Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.021 June 2, 1993 1) A toytn bankes (Martin Davis) 2) A toytn bankes (Ellen Prince) 3) The geography joke (Moshe Waldoks) 4) Idioms (Yitzhak Kertesz) 5) Farshidens (Dvosye Bilik) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Jun 1 14:52:06 1993 From: davism@turing.cs.nyu.edu (Martin Davis) Subject: "toytn baynkes" > b) Martin Davis' idiom about 'baynks' is the same as one of my > mother's favorite comments. > ... ... > I always wondered what a 'toyten bankas' could mean and > wondered if it was an up-dating and carrying over of the related old > practice of using leaches. Dead leaches would make more literal > sense than "dead" cups. The meaning was clear that whatever was > being proposed was useless. > > Harold L. Orbach I believe the point isn't that the "baynkes" were dead, but rather the person to whom it was (metaphorically) proposed to apply them. In other words, literally: It will help as much as applying cups to a dead person. Martin Davis 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Jun 1 19:23:24 1993 From: "Ellen F. Prince" Subject: "toytn baynkes" >From: Harold L. Orbach >Subject: Varia: ... Baynks >b) Martin Davis' idiom about 'baynks' is the same as one of my >mother's favorite comments. But my memory of her yiddish sounds >more like 'bankas' -- translatable as 'cups' -- an old medical >treatment common in Eastern Europe and also in Asiatic medicine. I >believe that 'cups' were a common form of treatment used by barbers >in the old days before modern medicine was dominated by allopathy. just wanted to point out that they were not limited to eastern europe and asia--for example, i know they were used in france and are called _ventouses_ in french. > I always wondered what a 'toyten bankas' could mean and >wondered if it was an up-dating and carrying over of the related old >practice of using leaches. Dead leaches would make more literal >sense than "dead" cups. The meaning was clear that whatever was >being proposed was useless. it's not dead cups--it's 'a dead person [dative]' cups'--it helps like cups [help] a dead man. that is, it doesn't help at all. ellen prince 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Jun 1 21:20:18 1993 From: WALDOKS@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU Subject: The geography joke An early form of this joke stems from pre-WWII, post Hitler Germany. The Jew at an immigration office finds all of the gates to other countries closed and aske for another globe, please. See, The Big Book of Jewish Humor (section 2 /Jewish/goyish). mit kovid Moshe Waldoks 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue Jun 1 23:59:30 1993 From: "Yitzhak Kertesz" Subject: idioms I don't know how others do it, I can barely keep up with reading mendele, let alone to react. (This is _not_ a complaint) I promise to post a question real soon for non-linguists, historians, bibliographers, and literary experts (not necessarily in this order), but since idioms, curses and proverbs are my favorites, let me contribute some comments. 1. The "flying Frenchman" Katriel Leibovic (3.016#4) was mislead by the transcription of the word, rosl does not have a zayin, but a samekh, therefore it cannot mean a rose. Bernstein derives it from polish "rosol (brine?)" in the second half of his collection (#191), thanks to M. Waldoks for reminding us about its existence. A yasher ko'ach to Dovid Braun for reminding us of the original form of the idiom. In disagreement with Eli Katz, and with no more authority, let me guess that the Frenchman _is_ the origin of the idiom, and in case it is not clear to everybody, let me add that it must be about that Frenchman who visited Russia, and who was referred to by his Jewish admirers as "helek tov" (Buona parte). 2. Pandera, Pantera appears on Shabbat 104b, as a reference to Joseph, the carpenter. 3. CPR for a dead man H. L. Orbach speculates about the meaning of "toyten bankes" (3.020#1). It seems to me, that the word "toyten" is not a modifier of "bankes" but the subject of the procedure. Bernstein has the following two expressions (#1201-2): "es helft, vi a toyten an 'el mole rakhamim'" "es helft, vi a toyten bankes". 4. The Queen is naked Sh Axelrod (3.013#5) is in good company, Bernstein quotes "A terets far di bentshlikht" as an irrelevant answer, and admits that he has no idea what's going on. The second half (Vashti's toothache) is very frustrating, I remember the whole issue being discussed in a footnote somewhere. Last week, while searching for chomets I checked all the footnotes in my apartment, but couldn't find this one. Of course, the Midrash, Talmud, Targum is filled with stories about the matter, but I couldn't locate any mentioning of teeth, only a tail. (Megilla 12b) On this occasion let me throw in the idea that somebody (perhaps an MA student?) should sit down and create an index to all the works of Dov Sadan. He has so much information hidden in footnotes and other places that this would be a great contribution to the study of E. European Jewry. (I know, I know, some of you will ask gently, why don't I take this task upon myself?) Yitzhak Kertesz 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Jun 2 01:40:32 1993 From: Dorothy_BILIK@umail.umd.edu (db28) Subject: Farshidens For Len and Lisa Duhl re Yiddish lullabies: Dov Noy is, of course the primary source- see his multi volume collection of Yiddish folk songs. Another is Toby Dobkin who has been working on the folklore of the Holocaust for a number of years. YIVO knows how to reach her. Yes, all you literary Mendelnikes there are many more of us around than you think but literary inyonim cannot be done vi di mame hot gezogt "fitch mitch." Un mir layenen Opotoshn, Nadirn, Kulbakn un azoy vayter. I am off to Paris in part to visit the Vladimir Medem library and then to London to see what they have in the new Yiddish library there. I attended the memorial for our beloved khaver, Irving Howe and was most moved by Abe Brumberg's reading in Yiddish of poems by Moyshe Leyb Halperin, Mani Leib and Kadye Molodovsky. Zaytzhe mir ale gezunt. Dvosye Bilik ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.021 If your message is intended for MENDELE, please write to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu If your node is Bitnet-only and is not connected to the Internet, please send your message to: mendele@yalevm If you want to discuss personal business or have a shmues with the shames, please write to: nmiller@starbase.trincoll.edu Please sign your articles.