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About this tool
Browse Marathi mhani with transliteration, literal translation, everyday meaning, a Marathi gloss and English equivalents.
Marathi Mhani Explorer is a browsable collection of 30 Marathi proverbs, each shown with a transliteration, a strictly literal translation, the everyday meaning it actually carries, a Marathi gloss and the closest English proverb where one honestly exists. A mhan is a complete saying quoted unchanged, unlike a vakprachar, which is a phrase-level idiom that has to be inflected into its sentence. A seeded four-option quiz builds questions and distractors from the same collection.
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The word-for-word reading is listed separately from the everyday sense, which is where most misreadings begin.
Each proverb also carries a one-line explanation in Marathi for students working in the language.
An English proverb is offered only when it genuinely matches; entries with no counterpart say so.
A mhan (म्हण) is a complete proverb quoted exactly as it stands, such as अति तेथे माती. A vakprachar (वाक्प्रचार) is an idiomatic phrase that must be conjugated into a sentence, so exam questions usually ask you to use a vakprachar in a sentence and to explain a mhan.
It means that the people who know least make the most noise — literally 'shallow water makes a great deal of sound'. It matches the English 'empty vessels make the most noise'.
It describes help or effort arriving in completely the wrong place: the fire is at one temple and the fire engine has gone to another. It is used of misdirected relief, budgets or attention.
Proverbs live in speech, so wording differs between Pune, Vidarbha, Marathwada and Konkan, and many have longer forms that are shortened in daily use. The versions here follow those most commonly printed in proverb collections and school readers.