Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 4.217 December 6, 1994 1) Glikl Hemel's loshn koydesh (Dvosye Bilik) 2) Cryptic language and thieves' cant (Marion Aptroot) 3) Rogelekh (Dovid Braun) 4) Rogelekh (Jules Levin) 5) A letter from Sholem-Aleykhem to Mendele (Louis Fridhandler) 6) Yiddish on short-wave radio from Israel (Alan Astro) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 05 Dec 94 14:45 EST From: dorothy_bilik@umail.umd.edu Subject: Glikl Hemel's loshn koydeshdike un mayrev yidishdike oysdrukn To Rick Gildmeister and other "gliklekhe meyvonim": In my article on Glikl's zikhoynes in the journal "Yiddish" vol 8, Spring,1992 I posit other possible factors for the high percentage of loshn koydesh in her work. --Her wide reading among the muser verk, tkhines, Tsene-rene and other homiletic didactic works, many of them direct translations from the Hebrew and her very frequent exposure to the magidim whose lexis was heavily Hebraic and the constant presence of at least one toyre melamid in her household. These latter sources are oral and, as I point out Glikl's citations and their anomalies can be frequently illuminated by reference to oral rather than written sources. I hesitate to add anything to the ongoing makhloyke about editing Mendele postings to conform to klal (read YIVO) standardization, but I would volunteer to help if such an editorial "board" would be considered viable. Zayt ir ale gezunt, Dvosye Bilik 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 6 Dec 1994 07:12:43 -0500 (EST) From: aptroot@husc.harvard.edu Subject: Cryptic language and thieves' cant On Fri, 2 Dec 1994 Rick Gildemeister wrote: > ...trust > me, you see words like "shoufel", which Mendelyanern Marion Aptroot > pointed out to me could have gone into Dutch through thieves' argot, > which contained a lot of this crypto-language that existed up till World > War II. The form "shoufel" is as far as I know not found in Dutch and that is not the only way in which I find myself misquoted. You may have read something where I've stated that there are words in Dutch which are generally said to be of Yiddish origin, but which actually entered the language through thieves' cant. I didn't say that Dutch thieves' language is based on Yiddish. That World War II would have affected the existence or nature of Dutch thieves' language significantly is new to me. Are you insinuating that the disappearance of 80% of Dutch Jewry meant the extinction of the Dutch underworld? I am not an adherent of the theory that Yiddish came into existence as a crypto-language invented by secretive Jews only so the non-Jews wouldn't be able to understand their dealings. Expressions which are used among groups to exclude outsiders can be found in any language, I don't think that the emergence of Yiddish can be sufficiently explained that way. I thought we had moved on since J.W. and Itzik Feitel Stern. Marion Aptroot 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 05 Dec 1994 16:59:25 EST From: dovid@mit.edu Subject: rogelekh > rogal For some speakers the pastry is a _ro'gal_. (Is there such a pastry in Polish or other Slavic language?) You can imagine that Yiddish phonology nativized it to _rogl_, reinterpretted this to be a diminutive to which the further imminutive may apply, and created _rogele_. (The non-litvish form _rugelekh_, usually spelled _rug(g)elach_, seems to be the most common form in American bakeries.) If I remember correctly, _rogal_ is a form listed alongside _rogelekh_ in Stutshkov's _Oytser_. Don't have it at hand at the moment. Dovid Braun 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 5 Dec 94 15:29:36 PDT From: jflevin@ucrac1.ucr.edu Subject: etymology of rogelakh I have always assumed that the root is a Slavic rog, 'horn'. My mother, who baked the best rogelakh in the world for many decades, called them 'horns' when she wanted to be fency... (You know the kugel ~ kigel joke: "in our house vi call it 'pudjing'...) The crescent shape, is after all, also the shape of the horn on a young goat or a European (?) fallow deer. Which brings us to the term for carob my father always used, 'boksa', a Yiddish preservation of the older German Bockshorn, later replaced (as in other Western European languages) by Sanktjohannesbrod, not used by the Jews for obvious reasons... Jules Levin 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: 05 Dec 94 15:12:31 EST From: 74064.1661@compuserve.com Subject: A letter from Sholem-Aleykhem to Mendele I reproduce here a Yiddish letter from Sholem-Aleykhem in Boyarka (his summer place) to Mendele Moykher Sforim in Odessa, I believe. I think Mendele was a principal in a Talmud Toyre there. The letter is dated Aug. 10, 1895. Sholem-Aleykhem had lost the family money in 1890, and was, no doubt, still suffering the effects. However, the first Tevye piece had already appeared in print. He was back writing masterful work. He had recovered a cautious confidence and optimism. Sholem-Aleykhem here is acceding to an acquaintance's request for help. He is acting as intercessor for someone who wants to approach Mendele for help but is too shy. It is an interesting bit of light on social customs of the time. There are a couple of daytshmerisms here which he had resolved to eradicate a few years earlier. His later letters and other writing tended to have fewer. Sholem-aleykhem aykh zeyde lebn, vos makht ir guts? Reyshes, kum ikh aykh meldn az mir zenen do ale borekh hashem in bestn gezunt. Di gesheftn got zay dank geyen atsind gor nit shlekht, halevay vayter nit erger, beser shat nisht. Dos vos amol avade nit. Vi zogt er, tsu khoydesh yomim kumt dos nisht. Nor danken got derfar. S'iz frier geveyn fil erger. Vehasheynes, bin ikh tsu aykh mit a bakoshe vi geveyntlekh a yid, vorem ven nit keyn bakoshe zeyt men dokh im nit un me hert im nit. Bekitser hot dem yidns a zun, Zbarski, tret arayn tsu aykh in di talmud toyre un hot moyre tsu aykh kumen, on a rekomendatsiye, bet er mikh ikh zol far im betn. Bet ikh aykh. Ikh ken dem Avrom Zbarski. Halevay volt ale undzere yidn geveyn azoy erlekh, un ver shmust undzere negidim megn gevis zayn far im di kapore. Nor geyt fregt got a kashe. Zayt gezunt un shtark vi es vintsht aykh ayer tomid getray eynikl Sholem-Aleykhem. Louis Fridhandler 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 05 Dec 94 15:43:17 CST From: aastro@vm1.tucc.trinity.edu Subject: Yiddish on short-wave radio from Israel The documentation accompanying the Grundig short-wave radio I just bought lists a 15-minute daily broadcast in Yiddish from Israel. Does anyone out there know anything about it? Is it beamed to the East Coast? Could it be received in Texas (where I reside)? Alan Astro ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 4.217 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line 2. Sign your article (full name please) A Table of Contents is now available via anonymous ftp, along with weekly updates. Anonymous ftp archives available on: ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files Archives available via gopher on: gopher.cic.net Send articles to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Send change-of-status messages to: listserv@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu a. For a temporary stop: set mendele nomail b. To resume delivery: set mendele mail c. To subscribe: sub mendele first_name last_name d. To unsubscribe kholile: unsub mendele Other business: nmiller@mail.trincoll.edu