Greek proverbs have carried wisdom, humor, and everyday truths across centuries. Now, scholars have uncovered 90 previously unknown Greek proverbs, hidden for hundreds of years inside an old manuscript in France. The remarkable discovery adds a new chapter to the long story of Greek oral tradition and shows how Greek culture continued to travel across Europe long after the ancient world had ended.
A Hidden Treasure in Orléans
The discovery was made by researchers Han Lamers of the University of Oslo and Toon Van Hal of KU Leuven while examining handwritten manuscripts in the library of Orléans.
What they found was a manuscript containing a collection of Greek sayings titled Proverbes Grecs. At first, the scholars assumed the material was already known. But after closer inspection, they realized the manuscript preserved 90 sayings never before recorded in modern scholarship.
This is the first page of the manuscript Proverbes Grecs, in which the researchers discovered the previously unknown proverbs.
(Source: Médiathèque d’Orléans / Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies)
The Man Behind the Proverbs
The sayings were originally collected in the 17th century by a Greek priest named Hermodorus Rhegius. Although historians already knew he gathered proverbs, only around 30 sayings had previously been attributed to him.
This new find increases his known collection to roughly 120 proverbs, making him a much more important figure in the preservation of Greek folklore than once believed.
Proverbs from the Aegean Islands
Hermodorus reportedly traveled through the Aegean Islands while carrying out Catholic missions among Greek-speaking communities. During these journeys, he wrote down proverbs he heard from local people.
That means many of these sayings likely originated in island communities and preserve authentic spoken Greek wisdom from everyday life. These are not elite literary texts—they are the voices of ordinary people.
Examples of the Rediscovered Sayings
Some of the recovered proverbs are vivid, practical, and humorous.
One reads:
“We spilled the oil, but it fell into the pot.”
This means that although something went wrong, no real harm was done.
Another saying states:
“Do as the priest says, but do not do as he does.”
A sharp reminder about hypocrisy—still relevant today.
Why Greek Proverbs Matter
Proverbs are more than sayings. They reveal how people thought, judged character, explained luck, and passed wisdom to younger generations.
Greek civilization has one of the richest proverb traditions in the world, stretching from Antiquity through Byzantium and into modern Greece. These rediscovered sayings help bridge that long cultural continuity.
They also show that Greek identity was preserved not only through famous philosophers and poets, but through the speech of farmers, sailors, priests, and families.
From Greece to France: A Long Journey
The original notebooks used by Hermodorus have been lost. Yet somehow the sayings traveled westward and were later copied into the manuscript of French physician Louis Gaudefroy, eventually ending up in the Orléans library after his death in 1725.
Without that chain of preservation, the proverbs may have disappeared forever.
A Victory for Greek Cultural Heritage
This discovery reminds us that Greek history is still full of surprises. Even in modern libraries, forgotten manuscripts can preserve lost voices from the Greek past.
The rediscovery of these 90 proverbs proves that Greek heritage survives not only in temples and ruins, but in language itself.
Final Thought
Empires fall, cities change, and manuscripts gather dust—but proverbs endure.
Sometimes a short saying can outlive kingdoms.
