Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
______________________________________________________
Contents of Vol. 4.344
March 1, 1995

1) Skotsl kumt (Eliyahu Juni)
2) Skotsl kumt (Yekhiel Yosef Reisner)
3) Skotsl kumt (Harvey Spiro)
4) Skotsl kumt (Meyshe-Yankl Sweet)
5) Geringelt; kibitzers (Leon Lipson)
6) Pamelekh (Mikhl Herzog)

1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 1995 00:07:21 -0500 (EST)
From: ao107@freenet.carleton.ca
Subject: Skotslkint

Mikhl Herzog wrote concerning 'skotslkint'.  I quizzed my grandfather,
who taught me the phrase a while back, and got the following comments:

> Eastern Yiddish, is generally an expression of surprise (and welcome)
> when an unexpected guest appears.

In my grandfather's use, it's more specific than that:  an unexpected
guest who one hasn't seen in an unusually long time--not if your
next-door-neighbour pops in suddenly to borrow some sugar.

> In Western Yiddish, the expression _gotl_ or _kotl kum_ is said only by
> women. Men say _sholem aleykhem_.

For my grandfather (a poylisher), it carries no gender restrictions at
all.

> Etymology? A reasonable suuggestion is a medieval German expression,
> something like _bis got willkommen_. Are there German sources to support
> this?

I don't know anything about German, but my grandfather's (folk) etymology
is "Gott's veln kimt" which he tried to translate as something like 'God
should welcome you' or 'Your coming is/should be God's will.'

[Begin Linguistic digression]

I assume that the switch from 'kimt' to 'kint' is some sort of Homorganic
Nasal Assimilation; it doesn't seem to come from a mistaken etymology
from kint (child), since the speaker involved understood it as coming
from the word kimt (comes).

[End Linguistic Digression]

He treated it sort of as an archaic phrase, and I imagine from the way he
used it that he hasn't used it much.  I'd bet he learned this explanation
in Poland at least 55 years ago.

Eliyahu Juni

2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 95 07:18:13 CET
From: reisner%plearn.bitnet@yalevm.cis.yale.edu
Subject: Skotsl kumt

My Yiddish, alas, leaves a lot to be desired (ich red vi a goy....), but
let me hazard another somewhat tongue -in-cheek guess at "skotzl kumt."

How about "dos ketsl kumt" = "Look what the cat dragged in!"?

Yale J. Yekhiel Yosef Reisner
Warsaw, Poland

3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue Feb 28 12:38:34 1995
From: hjs@nrc.gov
Subject: Skotsl kumt

Yude Rozof asks for a story or other reference which uses the term
"skotsl kumt."

I can't place the reference, but I believe that Sholem Aleichem uses the
expression in one of the early Tevye der Milkhiger chapters, possibly in
the chapter on either Menakhem Mendl or in the following one.  I'm sure
some Mendelyaner will respond gikher (or is it flinker?) with a proper
citation.  :)

Here's where a CD ROM of Yiddish musterverks would come in handy.  Anyone
know of such a project in preparation?  What an oytzer that would be --
but what a small market, nebokh.

Harvey Spiro
Vienna, VA

4)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 95 21:55:28 CST
From: msweet@facstaff.wisc.edu
Subject: Skotzl kumt

Anent the postings on "skotzl kumt": it's used in the beginning of
Peretz-Hirshbein's "Grine Felder"--Rokhl, the farm wife, utters it in
greeting her neighbors Alkone and Gitl, who have unexpectedly
arrived--they hadn't visited for a while previously.  No sarcasm seems
implied.  Her husband, Dovid Noyekh, simply greets them without ceremony
with the question "Vuhin forstu, Alkone?"  Wonder if this isn't a very
common informal greeting in peasant cultures.  I remember that it was in
Nepal--"kahan jane" (where are you going) being the usual greeting when
you met someone.

Meyshe-Yankl Sweet

5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 1995 11:00:40 -0500
From: llipson@mail.law.yale.edu
Subject: Geringelt; kibitzers

A propos two recent postings:

(i) Around 1930 my then not-yet-married aunt, who worked downtown in an
English-speaking environment, returned home and, wishing to learn whether
any 'phone calls had come for her, asked her mother, "Imitzer ot mir
geringelt?" (Probably would have been applauded by Freud, who is said to
have said There no misunderstood women -- only uncomprehended.)

(ii) From childhood I was given to understand that at the card table
there are not two tiers but three.  Behind the players are the kibitzers,
who shake their heads and point out to the players how they ought to have
played; behind the kibitzers are the tzitzers, who criticize the
kibitzers' critiques by shaking their heads and saying Tz-tz-tz....

Leon Lipson

5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 95  09:52 EST
From: zogur@cuvmb.columbia.edu
Subject: Pamelekh

I think this Yiddish word is best understood as a "blend" of Polish
_pomalu_ and German _allmaelich_. There are several such in Yiddish.

I seem to recall that the author of an 18th century Yiddish text I worked
on some tim eago (Moyshe Maruze, _Seyfer Refues_, 1790) wrote _pamelekh_
as if it were a Hebrew word:

i) In square letters, as different from the vaybertaytsh font used for
the rest of the text; ii) without vowel letters, using nekudes, instead;
iii) whith the letter _khes_, otherwise used only for Hebrew words, with
an exception I won't go in to here). He writes "pasekh-pey, segl-mem,
pasekh-lamed, khes" Surprising, because Markuze must have known all the
possible alternative explanations for the word.

Mikhl Herzog

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