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Many times in its history, the Serbian people have faced terrible sufferings and plagues. That is why it is perhaps not surprising that such sayings can seem morbid and “abnormal” to someone from the outside.
Some of these sayings were collected and written down by Vuk Karadzic, some are unknown, and some are of more recent date. Everything is used very often in modern speech, almost every day, and people generally do not know their origin or how sad and scary some of them are.
I present to you some of these sayings:
It carries children like a plague
“Plague” is the popular name for the plague. It is a terrible contagious disease that has taken hundreds of thousands of people across Europe and Serbia in the past. The most vulnerable suffered the most – children.
No one is a prophet in his village
According to tradition, this is a sentence of Jesus Christ that he addressed to the inhabitants of his hometown who did not accept him as God’s messenger.
Your cat ate your tongue
In the English navy, for minor offenses, such as disrespecting superiors, sleeping on guard, or drunkenness, rioters were punished by whipping with a whip with nine whips called a “Cat with Nine Tails.” The pain was so strong that a large number of victims were completely mute for some time after serving their sentences.
He laughs like crazy at flour
There is a theory that the term has Macedonian roots. There was a custom for the mentally ill (who often laughed hysterically) to be treated with prayers over flour, from which loaves were then made for them to eat.
Be good not to be blue
The saying was written by Vuk Karadžić in the book “Serbian Folk Proverbs” in 1849, with the explanation that such a husband threatens his wife, and today he tells us about the not very flattering attitude towards women in the Serbian tradition.
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