Here’s a list of African proverbs about life, love and family from around the continent. Some are known to come from specific tribes, ethnic groups or countries. Choose your favorites as a monthly mantra, an inspirational quote for your vision board, or just some ancestral insight to get you through the rest of your week!
African Proverbs About Life
- “A bird that flies off the Earth and lands on an anthill is still on the ground.”
- “Only a fool tests the depth of a river with no feet.”
- “Examine what is said, not who is speaking.”
- “If you want to know the end, look at the beginning.”
- “Knowledge is a garden. If it isn’t cultivated, you can’t harvest it.”
- “A roaring lion kills no game.”
- “Do not look where you feel. Look where you slipped.”
- “Restless feet might walk you into a snake pit.”
- “No shortcuts exist to the top of a palm tree.”
- “When two elephants fight, it is the grass that gets hurt.”
- “Tomorrow belongs to people who prepare for it today.”
- “No medicine exists that can cure hatred.”
- “All monkeys cannot hang from the same branch.”
- “He who digs a grave for his enemy might as well be digging one for himself.”
- “Even the lion protects himself against flies.”
- “However long the night, the dawn will break.”
- “If you heal the leg of a person, do not be surprised if they use it to run away.”
- “The axe forgets but the tree remembers.”
- “Once you carry your own water, you’ll remember every drop.”
- “Don’t set sail on someone else’s star.”
- “To try and to fail is not laziness.”
- “Seeing is different than being told.”
- “No matter how beautiful and well crafted a coffin might look, it will not make anyone wish for death.”
- “Wood already touched by fire is not hard to set alight.”
- “Confiding a secret to an unworthy person is like carrying grain in a bag with a hole.”
- “A feeble effort will not fulfill the self.”
- “Having a good discussion is like having riches.”
- “Don’t think there are no crocodiles just because the water is calm.”
- “He who refuses to obey cannot command.”
- “Do not call a dog with a whip in your hand.”
- “One falsehood spoils a thousand truths.”
- “The earth is a beehive, we all enter by the same door.”
- “Rain does not fall on one roof alone.”
- “However far a stream flows, it doesn’t forget its origin.”
- “If you think you’re too small to make a difference, try spending the night with a mosquito.”
- “If there is no enemy within, the enemy outside can do no harm.” 37. “The eye never forgets what the heart has seen.”
- “No person is born great. Great people become great when others are sleeping.”
- “When an old man dies, a library is burned with him.”
African Proverbs About Love
- “Truth should be in love and love in truth.”
- “When you marry a monkey for his wealth, the money goes but the monkey remains.”
- “Where there is love, there is no darkness.”
- “It is better to be loved than to be feared.”
- “When one is in love, a cliff becomes a meadow.”
- “He who loves, loves you with your dirt.”
- “If love is a sickness, patience is the remedy.”
- “To love someone who doesn’t love you is like shaking a tree to make the dew drops fall.”
- “If the full moon loves you, why worry about the stars?”
- “Don’t be so in love that you can’t tell when it’s raining.”
- “Even as the archer loves the arrow that flies, so too he loves the bow that remains constant in his hands.”
- “Love, like rain, does not choose the grass on which it falls.”
- “Do not treat your loved one like a swinging door: you are fond of it but you push it back and forth.”
- “Love doesn’t listen to rumors.”
- “One who loves the vase, loves also what is inside.”
- “One who marries for love alone will have bad days but good nights.”
- “Love for something makes a man blind and deaf.”
- “Let your love be like the misty rain, coming softly but flooding the river.”
- “The quarrel of lovers is the renewal of love.”
- “Don’t try to make someone hate the person he loves. For he will go on loving but he will hate you.”
- “If a woman doesn’t love you, she calls you “brother.””
- “Love is a despot who spares no one.”
- “Love doesn’t rely on physical features.”
- “If anyone makes you laugh, it is not always because they love you.”
- “You know who you love but you can’t know who loves you.”
- “Love is a painkiller.”
- “A happy man marries the girl he loves; a happier man loves the girl he married.”
- “One who plants grapes by the roadside, and one who marries a pretty woman, share the same problem.”
- “If money were to be found up in the trees, most people would be married to monkeys.”
- “Every kind of love is love, but self-love is supreme among them.”
- “True love means what’s mine is yours.”
- “It’s better to fall from a tree and break your back than to fall in love and break your heart.”
- “He may say that he loves you, wait and see what he does for you.”
- “It is difficult for two long-nosed lovers to kiss.”
- “A fish and bird may fall in love but the two cannot build a home together.”
- “Lovers do not hide their nakedness.”
- “When one is in love, a mountain top becomes a flat field.”
African Proverbs About Wisdom
- “Wisdom is wealth.”
- “Wisdom is like a baobab tree; no one individual can embrace it.”
- “The fool speaks, the wise man listens.”
- “Wisdom does not come overnight.”
- “The heart of the wise man lies quiet like limpid water.”
- “Wisdom is like fire. People take it from others.”
- “Only a wise person can solve a difficult problem.”
- “Knowledge without wisdom is like water in the sand.”
- “In the moment of crisis, the wise build bridges, and the foolish build dams.”
- “If you are filled with pride, then you will have no room for wisdom.”
- “A wise person will always find a way.”
- “Nobody is born wise.”
- “A man who uses force is afraid of reasoning.”
- “Wisdom is not like money to be tied up and hidden.”
- “One who causes others misfortune also teaches them wisdom.”
- “A fool cannot untie the knot tied by a wise man.”
- “Knowledge without wisdom is like water in the sand.”
- “Wisdom does not come overnight.”
- “One day in the life of a wise man is worth a fool’s entire life.”
- “To get lost is to learn the way.”
- “Other people’s wisdom prevents the king from being called a fool.”
- “By the time the fool has learned the game, the players have dispersed.”
- “If you close your eyes to facts, you will learn through accidents.”
- “The wise create proverbs for fools to learn, not to repeat.”
- “Just because the lizard nods his head, doesn’t mean he’s in agreement.”
- “A wise man fills his head before emptying his mouth.”
- “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.”
- “Your body is a temple of knowledge.”
- “A fool has to say something. A wise person has something to say.”
- “The wise man never takes a step too long for his leg.”
- “Give advice, if people don’t listen let adversity teach them.”
- “A man’s ruin lies in his tongue.”
- “No man can outwit their ancestors.”
- “It is better to live as a lion for one day rather than 100 years as a sheep.”
- “When deed speaks, words are nothing.”
- “He who does not know one thing knows another”
- “A wise person doesn’t fall down the same hill twice.”
African Proverbs About Family
- “A family is like a forest, when you are outside it is dense, when you are inside you see that each tree has its place.”
- “A united family eats from the same plate.”
- “A family tie is like a tree, it can bend but it cannot break.”
- “If I am in harmony with my family, that’s success.”
- “Where there are many, nothing goes wrong.”
- “A child is what you put into him.”
- “When you show the child the moon, it sees only your finger.”
- “We desire to bequeath two things to our children; the first one is roots, the other one is wings.”
- “A real family eats from the same cornmeal.”
- “Even the maid has a family.”
- “Don’t meddle with a family feud.”
- “In a family if you have somebody who is troublesome it’s the family members who are more worried than the troublesome member.”
- “If you educate a man, you educate one person. If you educate a woman, you educate a whole family.”
- “A husband with a good wife will never be on the road without supplies.”
- “A home without a woman is like a barn without cattle.”
- “Parents give birth to the body of their children, but not always to their characters.”
- “Every beetle is a gazelle in the eyes of its mother.”
- “A mother cannot give birth to something bigger than herself.”
- “It takes a village to raise a child.”
- “A small house will hold a hundred friends.”
- “A woman is a flower in a garden; her husband is the fence around it.”
- “The mother hen does not break its own eggs.”
- “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
- “Sticks in a bundle are unbreakable.”
- “Brothers love each other when they are equally rich.”
- “Dine with a stranger but save your love for your family.”
- “There is no fool who is disowned by his family.”
- “If relatives help each other, what evil can hurt them?”
- “He who earns calamity, eats it with his family.”
- “The old woman looks after the child to grow its teeth and the young one in turn looks after the old woman when she loses her teeth.”
- “When brothers fight to the death, a stranger inherits their father’s estate.”
- “Children are the reward of life.”
- “Home affairs are not talked about on the public square.”
- “A child does not laugh at the ugliness of his mother.”
- “Family must look out for family.”
- “It is hard to cure madness that originates in the family.”
- “When a bitter woman takes over the house, the family she rules is doomed.” Check out… 130 Irish Blessings100 Bible Quotes35 Healing Scriptures
