Imagery in Tuvan and Belarusian proverbs (in search of common and specific proverbial images); [Образность в тувинских и белорусских пословицах (в поисках общего и специфического в пословичных образах)]

The article examines the common and specific features of the figurative semantics of proverbs in the Tuvan and Belarusian languages, with a focus on identifying universal and unique aspects of proverbial imagery. Publications of proverbs from both languages serve as the basis for the research. It has been established that proverbial imagery is based on, firstly, semantic ambiguity and, secondly, expressiveness and figurativeness. The most significant images in proverbs from both languages are social (the world of individuals and society in their interaction), somatic (human physical nature), objective (things created by human labor), natural (inanimate nature), and faunal (living beings and their communities). At the same time, the distribution of images in proverbs does not coincide in terms of their ranking or composition between the two languages. In Tuvan proverbs, social, faunal, somatic, objective, and natural images are more prevalent, while phytonymic images are less common. In Belarusian proverbs, the order is social, faunal, objective, natural, somatic and phytonymic. The composition of proverb images in each group is unique to different languages. However, the differences between them are most evident in quantitative terms. There are only a few proverb images that have a universal quality. These images represent the general characteristics of reality in the ethnic worldview of the Tuvan and Belarusian people. The distribution of images in proverbs in the two languages reflects the specific way each ethnic group categorizes reality. © 2024 Ch. K. Lamazhaa. All rights reserved.