Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ____________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 17.006 August 5, 2007 1) fayer-yekelte (Noyekh Miller) 2) Manischewitz - Yiddish lost (Martin Jacobs) 3) shtotty (Sema Chaimovitz Menora) 4) dire (Bernard Cooperman) 5) foreskin (Muni & Carol Basman) 6) krasny bilet (Yale Reisner) 7) Il ballo proibito": storie di ebrei e di tango (Soleil Duchtel) 8) -lekh (Felicitas Payk) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: June 27 Subject: fayer-yekelte The term occurs in Howard Jacobson's _Kalooki Nights_ (Jacobson writes "fire yekelte" but never mind. I found the term interesting for several reasons. First, because fayer-yekelte refers to a woman who tends to the fire in an orthodox house, in short a shabes-goy(e). Jacobson himself uses shabes-goy in reference to the golem of Prague. So why the switch when he writes about England's Manchester? Might fayer-yekelte be a (partial) calque on charwoman? Second, this is the first time I've run across "yekelte" Presumably it's the same as "yekete", itself a word I find only in Mendele's archive (http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/vol07/vol07.191) where our late esteemed Mordkhe Schaechter writes " yekete (genitst in Mizrekh-Galitsye un efsher in andere mekoymes oykhet) " Third, where "yeke" in current Yiddish refers to German Jews (that at least is my experience) the word as used by Jacobson seems to point to an older and arguably original meaning. (See Mikhl Herzog's valuable note in http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/vol03/vol03.340). Noyekh Miller (For those who might have felt mauled on behalf of Yiddish by Michael Chabon's recent novel, be assured that Jacobson didn't learn his mame-loshn from a phrase book. _Kalooki Nights_ is basically an English __Adventures of Augie March_ as written by Moses Herzog.) Noyekh Miller 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: July 3 Subject: Manischewitz - Yiddish lost My wife just brought home a box of Manischewitz matsos, which has prompted this thought: When I was a child, Manischewitz products came with recipes in Yiddish printed on the container. Later, the recipes were dropped, but the side panel of the Manischewitz box still had information about the company in Yiddish. Then the Yiddish was replaced by English. Now I see that the English has been replaced by Hebrew (or, as someone on a Hebrew list recently put it, MIH [= Modern Israeli Hebrew]). No indication that the box was intended for export, and the fact that there is also English here leads me to believe that it isn't. Even the spelling of the name has been changed, from M.Alef.N.I Sh.Ayin.V.V.I.Ts(final) to M.N.I.Sh.B.I.Ts(final), which, like most non-Hebrew names transcribed into Hebrew, is unpronounceable except to those who already know the pronunciation. Am I the only one who misses the Yiddish? I used to love seeing those Yiddish words. Martin Jacobs 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: July 4 Subject: shtotty I am interested in knowing the origins of the word "shtotty," referring to someone (usually a woman) who dresses very fancy or elegant. Does it come from the word "shtot," thus differentiating the fancy "city" dresser from the country bumpkin or casual, laid-back dresser? Also, when and where did this word begin to be used? Was it ever used in the old country in some original Yiddish form or did it originate in the new world in its anglicized form? I have heard this word used in the frum, but not necessarily Yiddish speaking, Orthodox community. Is it also used in general Jewish (again, not necessarily Yiddish-speaking) circles? Sema Chaimovitz Menora 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: July 6 Subject: dire Does anyone have a sense of when the term "dire" as in dire-gelt (rent) came into Yiddish and what its specific meaning was? In Modern Hebrew the parallel word "dira" refers specifically to an apartment (as opposed to a free-standing house or "villa"). But I'm wondering whether in Yiddish the term has any kind of specific linkage to an "apartment" as opposed to a "house." The phrase "dira-gelt," which is well-known from the often recorded song, might mean "money for living [space]" and not necessarily refer to an apartment. In Modern German, the word Wohnung with a roughly parallel literal meaning is used for "apartment" and I was wondering if that might be the origin of the Hebrew usage. A dank. Bernard Cooperman 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: 8 July Subject: foreskin Can any one please provide me with the Yiddish word for "foreskin"? I believe there is a Hebrew word, but not one in Yiddish. We have asked several Yiddish mavens but no one seems to know. A sheynem dank! Muni & Carol Basman 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: July 20 Subject: krasny bilet Could this be a "red card" -- a severe warning or penalty -- in the football (soccer) sense? As always, further context might help. Yale J. Reisner Warsaw 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: May 20 Subject: Il ballo proibito: storie di ebrei e di tango I'd like to know if the Italian Furio Biagini 2004 publication Il ballo proibito: storie di ebrei e di tango (La Casa, Lettere, Firenze) is widely known among young Yiddish history fans such as many participants here, as well as if it can be expected that this textbook will be translated in the near future into English, French or German. Furio Biagini is a professor in Lecce University in Italy of Judaic philosophy and contemporary Jewish history, as well as of musicology and art history. Soleil Duchtel [Moderator's note: for reasons of length and clarity, we have not been able to publish the author's comments on the book. Please contact her directly at soleilchatel@gmail.com if you would like to hear more.] 8)---------------------------------------------------- Date: July 19 Subject: -lekh I would like to know the etymology of the plural suffix "lekh." I guess that the first two letters stem from the Southern-German "le" diminutive - is that right? But where does the "kh" come from? Is it maybe some Hebrew plural form that I do not know of? Or Slavic? Thank you very much in advance! Best, Felicitas Payk ---------------------------------------------------- End of Mendele Vol. 17.006 Please do not use the "reply" key when writing to Mendele. 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