猿も木から落ちる saru mo ki kara ochiru Even Monkeys Fall Out Of Trees

猿も木から落ちる is a whole scene: a monkey, a tree, and a fall. も means even, so the monkey is the one who should never fall. The saying is narrower than nobody is perfect. The skilled person slips at the very thing they are best at. It has two uses, and both are old: a warning not to relax where you are good, and a kind word for an expert's slip.

The proverb is native Japanese and was already a saying when a haikai verse of 1638 made the autumn leaves fall with it, calling it a たとへ; a book of sayings set it down in 1656.

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