The sicilian soul expresses itself through the proverbs. They represent a secular knowledge and inspire the behaviours and the way you act. In particular, there are several proverbs reffered to women.
The figure of woman in Sicily is very linked to the role of wife and mother. The man is the head of household, but the woman is the queen of the house and she has the main duty of feeding and upbringing sons. Infact the proverbs say:
“A casa, senza a fimmina, ‘mpuvirisci.” (“The house is poor without a woman”)
“La bona mugghieri è a prima ricchizza di la casa” (“A good wife is the first wealth of the house”)
The “Fimmina” (the woman), according to the sicilian prototype, must have some definite qualities: honest (“Muggheri onesta, trisoru ca resta.” i.e. “Honest wife, treasure that remains”), prim (“A fimmina ca havi russuri, attira chiù d’i ricchizzi.” i.e. “The woman attracts more with her prudish and less with her wealth”), refined and kind (“Fimmina bona, vali chiù di ‘na corona” i.e. “A refined woman is worther than a crown”), fair and discrete (“E’ bona donna, donna chi nun parra” i.e. “It’s a good woman the one that doesn’t speak too much”).
Unfortunately, with the passing of the years, proverbs like those mentioned above are disappearing, mainly due to the advent of new technologies, which have allowed the development of an increasingly shorter, compact, poor language, where it is necessary to communicate in the shortest possible time. It would be nice if these proverbs were collected in a space, physical or digital, so that they are direct testimony and can be consulted by generations to come.
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