"it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six" meaning in English

See it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Proverb

Etymology: A jury usually consists of twelve people; a coffin may be carried by six. Head templates: {{en-proverb}} it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six
  1. In a precarious situation, it is wiser to act decisively and be judged by a jury than to be killed through inaction. Categories (topical): Six, Twelve
    Sense id: en-it's_better_to_be_judged_by_twelve_than_to_be_carried_by_six-en-proverb-k1jrvc~P Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English proverbs, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries
     
{
  "etymology_text": "A jury usually consists of twelve people; a coffin may be carried by six.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six",
      "name": "en-proverb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "proverb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English proverbs",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Six",
          "orig": "en:Six",
          "parents": [
            "Numbers",
            "All topics",
            "Terms by semantic function",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Twelve",
          "orig": "en:Twelve",
          "parents": [
            "Numbers",
            "All topics",
            "Terms by semantic function",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In a precarious situation, it is wiser to act decisively and be judged by a jury than to be killed through inaction."
      ],
      "id": "en-it's_better_to_be_judged_by_twelve_than_to_be_carried_by_six-en-proverb-k1jrvc~P",
      "links": [
        [
          "precarious",
          "precarious"
        ],
        [
          "situation",
          "situation"
        ],
        [
          "wiser",
          "wiser"
        ],
        [
          "decisive",
          "decisive"
        ],
        [
          "judge",
          "judge"
        ],
        [
          "jury",
          "jury"
        ],
        [
          "kill",
          "kill"
        ],
        [
          "inaction",
          "inaction"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six"
}

{
  "etymology_text": "A jury usually consists of twelve people; a coffin may be carried by six.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six",
      "name": "en-proverb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "proverb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English proverbs",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries",
        "en:Six",
        "en:Twelve"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In a precarious situation, it is wiser to act decisively and be judged by a jury than to be killed through inaction."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "precarious",
          "precarious"
        ],
        [
          "situation",
          "situation"
        ],
        [
          "wiser",
          "wiser"
        ],
        [
          "decisive",
          "decisive"
        ],
        [
          "judge",
          "judge"
        ],
        [
          "jury",
          "jury"
        ],
        [
          "kill",
          "kill"
        ],
        [
          "inaction",
          "inaction"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six"
}

Download raw JSONL data for it's better to be judged by twelve than to be carried by six meaning in English (0.9kB)

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-03-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-02-21 using wiktextract (7c21d10 and f2e72e5). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.