Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
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Contents of Vol. 2 no. 72
September 23, 1992
 
1) Purim-gret (Mikhl Herzog)
2) A.A. Roback (Ira Robinson)
3) Smok (Margaret Mikulska)
4) Dreyfus(s) (Eli Katz)
5) Boss and balebos (Mischa van Vlaardingen)

1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 92  00:29 EDT
From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.Columbia.edu
Subject: Re: "Purim-gret"

.. we may have to look to German "Geraet" whose meanings
incl '(h'(household) effects'.

Mikhl

2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 1992 08:18 EDT
From: ROBINSO@Vax2.Concordia.CA
Subject: A.A.Roback

A couple of years ago Prof. Eugene Orenstein of the Dept.
of Jewish Studies, McGill University presented a paper on
Roback as a Yiddishist. To the best of my knowledge, it is
still unpublished.

Ira Robinson
Concordia University

3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 92 09:48:20 EDT
From: Margaret Mikulska <mikulska@astro.Princeton.EDU>
Subject: ES and other matters

[Mikhl Herzog writes:]

> As for English "shmuck" (rhymes with "puck") from Yiddish
> "shmok" (rhymes with "shtok"), forget the "family jewels"
> nonsense. It cannot derive from German Schmuck which would
> have yielded a Yiddish variant *shmik. Silly, huh? Best bet
> (according to Stankiewicz) is Polish-origin smok (?)
> 'serpent'.

"smok" means "dragon" in Polish.

-Margaret Mikulska
mikulska@astro.princeton.edu

4)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 92 11:33:28 -0700
From: katz@Sonoma.EDU
Subject: Dreyfus(s)

Raphael Finkel accurately and interestingly identified the
etymology of Dreyfus(s), with one exception.  It was not
Rashi's town of Troyes that was Treveris in Latin, but
rather the Mosel  city of Trier (French 'Treves'), a
location of early and (almost) continuous Jewish
settlement, and the birthplace of Karl Marx, whose uncle
was the town rabbi.  It's from here that the Dreyfus name
comes.  Incidentally, the University of Trier is today the
leading center of Old Yiddish studies on the European
continent.

Eli Katz

5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 92 23:02:45 MET DST
From: santen@dutiws.TWI.TUDelft.NL
Subject: RE: questions Ellen Prince

Dear Ellen,

I hope i have the answers to your (nice) questions.
In the first place "boss" indeed comes from the Dutch
"baas" (with the same meaning). I am not sure where the 
word baas comes from. There are some explanations......
One of them is quite interessting: "baas" comes from (our)
Jiddisch word "basserool" which means "boss....". 
"Basserool" comes from the Hebrew: "Bar Jisroel" ( son of
Israel ).

In the case of "bolleboos" i am competely sure !
"Bolleboos" ( a sarcastic way of saying "boss" and said by
all Dutch ) is a corruption of "Ba'al habbajit"
("Bool-ha-bojit"); let's say "the `baas' in house". That's
it' i hope it was "jopheh" (jofel) for you.

Mischa van Vlaardingen

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End of Mendele Vol 2.72

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