For Want of a Nail

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

"For want of a nail" is a proverb, having numerous variations over several centuries, reminding that seemingly unimportant acts or omissions can have grave and unforeseen consequences.

History

Variation

For want of a nail the shoe was lost,
for want of a shoe the horse was lost;
and for want of a horse the rider was lost;
being overtaken and slain by the enemy,
all for want of care about a horse-shoe nail.

—Benjamin Franklin
The Way to Wealth (1758)[1]

Variation

A little neglect may breed mischief ...
for want of a nail, the shoe was lost;
for want of a shoe the horse was lost;
and for want of a horse the rider was lost.

—Benjamin Franklin
Poor Richard's Almanack, preface (1758)

Short Variation

For want of a nail the shoe was lost;
For want of a shoe the horse was lost;
For want of a horse the battle was lost;
For the failure of battle the kingdom was lost—
All for the want of a horse-shoe nail.

—Unattributed
from Fifty Famous People by James Baldwin[2]

The proverb is found in a number of forms. Benjamin Franklin included a version in his Poor Richard's Almanack (1758), but over a century earlier, the poet George Herbert included it in a 1640 collection of aphorisms.[3][4][5] Predecessors include the following:


Further reading

References

  1. ^ The way to wealth Archived 26 July 2010 at the Wayback Machine By Benjamin Franklin (Retrieved 20100420)
  2. ^ James Baldwin (1912). "The Horseshoe Nails". Fifty Famous People: A Book of Short Stories. American Book Company. pp. 51–54.
  3. ^ Speake, Jennifer (23 October 2008). A Dictionary of Proverbs. OUP Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-158001-7.
  4. ^ Manser, Martin H.; Fergusson, Rosalind (2007). The Facts on File Dictionary of Proverbs. Infobase Publishing. ISBN 978-0-8160-6673-5.
  5. ^ Keyes, Ralph (1 April 2007). The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and When. St. Martin's Publishing Group. p. 69. ISBN 978-1-4299-0617-3.
  6. ^ Freydank; Grimm, Wilhelm (1834). Vridankes Bescheidenheit. Dieterich. p. XCVIII. Retrieved 1 September 2009.
  7. ^ Definition of Hood, etimology from the New Century Dictionary, with milddle english etimology including cote and hod (retrieved 20100402)
  8. ^ a b c Proverbs: For want of a nail the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the man was lost at answers.com
  9. ^ "Confessio Amantis" or "Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins" Incipit Liber Quintus: Part 3 from the Medieval and Classical Literature Library (retrieved 20100402)
  10. ^ Dictionnaire du Moyen Français Archived 5 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine (retrieved 20100402)
  11. ^ Adamn, Thomas (1629). The Works of Thomas Adams: The Sum of His Sermons, Meditations, And Other Divine And Moral Discourses. London: Thomas Harper and Augustine Matthews for John Grismand. p. 714. ISBN 9780404003531. Retrieved 2 April 2010.
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