# to carry coals to Newcastle



## vandad

I'm really eager to know how can it be said in other languages "to carry coal to Newcastle"? We in Persian say "to carry caraway to Kerman " and Kerman is a historical city in the south of Iran,in wich the most part of caraway seeds of Iran grow.And in Italain and other members of the romance languages and even in Dutch is said "to carry water to the sea" .


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## Saluton

You've posted this thread in the Russian section and received a correct answer: ехать в Тулу со своим самоваром (to go to Tula with one's own samovar).


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## jonquiliser

In Swedish I think it is "to sell sand in Sahara", though I'm not sure if this is rather used for someone so shrewd that he could sell sand in Sahara.


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## apmoy70

In Greek:
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1398079


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## sokol

Vandad, it would have been a good idea to include links to the previous threads you posted in other forums: 

Arabic
Dutch
Greek
Japanese
Korean
Polish
Russian
Turkish

In *German *there is:
- Eulen nach Athen tragen = carry owls to Athens (It is a calque of the Greek one and mainly used by educated people; many German native speakers wouldn't know the literal meaning of this idiom - still, it is the only idiom with this meaning which is used in all German speaking nations.)
- Regional idioms as listed here at Wiki of which however I only know "einem Eskimo einen Kühlschrank verkaufen" which however is not (!) synonymous (literal meaning: "to sell a fridge to an Inuit", and the idiom means "being an excellent salesman"); thus I can't confirm if they're really idiomatic, or in what regions they're used.


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## Wilma_Sweden

jonquiliser said:


> In Swedish I think it is "to sell sand in Sahara", though I'm not sure if this is rather used for someone so shrewd that he could sell sand in Sahara.


Yup, it would take superior sales skills to sell sand in the Sahara, which is similar to selling snow to Eskimos, but I've seen it used for pointless activities, too... 

The most common equivalent Swedish expression for doing something pointless is 'gå över ån efter vatten', i.e. to cross the creek for water, so similar but not exactly like the Romance/Dutch version.

/Wilma


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## phosphore

In Serbian one could say _raditi Sizifov posao,_ which (literally) means _to do the work of Sisyphus _and is not really synonymous to the English phrase, or _trla baba lan da joj prođe dan_, which means _to de something pointless._


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## poppi1986

In Hungarian we have a loval variant "Vizet vinni a Dunaba" meaning 'to carry water to the Danube'.


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## ilocas2

Czech:

*nosit dříví do lesa* - to carry wood into forest
*nošení dříví do lesa* - carrying of wood into forest

there is also *nosit sovy do Athén* - to carry owls into Athens, but this is rare, I think that I never heard it, I only saw it in written form


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## ESustad

You can also say "to bring sand to the beach" in English.


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## Gavril

Welsh (all of these are copied from the Geiriadur yr Academi dictionary):

_bwrw heli yn y môr_ "throw brine into the sea"
_iro blonegen_ ~"to grease pig lard"
_iro hwch â bloneg_ "to grease a sow with lard"
_gwerthu mêl i  berchen gwenyn_ "to sell honey to an owner of bees"
_mynd i 'ngheg i chwilio am fy    nhafod_ "to go to my mouth in search of my tongue"
_gyrru halen  i'r Heledd_ "to drive salt to Yr Heledd" (Yr Heledd is a placename meaning "the salt pit")
_golchi traed alarch_ "to wash a swan's feet"

Icelandic
_bera í bakkafullan lækinn_ "to carry into a brimming stream"


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## Nino83

In Italian (in addition to _portare acqua al mare_) there is _portare vasi a Samo, nottole ad Atene, cavoli a Legnaia (vases to Samo, noctules to Athens, cabbages to Legnaia__)_. 
In Sicily we say also _portare paglia a Lipari_ (strow to Lipari).


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## sound shift

I have always known this expression as "coal*s *to Newcastle" The ngram at https://books.google.com/ngrams/gra...s to Newcastle;,c0;.t1;,coal to Newcastle;,c0 shows a large degree of dominance over "coal to Newcastle".


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## Dib

Bengali:
"tæla mathay tel dewa" = "To put oil on an oiled head"
Context: It is common in Bengal, and other parts of Indian subcontinent to put oil to your hairs before a bath.


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## Geo.

sound shift said:


> I have always known this expression as "coal*s *to Newcastle"


I have to agree.  I'm English as well — from the home counties — and I have only ever heard the expression in the plural.  See Wikipedia:-  Coals to Newcastle


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## Radioh

ilocas2 said:


> Czech:*nosit dříví do lesa* - to carry wood into forest


It's the same in Vietnamese. We say *chở gỗ về rừng*, which literally means "to carry timbers to a forest".


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## Littlewit

This is a revival of a nine-year old thread, please delete if not appropriate: only revived as the variations on this common idea (to undertake a superfluous endeavour) have produced some really charming forms in European languages:

English, ''to carry coals to Newcastle'' [the area around Newcastle-on-Tyne was a tremendous exporter of coal]

German/Deutsch, ''Eulen nach Athen tragen'' ('to carry owls to Athens') [the owl was the sacred bird of Athena, the patron of the city, as well as appearing ubiquitously on the tetradrachms minted with Laurium silver after the battle of Salamis: the ''Attic owls'' that financed the Acropolis, the Parthenon and the vast effort of the Peloponnesian War

The German is a translation of a Greek original which was rendered into typically laconic Latin by no less a man, apparently, than Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, Erasmus himself: 'ululas Athenas' -- my Latin is rather old, I believe it to be an interesting double accusative plural shortening of ''ululas Athenas ferre'', the interesting thing for a rusty Latinist is why Athenae was not thrown into the Dative. My memory of the accusative absolute is rather dim -- can someone clear it up?


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## bibax

Littlewit said:


> ... 'ululas Athenas' -- my Latin is rather old, I believe it to be an interesting double accusative plural shortening of ''ululas Athenas ferre'', the interesting thing for a rusty Latinist is why Athenae was not thrown into the Dative.



_Athēnās_ can mean '(in)to Athens' in certain context. This construction (acc. without prep. _in_) was used mostly in the case of cities, very rarely in the case of the common nouns (_domum eō_, but _in silvam eō_).

Rōmam = to Rome; Rōmae (old loc.) = in Rome; e.g. Rōmam eō (I am going to Rome), Rōmae sum (I am in Rome);

Ergo:
Athēnās eō = I am going to Athens.
Athēnīs sumus. = We are in Athens.

ululās [in] Athēnās = owls (in)to Athens;


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## Littlewit

Thank you -- do please forgive my delay in replying. Most useful.


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## Penyafort

*Catalan*:

*portar taronges a València* = to carry oranges to Valencia
*tirar aigua a la mar* = to pour water on the sea​*Spanish*:

*llevar leña al monte*/*bosque *= to carry wood to the woods
*llevar agua al mar *= to carry water to the sea
*vender miel a un colmenero* = to sell honey to a beekeeper
*vender hielo a un esquimal *= to sell ice to an Eskimo​


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## Aliph

In *French
"Porter de l'eau à la mer*" to bring water to the sea or to the river like in this quote:
“_Son coeur se serrait à l'idée que le bien va toujours aux moins pauvres. Jamais ça ne ratait, ces gens de la Piolaine auraient porté de l'eau à la rivière”. _(Émile Zola : Germinal)


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## Yendred

Aliph said:


> In *French
> "Porter de l'eau à la mer*" to bring water to the sea or to the river



There's a more common expression in French:
_Enfoncer les portes ouvertes_ (literally: to push open doors)


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## Welsh_Sion

To supplement Gavril's list from GPC and the Academi dictionary, Welsh also has:

cario dŵr tros afon - to carry water over a river
cario dŵr i ffynnon - to carry water to a well/spring
cario glo i Fflint - to carry coal to Flint (NE Wales)
rho(dd)i pwltis ar goes bren - to put a poultice on a wooden leg (Ynys Mon/Anglesey dialect)

The reference to yr Heledd could be _Heledd-wen_ ('White Salt Pit' = Nantwich)  _Heledd-ddu_ ('Black Salt Pit' = Northwich) and (_Ynysoedd) Yr Heledd _ ('The Salt Pit Islands' = The Hebrides).

There's also the jokey one referred to in the UK sitcom, Only Fools and Horses (in English) which refers to X 'selling refigerators to Eskimos [sic.]' I think the reference here is more the idea that X has a sufficient brass neck to do this (hence the line gets a laugh), rather than, strictu sensu, being applied as something being sold which is unnecessary.


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## Nizo

Esperanto: *porti *_(or_* veturigi*_)_* akvon al la maro* (to carry water to the sea).


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