Irish Proverb 153 - Seanfhocail Ghaeilge 153

There is no wise man without a fault neither a fool without a talent.

The wise are not without their faults, nor fools without their talents.

Hi ppendergraft - Yes, your translation is entirely correct and very nicely put! My version is saying the same thing but less elegantly. Incidentally, the word saoi is still used to mean a wise person. In the early days of the language revival about a hundred years ago, An Saoi was often used as an equivalent of Mr. These days people say An Duine Uasal instead. Daoi is hardly used these days - there are plenty of expressive ways of calling people a fool in different dialects of Irish - amadán, bómán, bastún etc. but daoi is a literary word rather than a word that's commonly used.

The pairing of saoi/daoi illustrates a common feature in Irish of opposites beginning with S- and D- where the S-word denotes something positive and the D-word something negative. saor/daor, saibhir/daibhir, sólás/dólás, sona/dona, sorcha/dorcha, so-/do-, etc.

Anyone think of any others?

What about suáilce and duáilce, virtue and vice? Or soineann and doineann, which means good weather and bad weather? I don't know much about Irish etymology but I would guess that these pairs are somehow related to the Irish particles so- and do-. These are used (mostly with adjectives) to mean that something is easy to do or difficult/impossible to do. For example, a word can be sothuigthe or dothuigthe, meaning that it is easy to understand or difficult to understand. Or it can be sofheicthe or dofheicthe, visible or invisible.

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