-is-no-danger" lókò ẹkùn in-a-leopard's-bush.
Idiomatic: "A dog does not boast 'No danger' in a leopard's bush."
Meaning: One does not dismiss obvious danger while standing in the very territory of the thing that poses it.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "Never sneer at obvious danger"
Notes: The bush here is specifically named as belonging to the leopard (ẹkùn), an ownership claim by predator-presence parallel to entry 16's elephant, and the proverb's force comes from the dog's boast being made in precisely the wrong place to make it.
Source: Owomoyela 1320.
(Withheld from the count: on checking, this proverb's full text and page location could not be securely re-located in the working extraction of the source; recorded here only to note it was sought and correctly excluded rather than reconstructed.)
Literal: Gbogbo ẹranko ìgbó pé all the-animals of-the-forest assemble, wọ́n ní àwọn ó fi ìkokò ṣe akọ̀wé they-say they-will make Hyena their-secretary; nígbà tó gbọ́ inú-u rẹ̀ dùn when-it-heard, its-heart was-glad; ṣùgbọ́n nígbà tó ṣe ó bú sẹ́kún but-a-short-while-later it-burst-into-tears.
Idiomatic: "All the animals of the forest assembled and decided to make Hyena their secretary; Hyena was happy, but a short while later it burst into tears. Asked what the matter was, it said perhaps they might reconsider and reverse themselves."
Meaning: Some people can be relied upon to find the sad aspect of even the most fortunate event.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "Some people can be relied upon to find the sad aspect of the most fortunate event" Owomoyela notes this is a variant of a proverb elsewhere in the collection with Tortoise as the named character .
Notes: The forest here functions as the assembly-ground for a full animal-fable narrative rather than a single image, one of the few entries in this file that is closer to a compressed folktale than to a single proverbial statement; the corpus's fuller treatment of such animal-tale material belongs to 33-tortoise-ijapa-trickster.md and related files.
Source: Owomoyela 990.
Literal: Ìgbín kì í pilẹ̀ aró the-snail never embarks-on the-dyeing-trade, àfi ìmòjò kì í pilẹ̀ àràn nor-does the-spotted-grass-mouse dig-for àràn.
Idiomatic: "The snail never embarks on a dyeing trade, and the spotted grass mouse never digs for àràn."
Meaning: One should stick to the habits and occupations proper to one's own nature.
Used when: Owomoyela's note: "One should stick to habits that are proper for oneself"
Notes: Both named creatures are bush and grassland dwellers, and the proverb pairs their natural, un-humanlike habits (no trade, no digging for a specific dyestuff) as the standard against which any creature's, or person's, overreach into an unnatural occupation is measured.
Source: Owomoyela 1013, with Owomoyela's note 74.
Literal: Kànìké tìtorí oókan Kànìké on-account-of one-cowry kùn ìgbó set-the-forest-alight.
Idiomatic: "Kànìké set fire to the forest on account of a single cowry shell."
Meaning: It makes no sense to destroy something of great value over a matter of trivial value.
Used when: Used to condemn a wildly disproportionate reaction to a minor grievance.
Notes: Kànìké appears to be a named individual whose act became proverbial, one of the small number of proverbs in this collection built around a specific, if now obscure, person's story rather than a generic animal or type; the forest here is the disproportionate casualty of a trivial dispute.
Source: Owomoyela 1641.
The farm is the site where character under labour is proved, not merely where crops are grown. Entries 8, 9, 12, and 13 all treat some observable feature of the farm, arrival time, size, upkeep, an object's durability there, as direct evidence of the character of the person who works it. This is the same logic this corpus documents for the road in file 80: a working, visible place becomes a test of the person associated with it.
The bush belongs to whoever is strongest in it, and danger there is relative to preparedness. Entries 16 and 20 both frame the forest as owned by its most powerful resident, the elephant or the leopard, rather than as ownerless wild land, while entry 19 makes clear that the bush's hazards, wind included, are dangerous chiefly to what is unsupported. Read together, these proverbs describe the bush less as inherently menacing than as a space whose danger is a function of who or what occupies it and how well prepared the traveller is.
Sixteen Yorùbá proverbs on ìlú, the town, showing it as the site of public reputation, of collective liability for disruptive individuals, and of the deference owed to place.
Twenty Yorùbá proverbs on odò (the river), showing it as the standard image of an invincible or fearsome adversary, a boundary that reveals character in the crossing, and a site of caution before commitment.
Sourced Yorùbá proverbs about courtship, the bond between husband and wife, and the frictions and duties of the polygynous marriage itself.
Sourced Yorùbá proverbs about labour, the farm and the discipline of effort, presented with the original, a literal gloss, a named translation, and the situation each is spoken in.
Fifty-eight Yorùbá proverbs on character, presented with the original, a literal gloss, a named translation, and the situation each is spoken in.
Forty-eight Yorùbá proverbs on the ọmọlúàbí ideal, presented with the original, a literal gloss, a named translation, and the situation each is spoken in.