A Chinese proverb, usually filed as a 諺語 (yànyǔ) or a 俗語 (súyǔ), is a short saying from everyday speech, and a few began as lines in classical books. We looked for each of 160 sayings on one list in a named source. Sixteen traced to one. We read ten in the original book, and six of those ten are worded differently there. In three, a word has changed: the Analects has 民無信不立, said of the people in a talk about government, where the list has 人无信不立.
Taiwan's dictionary writes a source into its test for an idiom
Taiwan's Ministry of Education (MOE) defines the usual terms in its 《重編國語辭典修訂本》, the Revised Mandarin Chinese Dictionary. Its entry for 諺語 opens 「流傳的俗語」, a folk saying in circulation, so a proverb is one kind of 俗語 rather than a separate class. The 俗語 entry itself is short: 「通俗流行的話語」.
The entry for 成語, the set idiom, calls it 「漢語中有典源，具多層表義功能的固定語」, a fixed expression with a written source (典源, diǎnyuán), and adds 「形式不一，以四言為主」: the form varies, though four characters is the usual shape. The dictionary's own examples begin with 矛盾, two characters.
The two-part 歇後語 is another form again, covered in our guide to xiehouyu and their puns. These are one dictionary's definitions; we opened no mainland one. MOE text is quoted under CC BY-ND 3.0 TW, credit: 中華民國教育部（Ministry of Education, R.O.C.）。《重編國語辭典修訂本》（版本編號：2015_20260929）網址：http://dict.revised.moe.edu.tw/.
Main entries in the ministry's idiom dictionary print four list sayings word for word
We picked 17 sayings from the list by hand because they looked classical, so this sample says nothing about the whole list. We searched each in MOE's 《成語典》 (Dictionary of Chinese Idioms, 2020), which separates main entries (主條) from cross-references (附條) and keeps a wider appendix for research. Two-clause sayings matched only when typed with a full-width comma.
Four of the 17 are main entries in exactly the list's wording: 熟能生巧, 人言可畏, 近朱者赤，近墨者黑 and 不入虎穴，焉得虎子. Two more are main entries for the saying's core, 塞翁失馬 and 知己知彼. 滴水穿石 is a cross-reference whose page reads 「義參「水滴石穿」。」 Eight appear only in the appendix, and two, 養兒防老 and 三人行必有我師, are absent.
For 熟能生巧 the dictionary marks the source as tentative, 「典或出」, pointing to Ouyang Xiu's 《歸田錄》, and calls a second candidate 「有待商榷」, open to question. Its 塞翁失馬 entry gives the condensed saying as 「塞翁失馬，安知非福」, with 安, though one of its own example sentences uses 焉知非福. Six of the list's sayings are four characters long, and two of those are main entries. Credit: 中華民國教育部（Ministry of Education, R.O.C.）。《成語典》（版本編號：2020_20260929）網址：http://dict.idioms.moe.edu.tw/, CC BY-ND 3.0 TW.
Ten sayings can still be read in the original books
We found ten sayings on Chinese Wikisource in the text they come from: six lines of the Analects, each spoken by Confucius, two of the Laozi in the Wang Bi text, and one each of the Sunzi and the Three Character Classic.
| On the list | Source | The source reads | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| 己所不欲，勿施于人 | Analects, Yan Yuan and Wei Ling Gong | 己所不欲，勿施於人 | Same |
| 工欲善其事，必先利其器 | Analects, Wei Ling Gong | 工欲善其事，必先利其器 | Same |
| 欲速则不达 | Analects, Zi Lu | 欲速，則不達 | Same |
| 千里之行，始于足下 | Laozi ch. 64, Wang Bi text | 千里之行，始於足下 | Same |
| 三人行，必有我师 | Analects, Shu Er | 三人行，必有我師焉 | Drops 焉 |
| 祸兮福所倚，福兮祸所伏 | Laozi ch. 58, Wang Bi text | 禍兮福之所倚，福兮禍之所伏 | Drops both 之 |
| 人无信不立 | Analects, Yan Yuan | 民無信不立 | Word changed |
| 杀鸡焉用牛刀 | Analects, Yang Huo | 割雞焉用牛刀 | Word changed |
| 子不教，父之过 | Three Character Classic | 養不教，父之過 | Word changed |
| 知己知彼，百战不殆 | Sunzi, Mou Gong | 知彼知己，百戰不殆 | Order swapped |
The list is our Chinese proverb dictionary. Before a revision dated 3 November 2026, it said it kept its sayings apart from four-character 成語, its count included four entries repeated inside longer ones, and it noted the source wording for 2 of the 6 lines above that differ. The revision merges the repeats, leaving 160, and gives a Source line to the 16 we traced and to no other. On the revised page, searching 人无信不立 brings up one card whose Source line names the Yan Yuan chapter and its 民.
Those ten mostly read differently from the source text
Four of the ten match their source word for word. Two drop a particle, a small grammatical word. Three change a word, and one swaps the order of its clauses. Six of the ten differ from the book.
Context moves even where words hold. 欲速则不达 sits inside a reply to 子夏, governor of 莒父, who had asked about government: 「欲速，則不達；見小利，則大事不成。」 工欲善其事 answers 子貢 asking how to practise humaneness. 己所不欲 appears twice, in identical words.
The swapped order is the Sunzi's. Its Mou Gong chapter reads 「知彼知己，百戰不殆」, knowing the other side first, and the Di Xing chapter repeats that order. The common form puts the self first. 殆 there means danger: a hundred battles without peril.
The list writes 人 where the Analects has 民, and 杀 where it has 割
The Yan Yuan chapter sets 民無信不立 in an exchange that begins 子貢問「政」. Confucius names enough food, enough arms and the people's trust. Pressed to give one up, he drops arms, then food: 「去食。自古皆有死，民無信不立。」 The subject is 民, the people, and the question is how to govern; the saying has 人. We leave the reading to the commentators.
The Yang Huo chapter has Confucius arriving at Wucheng, hearing strings and singing, and smiling: 「割雞焉用牛刀。」 The text has 割, the saying 杀. Both name the same act of killing the bird, so the change is one of wording.
The third change is outside the Analects. The Three Character Classic reads 「養不教，父之過」, while the familiar form opens 子不教. We did not count 驷马难追: its four-horse team appears in the Analects as 「駟不及舌」, but spoken by 子貢 and differently worded.
Three sayings word an English proverb exactly
天助自助者 (tiān zhù zì zhù zhě) is "Heaven helps those who help themselves". 早起的鸟儿有虫吃 is "the early bird catches the worm", and 条条大路通罗马 is "all roads lead to Rome". We found no source that dates a borrowing in either direction, so a match is all we claim.
Most sayings on the list quote no book we could find
For 107 of the 160 we found no candidate source at all. Another 32 have a candidate text that might hold them, but we did not open it, so none counts as traced. Two circulate with a 20th-century attribution we saw only in 1969 and 1970 newspaper articles, never in the speaker's own text. The three English matches make up the rest.
That leaves 16 of 160, or 10%, traced to a named source. The denominator is one hand-made list, so the share says nothing about Chinese proverbs in general. Our guide on how well the 36 stratagems are attested puts the same question to another famous list.
Some sayings were already proverbs when a book first kept them. The Zuo Zhuan, under the fifth year of Duke Xi, labels one from outside the list with the word itself: 「諺所謂『輔車相依，脣亡齒寒』者」, cheek and jaw depend on each other, and without lips the teeth are cold.
