Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
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Contents of Vol. 14.045
April 21 , 2005

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Mendele vintsht aykh alemen a gezuntn un a zisn yontef peysekh

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1) Slob (Seymour Shenkman)
2) Slob (Sylvan Beer)
3) di yidishe shikse (Lillian Siegfried)
4) kuni-leml (Lucas Bruyn)
5) Prezhentise (Sarah Zarrow)
6) hakn a tshaynik (Sylvan Beer)
7) spodek (David Spodick)
8) rozhinkes mit mandlen (Felicitas Payk)

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1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Re: slob

I was surprised to see in Mendele 14.043 that expressions for "slob"
included only "slokh" and "shlimizolnik". The true word for "slob" is
"zhlob".

Seymour Shenkman

2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Slob, bad housekeeper

My mother would describe a bad house keeper as--by ir is tomid erev
shabbes. Translated--in her house it is always shabes eve, meaning that her
house is in an uproar and disarray always.

Sylvan (Shmuel Zanvil) Beer
Syracuse, NY

3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: di yidishe shikse


My parents listened to WEVD in the early 1940's when there was a
songstress, di yidisha shikse.  Does anyone have any information about her?

Lillian Siegfried
Staten Island, NY

4)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Re: kuni-leml

Hersh Hartman (vol. 14, n0. 38) asked about the meaning/derivation of kuni
in kuni-leml.

Here's the information contained in Niborski's Yiddish-French dictionary. I
give it, followed by my rough translation:

kune di (s): pilori, lieu … l'entre‚ de la synagogue o— une personne
condamne‚ par le tribunal communautaire pouvait subir une exposition
infamante; cellule jouxtant la synagogue o— la communaut‚ pouvait enfermer
un des ses membres pour une courte peine; coin de punition (‚cole); leml
= agneau.

kune, di (s): pillory; place at the entance of a synagogue where a person
condemmned by the community court could undergo a degrading exposition;
cell contiguous to the synagogue or the community building where the
community could lock in one of its members for a short punishment; corner
of punishment (school); leml: lamb.

Weinreich: pillory - der shandklots, der shandslup klots/slup - pole); v.
makhn lelaag ulkeles. (H. laag/keles - ridicule). Hebrew: amud-hakalon
(pillar of shame).

H. klu (caph) - prison.

lam (leml) - lamb [lom - lame].

Tsanin:

kune (s) di - 1. H. nemiya - marten. 2. H. sad/mahpekets - stocks; H.
tsinuk - jail, cell, goal.

Lucas Bruyn

5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Prezhentise

In Sheva Zucker's Yiddish book, prezhenitse is the word given for omelette
(I assumed, French omelette, not frittata). I had always heard omelette,
accent on the second syllable, and had assumed prezenitse came from Polish
or Ukrainian. Asking around my (mostly Polish and Ukrainian) German class
yesterday, I learned that the Serbian word for omelette is also prezentise
(it is totally different in Russian, Ukrainian, and Polish, although
obviously the words might have changed), and refers to the same food. Does
anyone have an idea about the origin of this word? I gather that most
Ashkenazi Jews in Serbia were originally from the more Northern lands of
the Hapsburg Empire, and it seemed somewhat doubtful that the word was
taken directly from Serbian, but perhaps a common origin? Any thoughts
appreciated.

Sarah Zarrow

6)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Re: hakn a tshaynik

I've heard it said that it was a slang expression used between klezmer
players. It meant to play the trumpet or trombone, both made of the same
kind of brass that a tshaynik would be. It refers to someone making a lot
of annoying comments. True or not, I like this explanation of the origin.

Sylvan (Shmuel Zanvil) Beer
Syracuse, NY

7)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: Re: spodek

Ruth Gay [Mendele 14.036] doesn't believe that a spodek could be a fur hat
(she obviously hadn'd read my comment and especially Noyekh Miller"s fuller
treatment of it). In a newspaper essay on aThe Spodicks of Long Island they
showed a picture of a "spodick"/"spodek": it was a conical fur hat. Of
course, as Noyekh writes, it is  also translated "saucer". Her father was
right that "dreyen (duln) a  spodek" has the same meaning as "hakn a
tshynik". Noyekh Miller writes that  that hat was popular with the Polish
nobility, but I think he meant a streiml,  which is bigger and quasi-flat.
My interest is manifest in my signature.

David Spodick

8)----------------------------------------------------
Date: April 21, 2005
Subject: rozhinkes mit mandlen

This is a query which is also closely related to this song. In the version
sung by Judy Bressler of the Klezmer Conservatory Band on their album
"Yiddish Renaissance", the second stanza begins with the lines:

In dem lidl, mayn kind, oy ligt fil ... and then comes a word which sound
like nevues,
az du vest amol zayn tsezeyt af der velt.

A few years ago there was a discussion on Mendele regarding the word
"nevura" or "nevuret" meaning "truth", which derive from the German word
"Wahrheit". [http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/vol06/vol06.passim] Can
anybody out there tell me whether the word in question in the song is a
variety of these words, and if not, how the word is written and what it
means. Thanks in advance,

Felicitas Payk
Hannover, Germany

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End of Mendele Vol. 14.045

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