Russian proverbs about friendship and what lies behind them

«Better to have a hundred friends than a hundred rubles.

«An old friend is better than two new ones.

Read them both one after another. The first tells you to make friends without number, the second says that even two new ones won't replace an old one. So just how many do you need, a hundred or one?

And that is not the only quarrel. «A friend in need is a friend indeed» asserts that there are few true ones, and how to tell them apart will become clear in a difficult hour. «Business is business» even advises keeping your guard up even with your own people.

Russian wisdom about friendship contradicts itself at every turn. And this is no oversight. Proverbs have never been a rulebook; they are remarks in an old debate that the people have been having with themselves for centuries. Each is right in its own moment and for its own occasion, and together they present a picture far more honest than any rulebook.

Let's walk through this dispute. Along the way, we'll see how the same idea sounds in English, because anyone looking for Russian proverbs about friendship usually wants a counterpart to their native expression.

A hundred friends or one old one

It all starts with arithmetic.

Behind the crowd stands the most famous of all: «Have not a hundred rubles, but a hundred friends.» The thought is simple and thoroughly practical for peasant life. Money will burn down along with the hut, but people will remain, come, and help rebuild. The same calculation is behind «Clinging to one another, fear nothing.».

An entire party is opposed. «An old friend is better than two new ones» recalls time, because a new person is good yet unknown, while the old one has been tested by years. «Old friendship never rusts» is about the same, only softer. And «It is easy to find friends, but hard to keep them» sums it up quite harshly.

There is no winner in this argument, and rightly so. One proverb speaks of the breadth of one's circle, the other of the depth of connection, and they are both about different things. Just note that «a hundred friends» is actually about a good reputation, not the number of acquaintances at all. A person whom everyone is glad to help was valued more in the village than a wealthy one.

In English, the first one corresponds to «A friend in court is better than a penny in purse,» although this expression is old and rare in living speech. The second one is most accurately conveyed by «Old friends and old wine are best,» and the coincidence here is almost word-for-word, down to the wine, which in Russian was replaced by time.

There is also a third party to this dispute that people forget about. «It's easy to find friends, but hard to keep them» has already been mentioned, and right alongside it is «If you have a friend, you will find the time.» Whoever has someone to call will also find the time. Both remind us that friendship requires effort; it doesn't just happen by itself.

The hour when everything becomes clear

The second question Russian wisdom resolves unanimously, a rare case.

«Everyone knows »A friend in need is a friend indeed,« even those who speak Russian with difficulty. Close by stands »A fair-weather friend is no better than an enemy.".

The meaning in all of them is the same. As long as things are good, a person is surrounded by people. The bottom is only visible when the water recedes.

English yields almost a twin, «A friend in need is a friend indeed.» The coincidence is so exact that bilinguals usually recognize the Russian version at half a word, and this is rare luck for translation.

Part of the same cluster is «For a friend, seven versts is not a detour.» The meaning is that for a friend, even a long journey is short. In English, «A friend’s house is never far» works similarly.

By the way, about the outskirts, since the word came up. That was what they called the fence around the village and the road along it. To ride around, along the outskirts, meant to make a detour. So «seven versts is not the outskirts» literally means: even seven versts for a friend are walked straight through. A verst, by the way, is a little over a kilometer, so we are talking about an hour and a half's walk, and for a friend such a road is short.

Where friendship ends and business begins

And this is where the people unexpectedly turn tough.

«Business is business draws the line. Friendship should not interfere with work. A boss who spares a friend-subordinate hurts both.

Even sharper sounds «Friendship is friendship, but tobacco is separate.» Tobacco is not mentioned here by chance. Tobacco was an expensive item, and sharing it by chipping in meant quickly running out of it, which is why even close friends kept their pouches separate. Later, the meaning expanded, and it came to mean: be friends all you like, but keep your financial affairs strictly transparent.

Russians are often embarrassed by these two proverbs, finding them calculating. In vain. They don't cancel friendship; they save it from its most frequent affliction: money and grievances. English expresses this in almost the same words, «Business is business,» and adds the warning, «Lend your money and lose your friend.».

Hence also «A goose is no match for a pig,» which means that friendship between people who are too different does not last long. The obvious English equivalent is «Birds of a feather flock together,» except that the Russian expression is insulting, while the English one is neutral.

Russians also have a special name for those who are only friends in good weather. Such people are called friends until the first trouble, and they also say «Once the tablecloth is off the table, the friendship has sailed away.» Anyone who searches for Russian sayings friendship is often surprised by how many bitter observations about unreliable acquaintances have been gathered in Russian. And indeed, a lot of them have been gathered, more than praises.

A bitter word is worth more than a sweet one

The last node is the most interesting.

«A friend is not one who flatters, but one who tells the truth.» The proverb directly values bitter words over pleasant ones, and this is, perhaps, the most Russian thing there is in the conversation about friendship.

The same idea is conveyed by «Friendship is strengthened not by flattery, but by truth and honor» and the famous «Tell me who your friend is, and I will tell you who you are.» The latter, by the way, is older than the Russian language. Similar things were said in antiquity and in Spanish collections, and it came to us through book culture.

The English express the same thought more often with the aphorism «A true friend stabs you in the front.» Its author is unknown, though the phrase is attributed to one person or another. The intonation, however, is different. The Russian proverb instructs, the English one jokes.

And completely aside stands «A man without friends is like a tree without roots.» This is no longer about the rules of friendship. This is about the fact that without it, a person is worth nothing.

This also includes «One for all, and all for one.» To the Russian ear, it sounds native, although it came to us with the translation of «The Three Musketeers,» and the motto itself has been known in Europe since the time of the Swiss Confederation; Dumas merely made it famous. It took root permanently, entered children's books and slogans, and today few people remember that it is a quotation. This happens with proverbs more often than it seems.

Speaking of translation into English, equivalents are not always found, and that in itself is curious. Russians have a separate proverb about tobacco and money, while the English put the advice not to lend money in that exact spot. The English have «There is no friend like an old friend,» which Russians answer with two proverbs at once. But «A person without friends is like a tree without roots» has no exact equivalent at all; the closest in spirit is «No man is an island,» and even that comes from the poetry of John Donne.

How to say this and how not to say it

Now about usage, because this is where children and adults abroad stumble the most.

It is worth starting with the fact that the proverb is rarely uttered in its entirety. A Russian will say, «Well, old friend, you understand yourself,» or «Don't have a hundred rubles, as the saying goes,» and trail off. The interlocutor will complete the rest themselves. The full phrase from beginning to end is heard either in a teacher's speech or ironically.

Next is more important. A proverb functions as a move in a conversation; it does not serve as mere decoration. It either justifies, reproaches, or draws a line. You cannot say «a friend in need is a friend indeed» just like that, without a reason. It is said when a friend has just helped out or, conversely, failed to show up.

There is also the question of tact here. Proverbs are convenient for reproaching, and Russians make full use of this. «Business is business, and pleasure is pleasure» (literally: Friendship is friendship, but tobacco is separate), said to one's face, sounds cold, almost like a refusal. A child should be explained that behind these words there is often a way to refuse politely, and there is little wisdom in them.

The speaker's age also matters. Proverbs are almost never heard in the speech of teenagers, except for two or three of the most common ones. A grandmother, on the other hand, will rattle off a dozen in a single conversation. Upon hearing an unfamiliar one, a child usually takes it literally, and that is when their entire worldview goes haywire.

It is also worth mentioning what is absent from proverbs about friendship. There is not a single word about how to make up. Russian wisdom explains in detail how to choose friends and how to test them, yet remains almost entirely silent on the subjects of quarreling and reconciliation. The only thing to be found is «You cannot chop down a strong friendship even with an axe,» and even that is more about durability than repair. Why this turned out to be the case is still a matter of debate.

Geese, versts and other incomprehensible things

A true story from real life. A nine-year-old girl heard her grandmother say «a goose is no match for a pig» and decided that her grandmother was insulting her friend. She got offended, and the conversation ended in tears.

It took a long time to figure it out. It turned out the girl only knew the goose from the cartoon and the pig from the fairy tale, and put them together into a picture meaning that her friend was bad. But the proverb is not about a bad person. It is about how people of very different backgrounds and statuses find it hard to get along.

That is how a proverb works in a child's mind if the roots are unknown. A child abroad hears about geese, tobacco, versts, and the outskirts of a village, but these things do not exist in their life at all. The words are understood, but the picture does not come together.

This is cured by analysis; rote memorization is useless here. Take a proverb, explain where the surrounding area came from, and ask to retell it in their own words. Until the child retells it themselves, consider that they didn't understand.

The reverse process is also going well: finding an English equivalent. «Друг познается в беде» and «A friend in need is a friend indeed» fit each other almost perfectly, and this discovery delights the children. Next come more difficult pairs, and then some for which no pairs can be found, and this is where the most interesting part begins.

It is also useful to know that Russian proverbs about friendship live in clusters; they never walk alone. In a single conversation, it is easy to hear three in a row, and they may even contradict each other. A grandmother will say «an old friend is better than two new ones,» a mother will object with «don't have a hundred rubles,» and a father will draw the line with his «friendship is friendship, but tobacco is separate.» The argument is not just in the language, it is happening at the table, and everyone is armed with their own line.

Finally, about proverbs that sound like they are about friendship, but are actually about something else. «It takes one to know one» is often mistaken for a friendly one, although originally it carries a mockery: they say this about people of the same kind, and more often about bad ones. «A man is known by the company he keeps» also does not praise the company, but warns. These two should be discussed separately when talking to a child, because it is extremely easy to confuse them with praise for friendship.

Whoever finds twenty proverbs about friendship not enough, will find comprehensive analysis of Russian proverbs on all topics at once.

At our school, proverbs are discussed as they come up in conversation naturally; there are no separate lessons dedicated to them. Palme School works with children from four to seventeen years old. Groups are small, and the level is determined in advance. You can start with two free lessons. The first is with a methodologist who gets to know the child and selects a group, the second is a trial lesson in a group with a teacher.

The argument that will never end

Let's go back to the beginning. A hundred friends or one old one?

Folk wisdom gives no answer and has no intention of giving one. It has gathered all sides of the argument and left the choice up to the speaker. Need to justify a wide circle of acquaintances? There's a proverb for that. Need to explain why you've been holding onto a single person for thirty years? There's another.

That is the whole value. It is a piggy bank of arguments for all occasions, accumulated by those who were friends before us.

Frequently asked questions about Russian proverbs on friendship