Національна Академія Мистецтв України Інститут культурології

Besides, proverbs may be regarded as the embryos of poetic lines due to their prosodic organization⁶⁷¹. Motivational aspect of proverbial speech involves the outer form and therefore expands itself over phonology as the consequence of the minimalism. Due to minimal scope the phonological means acquire primordial stress within the text of a proverbial locution. The very lexical matter remains inimitable and cannot be substituted with the external describing devices of an artificially built metalanguage. In particular it concerns those numerous patterns of proverbial expressions where etymological regeneration (in particular the etymological figures) or the opposite process of the loss of etymological continuity takes place. “Love sweetens life” is perhaps the brightest example. In the proverb “a miss is as good as a mile” alliteration exerts influence on the choice of lexical units determining the image of the whole. Thus the problem of the motivation of the sense of proverbial expression arises that by no means can be regarded without taking into consideration such factors of versification as rhyme and rhythm. It is to bear in mind that each proverbial locution represents a stable trope irreducible to its components where the signifying and the signified create inseparable formation. Proverbs possess the features of versification as far as their outer form is concerned (caesura, emphasis, enclitics and proclitics, alliteration, heterogeneous metric syllabic structures, pattering), and it gives reasons to spread here the methods of poetics. From the side of contents they are allegories peculiar for multiple semantic transitions. Thus a particular idiolect emerges where the motivation of the sense of a sign depends upon the incorporation of respective lexical units in the corpse of proverbs. Versification can be said to become the transition from the inner to the outer form in opposite to etymological regeneration (and simulation) with the ensuing reduction to taxonomic order. Instead of referring and reducing text to etymons with their taxonomy verses aim at generating their own code. The phenomenon of versification attests the presence of non-verbal power. It shows the insufficiency of language itself for explorative and communicative purposes of proverbial speech.

While dealing with versification even in such incipient shape as epigrammatic enunciations it becomes apparent that only chants supply conditions for the full and mature form of verses. Each verse will be sung earlier or later so it always is conceived as a virtual song. The virtual music is the innate property of versification. As to the proverbs one can already mention the features of rhyme (and alliteration as inner rhyme) that impart them the outlook of verses together with the devices of emphasis & caesura ensuing from their syntactic peculiarities. The last devices are also connected with proclitic & enclitic phenomena peculiar for the Slavonic languages and especially attested with epic formulaic locutions [Штокмар, 315]. It is to mention also the structures of syllabic versification peculiar for Polish and Ukrainian proverbs. One can add here the absolutely unexplored phenomenon of pattering that attests the importance of temporal schemes for epigrammatic versification. Meanwhile of a special importance it would be taking into account the discussed semantic structure of epigram: it is the decisive argument to regard the free verse invented in the decadent epoch as the species of epigrammatic poetry and the immediate continuation of proverbs.

One can notice features of rudimentary versification in proverbial enunciations that ensue immediately from the recurrent syntactic structure providing conditions for the meter. Not to mention the parallelism of members (that includes also the latent one as in “oaks may fall (when) reeds stand the storm”) it is to refer to common practice of clausal propositional structures that mark the most wide spread of proverbial inference as in “just as the twig is bent, the tree is inclined”. Recurrent syntactic structures are steadily associated with respective intonation and other prosodic means that become a kind of metrical scheme and arouse expectations of completing the utterance as the versified form.

Such syntactic meter entails still further consequence concerning the formation of accentual subordination and the division of propositional stresses into the primary one and the secondary one (Germ. Hauptbetonung – Nebenbetonung). Such integrative stresses can be correlated with what is called in Slavonic philology enclitic and proclitic combination of syllables under the single stress. (as in «який Сава, така й слава» ‘what Sava is so is his glory’). The accentual hierarchy arises that serves as the background for rhythmical organization. For instance it is such accentual differentiation that enables the opposition of the two meanings of the morpheme –thing in the proverb “to know everything is to know nothing”.

If these means ensue from the potential syntactic structures and give grounds for conclusions of the versified forms the case is still more complicated with the passage to actual structures with their emphatic accents and meaningful caesuras. The allocation of the device of caesura & emphasis is determined with the actual division of sentence and with the optional decision as to the meaning of the proverbial utterance. For instance the proverb “fine words dress ill deeds” displays different connotations when the caesura stands before and after the pr4edicate: in the first case it will go about the hypocrisy of eloquence, in the second case it will be the ignoble conduct that is implied. The same concerns emphatic stress in “it is not the only fish in the sea” where the stress upon sea would imply the open space for opportunities whereas the fish being underlined, the whole would be addressed to the searches of other objects besides the mentioned fish. One could still mention rhyme (and especially the alliterative devices of inner rhyme) as extremely significant vehicle of profile-making issues in proverbs. At last the effects of pattering (as a special proverbial subspecies) give additional arguments in favor of the existence of particular proverbial versification.

Syntactic schemes of sentential utterances become sources of the verses’ meter background as its envelope. It is respectively emphatic stresses and intersectional caesuras that win importance in this rise of versified forms within the scope of separate sentences. Both of them can be seen in the Latin proverb, “in pulchra veste sapiens non vivit honeste” (in splendid garments the wise doesn’t live honestly), where emphatically underlined “pulchra” combines with the separation of the last proper statement on the way of life of a wise man. The formation of syntactic rhythmical groups becomes one of the first steps towards versified texts as those directed towards chant as opposite to prose reproducing colloquialisms. Such a circumstance in its turn promotes peculiar conditions for the motivation of the proverbial contents.

Proverbs demonstrate the close connections between versification and topics, the last being the source for metrical schemes. Such an interplay between the development of idiomatic collocations and the rise of versified forms as the forces for the formation of images and motivation of ideas from expressive means can be traced in the history of free verse where proverbial influences are very palpable. One can quote the gnomic lines of D. H. Lawrence, for example, his free verse “Space”: “Space, of course, is alive / that’s why it moves about; / and that’s what makes it eternally spacious and unstuffy”. The free verse has its sources in the descriptive lyrics and as such it shows peculiarities that are convergent to those of proverbs. Meanwhile one encounters in the lyrical lines of the kind such images and devices that coincide with the manners peculiar for proverbs as the alliterative stanzas from H. Longfellow’s “Snow-flakes” may witness: “… Silent, and soft, and slow / Descends the snow”. The constancy of semantic shifts as the basis for the synthesis of images becomes also metrical force demanding respective forms that reciprocally determines motivation of the flow of images.

Within the context of special effects of versification the phenomena can be regarded that come to the brims of language and involve the risk of so to say ornithology of verbs: it goes about the onomatopoetic effects together with their consequences concerning syllabic structures. To return to the already discussed point of the existence of syllabic satellites of lexical schemes one could refer to the shade of charades that also does accompany epigrammatic locutions. Thus the opposition of lexical collocations vs. syllabic charades arises so that the problem of monosyllabic contraction would become a special side of this duality. One can say of syllabic sequence (as in the above discussed V.V. Shevoroshkin’s concept) that makes up a charade of an epigram. If in Indo-European monosyllabic patterns are obtained chiefly as the result of reconstruction and are related to primary, most early stages of history; it is quite an opposite to Sino-Tibetan where they are resulted from convergent and leveling processes. Contractions and abbreviations with their monosyllabic implications promote the formation of homonyms evoked with the convergent processes inappropriate for Indo-European where the divergence dominates in diachronic development. Within the context of monosyllabic effects as onomatopoetic means it would be appropriate to pay attention to the restriction of prosodic devices to pure whisper as the minimal verbal expressive device. The voiceless speech is paradoxically the nearest to the written speech of literature in view of such restriction although it is whisper that generally serves to fascinate the listener in incantations. Thus the coincidence of the most advanced verbal art and the remotest antiquity takes place. The restrictions of onomatopoetic means give rise to a still different aspect of the Signifiers concerning the role of the so called reptile complex and the attachment of sibilants to it.

One can say of the effects of eidetic reduction or charades when it goes about the phenomena that V.I.Abayev once has described⁶⁷³. Such lexical units are called ideophones, and it would be reasonable to treat their identification with the etymologically motivated units as the reduction to onomatopoetic images of eidetic meaning. One can very vividly trace such process in the following riddle (the answer – a face): “Ой на горі гай, під гаєм мигай, під мигаєм сапай, пад сапаєм хапай” (Oh, there’s a grove on a hill, blink under grove, dig under blink, catch under dig). The verbs in imperative here resemble interjections: хапати (to catch, with the cognates of Lat. capere, Germ. haben) is reduced to expressive interjection хап, мигати (to blink, the cognate to могти (= may) in its primary meaning “to stretch” by Melnychuk) is reduced to миг, гай “grove” (from гоїти “to heal”) also resembles interjection in such a row. It is worth admitting that even the ontological verb бути = to be does also contain an etymological possibility of such a transformation due to its kinship with бухнути “to grow” (as, for instance, German bin reveals to have kinship with Bö “a violent wind” and further to Slavic буйний “ferocious”) and with the reduced form бух.

One can observe the formation of such monosyllabic shadowy charades that accompany almost each verb and may play the role of interjections. To such monosyllabic “shadows” belong, for example, such duplicated locutions, as круть-верть, жив-жив (the last being used as the means of expression of sparrow twinkling), топ-топ. Such refrain as “цур тобі, пек тобі, дяче” includes the contracted form of a very essential root *pek (from the field of the designations of the element of fire). Monosyllabic substantives that are derived from verbs, such as біг (<бігати) “run”, край (<краяти) “cut, share”, or even such a contracted form as тра (<треба) “one needs” are quite a usual phenomenon for oral speech. Besides, it would be of an importance that such contracted forms were used in etymological figures (as in Russian сиднем сидеть).

It is the terrain of adoption and especially of the adopted proper names where the onomatopoetic effects together with contraction until the monosyllabic forms are known comparatively well. For instance, monosyllabic contracted lexemes are attested with such adoptions as дьяк < Gr. diakonos, Pol. gnyck < Germ. Genick ‘back of the head’. It is the Vulgar Latin that represents the classical samples of such transformations as Pol. clo < Germ. Zoll < Lat. teloneum ‘customary tax’, Engl. aid < Lat. adjuvare. One can choose for a symbol of such procedures the origin of the word check where at least three different roots converged and amalgamated. Still more widespread are the transformations of the kind in the sphere of proper names as John (< Hebr. yohanaan ‘the God granted’), George (< Gr. georges ‘farmer’), Jack and Jim (Vulg. Lat. alternation Jacobus / Jacomus) etc. Thus vulgar etymology of etymological simulation, contraction of monosyllabic type and onomatopoetic effects converge together and promote interaction in distorting primary language’s code. Such processes flow within the narrow space of epigrammatic locutions.

Charades of eidetic reduction play an important role in the poetics of puns and especially of nonsense poetry which builds one of the principal ingredients of childish folklore. The researchers single out “onomatopoeic works” – in particular with the imitation of “frogs concertos” [Довженок, Луганська, с. 24]. Meanwhile the paradox of the situation is to be seen in the fact that to imitate frogs the lexeme is used that is homonym with the term of kinship кум (borrowed from Latin commater, wherefrom also Polish kmotr). Thus etymological simulation is connected with contamination. Another sample is to be found in glossolalia that is to be encountered in some nonsense refrains⁶⁷⁴. All these phenomena from the usage of proper names to glossolalia have common in the fact that deetymologisation entails also the splintering of discourse in separate fragments that are combined as independent units contaminating each other. The last example proves the statement that versification can be said to become a counterpoise to etymology (both to regeneration and to simulation). Instead of referring to etymons verses aim at making up their own peculiar code and at involving prosodic powers that would exert impact upon verbal substance. .
2.1.8. Etymological Problems of Proverbs
The involvement of outer form with the evolvement of textual profile indispensably comes back to etymological order with the system of etymons that proverbial enunciations refer to. Etymons themselves can be conceived in this respect as a special case of profile presupposing proverbs to become circumscriptions of the contents concealed within the inner form. The reference to etymons in proverbial text becomes then the devices of periphrastic description of such deeper contents with the respective consequences concerning motivational aspects. In particular the duplicity of direct (literal) and derivative (figurative) meanings coexisting in proverbs promotes disclosing motivational contribution to semantic development that correlates with the history of words where such transitions are kept into custody and revitalized or simulated in the interrelationship of inner and outer forms. Thus it does not go only about the fold of a narrative in a proverb: the history of semantic development with its interplay of spontaneity and motivation also is compressed and reflected in the rise of derivative meanings.

One can point to the sphere of folklore where the role of etymology as of the source for building a narrative especially wins its importance. It is the realm of paremiology as a specific etymological laboratory where the valence of etymons are examined and the selection of paired locutions is made. The heritage of a word’s history that has sunk as sediments & residues of inner & outer forms’ connection becomes the inexhaustible source for the generation of new derivative meanings. Idioms generated in a newly created proverbial text show the peculiarities of the semantic load while reproducing or imitating etymological meanings both through regeneration and its simulation (the so called vulgar etymology). These “diachronic games” with a word are essentially enhanced with the inner rhyme (Stabreim), and they result in the meaningful devices of alliteration in proverbs that either coincide with etymological figures or simulate them. Even the primitive verbal rhyme (based on the similarity of the endings) can be regarded as a special case of etymological figure and as the indication of tautology in the word - formation. Therefore the above mentioned problem “versification and etymology” gains special significance in the realm of proverbial poetry.

One can cite a genuine paragon of etymological regeneration attested in A.I. Sumbatov-Yuzhin’s play “Rafael” with the exclamation of the main hero “Девушка дивная!” ‘Girl wonderful (divine)!’. It obviously implies the locution (*дева дива = *диво дева → Приснодева Богородица Мария) thus referring to the images situated beyond the reach of etymological development. Semantic transition is represented with words but it means much more than the words can do. In its turn reciprocally the rhyming devices of proverbs are in some cases regarded as the reliable evidences for etymological conjectures concerning the affiliation of a lexical unit to the respective nest⁶⁷⁵. In particular it concerns ornithological names with constant epithets⁶⁷⁶. Stable lexical combinations of the proverbial kind give witnesses as to the processes of semantic transition⁶⁷⁷. One could remind also the above discussed role of rhyming rows as the motivational sources exemplified with the kinship between the etymons of <young> and <juice> referring to √*ieu. The connections of proverbial phrases with etymological sources are numerous and diverse. In the Czech proverb mlatit hluchou slamu “to grind weeds (literally empty straw)” the triple alliteration of l attracts attention thus making us treat the initials (m, h, s) as a kind of prothesis. Such etymological cognates as молоти (to grind) and молити (to pray) (and German. melden in its primary meaning “to sacrifice > to blame”), глухий (deaf) and глум (humiliation) (and Russian глупый (dull)), as well as солома.and German Halm (stalk) aid to conceive the hidden metaphor. Each of the three lexemes bears here the etymological potential of widening its meaning. Still in another proverb prace kvapna malo platna = покваплива праця мало оплачується the alliteration of p stresses the confrontation of etymons of праця (work - a hypothetical cognate - перти and Latin premo, pressum), and квапитися (to haste) (the cognates - кипіти (to boil) and Latin cupio, Cupido). The last member of alliteration платити (to pay) is derived from плат (cloth – as an ancient way of retribution), and its generalised meaning is present in Greek  “broad”. In the proverb po lžičce davat, po lopate brat (to give with a spoon, to take with a shovel) the contraposition ложка – лопата is stressed with alliteration, and it entails the formation of a situative synonymous row where etymologically heterogeneous elements are coupled on the polar positions: the first is derived from лизати = Germ. lecken = Lat. lingo = , and лопата approaches onomatopoetic лапа ‘paw’ and лопух ‘burdock).

The etymological sensibility of people is to be felt also in such a proverb as “Скунда скаче, ринда риє” (skunda springs, rinda digs, answer - magpie and pig). Here ринда converges literally with Lettish rinda = ряд, and, in its turn, Lithuanian skundžu = Russian скудный; such a confrontation has its origin in Balto-Slavic unity. While comparing the Polish proverb “Lepszy prostak powolny niż mędrec swawolny” (a slow simpleton is better than a willful wise) [Kolberg, S. 346], the Russian “На каждого мудреца довольно простоты” (it is sufficient simplicity for each connoisseur) and the Ukrainian “Учений недоучений гірше як простак” (a taught ignoramus is worse than a simpleton) [Номис, № 6089] one encounters the reflection of the difference of ethnic worldviews. The etymon represented in мудрість (cognate to пам’ять (memory), German meinen (Engl. mean), Latin memini) is here treated in three different ways: if in the first two it is contrasted to простота (simplicity, etymologically derived from про, cognate to перший, and стояти), the Ukrainian version prefers to treat наука, навчання (cognate to звичай, призвичаюватися) and it gives grounds to trace perfectly other contraposition of the ideas of learning (in particular of the incomplete learning that is peculiar for ignoramus) and of naivety. Here one encounters the image of learned ignorance (docta ignorantia) coined in the Renaissance epoch. Being a metonymic catachresis this collocation itself serves as the convolution of the whole lore referring to the implied contents. Meanwhile the locution has also broad etymological connections that refer to the implicit ideas of priority and initiation. In such proverbs as “Мовчи та мак товчи” (keep silence and grind poppy seeds with the alliteration мак - мовчання) one can also notice the already mentioned semantic connections мовчати - молоти.

Etymological sensibility shows on the equal scale also another genre of riddles. A unique sample⁶⁷⁸ is to be found in such a line with alliteration: “Сивий віл випив води повен двір” (a grey ox has drunken the whole yard of water) (answer - frost). The combination of words with perfectly different etymons around the pivot phoneme в (that belongs in випив to prefix and not to root) enables paronymic attraction as the foundation for the change of meaning. In the riddle Серед лісу-лісу лежить прут заліза (there lies an iron twig in a forest; answer – a snake, an adder) one could take into consideration that залізо and желво are etymological cognates and it gives a prompt to guess an answer. One can find paronymic attraction in the Russian riddle “Кого не осилит ни царь, ни псарь…?” (whom neither king nor huntsman can conquer) [Садовников, 2142] (answer - sleep): here the contraposition сон-сила (sleep - force) reveals the opposition of physical and psychological (сила has the etymological meaning of tie). Thus the deep diachronic senses concealed within inner form become revitalized with the intensification of the devices of outer form.

At the same time the involvement of outer form within the scope of motivation comes to the so called “macaronis” (hybrids, creolization, contamination and other eclectic phenomena) as the cases of intensified heterogeneity that entails the confusion of etymons. Such phenomena as the revelations of migrations’ processes attach that of adoption (assimilation with the succeeding adaptation) as in the cases of vulgar etymology. In particular the treatment of proper names is comparable to such effects. When proper names are used they are often reinterpreted in the manner of the so called “vulgar etymology” with the iconic motivation of signs (intermingled with onomatopoetic effects). The particular cases of adoption of proper names give a broad field for examining motivational conjectures with reference to etymological representations⁶⁷⁹. Such ways of reconsidering the proper names remain within the borders of vulgar etymology⁶⁸⁰. At the same time there can be cases that can’t be reduced to occasional coincidence of paronyms⁶⁸¹. Thus in a Russian riddle “За Костей пошлю гостя” (I shall send guest to Kostya – answer “a shot of a bullet”) the proper name Костянтин is likened to the word кість (bone). Similar mutual approximations are widespread in Ukrainian child folklore, as in the rhymes “Федьку - редьку”, “Харитоне-макогоне”, “Михалку - скалку” (here – the names of radish, mortar, pin) [Дитячі пісні, 1111-1117]. It is easily to show such cases in colloquial speech of the societal margins. Such attempts may be exemplified with a pseudo-etymological figure “жизнь есть жесть” (life is tin) where one derives жизнь < жисть (a vulgar form of life) and жесть comes back to жестокий (cruel) as its abbreviation. At the same time such simulations are to be traced in the high culture, for instance L. Tolstoi (according to the testimony given in the memoirs of M. Gorki) suggested such a quibble as столковался (he agreed) being reduced to стол ковался (a table was being smithed). Another example is the proverb «толк то есть, да вколочен не весь» (there is sense though it wasn’t all hammered in) presuming obvious prejudicial identification of education with repression where толк is erroneously derived from толочь, толкать (to pound, to push).

In its turn