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Russian SayingsRussian sayings give an insight an many aspects of Russian history, culture, national character. Russian language is replete with many hundreds of proverbs (пословица/poslov'itsa/) and sayings (поговоркa/pogovorka/). These were already tabulated by the seventeenth century, and collected and studied in the nineteenth and twentieth, with the folk-tales being an especially fertile source. Quite a few sayings are of literary origin. Sample sayings в тридевятом царстве /v trid'ev'atom tsartsv'e/ "in the twenty-seventh kingdom", a typical beginning of a fairy tale; often used ironically in a reference to a place far away. со времён царя Гороха /so vrem'on tsar'a goroxa/ "since the times of Tsar Green-pea" = "since time immemorial" ни к селу, ни к городу /ni k s'elu, ni k gorodu/ "neither for a village nor for a city" = "of no use or relevance whatsoever" хоть кол на голове теши /xot' kol na golov'e teS1/ "even if you whittled a spike on his head..." (said of someone ultimately stubborn or recalcitrant) Related article
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