Fortune favors the bold is an idiom that suggests that taking risks will pay off. It comes from a Latin phrase audentes fortuna iuvat that dates back millenia. It encourages the listener not to be fatalistic and instead to make audacious decisions.
Examples: Fortune favors the bold in a sentence
Believing that fortune favors the bold, Róisín quit her day job to pursue her interior design dreams.
They say that fortune favors the bold, and sometimes history seems to back that up.
It’s impossible to know just how many dreams have come crashing down because someone wrongly believed that fortune favors the bold was some sort of guarantee.
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Using fortune favors the bold
You can use fortune favors the bold in any circumstance where it would be appropriate to encourage someone to take a risk. It can be used as a motto, an encouragement, or as part of a statement.
Examples: Fortune favors the bold in a sentence
The regiment’s crest read “fortune favors the bold,” and their behavior under fire exemplified that motto.
Survivorship bias partly explains the belief that fortune favors the bold, as the risk-takers who fail are easily forgotten.
The entrepreneurial spirit seems to be defined by the idea that fortune favors the bold, with entrepreneurs often risking their houses and savings to pursue their ideas.
Fortune favors the bold in Latin
There are several Latin phrases that can be translated as fortune favors the bold. The one most commonly cited is audentes fortuna iuvat, but there are others, including:
- audentis fortuna iuvat
- audentes fortuna adiuvat
- fortuna audaces iuvat
Other variations on the same idea include:
- fortuna eruditis favet [fortune favors the learned]
- fortes fortuna adiuvat [fortune favors the strong]
Notice that we can recognize the roots of some English words in the Latin. Obviously, we get “fortune” from “fortuna,” but we also can see “audaces” as the source of the English word “audacious,” meaning “daring,” and “eruditis” giving us “erudite,” meaning “showing great learning.”
Other similar idioms
The same, or similar, sentiment is also found in other idiomatic phrases. The British Army Special Forces Regiment, the Special Air Services (SAS), has the motto “Who Dares Wins.” It’s possible this was taken from the German phrase “wer wagt, gewinnt,” which has the exact same meaning.
Other common English idioms include:
- Nothing ventured, nothing gained
- Faint heart never won fair lady
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