Talk:make a silk purse of a sow's ear

Alternate interpretation?

After 10 pages of Google results, I find nothing to support my speculation, but it seems eminently logical to me.

Since "silk purse" is a crude euphemism (??) for a woman's genitals, it seems to me that another interpretation of this idiom could be more literally:

"You can't make a vagina out of a sow's ear"

I have asserted this meaning for years, but only now thought to verify my (possibly unique) understanding.

Has anyone heard this usage in real life? Bobdoss01 (talk) 16:28, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Actually I haven't ever seen such an interpretation of the proverb in the 75 years since I first heard it from my school English teacher. I would think it is a product of the recent modern world. Closer to the truth of the accepted meaning are the facts of life in the 15th and 16th century Scotland where it originated from a Clergyman. In those days people used pig skin for all manner of personal items, from boots to purses. A usable part of the pig carcass were the ears which were commonly slit to form a simple purse by inserting a draw string to close the top. You can see painting as drawing from that time which clearly depict such "pig ear" purses hanging from the belts of citizens and Clergy. Clearly this was a low quality cheap item and could not be compared with the cost and social quality of a purse made of silk and used by the Ladies and Gentry of the day. The author of the proverb was a bit of a poet and merely used this purse difference to make a point about society. Jug — This unsigned comment was added by Only a jug (talk • contribs) at 03:39, 26 September 2020 (UTC).

My impression is that a woman’s genitalia might visually resemble a sow’s ear but feel like a silk purse…. 2605:59C8:30C7:CE10:C493:6400:5366:444C 17:05, 22 August 2024 (UTC)