Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 1 no. 100 November 15, 1991 1) Sissel (Mikhl Herzog) 2) The /i/ vowel (Ellen Prince) 3) Nazalization (Mikhl Herzog) 4) Cherneshkes etc.--the final word? (Bob Rothstein) 5) Challah and Koyletch (Herschel Basser) [A hundert numern fun Mendele! Ver volt zikh geven gelost gloybn?! A sheynem dank unzere leyzer un a yasher koyekh unzere shrayber. Mendele] 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 14 Nov 91 11:11 EST From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.BITNET Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.95 DARE (Dictionary of American Regional English) has just announced the forthcoming publication of its 2nd volume (D-H, I think). It will be a while before they pass judgment on "sissel". 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 14 Nov 91 12:23:03 EST From: Ellen Prince Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.99 mikhl herzog writes: >As for the pronunciation "khally" and even the spelling >"holly bread", there's an area in northeastern Poland, >around the towns Lomza and Grajewo (local Yiddish "Womzi, >Grayvi") where all words like "khale, kale", etc. are >pronounce d "khali, kali". Could that account for the >"holly bread"? well, i NEVER heard the /i/ vowel in these words in YIDDISH--if it was a yiddish dialect that influenced them, how come it didn't affect their yiddish? it was only in the english/yinglish words. i can just hear my mother saying 'gey koyf a khale' OR 'go buy a khali' but never 'gey koyf a khali'. now, if the people from lomza etc got to america first and borrowed these words into english, using of course their native dialect's phonology, subsequent waves of immigrants might have thought that that's how you say these things in english. so do we know if they got there first? also, what's the story on these dialects? would they also have said shmati and khaneki and maysi (/maynsi/ or /ma:nsi/) and latki...? if they said /i/ in all and only the words where the yinglish has /i/, i'll buy it, but otherwise i'm dubious, tho a dialect story seems like the only possible answer, given the restricted domain of the phenomenon. i think there's an analogous thing in 'italinglish'--the english of italian-americans--where final vowels get dropped: zbaget 'spaghetti', rigot 'ricotta', manigot 'manicotta', fazul 'fasouli' etc. and it happens even in the english of italian-americans whose native italian dialect doesn't do it. but i don't think this phenomenon is well-understood either. >the tushi, bubi phenomenon may well reflect the >mummy, daddy one. No? again, why only in certain words? why would mommy/daddy affect khale and not matse (which was never /matsi/), bube and not tante (never tanti)? a dank. 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 14 Nov 91 14:34 EST From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.BITNET Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.99 Fayvl: how about that nasalization in your "bube-maanse". Any justification in Hebrew classical phonology for the nasalization of "ayin": manse. ya(y)nkef and consistently among Sefardim, in Judeo-Italian, etc. Anyone else on this? mIkhl. 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 14 Nov 91 23:24:51 -0500 From: ROBERT.ROTHSTEIN@SLAVIC.umass.edu Subject: Reply to Mendele Vol 1.99 In re Nigella: Stutchkoff lists shvartskiml (cf. German Schwarzkuemmel) and feldkiml. B. A. Sokolovskii (Botanik. Hantbikhl. Kiryat sefer: Vilna [?], l928--cited by Immanuel Loew, Die Flora der Juden) gives tshernishke. (Actually Loew cites "tsherniske," but I suspect a misprint.) It's czarnuszka in Polish and chernukha or chernushka in Russian. For further confusion: plants of the genus Nigella are apparently sometimes known as fennel-flower, although they have nothing to do with fennel. The black seeds that people have been remembering are from Nigella sativa. I quote Jill Norman's _Complete Book of Spices_: "The herbalist Gerard describes the seeds as '...of a blackish colour,, very like unto onion seed, in taste sharpe, and of an excellent sweet savour.' [...] In India, where nigella seeds are commonly used as a flavoring, there is much confusion about their name. In the north of the country, where nigella grows wild, they are called _kala jeera_ or black cumin. Real black cumin is also known as _kala jeera_ as well as shahi jeera_, or royal cumin. In much of India, nigella seeds are known as _kalonji_ (black onion seeds)." Regarding cumin, Norman writes "Cumin is often confused linguistically with caraway. In French, caraway was often referred to as _cumin des pres_, and inaccurate translations from Indian languages have confused _jeera_, which usually means cumin, with _shia jeera_, or caraway [..] Black cumin (_kala jeera_) is [...] sometimes called black caraway. [...] It should not be confused with nigella, which has also been known by the same name." I suspect that's more than anyone wanted to know, but I get carried away sometimes. Bob 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1991 02:27:38 -0500 From: fishbane@epas.utoronto.CA Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 1.99 In the days when I lived in winnipeg, where yiddishkeit meant bekitzer-- just speaking yiddish-- so that Israelis didn't count -- the bakeries sold no challah, but they had a clone for it, which was called koyletch-- is this some dialect I know nothing about because in Toronto chalah is chalah unless its egg bread.-- where did koylich come from?...........herschel ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol 1.100