Traditional Jamaican proverb · taught in Clarendon
Wen bul uol, dem tek hog-miit ti-tai fi tai im.
When the bull is old, they tie him with hog-meat vine.
Strength doesn't last — what could never have held you young will hold you in the end.
two-clause indicative with time clause
The when clause has no linking verb in it at all — bull ole, with nothing between them — and dem stands for people in general rather than any group you could point to.
This one is taught in Clarendon.
Cassidy quotes this proverb — 'When bull old, dem tek hog-meat ti-tie fe tie him' — in his entry for te-tie, a common word for string which he takes as possibly a Jamaican reduplication of English tie. Hog-meat is the trailing vine it is made from.
The grammatical categories this description uses — clause type, mood, and the sound patterning noted where it carries the proverb — follow Unseth's framework for describing a proverb rather than only translating it.
The proverb is folk material. The description of how it is put together follows the framework in the work above; the translation and the commentary are mine.
Hear it, and collect the rest →