A thousand men can't undress a naked man.

This saying is typically labeled a Greek proverb in modern collections of folk wisdom rather than traced to a single identifiable ancient author or text. It belongs to a family of Mediterranean and Near Eastern proverbial expressions about the futility of extracting what is not there—especially from someone who is already destitute. In practice it has been used in everyday disputes about debts, taxes, or punishment: no amount of pressure, force, or collective effort can obtain money, goods, or concessions from a person who has nothing left to give. Its “Greek proverb” attribution signals traditional oral circulation more than a fixed historical moment of utterance.

This proverb uses a blunt physical image to express a practical limit: you cannot take from someone who has nothing left to give. It is often applied to poverty, insolvency, or any situation where pressure, threats, or collective force cannot extract resources that simply do not exist. The hyperbole of “a thousand men” underscores the futility of coercion when the target is already stripped bare—materially, emotionally, or socially. As a piece of folk wisdom, it also carries an implicit ethical warning: piling on the powerless is not only ineffective but cruel, because the demand itself ignores reality.

1) "You can't strip a naked man."
2) "You cannot take clothes off a naked man."
3) "You can't get blood from a stone."