ProverbWisdom
English originc. 1600
English originc. 1600He knows not a hawk from a hand-saw.
Meaning: Lacking discernment between predator and tool reveals ignorance of fundamental distinctions in one's world.
Who said it? William Shakespeare, Hamlet, c. 1600
Origin: From Shakespeare's Hamlet (c. 1600). Hamlet, feigning madness, tells his old school friends that he is "but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw." Some scholars think "handsaw" is a corruption of "hernshaw," a young heron, which would make both of them birds.
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