Abstract
EVIL EYE IN PROVERBS AND IDIOMS
The effort to make sense of the situations and events around the human being from the
beginning of life, the emotional states in which s/he is in, the need to be protected from
dangers have been effective in the formation of various beliefs, one of these beliefs is the evil
eye, whose roots go back to ancient times.
The evil eye emerged as a result of feelings such as curiosity, fear, anxiety and uncertainty
that people who started to explore the world they lived in. The person who observing his
environment, considered some people and objects in a separate position from others and
believed that they had a different power. These are used sometimes to suppress different
emotions and sometimes to improve their situation. Beliefs shaped by such factors have
been passed down from generation to generation by taking power from interpersonal
interaction in environments where society comes together.
The evil eye, which has been in the flow of life since the earliest times, has also existed in
oral culture products such as proverbs and idioms. Proverbs and idioms, which are among
the oral culture products, have functions such as establishing the connection between the
past and the present, and ensuring the continuity and permanence of the culture, help to
convey the knowledge, interaction and experiences of past generations.
In this study, the evil eye will be explained taking into account the history of culture and
practices in daily life based on examples chosen from Ömer Asım Aksoy’s Proverbs and
Idioms Dictionary I-II.
Keywords
Evil eye, proverb, idiom, oral culture, history of culture.