- English translation
You shriveled winter fig!
- Literal wording
O stunted sycamore fig, O thing of the winter!
- Meaning and lesson
The expression likens a frail person to sycamore figs that the winter has come upon. Once the cold reaches this fruit, it shrinks and withers, and the person being addressed is pictured the same way: shriveled, diminished, and stripped of vigor.
It is applied to someone whom sickness has exhausted and left gaunt. Both vocative calls point at the same image, binding the person to winter-struck fruit, so the speaker is commenting on a body that disease has visibly reduced.
- When it is used
Said of, or called out to, a thin person worn down by illness, likening them to winter-shriveled figs. Because it singles out a wasted, sickly appearance, it can wound someone who is actually ill.
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How this record reached us: Editorially sourced.
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