Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 2 no. 125 December 20, 1992 1) Turkey (Yankel Kessler) 2) A sheynem dank (Mikhl Herzog) 3) Philosophers, Fiddlers and Fools (Max Stern) 4) Segol (Yitzhak Kerte'sz) 5) -m versus -n (Khaim Bochner) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 14:40 PST From: KESSLER Subject: RE: Mendele Vol 2.124 for mendelehn: in case some missed the recent letter in the NYT, it may amuse y ou to see what a rabbi from (pace James Joyce! Phoenixville) writes about the U S national bird (if I can upload it): It May Help Be Jewish to Love Turkey To the Editor (NYT) 12/14/92): May I add another linguistic note to the colorful "One Strange Bird" by Margaret Visser (Op-Ed Nov 26)? The concurrence of the voyages of Columbus and the expulsion from Spain of its J ewish population after cneturies of mutually advantageous co-existence has been widely aired in t his 500th year of commemoration of both events. One of the key personnel making the first voyage was Luis de Torres, employed by Columbus as interpreter since he had wide knowledge of Chaldean and Arabic, the languages of the areas they expected to reach. A "Converso," one fo the Jew who had converted to Catholicism under the pressure of the Inquisition but remained a secret adherent of his own faith, de Torres al so knew Hebrew well. It was natural that de Torres was in the first boats sent to shore on October 12 , 1492. In a letter written to a friend in Spain, he described the strange bird seen in this new lan d. As Ms. Visser notes, during the courting season the bird gobbles, struts and puf fs, and his tail feathers display in the manner of a peacock. De Torres gave it the name that app ears in the biblical book of I Kings, 10:22, the Hebrew word for peacock: tuki. Surely a much more di rect line to "turkey" than the various other speculations at hand. Rabbi Harold M Kamsler --from Yankel Kessler 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 17:56 EST From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.Columbia.edu Subject: Concerning "a sheynem dank" The simple answer is that Yiddish has merged the dative and accusative, in the case of the masculine, in favor of the historically dative form in all of Eastern Yiddish and, in the feminine in favor of the accusative in most or all of Central Yiddish and in parts of Northeastern Yiddish as well. Mikhl Herzog. 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 17:59:51 PST From: Max Stern 310-524-6152 Subject: Philosophers, Fiddlers and Fools For those within reach of KCRW-FM, 89.9 FM in Santa Monica, California: Don't miss "Philosophers, Fiddlers and Fools," the 13th annual Chanukah celebration hosted by Ruth Hirschman, to be aired this year from Noon to 3:00 on Monday, December 21. Hirschman writes, Yiddish is a language that has outwitted history. It is as miraculous as the flames that burned through the eight days and nights of the first Chanukah. For the past 13 years I have hosted and produced a three-hour program that is an open love affar with Yiddish, the language of my childhood. It is always a very personal and emotional experience. By now, my trusted Board Operator, Mitchell Harding, has mastered the strange phonetics. These days we even have latkes with apple sauce and sour cream for the staff. And every year, I play a mix of favorites and new songs that inexplicably present themselves just before broadcast. The audience includes seniors in retirement homes, young mothers trying to pass on some of the magic to their children, the sons and daughters of that extraordinary generation that spoke Yiddish everyday, and a rainbow mix of listeners for whom this program is an evocation of their own culture. Over the years they have become regulars. This year I hope you will join them. KCRW is carried by several cable systems; email me for a list if you are interested. Max.Stern@TorreyPinesCA.ncr.com 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 20:20:47 PST From: Yitzhak Kertesz Subject: segol to: Meykhl Herzog (bad pun, zey mir meykhl!) the besorah question confused me, because we have gevure (might) on one hand, but Devoyre (as in Dorothy Billik, whom I met in Boston along with others from the Mende-list, perhaps at AJS next year we should have a session devoted to mendele), or Sechoyre (trade, merchandise) on the other. My real questions are about your recent note on the segol, and its relatives (124#2). Is "ay", as in Central Yiddish "A yiddisher maylekh" a tsere, or a diphthong? If the latter, then Eastern Hungarians are a special category, because they pronounced these segolates with a tsere, as in me'lekh, ke'ver, or (pardon me for using a pejorative !?!?!?!? term) she'gets. This led to the Hungarian/Yiddish pun in: "Ke'rem is a weingarten". (Ke'rem in Hung. means *please*=*bitte*) A second question: does it make a difference that the first group (Elul, emes) has a short, unaccented vowel? Yitzhak Kerte'sz bm.lbh@rlg.bitnet 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 16:27:06 -0500 From: bochner@das.YCC.Yale.Edu Subject: -m versus -n Malkah Winters writes: > why Yiddish has `ah sheyneM dank', with what looks like a > dative ending. I noted tonight that someone (my apologies > for not remembering the name) ended his comment/question > `ah groyseN dank'. Any comments about the endings? Both of these are accusative, I think: Adjectives modifying masculine nouns don't distinguish dative/accusative. The ending is -em for adjectives ending in "n", and for "nay"; for other adjectives it's -n. "Ikh hob gezen dem sheynem, hoykhn binyan." -- accusative. "far undzer nayem, frayen dor" -- dative (< "Shtil, di nakht") -- Khaim ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol 2.125 A freylikhn yontef alemen!