What would be the closest Greek proverb to “we all have to start somewhere”, meaning “do not worry about making beginner’s mistakes, since all of us at one time had to make them”.
Ἀρχὴ ἥμισυ παντός. …
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I found this quote in Aristotle’s Politics that you seem to be referring to: ἡ δ’ἀρχὴ λέγεται ἥμισυ εἶναι παντός,
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There’s a Greek proverb that means exactly the opposite of what you want: Ἀρχῆς κακῆς τέλος κακόν or Mali principii malus finis, “A bad beginning makes a bad end" (Erasmus 4.ix.86) attributed to several sources including Euripides.
How about the quote from Hesiod, παθὼν δέ τε νήπιος ἔγνω, “a fool learns when he has suffered,” sometimes quoted as παθήματα μαθήματα. Aesop uses this formula as the moral of several fables: ὁ μῦθος δηλοῖ, ὅτι πολλάκις τὰ παθήματα τῶν ἀνθρώπων μαθήματα γίνονται.
They use παθήματα μαθήματα in Thrasymachus so I’m glad to know the source of this cliche, thanks for the info. As for the Aesop quotes, do these quotes come from Babrius or some other later writer. Also, I want to encourage you to take a look at my essay posted inn the composition sections. any pointers would be appreciated.
This is used in several fables in Hausrath’s Corpus fabularum Aesopicarum. That collection pulls from various sources, so I don’t know if it’s Babrius or another author.
I will read your essay but I’m not competent to assess it, unfortunately. Nice job for attempting it. I will reply if I spot anything super-obvious, but it’s likely someone else will spot that before me, lol.
found an earlier version in Pythagoras: τοιοῦτον δή ἐστι τὸ ἀρχὴ δέ τοι ἥμισυ παντός. as seen here: http://217.71.231.54:8080/TLG0632/0632_002.htm
I find this very interesting, that all learning is Mathematics. It does make me wonder, with the simple one letter difference possibly suggesting a closer link between παθήμα and μαθήμα that the base context is ‘that which is put upon one’ to ‘that which one has gained ’; how, put together would allude to the larger idiom of “we all have to start somewhere” or “a fool learns when he has suffered”? We of course do this in english with very well known idioms. We flatten them out into collapsed phrases which represent the idiom. But without this base knowledge, which I suppose counts as oral tradition, how would any reader in any time period derive the larger idiom from the two word phrase?
I find this very interesting, that all learning is Mathematics.
That does not follow. μάθημα means ‘that which is learnt, lesson, learning, knowledge’, from the root μαθ- which also gives μανθάνω ‘learn, understand, know’. The meaning ‘mathematics’ is secondary. Cf. how English learning (in the right context) may imply a certain kind of academic knowledge, as opposed to having learnt how to ride a bicycle. Or how wheel in some contexts means ‘steering wheel’; that does not mean that all wheels are steering wheels.
It does make me wonder, with the simple one letter difference possibly suggesting a closer link between παθήμα and μαθήμα that the base context is ‘that which is put upon one’ to 'that which one has gained ’
A one letter difference does not suggest anything in itself. The derivational ending should be ignored, of course. That leaves the roots παθ- and μαθ-. Their etymologies don’t seem to be wholly certain, but there is no a priori reason to believe that they should be related, nor do any of the etymologies I can find suggest a link.
I don’t see where you get your “base context” from. παθ- gives πάσχω ‘undergo, experience, suffer’; μαθ- is ‘learn’, etc.
παθήματα μαθήματα (sc. ἐστί) means, literally and quite straight forward, ‘that which is experienced is something that is learnt’, or simply ‘experiences are lessons’. It happens to be a neat rhyme, but apart from that, there’s not much room or need for interpretation.
Thanks for the feedback.
As for the base context I speak of, παθήματα LSJ entry states "that which befalls one, suffering, misfortune" but is also used as “of good fortune” so the context of bad experience seems to be something not inherently built into the word. This would leave "that which befalls one" which in english is “that which is put upon one” synonymously.
As for μαθήματα, the primary entry "that which is learnt, lesson" seems to encompass all learning, not just that which is academic. If this were not so, the phrase “παθήματα μαθήματα” would not hold semantically. However, you are correct in your assertion that “that which one has gained” does not hold as it does not extend to nor suggest material gain, so I was incorrect. I should have said “knowledge one has gained (for oneself)”. I should have been clearer in stating that the word we have come to use for the modern concept of Mathematics derives from a word used much more broadly in semantic range.
Still, to stick to the point of the thread, in my opinion “παθήματα μαθήματα” although close, does not fit the idiom “we all have to start somewhere”, although it is a very clever rhyming phrase.