“The girl carelessly dropped the cloth that covered her, and appeared to the eyes of all beholders such as Venus showed herself to the Phrygian shepherd, having indeed the celestial form of that goddess.”
Bougainville's celebrated, highly romanticized account of his 1768 landing at Tahiti, which he named 'New Cythera' and which shaped Europe's enduring image of the island as an earthly paradise.
— Louis Antoine de Bougainville, French Polynesia
Source: Louis Antoine de Bougainville, Voyage autour du monde (1771); English translation by John Reinhold Forster, A Voyage Round the World (1772)
More Proverbs from French Polynesia
The coral grows, the palm grows, but man departs.
Nature and the reef endure across generations while a single human life is fleeting — a call to humility before the permanence of land and sea.
Do not dive in with anger.
Entering the water — or any risk — while angry clouds judgment; calm the mind before you act.
The dead go to count the stars, and will return once they have counted them all.
A folk image of death as an unfinished journey rather than a final end, reflecting a Tahitian view of the spirit's lasting bond with the living world.
Every man is the builder of his own hut.
Each person is responsible for shaping their own life and future through their own effort.
If you aim your spear at two fish, both will escape.
Trying to chase two goals at once often means catching neither; focus brings success.
Goods given make a quicker return than goods held.
Generosity circulates and comes back to the giver, while hoarding brings nothing.