Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ____________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 17.003 June 10, 2007 1) petsha (Leonard Fox) 2) petsha (Hugh Denman) 3) mir/fatsheyle/fusnoge (Hershl Glasser) 4) help with translation (Alan Shuchat) 5) tkhine (Rivke Margolis) 6) term for female rabbis (Marjorie Schonhaut Hirshan) 7) kasharn (Mindle Crysel Gross) 8) Topele kukeriku (Florette Lynn) 9) Ibi Kaufman (Martin Jacobs) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 15 Subject: petsha Here's a recipe that is very similar to the way my grandmother (from Romania) prepared petsha: 2 calves' feet, cleaned and sawed to fit pot. Cold water to cover 1 onion 1 clove garlic 3 bay leaves 1 tsp. peppercorns (optional) salt to taste 2 TBS lemon juice or 1/2 cup vinegar 3 hard cooked eggs, sliced Sliced lemon for garnish or parsley Cook feet in water 10 minutes. Skim and add onion, garlic, bay leaves, peppercorns. Cook over reduced heat for 1 hour. Skim again. Simmer for 2 hours or till bones stand away from gristle and meat. Strain. Cut usable meat and gristle into fine cubes. Add to strained liquid. Taste and add salt if necessary. Add vinegar. Cook 5 minutes after bringing to a quick boil. Turn into an oblong glass dish about 2 inches in depth. Let cool until partly jelled. Place some egg slices on the top and stand remaining egg slices upright inside the dish along the sides. Chill in refrigerator. When completely jelled and firm to the touch, unmold on serving plate. Cut into squares if desired. Garnish with parsley and/or lemon. Chicory, shredded lettuce or watercress make a nice base on which to serve this as an appetizer. Serves 4 to 6. Leonard Fox 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 18 Subject: petsha I'm afraid I can add nothing of a culinary nature. In fact, I'm not sure that I want to hear much more on this topic, so much does it turn my stomach over. However, I can perhaps make a small contribution concerning the etymology of "fusnoge." I remember Mikhl Herzog mentioning in conversation many years ago that there exists an interesting lexical disambiguation-phenomenon which seems to adopt the style of taytsh-loshn. It replaces Hebrew/ Yiddish (as in 'khamer-eysl') with Yiddish/Slavic, so that it is now the Slavic term which is used to gloss the Yiddish where a possibility of confusion might exist. In sabesdiker-losn-territory [s] and [sh] are collapsed and both are realized as the voiceless alveo-palatal fricative heard, for example, in Polish slubowanie [kindly imagine an acute accent on the s] or in Castillian las agues. Furthermore, as is very well-known, in the entire CY area vov is articulated as [i]. Now, where these two areas overlap, as they just do in and around the valleys of the Narew and (zachodni) Bug, fus and fish will sound identical [see LCAAJ maps 34 & 65]. Since fus (in this special sense) and 'fish' are both comestibles, confusion is possible, and so people became accustomed to disambiguate by saying either fisnuge or fisribe, using the Polish or Belarusian terms for foot and fish respectively [It is important in this context not to say anachronistically Russian]. Once the term fisnuge had established itself for this "delicacy" in this particular dialect area, it was adopted in other areas with the appropriate dialect realization, in klal-yidish therefore "fusnoge." If I am not mistaken, Prof. Herzog mentioned other instances of this same disambiguation feature, but I can neither remember nor find any mention of this phenomenon in his "The Yiddish Language in Northern Poland." Perhaps he would care to comment himself. Hugh Denman 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 16 Subject: mir/fatsheyle/fusnoge 1) mir/wir: In Yiddish dialects, there is fluctuation too, between mir, indz and me. My favorite example is from the Maurice Schwartz film "Tevye" (although most of the dialogue is lifted directly from Sholom Aleichem, I don't think this particular bit is), when Tevye encounters the three rich women along the road. The oldest of the three explains to Tevye why they're wandering around: "Mir zenen damen fin Yehupets ... indz ze'mir aroysgegangen af a minitkele shpatsirn in me'ze'mir farblondzhet gevorn. In others words, three different equivalents for 'we are' in one speech! 2) "fatsheyle": According to Max Weinreich, the word is probably of Romance origin. The etymology that is usually proferred is Italian "fazzoletto." 3) "petsha": "Fisnoge" is not a "compound of German and Russian words for foot," but of the Yiddish word for "foot" with one of the Slavic words, most likely Polish. A Yiddish word like "fus" is a Yiddish word, not a German word! Paul (Hershl) Glasser 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 27 Subject: help with translation I'm trying to translate a few words of Yiddish for someone. It's the inscription on the back of a photo. 1. I know that "tsum ondenk" can mean "in memory of." But it's also found with photos. For instance, how would you translate "tsum ondenk inzer brider fun ..." Is this "a remembrance of our brother from ..." or "a remembrance for our brother from ..."? Would "a souvenir" be better? 2. How would you translate "gefeynenim" as in "inzer gefeynenim brider"? It's spelled gimel-ayin-fey-tsvey yudn-nun-ayin-nun-ayin-yud- mem (sofit). I would have expected paskeh tsvey yudn and either ayin- mem or yud-mem at the end. Thanks for your help, Alan Shuchat 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: June 1 Subject: tkhine Shelley Posen, a folklorist un zinger, hot geshribn a lid bazirt afn der tkhine vos zayn mame un shvester flegn zogn shabes. Er vil visn tsi di dozike tkhine iz bakant andere yidish-reders. Me hot zikh oysgelernt di tkhine fun der rusisher boben. Haynt hobn di shvester farsheydene nuskhoyes un me gedenkt nit dem gantsn tekst. Der teskt (vi er shteyt un geyt): Lekoved shabbes, lekoved got lekoved dem heylikn gebot sore, rivke, rokhl, leye di likht vos ikh bentsh akegn dir akegn dayn hartsvegn, toyre vegn mit mir, mayn mamen, mayn tatn, mayne shvester, mayne brider, mayne kinder, my nieces, my nephews, mayn man, kol yisroel Gute mlokhim tus di likht, beyze mlokhim fun di likht, Gute mlokhim tus di likht beyze mlokhim fun di likht, yehi ratzon milfonekha adonoy eloheynu v'elohey avoteynu ... vekadmonis ... lebn iber a vokh un iber a yor zol keynem nit feyln un vayter tsindn di likht. omeyn. zayn iberzetsung, vos er zingt af zayn nay kompaktskl, Menorah: In honor of the Sabbath, in honor of God In honor of the holy commandment Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Leah The lights that I bless are for your sake For your heart's sake, for the sake of the Torah On behalf of my mother, my father, my sisters, by brothers, my children, [other family members,] all Israel Good angels to the lights Evil angels from the lights Good angels to the lights Evil angels from the lights May it be Thy will, oh Lord our God and God of our fathers ... ??? ... [may they] live over the next week and over the next year That none may be absent as again we kindle the lights. Amen. Me ken zikh farbindn mit im durkh blitspost: Sheldon Posen Sheldon.Posen@civilisations.ca A dank! Rivke Margolis 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: June 1 Subject: Term for female rabbis I have just returned from L.A. from my niece's ordination. More than half of her class was female. With the advent of more female rabbis being ordained, there seems to be a blank space for the word or name for the husband of the rabbi in both Yiddish and English. As a group, perhaps we can coin a meaningful new word, or at least make some suggestions. Marjorie Schonhaut Hirshan 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: June 3 Subject: kasharn Efsher kent ir mir derklern vos dos vort kasharn meynt. ikh halt in iberzetsn a manuskript geshribn fun a man velkher iz geven in novogrudak in di milkhome-yorn. er shraybt az men hot genumen groyse tsoln yidn un zey avekgefirt tsu di kasharn un dershosn. ikh dank aykh in foroys far ayer hilf. mit frayndlekhe grusn, Mindle Crysel Gross 8)---------------------------------------------------- Date: June 7 Subject: topele kukeriku Not sure if my spelling is correct, but I was told this was by Sholem Aleichem and I can't find out anything else about it. Anyone have any ideas? I've tried to "google" it, but nothing. A sheynem dank faroys, Florette Lynn 9)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 8 Subject: Ibi Kaufman I thank Malvin E. Ring for his suggestion that "lomir ale zingen" is the program I saw on PBS years ago. To confirm this, I recently purchased a copy. It is a delightful program with several of the big names in Yiddish music today when they were so young you would have difficulty recognizing them (Mike Burstyn, Eleanor Reissa, Michael Albert, Avi Hoffman, Zalmen Mlotek). But one performer was unfamiliar to me; can anyone tell me anything about Ibi Kaufman? Did she go on to have a successful career as the others did? Delightful as the program is, and glad that I am to have acquired it, it is not the program I was actually looking for. That, I fear, is lost somewhere in the archives of some PBS station, to be found some centuries from now by a researcher looking for something completely different. Perhaps the momentous find will make the front page of the NY Times ("TV Program Believed Lost since the 20th Century Discovered in Archives"), on the Internet, of course, since there will no longer be print newspapers. Martin Jacobs ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 17.003 Please do not use the "reply" key when writing to Mendele. Instead, choose one of these, as appropriate: Material for postings to Mendele Yiddish literature and language: mendele@lists.yale.edu Material for Mendele Personal Notices & Announcements: victor.bers@yale.edu (in the subject line write Mendele Personal) Other messages to the shamosim: mendele@lists.yale.edu Address for the list commands: listproc@lists.yale.edu To signoff from the list, email to listproc@lists.yale.edu with the following request: signoff MENDELE or unsubscribe MENDELE Mendele on the web: http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/index.htm