http://www.widespread-idioms.uni-trier.de/?p=projektziele&lang=en    

Projektijuht dr Elisabeth Piirainen    

The research project "Widespread Idioms in Europe and Beyond" has dealt with idioms that share the same lexical and semantic structure across a large number of languages. . It was aimed at investigating this phenomenon systematically, for as many languages as possible.

One of the principal goals of the project was to identify the core set of idioms that actually exist in many languages, Europe-wide and beyond. This core set of figurative units --- common in Europe --- will be published in a dictionary.
The first Volume is in print.

Elisabeth Piirainen (forthcoming): Widespread Idioms in Europe and Beyond: Toward a Lexicon of Common Figurative Units. New York: Peter Lang [Series "International Folkloristics"], 680 pages.