(Lat. proverbium, i.e., pro-verbum), a by-word or saw, has been defined by Erasmus as "Paræmnia est celebre dictum scitâ quasimodo novitate insigne" (i.e., a proverb is a well-known saying remarkable for some elegant novelty). Of the numberless attempts at defining a proverb, perhaps the most elegant is that of Cervantes, who describes them as "short sentences drawn from long experience" (Don Quixote, part i., c. 39). With the Opera Moralia (vol. v., ed. Wytenbach) of Plutarch, a collection of 131 proverbs are given, with explanations, which may be relied upon as tolerably genuine. To collect and explain such stray portions of the wisdom of the people has engaged the attention of many of the most learned men the world has known. We have the testimony of Laertius, that Aristotle, Theophrastus, and Chrysippus, all engaged in collecting proverbs. Synesius, a writer of the fifth century, quotes from a work of Aristotle, now lost, a description of a proverb: "A proverb is a remnant of the ancient philosophy preserved amid very many destructions, on account of its brevity and fitness for use." Zenobius, who lived in the beginning of the second century, epitomized 552 proverbs of two old writers, Terraeus and Didymus; and Diogenianus, his contemporary, made a collection of 775 proverbs. These two collections, with 1400 adages from Suidas, 353 from the Vatican library, and a selection of rhymed adages, were edited by Andrew Schott, 4to, Antwerp, 1612. Michael Apostolius of Byzantium, who lived about the middle of the fifteenth century, collected 2027 ancient proverbs, which were published by the Elzevir, 4to, Lugd. Batav. 1653. The same house likewise published at Amsterdam, in 1663, a useful epitome of the 4151 adages of Erasmus.

In point of number, originality, and elegance, the proverbs of Spain stand in advance of those of all other countries. They can be traced back to the very earliest times. Many are found in the General Chronicle, one of the oldest of Spanish prose compositions; and among them is the happy one on disappointed expectations, quoted more than once in Don Quixote:—He went for wool, and came back Proverbs, shorn." Several occur in the Conde Lucano of Don John Manuel, and many in the poetry of the Archpriest of Hita, both of whom flourished in the time of Alfonso XI. Till 1496, when Mendoza, Marques of Santillana, at the request of Juan II., collected for the instruction of Prince Henry a hundred rhymed Proverbios, and above 600, "such as the old women were wont to repeat in their chimney-corners," the old and wise proverbs of the language had obtained no settled place in the didactic literature of the country. From that date, however, they began to be turned to account. About the middle of the same century Pedro Valles published an alphabetical list of 4300 old Spanish adages; and Hernan Nuñez de Guzman, the Greek scholar and nobleman, increased the series in his Refraues (1555) to above 6000. Mal Lara, a Sevillian, made a selection from this great store of 1000 proverbs, and adding a commentary to each, published them in 1568, under the not inappropriate title of Philosophy of the Common People (La Philosophia Vulgar). Palmerino, a Valencian, published in 1569 above 200 proverbs appropriate to the table; and Oudin issued a collection of Spanish proverbs for the use of foreigners, at Paris in 1608. Sorapain in 1616–17 issued two collections of medical proverbs; and finally, in 1695, Cejudo, a schoolmaster of Val de Peñaz, gave the world about 6000, with the corresponding Latin adages, where he could find them, and with explanations more satisfactory than had been furnished hitherto. A curious collection of Valencian proverbs was published in 12mo at Valencia, by Carlos Ros in 1733. Notwithstanding the number thus collected, many thousands still remained unpublished, known only among the traditions of the humbler classes, that had given birth to them all. Juan de Yriarte, the king's librarian at Madrid, collected towards the middle of the eighteenth century no less than 24,000; and yet it is supposed he had not nearly exhausted the stock peculiar to the common people of the provinces. There is also a good modern collection of Spanish proverbs in six duodecimo volumes by Repales. It is, perhaps, not possible to account for the number of proverbs which are found in Spain above any other country in Christendom; but be this as it may, we know they are frequently the most pleasant and most characteristic ornaments of the national literature.

In our own country, among the numerous collectors of proverbs, may be mentioned John Ray the naturalist, who published in 1670 his book on proverbs, which has been frequently reprinted. There is likewise a valuable collection of English proverbs, with lengthened explanations and an ingenious preface by Oswald Dykes, 8vo, London, 1708. In Ray's collection there are, besides English proverbs, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Danish, Eastern, and Hebrew proverbs. He divides them into various classes, arranges each alphabetically, and winds up by an extensive index to the whole work. The works which Ray consulted were—1. The Children's Dictionary; 2. Camden's Remains; 3. Clark's Collection; 4. Gent's Collection; 5. Herbert's Jaculum Prudentium; 6. Codrington's Collection; 7. Howell's Paracæmographia. A new edition of this work has recently (1855) been published by Henry G. Bohn, in which are introduced large additions of proverbs, sayings, sentences, maxims, and phrases, under the title of A Handbook of Proverbs.