Talk:Speak of the devil

Latest comment: 3 years ago by Lembit Staan in topic Removal of similar proverbs in other languages

Indonesian and Malayalam sayings edit

I fail to see what they're doing here. Judging by the literal translations, they appear to bear no relation to 'speak of the devil' at all. If someone could provide an explanation it would be greatly appreciated. Cathfolant (talk) 03:34, 14 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Yiddish sayings edit

The variation translating to 'A shame ...' has no dictionary source but there are some forum usage examples (sans diacritics). [1][2] A more reliable source may be difficult to find. WillIdleAway (talk) 13:00, 27 October 2018 (UTC)Reply

Discussion edit

Somebody's in love with the citation needed tag on this page. M I RITE??? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.202.174.2 (talk) 17:26, 12 March 2019 (UTC)Reply

Reboot this mess edit

Invoking WP:TNT, I will take a stab at pruning this tag-bombed page that hasn't seen much work in the years since tagging. Ifnord (talk) 03:09, 27 April 2020 (UTC)Reply

Removal of similar proverbs in other languages edit

I think that removing the section containing similar proverbs in other languages is a huge loss for readers. Some material was referenced, some wasn't but is in current conversational use, simply poorly represented in academic works and might require some input from native speakers. Just compared how interesting the page content was before and how dry it looks currently. For those saying that proverbs should strictly contain the word 'devil', you're failing to see the use the proverb itself has on the personification of evil, which is represented differently among different cultures. Finestra9 (talk) 21:55, 01 November 2020 (UTC)Reply

We have wiktionary for translations. Staszek Lem (talk) 23:25, 1 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Sure, one can find translations of this proverb on Wiktionary, but the current Wikipedia page doesn't even mention the fact that there are so many translations of this saying in many different languages. That is not the case for most proverbs. The fact that this saying is so universal is remarkable. 141.134.151.207 (talk) 20:35, 25 February 2021 (UTC)Reply
Please find a reliable source which says so. Lembit Staan (talk) 02:38, 26 February 2021 (UTC)Reply
How ridiculous is that? You're demanding me to find a source for the fact that this idiom has many translations, after you guys just deleted the entire section with all the translations? The previous version of this page had translations in 37 different languages, 15 of which had individual citations. But you threw the baby out with the bathwater, and now you demand other people to go fix the problem that your TNT nuke created. Thanks but no thanks. 141.134.151.207 (talk) 18:35, 1 March 2021 (UTC)Reply
I am not demanding from you nothing. We are volunteers here. As for sources, Please read our policies: WP:V, WP:RS and don't throw tantrums without knowing the rules. Information in wikipedia must be verifiable by anybody. Jokers and hoaxers plague wikipedia since day one. No one can possibly know all 102 languages to confirm the translations, hence the requirements. Lembit Staan (talk) 03:32, 2 March 2021 (UTC)Reply