EXPLORATIONS

IN
JUDEO-SLAVIC LINGUISTICS

BY

PAUL WEXLER

L E ID E N — E. J . B R IL L — 1987
 EXPLORATIONS
IN
JUDEO-SLAVIC LINGUISTICS
CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE SOCIOLOGY
OF
JEWISH LANGUAGES

ED ITED BY

JOSHUA A. FISHMAN

VOLUME II

LEIDEN — E. J . BR ILL — 1987

 EXPLORATIONS
IN
JUDEO-SLAVIC LINGUISTICS

BY

PAUL WEXLER
Tel-Aviv Universicy

LEIDEN — E. J . BRILL — 1987

 ISBN 90 04 07656 5

Copyright 1987 by E. J . Brill, Leiden, The Netherlands

All rights reserved. So part 0/ this book may be reproduced or
translated in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, mierofuhe
or any other means without written permission Jrom the publisher
PH! NT ED IN T H E NETH ERLA NDS BY E. J . BRILL
 “ T he phenomenon of Jewish language creation in various parts of the
world is one of the most interesting topics in the study of Jewish and
general culture. It is the task of the linguist and the social scientist to
delineate the common features in the various Jewish languages.”
(U . W einreich, College Yiddish, New York 1949, p. 144).

“ ... it must be borne in mind that the significance of the subject

[history of the Jew s in Eastern and Central Europe] is out of all propor­
tion to the limited extent of the factual record... T hat there were Jews
there in [the D ark Ages] is not unlikely. But in fact we know nothing
whatsoever of them, other than a couple o f later and improbable legends,
a vague reference to Jew ish slave dealers in the region (in 1085), and an
unsubstantiated report of the presence of Jew s in [Gniezno]. All this il­
lustrates the difficulty of building up a consistent picture of Jewish origins
in medieval Europe, even in those areas where their presence was later
so significant.”
(C. Roth, T he early Jewish settlements in C entral and Eastern Europe
1, G eneral setting. In C. Roth and I. H . Levine, eds., The world history
of the Jewish people 11. The Dark Ages. Jews in Christian Europe 711-1096,
New Brunswick 1966, p. 304).
 CONTENTS

P re fa c e ............................................................................................................... ix
1. G oals n ear an d f a r .............................................................................. ix
2. A cknow ledgem ents.............................................................................. xn
A bbreviations and s y m b o ls ........................................................................ xv
T ra n s lite ra tio n ................................................................................................ xvn

1. Jew ish contacts w ith the Slavs in the first a n d early second m il­
len n ia A D ................................................................................................... 1
2. T h e aim s of Ju deo -S lav ic linguistics ................................................. 6
3. E xtinct Jew ish linguistic strata in the Slavic lands (other them
S la v ic ).......................................................................................................... 10
3.1 J u d e o -G re e k ......... ............................................................................. 13
3.2 J u d e o - L a tin ........................................................................................ 59
3.3 (Judeo-)A sian la n g u a g e s ................................................................ 60
3.4 R e c a p itu latio n .................................................................................... 80
4. T h e Slavic languages o f th e non-A shkenazic an d n on-S ephardic
Jew s in the Slavic lands, 10th-19th c e n tu r ie s ................................ 81
4.1 Ju d eo -W est Slavic glosses in H eb rew characters, mid-
lO th-m id-13th c e n tu rie s.................................................................. 89
4.2 Ju d eo -W est Slavic inscriptions in H ebrew characters on
coins, late 12th-late 13th c e n tu rie s ............................................ 95
4.3 Ju d eo -E ast Slavic w ords an d phrases in H eb rew characters,
late 15th-17th c e n tu r ie s ................................................................. 96
4.4 Ju d eo -E ast Slavic caique languages, 13th-16th centuries 99
4.5 K areo-Slavic(?) in C yrillic characters, early 19th cen tu ry , 112
4.6 South Slavic term s in B alkan J u d e z m o ................................... 112

5. T erm s in Slavic languages relatin g to J e w s ........................ .......... 114■

5.1 N ative Slavic te r m s ......................................................................... 118
5.2 L atin and G erm an term s in W est Slavic la n g u a g e s............ 136
5.3 A G reek term com m on to all Slavic languages .................... HO
5.4 T urkic term s in Slavic la n g u a g e s............................................... 140
5.5 T e rm s for ‘J e w ’ in Slavic la n g u a g e s......................................... 141
6. R ecovering Judeo-S lavic an d early W est Slavic com ponents
from Y iddish an d H e b re w .................................................................... 151
6.1 P robable Ju d eo -W est Slavicisms in Y iddish and H ebrew . 154
V III CO NTEN TS

6.2 W est Slavicism s com m on to Y iddish an d G e rm a n .............. 163

6.3 N on-coterritoriality o f Y iddish Slavicisms an d th e ir Slavic
ety m a .................................................................................................... 168
6.4 R ecovering th e H ebrew , Ju d eo -A ram aic a n d o th e r non-
native corpus of Ju d e o -S la v ic ....................................................... 180
6.5 Y iddish-Slavic and H ebrew -Slavic b le n d s ............................... 184■
6 .6 Bilingual Slavic-Y iddish and m onolingual Slavic folklore
of the A shkenazic J e w s ................................................................... 188
6.7 S tereotyped Slavic speech o f the A shkenazic Je w s, 17th-
18th c e n tu r ie s ................................................................................... 192
7. H eb rew and Ju d eo -A ram aic com ponents o f possibly non-A sh-
kenazic origin in Slavic an d languages of the C aucasus ........... 197
7.1 H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ra m a ic loans in Slavic languages w ith
Y iddish and Ju d e z m o cognates .................................................. 200
7.2 Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in Slavic languages w ithout Y iddish
and Ju d ezm o cognates ................................................................... 214
7.3 H ebrew -Slavic blends .................................................................... 215
7.4 R ecovering th e Judeo-S lavic p ro n u n ciatio n n orm s of
H e b r e w ................................................................................................ 219
7.5 H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans of non-A shkenazic origin
com m on to Slavic a n d languages of the C aucasus .............. 221
7.6 H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in languages o f th e C a u ­
casus w ith no Slavic (non-A shkenazic) c o g n a te s................... 226
7.7 H ebrew and Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in Slavic and Finno-
U gric lan g u ag e s................................................................................. 228
7.8 T h e geography of H eb rew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in the
Slavic la n g u a g e s ............................................................................... 228
7.9 R ecovering the H ebrew and Ju d e o -A ra m aic corpus o f
Ju d eo -W est S lav ic............................................................................ 229

8. S um m ary and topics for the fu tu re .................................................. 230

B ib lio g rap h y .................................................................................................... 234
Index of w ords, phrases an d so u n d s....................................................... 270
 PREFA CE

1. Goals near and jar.

T he present study is a somewhat unconventional foray into historical
linguistics; unconventional because it offers neither a detailed analysis of
specific texts nor a systematic presentation of change in a single language
or group of related languages. T his study is an attem pt to recover the
“ distinctive Jew ish features” of the dialectally diverse Slavic speech of
the G reek, Iranian, Turkic and possibly Aramaic Jew s who created the
Judeo-Slavic civilizations that took root in scattered locales between the
Elbe and D niepr Rivers before the arrival of the Ashkenazic (Germ an)
and Sephardic (Iberian) Jews. T he autochthonous Jew s in the Slavic
lands left few literary or m aterial remains during the approxim ately thou­
sand years of their existence; it is no wonder then that these communities
have gone unnoticed by most scholars. It was only in the second half of
the 19th century that linguists first became aware of the existence of
Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters from the West and East Slavic lands
written between the 10th and 17th centuries, and of a translation of eight
books of the Old Testam ent into East Slavic from the late 15th- early 16th
century written in Cyrillic characters and probably made by Jew s.1 In the
last few decades, historians have begun to re-assess the contributions of
non-Rom ance and non-Germ anic Jewries to the ethnogenesis and form a­
tion of the Ashkenazic Jews. The most recent development is the publica­
tion of a K hazar Hebrew docum ent from Kiev establishing the presence
of a K hazar Jewish community in that city in the early 10th century. This
docum ent provides the earliest indigenous m ention not only of a Jewish
presence on Slavic soil, but also of the city of Kiev itself.2
M any scholars have been prepared to regard the Slavic materials w rit­
ten by Jew s as proof of the existence of monolingual Slavic-speaking
Jew s, but few would accept these materials as evidence that the Jew s
created unique variants of Slavic, analogous to the well-known Jewish
variants of G erm an and Spanish-Y iddish and Judezm o.’ At best, the

1 Curiously, Jew ish scholars seem lo have been largely unfam iliar with the East Slavic
translation of the Bible, while most Slavic scholars are oblivious to the Slavic glosses in
Hebrew characters. A ltbauer is one of the few scholars to display an interest in all the
m aterials.
* See Golb and Pritsak 1982 and discussion in sections 1, fn. 7; 3.125, fn. 86 and 4,
fn. 19 below. T he next reference to Kiev is in the writings of the Persian Abu I;haq a)-
Iftaxri, mid-10th c. (see Harkavi 1870: 199).
1 See the definition of Jewish languages in section 2 below.
X PR E F A C E

uniqueness of the Jewish data has been said to reside in the use of th e
Hebrew alphabet and the reflection of colloquial features not regularly
found in Cyrillic, Glagolithic or Latin docum ents of the same period.
T he present study will try to define the nature of the Slavic languages
used by Jews before the advent of the Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews o n
the basis of the extant Slavic glosses and texts composed by Jews as well
as evidence from a num ber of coterritorial Jewish and non‫־‬Jew ish
languages. I think that it is reasonably certain that the Slavic used b y
non-Ashkenazic Jew s in the West Slavic lands was, in its genesis an d
com ponent make-up, a “ Jew ish” language, i.e. a “ Judaicized” W est
Slavic. The sparse vestiges of Slavic speech used by Jew s in the Belorus­
sian and U krainian lands make it difficult to determine whether the p ro ­
cess of linguistic Judaicization took place here as well, but indirect
evidence from the East Slavic languages and Yiddish gives some grounds
for making this assumption. U nfortunately, we lack South Slavic texts
written by Jews, but there may be some evidence of a South Slavic im ­
print on Yiddish and Judeo-W est Slavic; also, the Slavic terms borrowed
by Balkan Judezm o as early as the 16th century suggest some deviations
from the immediately coterritorial Slavic dialects.
T he Slavic Jew s traditionally called the Slavic languages “ Ca-
naanite” ,4 but to avoid confusion with the West Semitic language of the
same name, I prefer to use the general term “Judeo-Slavic” . T his
language, or collection of languages, is the forgotten link in the chain of
Jewish language creativity in Europe which joins a Judeo-G reek
saturated with Judeo-Iranian (and possibly Judeo-A ram aic a n d ju d e o -
T urkic elements) with Yiddish and possibly Balkan Judezm o. In my
discussion of the Slavic data recorded in Hebrew characters, I prefer to
use broad labels, such as “Judeo-W est Slavic” , “Judeo-East Slavic” ,
etc. rather than “Judeo-C zech” , “Judeo-B elorussian” , etc.5 T he reason
for this is that while Slavic glosses written in Hebrew characters by Jews
show a close affinity to the coterritorial Slavic speech, they also contain
non-coterritorial Slavic components and innovations; for example, while
the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses from the Czech lands are predominantly

4 See section 1, fn. 17 below.

5 The terms “Judeo-C zech” or “ Czech-Jewish“ are widespread (see e.g. Mazon
1927; Jakobson 1957:7-8; Komarek 1963:745; Trost 1968; Hill 1981). The term
“Judeo-Belorussian” was used once by Bjadulja (1921:35) but is otherwise unattested.
Hill proposes the epithet “Judeo-Slavic (Eastern)*’ for Slavic glosses in Hebrew
characters from the Belorussian and Ukrainian lands (1981). Among these authors, the
glottonyms are only intended to define Slavic fragments in Hebrew characters; the ques­
tion of whether these dialects were Judaicizcd is not discussed. M. Weinreich was the first
to insist on the specifically Judaicized nature of the languages and to propose the terms
“ W estern K naanic” and “ Eastern K naanic” for Judeo-Slavic (1956:624; 1:1973:85).
 PR EFA C E XI

Czech, they also contain components which bear closer affinity with Sor-
bian, and possibly also with Polabian and South Slavic. Also, the area
in which “Judeo-C zech” was used probably only partly overlapped with
that of the non-Jewish cognate dialect. H ence, a term like “Judeo-
C zech” would be misleading. Jewish anthroponym s recorded in non-
Jewish Slavic sources will be identified in the same fashion, with the
language of the text added; thus, a Jewish anthroponym found in a Polish
text would be defined as “Judeo-W est Slavic (Polish)” .
In spite of the incomplete state of our knowledge, there are good
reasons to attem pt to delineate the field of Judeo-Slavic linguistics at the
present time. No European people has made a more lasting im print than
the Slavs on every Jewish language and culture area in Europe—on
Rom ance (Balkan Judezm o), G erm anic (Yiddish), Greek (Judeo-
Greek), Turkic (K araite, Krymdak), Iranian (Judeo-Tat) and Kartvelian
(Judeo-Georgian) (and through all of the latter, on contemporary Israeli
H ebrew). Probably no part of Europe has seen such a variety of Jewish
languages as the Slavic lands; e.g. on different parts of U krainian ter­
ritory Yiddish, Judeo-Slavic, Jew ish-U krainian, Kareo-Slavic (on the
terminology used here, see sections 1, fn.2 and 2 below), Khazar,
K araite, Krymdak, Judeo-G reek, Judezm o and possibly Judeo-A ram aic
have been spoken at various times. Yet today, the conditions for a unique
Jewish culture in the Slavic lands no longer obtain; Yiddish, the most im­
portant successor language of Judeo-Slavic, as well as K araite and Judez-
mo, are all becoming obsolete in their adopted Slavic hom elands,6 and
the Slavic element in the Jewish cultures transported to non-Slavic lands
is rapidly receding. It is imperative to awaken interest in the field of
Judeo-Slavic linguistics and history while there is still a significant body
of scholars who are at home in both the Slavic and Jewish worlds.
I am well aware that the subject of Judeo-Slavic languages is risky and
conjectural. Nevertheless, the fascination of the subject, both for linguists
and historians, far offsets any critical attacks which such a study may be
subjected to. For the field of Slavic linguistics in general, the Jewish
variants of Slavic can provide the earliest docum entation of many Slavic
roots as well as a unique opportunity to reconstruct aspects of historical
communal dialectology. But the idiosyncratic dynamics of Jewish
population movement within the Slavic lands, e.g. (a) from south to west
and east, (b) from west to east and (c) east to west, and the unique fu-
sional history of their languages makes it exceedingly difficult to ex­

6 T he Soviet Union remains ai present the only Slavic-speaking country with a

substantial Jewish population. In the 1970 census, 17.7% of Soviet Jews gave Yiddish
as their native language ( Itogi 1973).
 I

X II PREFAC E

trapolate from the Jewish to the non-Jewish data and vice versa. F o r
historians of the Jew s and the Slavs, Judeo-Slavic linguistics can olTer th e
most reliable index of Jewish settlement in the Slavic lands and of J e w is h -
Slavic symbiosis before the first millennium AD. I hope that the p re s e n t
“ state-of-the-art” report will stimulate students o f Jewish history a n d in ­
terlinguistics, Slavicists and sociolinguists to intensify their c o m m o n
search for further facets of the Jewish linguistic and cultural ex p erien ce
in the Slavic lands.
The reader will find here an extremely copious bibliography a n d a
heavy footnote apparatus. 1 felt that this was desirable since the field of
Judeo-Slavic linguistics is being explored here in all its ram ifications for
the first time. T he paucity of texts obliged me to advance new hypotheses
for old data and to seek new data from many Jewish and non-Jew ish
languages, some of which are coterritorial with or contiguous to S lavic,
others distant and often genetically unrelated to Slavic; most of these
materials are unfam iliar both to Slavicists and to students of Je w ish
linguistics. A careful identification of the sources will perm it the in ­
terested reader to weigh the evidence on his own. T he bibliographical
references are coded by subject, so that the reader can readily identify (a)
prim ary and secondary sources of Judeo-Slavic passages and Slavic tex ts
translated from Hebrew or containing Hebraisms; (b) m aterials o n
Jewish-Slavic linguistic contacts, and (c) supponing evidence from c o m ­
parative Jewish interlinguistics and non-Slavic Jewish languages.

2. Acknowledgements
First and foremost, I am pleased to acknowledge my deepest appreciation
to W olf Moskovich (The Hebrew University), George Y. Shevelov (C ol­
um bia University) and Dovid Katz (Oxford University) for reading the
manuscript and making many suggestions that led to significant im ­
provements. In addition, Father Alexander Nadson made available to
me the rich resources of the Francis Skaryna Byelorussian Library and
M useum in London on more than one occasion; the Deutscher
Akademischer Austauschdienst provided a travel grant in 1982 which
enabled me to complete most of the prelim inary research in M unich—in
the libraries of the University, the U krainian Free University and the
Bavarian State Library; Peter Rehder (University of M unich) deserves
thanks for his efforts in making the travel grant possible. Moshe Altbauer
(The Hebrew University) provided bibliographical references and al­
lowed me to consult his study of the Codex # 262 before its publication.
Them es from this study were read at the Second International C on­
ference in Research in Yiddish Language and Literature held at Oxford
 PREFAC E X III

and before the Anglo-Byelorussian Society in London in July 1983; at the

International Symposium on Diachronic and Synchronic Aspects of the
Contacts between Slavic and Jewish Languages held in Jerusalem in
April 1984, before the U krainian Academy of Arts and Sciences in the
U .S. in New York and the H arvard U krainian Institute in Cam bridge
in O ctober 1984. At those meetings, I was able to profit from discussions
with David M . Bunis, Shaul Shaked, Rhone Shmeruk, M eyer Wolf,
M ichael Zand (The Hebrew University), H erbert H . Paper (Hebrew
U nion College), M arvin I. Herzog, M ordkhe Schaechter (Columbia
University), Edward Stankiewicz (Yale University), Omeljan Pritsak,
Bohdan Strum ins’kyj (H arvard University), Aharon Dolgopolsky (Haifa
University), Victor Swoboda (University of London), M aria Zag6rska-
Brooks (University of Pennsylvania) and Josef Bar-El (Bar-Ilan U niver­
sity). O thers who clarified specific points about non-Slavic languages are
Yona Sabar (UCLA), Alexander Borg, Jo h n Glucker and Baruch
Podolsky (Tel-Aviv University), Joshua A. Fishman (Yeshiva U niversi­
ty) and M ordekhai Avraham (Jerusalem). I also owe a special debt of
gratitude to the students of my course in Jewish Interlinguistics at YIVO-
Colum bia University (fall of 1984) for their stimulating discussions.
Slavic inform ants who discussed much of the contem porary data treated
in this study are too num erous to thank by nam e; suffice it to say that
their patience helped eliminate many errors and imprecisions.
I dedicate this preliminary study to the memory of Ibrahim ibn
J a cqub, the Catalonian Jewish traveler from Tortosa who provided the
first known on-the-spot description of his coreligionists in the Slavic set-
dem ents of Anhalt and Saxony over a thousand years ago.
Paul Wexler
Tel-Aviv 1985
 A BBREV IA TIO N S AND SYMBOLS

a anthroponym Gk Greek pi plural(c)

acc accusative Go Gothic Plb Polabian
adj adjective H High prep preposition
adv adverb He Hebrew Pro Provencal
agent agentive suffix Hg H ungarian Pt Portuguese
Alb Albanian inst instrumental R Russian
Ar Arabic int interjection Rmn Romance
Aram Aramaic It Italian Rom Rom ani2
arch archaic J Judeo- Rum Rum anian
Arm Armenian Jew Jewish S South(em)
Bg Bulgarian Ju d Judezm o1 Se Serbian, Serbo-
Br Belorussian Kab Kabardian sep pg separate pagination
c century K ar Karaite sg singular
C Common Kash Kashubian SI Slavic
Cat Catalan Kum Kumyk slg slang
ChSl Church Slavic L Low(er) So Sorbian5
Cl Classical Lat Latin Sp Spanish
col columns Le Lettish St standard
coll colloquial Li Lithuanian Svk Slovak
cq caique language loc locative Svn Slovenian
Cr Croatian m masculine Syr Syriac
Cuv C uval M Middle t tantum
Cz Czech Mac Macedonian T at T atar
dat dative Malt Maltese «P toponym
dial dialectal Med Medieval Tu Turkish
dim diminutive Mod M odem U Upper
Du Dutch ms(s) manuscript(s) Uk Ukrainian
E East(em ) n noun V Vulgar
Eng English N N orth(em ) W W est(em)
f feminine nom nominative Y Yiddish*
fam family name O Old • reconstructed
Fr French Os Ossete + suggested
G Germ an P Polish reading of a
gen genitive pej pejorative Judeo*Slavic,
Geo Georgian Per Persian Yiddish,
Hebrew or
Arabic gloss

1 Balkan Judezm o examples are taken from Nehama 1977, except for the Hebrew and
Judeo-Aram aic components of the language which are taken from Bunis 1980.
* Rom ani examples are from Wolf 1956, 1960 unless otherwise stated.
5 Sorbian examples not designated as “ U pper" or “ Lower" are common to both
dialects.
‫ י‬In defining Yiddish dialects, I use the term “ Eastern Yiddish" to designate all
dialects spoken east of the Czech and Slovak lands; all other dialects of Yiddish, including
those in the Czech and Slovak lands, are called “ W estern Y iddish". W here more precise
delineation is required, I define Yiddish dialects by the coterritorial non-Jewish
languages, e.g. "G erm an Yiddish” , “ Belorussian Yiddish” , etc. For a classification of
Yiddish dialects on internal Yiddish considerations, sec S. A. Bim baum 1979:94-105; D.
Katz 1983.
 T R A N SL IT E R A T IO N

Examples from non-contemporary Jew ish languages and pre-Israeli

H ebrew are transliterated from the Hebrew alphabet; contemporary
Israeli Hebrew, Yiddish and Persian examples and Hebrew an-
throponyms and references are given in a broad phonetic transcription.
For West Yiddish and T atar Belorussian examples, we follow the
transcription system of the sources. K araite examples are transliterated
from the Cyrillic spelling used by Baskakov el al. 1974, unless otherwise
stated. Soviet toponyms are cited in their native forms, except for a few
well-known toponyms which are cited in the accepted English version.
T he transliteration systems of the Hebrew alphabet (also used for
Judeo-A ram aic), the Yiddish, Arabic and Cyrillic alphabets are given
below.

Hebrew Yiddish

K ‫נ‬ ‫י‬ ‫ר‬ r ‫א‬ .‫נ‬ ‫ז‬ Z ‫ע‬ e

j
‫כ‬ b ‫ב‬ k i, s’ ‫א‬ a ‫ח‬ b‘ S P
‫כ‬ V ‫כד‬ X1 & S ‫א‬ 0 ‫ט‬ t ‫סף‬ r
‫נ‬ ‫ל‬ 1 ‫ח‬ t ‫כ‬ b ‫ר י‬ ‫צץ‬ c1
g ‘. j
‫ד‬ ‫יד‬
d ‫מס‬ m a ‫כ‬ V* 'j ‫ק‬ k
‫ה‬ h n1 e ‫ג‬ ‫יי‬ ‫ר‬ r
‫נז‬ g aj
‫ו‬ w ‫ס‬ 9 ( ‫ד‬ d ‫כ‬ k* ‫ש‬ 5, s:
‫ו‬ u ‫ע‬ < u ‫ה‬ h ­‫ס‬ X1 ‫ס‬ i*
\
‫ו‬ o ‫ס‬ P i ‫ ו‬.‫ו‬ u ‫ל‬ 1 ‫ח‬ r*
‫ז‬ z ‫פף‬ P ‫י‬ e ‫וו‬ V ‫מם‬ m1 p s4
‫ח‬ h ‫צץ‬ ‫י‬ i ‫וי‬ ‫נן‬ n1
C1 °j
‫ט‬ ‫ז‬ ‫ק‬ q a ‫ס‬ ‫ג‬

1 T o the left is the form of the letter in word-final position.

2 In European Hebrew and Yiddish writings up through the I8th century, this letter
frequently denoted both / and 1 ‫׳‬, the choice of symbol is determined by etymological con­
siderations.
’ The letter is written in Yiddish before initial aj, ej, oj, i and u.
* Used in Yiddish only in the spelling of Hebrew and Judeo-Aram aic words.
X V III TR A N SL ITER A TIO N

]yrillic (Slavic and Kumyk) y u

a a w
6 b ♦ f
B V X X
r h (Belorussian, Ukrai- 0 c
man); g (Russian, South ‫י‬ ‫ן‬
Slavic) ‫ש‬ 3
n> g (Kumyk) Ul 5t (Bulgarian); 8£ (Rus-
4 d sian, Ukrainian)
e e ‫«ו‬ i (Church Slavic, Old
c e Belorussian, Old R u ssian ,
c je O ld Ukrainian); ” (R us-
K i sian); 3 (Bulgarian)
3 z u y
i i k k (Church Slavic, Old
1 j' Belorussian, Old R u ssian ,
H i (Russian); y (U krainian) O ld U krainian);
It j ’ (Belorussian, R ussian,
4 g Ukrainian)
K k ■k 6
Kb q (Kumyk) 3 €
;1 1 H) j U
M m a ja
H n A <?
0 0 Ms j<?
fl P * 9
P r Mf. J9
c s « f
T t

Arabic

1 ‫־‬ e di ‫ל‬ * J-

^ b C h J r j‫״‬

O t t X J z j>

z, 0 J d a* s -k
 TR A N SL ITER A TIO N XIX

-k 0 j q n * a

^ < *J k i h t i

g J I J W t U

f f m ^ j
 1. JE W IS H C O N T A C T S W IT H T H E SLAVS IN T H E FIR ST
A N D EARLY SEC O N D M IL L E N N IA AD

In the 1920s, fully 40% of European Jew s resided in Slavic-speaking

countries, yet only about 10% of them were native speakers of a Slavic
language.1 T he bulk of the Jewish population in the Slavic lands spoke
either G erm an (in the Czech and Slovak lands, marginally in Bukovina),
H ungarian (Slovakia, Subcarpathian U kraine) or a non-indigenous
Jew ish language, such as Yiddish (Czechoslovakia, Poland and the
U SSR ), Judezm o (in the South Slavic lands) and very marginally
K araite (Poland, the U SSR), T at and Krymfiak (the U SSR).2 As a
group, the Jew s in Slavic lands became predom inandy monolingual in
a Slavic language only after W orld W ar I I.s Yet, a thousand years ago,
1 For the population figures, based on the national censuses of Poland, the USSR,
Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia (1920-1926) and for language statistics (1925),
see R uppin 1:1930:100; 2:1931:131.
1 According to Ruppin, 7886 out of 8219 Jew s in Bosnia and Hercegovina in 1910
(1:1930:80, fn.4) and 41,920 out of 43,232 Bulgarian Jew s in 1920 (2:1931:120) spoke
Judezm o. T he Czarist census of 1897 recorded Yiddish as the native language of 96.9%
of the Jew s in the Czarist Empire; this figure dropped to 70.7% by the first Soviet census
of 1926 (ibid., 2:1931:122-3). R uppin cites one million Jew ish speakers of G erm an in
1925—down (as a primary language?) from one and a quarter million in 1900 due to the
rise in prestige of national languages in Czechoslovakia and R um ania (2:1931:131). The
Soviet census o f 1970 recorded 4571 ethnic Karaites in the entire U SSR, o f whom only
585 gave Karaite as their native language (Itogi 1973:22(1). The Karaites are a Jew ish sect
founded in Iraq in the 8th century, which rejects the oral law (Talm ud). From Iraq, they
m igrated to Palestine, Egypt, N orth Africa, Spain, the Byzantine Empire and the
C rim ea— in the latter by the 9th century (Lewicki 1956:21). In the 14th century, C ri­
mean Karaites settled in the G rand Duchy of Lithuania. T he K araite centers on the eve
of W orld W ar II were confined primarily to Egypt, Palestine, Istanbul, Poland,
Lithuania and the U SSR. K araites in Egypt speak Arabic (but it is unclear whether their
dialect differs from that of the coterritorial Muslims and Jew s), in Northern Europe
Karaite— a Q 1 p£ak Turkic language also spoken in the C rim ea until the 19th century,
and in Istanbul—until recently—(Kareo-?)Greek, called javmitika ( < He jn in il ,G reek’
+ Gk ■ika (vs. nmejika ‘Greek spoken in T urkey‘, elinika ‘Greek spoken in G reece’) (in­
formation supplied by Mordekhaj Avraham). O n the T urkic language of the community,
see Moskovich and T ukan 1980; W exler 1980b; 1983a. O n the eve of World W ar I, there
were approximately 10,000 K rym faki residing in the following cities, in descending order
of population: K arasubazar (now Bilohirs’k), Simferopil’, Feodosija, K erf (Kaja
1914:76). The K rym iaks were nearly entirely exterm inated by the Germ ans during
World W ar II (Filonenko 1972).
5 Though even in the 19th and early 20th century, there were a num ber of Jew s who
became prom inent writers in Slavic languages, e.g. Julian Tuwim (1894-1953) in
Poland, Zmitrok Bjadulja (1886-1941) in Belorussia; see Harkavi 1865 for a Russian ex­
ample. Donath 1923-1930 gives details on Jewish literary activity in Czechoslovakia. For
some discussion of the Jewish periodical press in Poland and Russia during the 19th cen­
tury, sec Shmeruk 1981a. W e also have evidence from the late 19th and early 20th cen­
tury that Jew s in many rural areas were often quite fluent in Slavic languages. For
2 JE W IS H CO N TA CTS W IT H T H E SLAVS

the majority of the Jewish population in the Slavic lands may also h av e
been native in some form of Slavic.
T he history of the Yiddish- and Judezm o-speaking com m unities in
Slavic lands is weU known. Small num bers of Iberian Jew s first began to
settle in diverse parts of the Balkans after 1391, with their num bers in ­
creasing dramatically after the expulsions of the Jew s from Spain an d
Portugal between 1492 and 1498.4 Yiddish, the language of the Jew s in
the G erm an lands, developed in the 9th-10th centuries—in the
Rhineland on the base of the Judeo-French (and Judeo-Italian?) dialects
brought by Jew ish im m igrants, and in the mixed Slavic-German lan d s
east of the Elbe River, on Judeo-R om ance and Judeo-Slavic population
bases.5 Judeo-G reek and Judeo-A ram aic substrata may also have p a r ­
ticipated directly in the rise of Yiddish. Beginning with the 12th cen tu ry ,
Yiddish was brought to Bohemia and M oravia whence it ultim ately
spread to Poland and the East Slavic lands.
T he Yiddish-speaking Jews who settled in Lusatia, B ohem ia,
Belorussia and the U kraine encountered small indigenous Jewish c o m ­
m unities which were Slavic-speaking, while the Judezm o-speaking J e w s
encountered Greek- and possibly Slavic-speaking Jew s in the S o u th
Slavic lands. The dates of the first Jewish settlements in C entral, E astern
and Southern Europe cannot be stated with any certainty, since the J e w s
residing in these areas in the first millennium AD left scant records.
Jew ish testimony to a Jewish presence in the Slavic lands dates from th e
10th century; non-Jewish testimony from the 9th century. T he first
Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters appear to have been written in th e
early 10th century (see section 4 below). We owe the first m ention o f a
Jew ish settlement in the Slavic lands to Ibrahim ibn J a cqub, a 10th c e n ­

example, in the late 19th century, a Ukrainian was bemoaning the fact that in the sm all
towns of PidJjaiija, where the U krainians were said to be switching to Russian, “ o n ly
the Jew s can speak U krainian” ( “ M a ndrivka..." 1872:7:312); see also the enthusiastic
account of a Belorussian nationalist in 1910 who encountered an old Jewess near B a k ity .
in W estern Belorussia. who could speak "p u re Belorussian" (Jadvihin S. 1910:404-5).
O n the creation of Slavic proverbs by Jew s, see Horovic 8-9:1912:123 (editor's note) a n d
section 6.6 below. The circumstances attending the use of Slavic by Y iddish-speaking
Jew s need to be ascertained. For example, on Purim , Chassidic Jew s in the H ucul a r e a
of Northwest Rum ania are reported to have recited the Scroll of Esther in U krain ian
(Chajes 1934:452).
* For discussion ofjudezm o in the Balkans, see Mezan 1929; Baruh 1935; Bunis 1983.
1 For an external history of Yiddish, see M. W einreich 1973; S. A. Bim baum 1979.
R ubitejn argues in support of a Germanic-speaking Jew ry in the G erm an lands as e arly
as the Rom an period (1922:7-9), but there is no evidence for this. T he reference in a
Latin document from 568 to a Jew from Bourges with the Germanic nam e Sigericut (see
Aronius 1902, #33) is hardly valid for the Germ an lands. The pre-W orid W a r II
Yiddish-speaking population in the South Slavic lands appears to be of relatively recen t
origin, though there were Ashkenazic communities there in the pre-Sephardic p e rio d .
 JE W IS H CO N TA CTS W IT H T H E SLAVS 3

tury Jewish traveler from Tortosa, Cataluna, who noted the presence of
Jew s on the banks of the Saale R iver.6 A K hazar Hebrew document
dated c.930 contains what is possibly the earliest reference to a Slavic
town: H e qjjwvV + kijdv ‘K iev’.7 T he oldest reference to Slavs in a Jewish
source is H e *wnntjt (corrected from wwntjl)/ + vantit (10th c), an East
Slavic tribe (sec R Vjatiiy)\ the term is also known in a late 9th century
Arabic text in the form wantit* Equally sparse are the non-Jewish
references to Jew s and their speech. The first such report of Jews in the
Slavic lands and their use of Slavic was made by the 9th century Persian
geographer ibn Xordadbeh. W riting in Arabic, he mentions multilingual
Jew ish m erchant travelers, known as ‘R adhanites’. These merchants,
though not necessarily residents of any Slavic country, traveled between
W estern Europe and C hina via K iev.9 It is difficult to determine the ex­
tent to which these peregrinations led to perm anent Jewish settlements,
though in the Slavic lands traversed, Jewish settlements came into ex­
istence by the 11th century, e.g. in Regensburg, Erfurt, Cernihiv and
perhaps Przemysl. Local sources also record the presence of Jews in West
Slavic lands by the 9th- 10th centuries.10 A Hebrew letter composed in
Saloniki perhaps in the year 1000 speaks of a monolingual Slavic­
speaking Jew from the East Slavic lands. 11 In addition to uncovering the

• See Spuler 1938; Kowalski 1946; Jakimowicz 1949; Strohmaier 1979.

’ See Golb and Pritsak 1982. This document predates by almost two centuries the next
known reference to Jews in this city—in 1113 (see Lewicki 1956:21). O n the alleged visit
o f a Czech rabbi, Eliezer of Prague, to “ R ussia" in the late 12th century, see Zunz
1876a:83; on the settlement of “ W estern” Jews in Kiev, see Rawita-Gawroriski
1924:49-50; Golden 1980:21; H. Bim baum 1981a:233; 1981b:30-31, 35, fn 15. F o ra
survey of Jew s in Kievan R us’, see Ettinger 1966. Epstein mentions a Moses of Kiev who
studied in W estern Europe in the 12th century (1895:511).
• See Lewicki 1956:30; I958a:3l6; Wexler 1977a:104. The loss of nasal consonants in
East Slavic is dated at about the 10th century (Wexler 1977a: 104).
• The passage in ibn Xordaflbeh reads: “ The road of the Jewish traders called
\r*i*njjhJ + 1arraianijja They speak Arabic, Persian, rum [Romance or Greek], Jrondiijja
!French or Germ anic?], ’andatwijja [Spanish?] and 1af!aqlabijja [Slavic]” (XV: 119;
reprinted with a commentary by Lewicki 1: 1956-[I977]:74-5, 118fl). O n the etymologies
proposed for the term 'R adhanites', see Kmietowicz 1970. It is inconceivable that a
single m erchant could have been fluent in such a heterogeneous group of languages. The
activity of these Jewish m erchants seems to have ceased by the late 10th century. O n the
Jewish participation in the international trade routes, see Brutzkus 1943:32; M.
Weinreich 1956:623. O n the presence of Jews in China during the 9th century, see the
account of Abu Zajid Hasan (c.916) (translated in Ferrand 1922:76); Leslie 1972; W exler
1985a. O n the use of Ar *awaqldbijja to refer to Germanic and Finnic peoples, sec Lewicki
1960:40-1. See also the use of M edH e ^alktnaz to denote both Germanic and Slavic
groups, discussed in section 6.13, fn. 49 below.
10 For a late 8th-early 9th century Latin mention of a Slavic-speaking Jewish physician
in Salzburg, see Aronius 1902, # 80. For further discussion of early Bohemian Jews, see
Kestenberg-Gladstein 1966.
11 See Baron 1957; W einryb 1962b and section 4 below.
4 JE W IS H CO N TA CTS W IT H T H E SLAVS

location of the earliest Jewish settlements, there also remains the p ro b lem
of ascertaining whether these early settlements continued to exist up u n til
the arrival o f the Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews. It is unlikely that m a n y
Jewish communities in the U krainian lands could have survived th e
destruction of the T atar invasions in the 13th century; the Jew ish set-
dem ents in Thrace and M acedonia probably also suffered decim ation
along with the general population as a result of the wars between th e
Bulgarian, Greek and Latin Kingdoms in the early 13th cen tu ry .
Moreover, the veracity of many of the accounts about Jews in th e
prim ary historical sources—both Jewish and non-Jewish—is open to
question, since the events described were usually copied down m any c e n ­
turies after they took place and transm itted by copyists who often confus-
cd Slavic toponyms and glosses due to ignorance of the original
languages.12 For this reason, the historian, Bernard W einryb, was in clin ­
ed to discount most of the early documents in reconstructing a Jew ish
presence in the Slavic lands (1957, 1962a, 1962b). I wholeheartedly a c ­
cept W einryb’s call for caution when drawing conclusions from historical
sources, but submit that had W einryb been in a position to consider the
linguistic evidence,15 he might have posited a Jewish presence in the
Slavic lands before the 10th century. T he linguistic evidence gathered
here should give greater weight to the historical docum entation that
W einryb saw fit to question some twenty-thirty years ago.
T he earliest contact between Jew s and Slavs could have taken place
four centuries before the earliest docum entation, i.e. in the 6th century,
in the cities along the northern littoral of the Black Sea, when Judeo-
Greek- and possibly also Judeo-Iranian-speaking Jew s could have first
met East Slavs. In the same area, the Turkic-speaking Judaicized
K hazars had intercourse with the East Slavs in the 8th-10th centuries.14

11 For a critical discussion of the alleged Polish Jewish family nam e Prochoumik
(mid-9th c), and the alleged presence of Greek Jew s in Przcmysl, Galicia, in the 11th cen­
tury, see W einryb I 962b: 453481-482 , 464-465 ,455‫ ־‬and section 4, fn. 14 below.
‘‫ י‬W einryb only treats anthroponymic evidence cursorily (1962b:4945‫)־‬. For a criti­
que of W einryb, see Ettinger 1966:442.
1 * O n Iranian cultural influences among the Jew s in the area north of the Black Sea,
see Nadel 1961:81, though no evidence is forthcoming. For the theory that the Khazars
received Judaism from Iranian Jew s, see Brutzkus 1937:28, 32, 41; Altman 1947. For
further discussion of Judeo-Iranian-Slavic-Yiddish contacts, see sections 3.3-3.312
below. O n general East Slavic relations with Iranian and Khazar groups, see Slakacixin
1928:17, 21-3; Artamonov 1962; Chubaty 1963; Ohlobyn 1963. T he reference to jew s
moving to Khazaria appears in the writings of M as(udl (c.930) (1863: see also fragments
in Starr 1939, #91; Golden 1980:20; Golb and Pritsak 1982:102, 106-7). The Khazars
are said to have known the Slavic word zakon ‘law’, according to Constantine Por-
phyrogenitus (c. 948-952) (see zakonon in M igne 1857:113, chapter 38, col. 319-20 and
sections 5.1214 and 5.5222 below).
 JE W IS H CO N T A C T S W IT H T H E SLAVS 5

T here are also reports of Byzantine, A rm enian and Iranian Jewish im ­

m igration into the K hazar lands in the 7th-8th centuries, and of Jew s and
Judaicized K hazars m igrating west into U krainian lands in the 10th cen­
tury (see also sections 3.3-3.323 below) .15 O n the D alm atian coast,
autochthonous Judeo-Greek* and Judeo-Latin-speaking Jews could have
encountered the Slavs who were beginning to penetrate that area as early
as the middle 6th century; Judeo-G reek- and/or Judeo-R om ance-
speaking Jews in Pannonia (W estern H ungary, N orthern Yugoslavia
and Eastern Austria—bounded in the north and east by the D anube)
could have met Slavs as early as the 7th century.16 In all areas of Europe,
there might have been speakers of Judeo-A ram aic. Finally, the variously
docum ented participation of Jew s in the transferring of Slavic slaves to
W estern Europe and North Africa raises the possibility of Jewish-Slavic
contacts outside the Slavic lands.17

15 Altman 1947; Baron 1957:196-7; Shevelov 1979:211. Note also the contact between
St>. Cyril and M ethodius and the Jews (Samaritans) in Xerson and the possible Hebrew
origin of a num ber of letters in the Glagolithic alphabet (the latter, despite its nam e, was
the invention of St. Cyril) (Jagi£ 1911). O n general contacts between Slavs, Bulgars,
Khazars and Byzantine Jew s, see M lzan 1929:1190. T he putative K hazar role in
transm itting Talmudic and Biblical stones to the East Slavs has been discussed by Barac
1908; 1924; M eUerskij 1956a; 1956b; 1958. O n the alleged role of Khazars in transm it­
ting Hebrew musical genres to Kievan R us’, see Yasser 1949:45.
'• For general historical background, see L<fvy 1892; Brutzkus 1930:343; 1944; Dvor-
nik 1956; 1970; Chubaty 1963:589; Ohlobyn 1963:577; Kovalevsky 1964; M . Weinreich
2:1973:197-198, 4:267; Schramm 1981:140ff. For a map showing the spread of the Slavs
into the Balkans, see Schramm 1981, map 5. O n the possibility of Jewish participation
in the migrations of the H ungarians into H ungary, see 2ak 1964:229.
” See S tarr 1939:136, fn. 155 (texts » * 155, 193); Kusseff 1950; Lewicki 1952:485;
1956:22; 1961; Jakobson and H ^ le 1964:153; Obolensky 1971:96. The 12th century
bronze doors of the Cathedral of Gniezno portray a Jew with bound slaves (see the
photograph in Roth and Levine 1966, figure 1; Barraclough 1970:126 and Gumowski
1975:36). T he use o f He kna'ani to denote Slavdom and Slavic languages in Medieval
times follows the practice in European languages of equating ‘slave’ and ‘Slav’ and
reflects the fact that the Canaanites in the Old Testam ent had the status of slaves. For
details, see Mieses 1934:253; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:28-30; M . Weinreich 1956;
1:1973:84; Jakobson and Halle 1964:147-154; Lewicki 1964c:364. The founder of the
Chassidic movement, the Baal §em Tov (pseudonym o fjisrael btn Elitztr, 1699-1760)
is reputed to have called his Ukrainian servant a “ C anaanite" (Chajes 1934:449). The
Polish Jewish family name Chanaan (Krak6w 1495) may indicate a Christian convert to
Judaism (Mieses 1934:253). See also S ejud kenaani adj ‘Slavic, Yugoslav, gentile (?)’
(1862), which appears to be the most recent use of the Hebraism in this m eaning. See
also discussion of the semantic recalibration of historical ethnonyms in section 5.5213
below. O n H e gvalim in the correspondence of Hasdaj ibn §apru! to the Khazar king,
see Zunz 1876a:83; Modelski 1910; Lewicki 1964a:91-92. A bibliography of works deal­
ing with this correspondence is given in Lewicki 1956:16-7.
 2. T H E A IM S O F JU D E O -SL A V IC L IN G U IS T IC S

Jew s have been pursuing a pattern of adapting non-Jewish languages

ever since they first switched from spoken Hebrew to Aramaic and I ra ­
nian languages in approxim ately 600 BC. T he Judaicization of non-
Jewish languages involves the fusing of a unique selection of coterritorial
non-Jewish linguistic material with Hebrew, Judeo-A ram aic and o th e r
Jew ish substrata] elements. Two additional factors can increase the
divergence between Jewish and non-Jewish cognate dialects: (a) Jew ish
languages are receptive, in principle without lim itation, to enrichm ent
from written and hieratic H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic—languages w ith
which they coexist in a perpetual state of diglossia.1 Regardless of
w hether a Hebrew element comes from the spoken substratum or from
the written adstratum , it is usually subjected to two types of integration
in the Jewish target languages, depending on the speech context.
Hebraism s introduced into the spoken Jewish language will be called
“ merged H ebrew ” , while a H ebrew monolingual text pronounced by
speakers of a Jewish language (i.e. in the context of a prayer or form al
recitation) will be designated as “ whole H ebrew ” .2 (b) The Je w ish
variant is often relatively more receptive to enrichm ent from non-cognate
non-Jewish sources than the cognate non-Jewish dialects, and ten d s to
preserve the form and m eaning of the loans with greater fidelity (see also
sections 3.3112, 4.114 and fn. 42, 4.1141, 6.2-6.225 and 6.32 below ).
Research in com parative Jewish interlinguistics has revealed fo u r
distinctive types of language developed by Jews:
Type 1: Most Jewish languages are created on the basis of a J e w ish
linguistic substratum , leading back in an unbroken chain to sp o k en
Hebrew. I give these languages the epithet “ Ju d e o ‫ ”־‬, e.g. Ju d e o -L a tin ,
unless a native epithet is available, e.g. Yiddish, Judezm o. A
characteristic feature of such languages is the fusion of com ponents ta k e n
from a coterritorial non-Jewish language and heterogeneous n o n -n ativ e
components, am ong which Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic are the o n ly
components common to all Jewish languages. In the case of Yiddish a n d
Judezm o, the chains of language shift can be conceived, in p a rt as
follows: Hebrew > (Judeo-Aramaic c.6th c BC > ) Judeo-G reek (c .4 th

' For details, see Rabin 1981:8; W exler 1981b:J19-124.

5 For examples and further discussion, see W exler 1981b: 119ff. T he term inology w as
first proposed by M ax Weinreich. The extent to which this dichotomy is characteristic
of all Jew ish languages (and maybe even non-Jewish languages receptive to H eb rew ) has
yet to be determined.
 T H E A IM S O F JU D EO -SLA V IC LIN G U ISTICS 7

c BC) > Judeo-L atin (c.Jst c AD)/Judezm o; Judeo-French and Judeo-

Italian > Yiddish (9-10th cc). A small Greek substratal element can still
be identified in both contemporary Yiddish and Judezm o; in addition,
Yiddish has acquired Grecisms through its Judeo-Slavic substratum and
through direct contact with Judeo-G reek (see sections 3.13-3.163 below).
J u st as W estern Judeo-G reek was supplanted by Judeo-L atin (and
Judeo-B erber in North Africa?), I suppose that Eastern Judeo-G reek was
supplanted by Judeo-Slavic (see also section 3 below).
Type 2: Languages may also acquire a Jewish identity because of
linguistic shifts affecting either the Jews or the non-Jews, but not both
groups, and/or displacement of the Jewish speakers from their original
habitat without subsequent acquisition of the newly coterritorial
language.’ Languages which become Judaicized “ by default” may lack
a significant Jewish linguistic substratum . I propose to give these
languages the prefix “ Judaicized” , e.g. Judaicized Iraqi Arabic,
Algerian Arabic.
Type 3: T here are Jew ish languages which are created solely for the
purpose of translating a Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic text. Such languages
tend to follow the syntax and word-formation of the original language
rather faithfully and rarely have a spoken function in the com munity. I
will call such languages “Judeo-X caique” languages, e.g. Judeo-East
Slavic caique language (see sections 4.4-4.4125 below).
Type 4: Finally, there are languages used by Jews which hardly differ
from the language of the coterritorial non-Jewish population in their
native corpus, but may occasionally employ Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic
elements, as well as elements from an obsolescent Jewish language. Such
languages are either obsolescent Jewish languages or non-Jewish
languages in the early stages of Judaicization. These languages will be
given the prefix “Jew ish-” to distinguish them from types 1 and 2, e.g.
Jew ish-R ussian, Jewish-Polish.* A distinguishing feature of these
languages is the tendency to avoid Hebrew morphological machinery
when borrowing Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic components, e.g. Jewish-

5 For example, Jew s characteristically lag behind non-Jews in carrying out a language
shift. O n the prolonged use of Arabic by Jew s in Toledo, see W exler 1981b:l 14; in late
15th century Palermo, see Bresc and Goitein 1970:905-6. See also the longer retention
of Greek by Rom an Jews discussed in section 3 and of Altaic toponyms by Ukrainian
Karaites in section 6.7, fn. 244 below. Also relevant ‫ גו‬Kessler’s discussion of the
Judaicization of G erm an nam es among German Jew s (1935:24) and Mieses' discussion
of G erm anic elements that are preserved only in Yiddish and hence become re-defined
as uniquely Jewish (1924:261). See also the existence of Slavic folksongs and proverbs
preserved now only among Jews (Brutzkus 1945; Goldberg 1928 and section 6.6 below).
‘ W exler 1981b: 105-7.
8 T H E A IM S O F JU D E O -S L A V IC LIN G U ISTIC S

Czech bockr ‘Jewish seminary student’ takes the Czech plural m a rk e r,

e.g. bochfi pi vs. W , NY boxer ‘young m an ’: boxerim pi ( < H e
bahur.bdhunm pl).J
In all likelihood, the Slavic Jew s developed at different periods all four
types of Jewish linguistic expression, in addition to speaking the m ajo rity
variants of Slavic. In the early Middle Ages the Slavic dialects of the Je w s
were probably of type 1—i.e. distinct from the coterritorial non-Jew ish
Slavic speech by virtue of a Judeo-G reek (and possibly o th e r)
substratum , a Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic sub- and adstratum , a n d a
unique selection of Slavic linguistic m aterial—not all of which was
necessarily of coterritorial Slavic origin. At the same time, other form s
of Slavic could have become Judaicized in the m anner of type 2. In p ra c ­
tice, however, it is not always possible to distinguish between type 1 and
type 2 due to the fragmentary nature of the data and our ignorance of
the sociolinguistic factors. A Judeo-Slavic caique language—an exam ple
of type 3—existed in the East Slavic lands in the 15th-16th centuries and
possibly in the West Slavic lands several centuries earlier. Finally,
distinctive forms of transitional Jewish-Slavic speech came into existence
am ong speakers of Yiddish and Judezm o shifting to Slavic; these
languages would constitute examples of type 4. It is interesting that the
de-Judaicization of Judeo-Slavic speech took place under rather unique
conditions. Linguists are accustomed to finding indigenous Jewish
languages replaced at some point in time by the coterritorial non-Jewish
language, e.g. G erm an Yiddish by High G erm an. But in the Slavic
lands, some (most?) of the indigenous Judeo-Slavic dialects were directly
superseded by one of two imported Jewish languages—Yiddish or Judez-
mo; the latter ultimately became superseded in turn in the 19th and 20th
centuries by standard variants of Slavic—though for some speakers not
without passing through a transitional stage of Jewish-Slavic. I do not
rule out the possibility that Yiddish and Judezm o were also direcdy
adopted by Jewish speakers of standard Slavic. In recent times, even
after acquiring a standard Slavic language, Jews may continue to differ
in their speech habits from the coterritorial non-Jewish population. For
example, many Jews in interbellum Slovakia preferred H ungarian to
Slovak (the indigenous Jew s in the Subcarpathian Ukraine still do), while
the majority of the Jew s in the non-Russian-speaking Soviet Republics
today speak Russian rather than the coterritorial languages (but see also
section 1, fn. 3 above). T he present study will consider examples of types
1, 2 and 3 only.

5 Ibid., 107, fn. 13.

 T H E A IM S O F JU D E O -S L A V IC LIN G U ISTIC S 9

M y discussion of Judeo-Slavic linguistics begins with an examination

of the Jew ish languages believed to have been brought to the Slavic lands
during the First m flennium AD, proceeds to a characterization of the ex­
tant Judeo-Slavic m aterials and ends with an attem pt to uncover a Judeo-
Slavic com ponent in the Slavic languages and in successor Jewish
languages, notably Yiddish.
 3. E X T IN C T JE W IS H L IN G U IST IC STR A TA IN
T H E SLAVIC LANDS
(O T H E R T H A N SLAVIC)

3.1 Judeo-Greek
3.11 Byzantine cultural patterns among Jews and Judaizers in the Slavic l a n d s
3.12 Judeo-Greek loans in European non-Jewish languages
3.121 JG k he megate hemera
3.122 JG k paraskevi
3.123 JG k phylakteria
3.124 JG k rhetor
3.125 JG k sambata
3.126 JG k sxote
3.127 JG k synagogi
3.13 Judeo-Greek loans in European Jewish languages
3.131 Yiddish Judeo-Grecism s received through Judeo-R om ance: O S w iss Y
f w l m Ju d talamo
3.132 Yiddish Judeo-Grecism s diffused through Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic: Y
apetnpes — apitropos, Ju d apatropos — apo-\ Y sandek, Ju d sandak
3.133 Diffusion of Grecisms to Yiddish from non-Jewish languages: WY m int(
3.134 Yiddish Judeo-Grecism s borrowed directly or through a Judeo-S lavic
intermediary: Y kaloves(nik), etc.; ktU\pjnkw'! — -1 ; OY.JW S1 dwkws, H e
d'u ‘kas, etc.; JW SI gum‫\ ;־‬w)qdwn; Y, K ar, Ju d aoer\ G H e (jpjt, J u d
tapet(e); Y, J F r trop\ J u d stunba(d); Jew -C z dlouhy den\ K ar baraski, Y
sandek, J u d sandak
3.14 A possible Judeo-Greek Hebraism in Yiddish: He ifilldh ,prayerbook’
3.15 A possible Judeo-Greek pattern of discourse in Yiddish: J(?)G k (ou pouliou
to gala — Y fojglmilx
3.16 Judeo-Greek influence in European Jewish anthroponyraics
3.161 Judeo-G reek anthroponym s in Yiddish first attested in Palestinian
sources: Y ineur, Ju d senior, OW Y prig6ras\ JF.S1 Tannmovii, etc.; OYVY
lodres, J u d todrot, EY badaru(s)\ EY margolin, etc.
3.162 Judeo-G reek anthroponyms in Yiddish first attested in Europe
3.1621 Judeo-G reek anthroponyms in Yiddish taken directly from
Judeo-G reek or diffused through a Judeo-Slavic intermediary:
Y fajvtti — fejbul\ kalmen — kalonymos, etc., Ju d kalo —
kotonomos; Y sender — sendir, Ju d sanda\ Y pwp* — Poppelman
3.163 Uncovering caiques of Judeo-Greek anthroponym s in Yiddish and
Judeo-Slavic: Y blume ~ -ime\ Florya\ JW SI Kivieta, Kvitna, Y cejmex, Jud
cemax, Y pejrtx, Ju d peragja — -xja\ Y golde\ stale — 110-; torex, Ju d leragja
— ■x)a; Y frejde\ sime, JW SI St'aslny, JES1 Siasny(j), EY dcojrt, JES1
Piolka; Y badane(s)\ JESI Tanxonovii, etc.; JW SI Glownia, etc., Swyathly
3.2 Judeo-Latin
3.3 yudeo-)A sian languages
3.31 (Judeo-) Iranian
3.311 (Judeo-)Iranian loans in Yiddish
3.3111 Y dav(e)nen, daven-lul
3.3112 EY }abai, OW Y cwbw'i', EY libel
3.312 A Judeo-Iranian Hebraism in Karaite: hag
3.313 Pers fin morg
3.32 (Judeo-) Turkic
3.321 A possible Judeo-T urkic substratum in Balkan Judezm o
 JE W IS H LIN G U IS T IC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 11

3.322 Alleged K hazar phonological interference in K hazar Hebrew

3.323 Alleged K hazar terms in Byzantine Greek and Russian
3.33 Judeo-Aram aic
3.331 A possible colloquial Judeo-Aram aic substratum in G erm an Yiddish
3.332 A possible Judeo-A ram aic impact on Khazar Hebrew
3.333 Judeo-Aram aisms in Slavic and languages of the Caucasus
3.34 Asian Jewish anthroponym s in the Slavic lands
3.341 Anthroponym s derived from the calendar cycle: He hannukah\ jom lav,
mah jifita ‫׳‬, nisan; pis ah, tiPah ki'dv
3.342 Judeo-A rabic and Asian Hebrew anthroponyms: He caddq\ jaq&r,
mivarax, nalronaj) sa'-adjah\ JA r hakim; majmun(a)\ sulajman (?)
3.4 Recapitulation

3. IN T R O D U C T IO N
Jewish groups have existed in almost all parts of Europe at one time
o r another, but only a few Jewish communities are known to have
developed a distinctive Jewish subculture, reflected in unique ritual
customs and a Judaicized variant of the coterritorial non-Jewish
language. Examples of Jewish subculture areas are Judeo-G reek
(Greece, Southern Italy, the Balkans, Asia M inor, C rim ea, Southeastern
Spain, Southern France, Egypt), Judeo-R om ance (developing first in the
Latin homeland and spreading to all the Romance areas except
R um ania), Judeo-G erm anic (Yiddish: G erm any, Austria, Holland,
Switzerland, Alsace, N orthern Italy, H ungary, West and East Slavic
lands, Baltic lands, Rum ania), Judeo-Turkic (Crim ea, East Slavic
lands), Judeo-T at and Judeo-G eorgian (Caucasus), Judeo-Slavic (West
and possibly East Slavic lands, but conjectural in the South Slavic lands).
M ost Jewish cultural areas differ in their geographical spread from that
of the cognate non-Jewish culture areas. Besides the examples cited
above and in part 1 of the preface, see also Judeo-French, which extend­
ed from N orthern France into the Rhineland and Judeo-Ibero-Rom ance
which was spoken in North Africa, the O ttom an Empire, N orthern
Europe and the non-Hispanic Americas; finally, contemporary Judeo-
T at and Muslim T at are not entirely coterritorial. Some culture areas
have become extremely heterogeneous, for example, in the Italian lands,
G erm an, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Greek and Arabic Jew ries co­
existed to some degree; in the C rim ea, there were G erm an, Spanish,
Italian, Greek, Turkic, N ear Eastern and possibly Slavic Jewries, etc.1
T he reconstruction of the Slavic speech habits of the Jews in the Slavic
lands occasionally obliges me to examine both coterritorial (e.g. Yiddish)
and contiguous (e.g. Turkic, Iranian) Jewish languages, since the latter
Jewries may either have participated in the ethnogenesis of the Slavic

1 See M arkon 1934:443.

12 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Jewish communities, or influenced the latter after their co n stitu tio n .

Consideration of other minorities in the Slavic lands (e.g. the G e rm a n s,
T atars, Roma) may also prove desirable from time to tim e, in assessing
the differential impact of Slavic on non-Slavic Jewish languages such as
Yiddish and Judezm o.
In the discussions below I will explore Slavic before non-Slavic d a ta ,
and relatively more certain before less certain etymologies. T he u tiliz a ­
tion of non-Slavic sources for the recovery of Judeo-Slavic is com plicated
by the poor state of etymological and historical dictionaries for m ost o f
the relevant languages, e.g. Yiddish and the C um an languages. I am
confident that progress in Yiddish etymologies will reveal a more signifi­
cant “ O riental” component in that language than is presendy a p ­
preciated. M any existing lexicographical studies must be used w ith
caution; this is especially true of Slavic dialect dictionaries and G erm an
slang lists compiled by non-linguists (e.g. Varlyha 1964, 1970; W olf
1956). For many Jewish languages, e.g. Judeo-T at, Judeo-G eorgian an d
K rym iak, the most rudim entary synchronic dictionaries and descriptions
are still lacking, while Soviet dictionaries of Jewish languages have been
purged of much of their “ Jew ish” content—precisely the param eter of
importance to us.2
T he evidence for Judeo-G reek and Asian substrata in European
Jewish languages comes from a num ber of sources; (a) close parallels in
the liturgy of the Czech and Byzantine Jews and in the folklore of the
Czech Jews and the Byzantine Greeks; (b) possible Judeo-G reek influ­
ences on East Slavic Judaizers; (c) Judeo-G reek elements in the Slavic
languages, O ld Bavarian G erm an and a num ber of languages spoken in
the Caucasus; (d) Judeo-G reek elements in Yiddish, Judezm o, Judeo-
West Slavic and Karaite; (e) Judeo-G reek influence in the Jewish
onomastics of Central, Eastern and Southern Europe; (f) Yiddish terms
of Iranian origin; (g) Yiddish inclusion in an onomasiological isogloss
connecting Asian and African Jewish languages and earlier stages of
Judeo-G reek and Judeo-L atin; (h) Jewish anthroponym s of probably
Asian origin in use in the Slavic and G erm an lands; (i) non-Yiddish pro­
nunciation of Hebrew anthroponym s in the Slavic lands; (j) Hebrew
loans in Slavic and languages of the Caucasus which cannot be ascribed
to a Yiddish interm ediary; (k) a possible colloquial Judeo-Aramaic
substratum in European Jewish languages other than Greek and Latin
(e.g. Yiddish and Khazar).

’ The poor coverage in Baskakov el ai 1974 of the Hebrew component in Karaite ij

discussed by Allbauer 1979-80. See also Sapiro et al. 1984. Similarly, the Jewish connota­
tions of Slavic words are frequently omitted in Soviet dictionaries of Belorussian, Russian
and Ukrainian.
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 13

3.1 Judeo-Greek
Greek was the first European language to be widely acquired by Jews,
both inside and outside of Palestine; its first adaptation by the Jew s dates
to the 4th century BC in Egypt. T he early period of Judeo-G reek
witnessed the composition of a num ber of im portant literary works in
Egypt and Palestine, e.g. the Septuagint translation of the Old T esta­
m ent (the earliest sections of which date from c. 3rd century BC), the
New Testam ent (lst-2nd centuries AD), the writings of the Alexandrine
philosopher Philo ( l s t 2 ‫־‬nd centuries AD) and the historian Flavius
Josephus (36‫ ־‬after 105 AD). The Judeo-G reek diaspora largely parallel­
ed the settlement of the Greeks themselves, eventually covering an enor­
mous area from Southern Spain and France to as far east as Iran and
India, and from the northern shores of the Black Sea to North Africa and
E gypt.5 Significantly, the impact of Greek on the colloquial languages
varied considerably; for example, the Greek imprint on the cultures and
languages of the Crim ea and the Caucasus was especially strong, while
G reek language and culture died out in W estern Europe (except for Italy)
relatively early in the Christian e ra .4 Yiddish itself may retain a reflection
o f the general pattern of Hellenization in Europe, since Judeo-G reek an-
throponym s which are preserved in their original form in W estern Yid­
dish dialects have Judeo-Slavic translation equivalents in Eastern
Yiddish (e.g. W Y [He] p[>]rigoras ma, unattested in Eastern Yiddish
sources — JSI (Br) TanxomovU, etc. fam in Eastern Yiddish areas; WY
todros ma vs. EY badane fa, badanes fam: see discussion in section 3.161
below). Translation would only be expected in communities where the
meanings of the Greek names were still understood.
T here is a significant body of Jewish tombstone and synagogue in­
scriptions from the colonial Hellenic territory, mainly in Greek (and
usually in Greek characters), but also partly in Latin (in both Latin and

* O n close contacts between Jews and Greeks in Arles in the early 6th century, see
G ross 1878:68; C aro 1:1908: 152. O n the presence of Greek Jew s and Jewish influence
in Iran and India, see T am 1938: 29, 62, 416, 423, 434. T o the best of my knowledge,
the only linguist to explore the broad geographical param eters of Judeo-Greek territory
(though om itting the Black Sea colonies and Iran) was M ax Weinreich (1:1973: 81fT, 97);
see also W exler 1985b. Besides the perm anent Greek settlements, we must also reckon
w ith the penetration of Greek traders (including Jews?) into the peripheral areas, e.g.
11th century Byzantine artifacts have been found as far north as Kiev and Cem ihiv
(Sfakacixin 1928:16, 57). No Greek influence has been found in the late 9th-10th century
graveyard (kurgany) at Gnezdovo (just west of Smolensk) (ibid 16). O n Byzantine art
forms in 13th-15th century Poland, see Gieysztor 1970:1%, 204; Seibt 1970:88. For a
m ap of the Greek-Latin language boundary in the Balkans in the middle 1st century BC,
see Gerov 1980:149.
4 O n the longer retention of Greek language and culture in the Eurasian steppe than
in W estern Europe, see Pritsak 1981:72.
 14 JE W IS H L IN G U IS T IC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Greek characters), but there are no known Judeo-G reek lite ra ry

documents from locales other than Egypt and Palestine. E u ro p e a n
Judeo-G reek inscriptions are found in the following locales: S p ain
(Elche, 6th century; T ortosa, trilingual H ebrew-Latin-Greek in scrip tio n ,
date?);5 France (Antibes, late 2nd century; Bordeaux, 6th century; N ar-
bonne 688);6 Italy (Rom an catacombs, 1st century BC?—late 3 rd c e n ­
tury AD);7 Yugoslavia and Bulgaria (Osijek, 3rd century, L atin
inscriptions with a Greek word; Split [Salona] n .d .; Sarajevo, m ag ical
formulas, n .d .; Stib [Stobi], synagogue inscriptions, 2nd or 3rd c e n tu ry ;
Gigen [West-Bulgaria], tombstone);8 H ungary (Esztergom , n .d .;
Dunaujvaros [Intercisa]9 c.222-235; tombstone with two p ortrait busts
with Latin and Greek inscriptions, n .p ., n.d.; Albertirsa, Latin in G re ek
characters, n .d .);10 Black Sea tombstone and synagogue in scrip tio n s,
lst-3rd centuries; 11 G erm any (Regensburg magical formulas, 3 rd cen ­
tury; Badenweiler, Greek and Latin words in Greek characters, n . d . ) . 13
U nfortunately, we have no Judeo-G reek evidence from areas w ith a
Slavic population, except for Regensburg, then perhaps in Slavic speech
territory, and there is some doubt whether these materials should even
be ascribed to Jewish authorship;15 all the Black Sea inscriptions p re d a te
5 Frey 1:1936, # #661-664; S. Katz 1937, appendices 142-144, 147-148; G o o d en o u g h
1953:58; C am era and Millas 1956:267-273, 408-410; M. W einreich 3:1973:85, fn .5 .
6 Frey 1:1936, # #670, 672; S. Katz 1937:62; Blumenkranz 1974:234-235.
' Cassuto 1932-1933; Frey 1:1936, #497; Leon 1960. O n Greek names am o n g S a rd i­
nian Jew s, see Rowland 1973, # #62, 203, 641, 894, 1260.
' Frey 1:1936, # #679-680 , 694; M arm orstein 1936-1937:377; Scheiber 1960:48-52;
1966:314; Eventov 1971:31-32; Lifshitz 1975:60, #678a.
9 Formerly Sztalinviros and before that Dunapentele.
10 Frey 1:1936, # # 4 1 3 , 675-677; Goodenough 1953:59; Bark6czi 1954; S ch eib er
1955:189, 192ff. Beranek also raises the possibility that the first H ungarian J e w s m av
have been from Byzantium (1949:38); see also Scheiber 1966:313-314.
11 Frey 1:1936, # # 6 8 3 , 78 (under “ Paiens judaisants” ); Nadcl 1960:44, 151-153;
Struve 1965. T he major centers of Jewish settlement were at O lbia at the m o u th o f the
Buh River, Xersones, Theodosia (now Feodosija), Panticapaeum (now K eri) an d T a n a is
(now Azov, on the Sea of Azov at the mouth of the Don River). O n the possibility that
the inscriptions are from a com munity of converts to Judaism and not from native Je w s,
see Goodenough 1956-1957.
11 Perdrizet 1928:82; Frey 1:1936, ##673-674. Mieses postulated that B yzantine
Jews could have em igrated as far west as Bavaria but gives no supporting evidence
(1924:300). See discussion in Aronius 1902, # 157. On a possible Jewish presence in the
Rhineland in the late 3rd-early 4th centuries, see Asaria 1959:35. See also R ubS tejn
1922, mentioned in section 1, fn. 5 above.
13 Lifshitz is sceptical (1970:82). In any case, the authors of the inscriptions w e re at
least influenced by Judaism . Note the observation by Balasz that Judaism o u tsid e of
Palestine deviated from orthodox Judaism , as it was influenced by su rrounding non-
Jew ish cultures, hence, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between Jew s and non-Jew s
outside Palestine in the early Christian era (see also Solin 1980:304, f n .ll) . B alisz m e n ­
tions the example of a Latin inscription from the district ofC am panie, Italy, that begins
with a cross and ends with a Hebrew phrase (1947:7-8), but Frey believes the H eb rew
and Latin inscriptions were originally separate (1:1936. #88, appendix).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 15

the settlement there of Slavs. Jewish inscriptions in Hebrew and Judeo-

Aramaic dating from the early C hristian era have been found in Georgia
but we know of no Judeo-G reek materials from this area. 14 Alongside
Greek, indigenous languages were spoken in all parts of the Hellenic
diaspora, but, except for G eorgian, we have no evidence that the Jews
also adapted these languages (e.g. was there a Judeo-T hracian in the
Eastern Balkans?). In West European and N orth African Greek set-
dem ents there is evidence of Syrian and A rm enian communities as
well, 15 but it is unclear if these counted Jews in their ranks.
In all territories except Greece and Istanbul, Judeo-G reek dialects
were eventually replaced by new Jewish languages which owed their
genesis in part to a Judeo-G reek substratum acting upon the newly ac­
quired non-Jewish language. T he Jewish successor languages to Judeo-
Greek include many, if not all the Judeo-R om ance languages, Judeo-
Slavic and possibly Yiddish (in Bavaria), North African Judeo-A rabic
and Judeo-B erber, Judeo-T at and Judeo-C um an (i.e. K araite, K rym iak
and possibly Judeo-K hazar); presently we lack studies of the Judeo-
Greek components in most of these languages.16 A comparative study of
Grecisms and Judeo-G recism s in all Jewish languages and in the coter­
ritorial non-Jewish languages remains an urgent desideratum of
M editerranean linguistics. Since there are no Judeo-G reek texts from
Byzantium itself before the lO th -llth centuries,17 the systematic collec­
tion and analysis of Judeo-G recism s in Yiddish and Judezm o would be
of inestimable importance both for the study of colonial Greek dialec­
tology as well as for Judeo-Slavic. T he circumstances leading to the near­
ly complete extinction of Judeo-G reek outside the Greek lands have yet
to be elucidated. At present, we can posit the definitive switch from
Judeo-G reek to Judeo-L atin by the Rom an Jews in the 4th century,1* i.e.
some two centuries after the language was given up by non-Jews in
Rom e. Historians believe that Jews in 6th century southern France were
bilingual in Greek and Rom ance. 19 The use of Judeo-G reek in southern
Spain in the 6th century may have been connected with the brief Byzan­
tine presence in that country during the 6th and 7th centuries, but we
cannot determ ine how long dialects of Greek were used in Spain—either
by Christians or by Jews. As the language of tombstone inscriptions,

14 Moskovich and Ben-Oren 1982:20, quoting Babalikajvili 1971.

15 See Brehier 1903.
'• M . Weinreich 1973, passim; Bunis 1981:37; W exler 1985b. Not all Grecisms in
these languages need be from a Jewish dialer!.
17 Dalven 1971.
“ Von H arnack 2:1924:800, fn.2; Shari 1971:178. O n the southward migration of
Rom ance speakers to the Saloniki area in the 71h century, see Schramm 1981, passim.
'» Gross 1878:68; S. Katz 1937:62.
16 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Greek was gradually replaced by Hebrew in many locales, e.g. Italy, th e

Black Sea area, Egypt after the 6th century.20 T his renewed use o f th e
Hebrew language is believed to have been due in part to the m ig ratio n
of Jews from the Babylonian and Palestinian centers of learn in g to
Europe after the 8th century.21 In the non-Greek areas once d o m in ated
by the Byzantine Empire, e.g. the South Slavic lands, a Ju d eo -G reek
identity was apparently never fully submerged by the Sephardic m a jo ri­
ty, as can be seen from the presence of a “ G reek” synagogue in S ofia
up until the 1880s.22 T o judge from the epigraphic evidence, the J u d e o -
Greek population in the Crim ean Peninsula and the Southern U k ra in e
seems to have been dissolved by the 8th century; today there is a sm all
community of Tatar-speaking Jew s (Krym£aks) in the area but the age
of their settlement is unknown. The only-Greek-speaking com m unities
there today, which date from the late 18th century, are Christian (th eir
language is called Rum eka).25 In the Daghestan Autonomous Region in
the Caucasus, there is a small community of Tat-speaking Jews, whose
settlement may go back to the Sassanid period, between the 3rd and 7th
centuries A D ,24 and whose ancestral language may have been Ju d eo -
Greek. Today in Jewish communities, forms of Greek are used only
marginally in the Karaite community in Istanbul and by Jew s in scat­
tered parts of Greece itself.”
3.11 Byzantine cultural patterns am ong Jews and Judaizers in the
Slavic lands. M ax W einreich has called attention to parallels in the

« Leon 1960; Nadel 1960:69.

21 M. Weinreich 2:1973:31; Simonsohn 1974:831, 856-857. O n M . W einreich’s sug­
gestion that Babylonian pronunciation norms of Hebrew were imported to Germ any
before the 13th century, see discussion in section 3.331 below.
27 Baruh 1935:173. T he presence of numerous Greek family names among Bulgarian
Jews has often been noted, see e.g. koto, papo, politi, rvditi, etc., but the chronology of
these names requires clarification (see M izan 1929:1191; Baruh 1935:173; Mascona
1967). T he recent association of Balkan Sephardic Jews with Greek culture manifests
itself in the fact that in Austrian Trieste, Sephardic Jew s from Serbia and Dalm atia were
known in Italian as Greghi ‘Greeks’, to distinguish them from Ashkenazic Jews (Wolf
1961:280). In the 16th century, Greek-speaking Jews in Sofia objected to the epithet
“ G reek" applied to them by the Sephardic newcomers (see the Hebrew text cited by
Xananel and ESkenazi 1:1958:27-28, note I).
‫ ״‬The non-Jewish Greeks are found primarily in the Donec'k oblast' of the Ukrainian
SSR and in parts of the Caucasus, notably in Georgia. See Blau 1874; Horbai
1979-1980. On the language nam e, see also section 1. fn.2 above. The Vita Methodn
relates conversations between St. Cyril and Jews in Derbent on the Caspian Sea c.860
which St.Cyril recorded in Greek and which St. M ethodius translated into Slavic (Bosl
1964:15-16). Derbent Khazars are mentioned in Georgian sources from the 1170s (Ar-
tamonov 1962:445).
‫ ״‬See Lazard 1966-1968:77. According to Loewenthal, the Judeo-T ats settled in Azer-
bajd£an in the late 8th-early 9th century (1952:63).
‫ ״‬Details arc given in Dalven 1971:426.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 17

liturgy between the Jews in the Czech lands and Greek Jewish ritual,
noting that the ritual employed by the Jew s in the lands east of the Elbe
River has continued to differ in certain details from that employed by the
Ashkenazic Jew s settled west of the river up to the present century (see
also discussion of the Elbe River as a dividing line in section 6 below).26
W einreich has also claimed that the legend of the Golem ( < H e golem
‘shapeless m atter; boor’), a mythical, partly hum an creature said to be
made by magic by Rabbi Ja h u d a Lejb (Low) of Prague (c. 1525-1609),
may originate in Byzantine sources.27 A complication with ascribing the
story of the Prague Golem to Byzantium is that the Czech Jewish story a p ­
pears to date only from the second half of the 18th century. O n the other
hand, a fact which might substantiate a Byzantine origin is that a Golem
who serves his creators by carrying out tasks bestowed upon him is
known am ong the Italian Jew s in the 10th century.28 T he existence of a
sim ilar legend am ong a num ber of European peoples, both Jewish and
non-Jewish, highlights the need to study the diffusion of Byzantine
folklore to N orthern Europe within a com parative framework. A Golem
story is also associated with Rabbi Eliahu Baal Sem, who lived in Chetm,
Poland in the mid-16th century.29 Ettinger believes that the Psaltyr’ of
the Russian Judaizers of the 15-16th centuries shows similarities with the
Judeo-G reek (Rom aniote) version of the prayers.50 O f course, rite-
m aintenance is not necessarily indicative of language-m aintenance.
3.12 Judeo-G reek loans in European non-Jewish languages.
Languages in contact with Judeo-G reek can be expected to provide clues
to the reconstruction of Judeo-G reek. In the Slavic area, candidates for
study include (a) the six Jew ish languages which may have replaced
Judeo-G reek, i.e. Judeo-Slavic, Yiddish, Judezm o, and possibly Judeo-
T a t, K rym iak and K araite,51 and (b) non-Jewish languages such as the
Slavic languages, G erm an and languages spoken in the Caucasus. In the
first group, we may speak of a Judeo-G reek sub- and adstratum ; in the
second group, of a Judeo-G reek adstratum alone. T he Jew ish and non-
Jew ish target languages have very few Judeo-G recism s in common. The
Jew ish languages themselves differ widely in their Judeo-G reek corpus;
Judeo-Slavic offers few examples, while Yiddish is relatively rich in

M. Weinreich 1:1973:86-87; 3:71. See also Zunz 1919:72-73; Jakobson 1957:7-8.

‫ ״‬M. W einreich 1:1973:87; 3:73. See also S(arr 1939:73, 117.
“ Scholem 1971:755.
” Chajes 1934:454.
» Ettinger 1960:231, fn.16.
J1 For a discussion o f whether K araite should be defined as a “Jew ish” language, see
W exler 1983b. In theory, Judeo-K hazar might also have incorporated a Judeo-Greek
substratum , but almost no examples of this language survive (see Golden 1970; Golb and
Pritsak 1982).
18 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Judeo-G recism s.52 T he Judeo-G reek corpus of Judezm o, J u d e o -T a t,

Krym£ak and K araite has yet to be studied systematically.13 G erm a n
(especially the Bavarian dialect), may also have a m inor corpus of J u d e o -
Grecisms. T he num ber of Judeo-G reek terms in the Slavic languages is
very small; they are clustered mainly in the East and South Slavic
languages, but rarely have Jewish associations. Traditionally, students of
the Greek elements in the non-Jewish target languages have explored
such param eters as the chronology and geography of the contact (e.g .
Byzantine, M iddle, M odem Greek; Crim ea, N orthern Italy, G reece),
channels of diffusion and stylistic integration (e.g. direct versus indirect
borrowing through an intermediary such as Latin, Church Slavic;
literary vs. slang).14 Yet hardly any scholar has suggested contact with
Judeo-Greek as the source for Judeo-G recism s in any non-Jewish
language.” T hus, a num ber of Greek terms in Slavic, G erm an and in
diverse languages spoken in the Caucasus have traditionally been ascrib­
ed to Greek ecclesiastical influence; while not rejecting such a derivation,
I would like to propose that contact with a colloquial, specifically Judeo-
G reek, dialect might also be a likely source for some of the data, especial­
ly when the Greek terms have blatant Jew ish associations.
It is significant that Judeo-Grecism s attested in Bavarian G erm an
dialects and in Slavic rarely appear in Yiddish (see the possible excep­
tions o f ‘Yom K ippur’ in section 3.121 and ‘bird ’s m ilk’ in section 3.15
below). The lack of overlap in the corpus of Judeo-G recism s in Jewish
and non-Jewish languages could mean either that Yiddish spread to
Southeast G erm any after the local Judeo-G reek had been largely aban­
doned in favor of Judeo-W est Slavic, or that Yiddish speakers had little
contact with Judeo-G reek speakers and/or chose not to adopt Judeo-
Greek terms. U nfortunately, the sparse Judeo-Slavic glosses give little in­

” For discussion of Grecisms in Yiddish, see sections 3.13-3.163 below.

‫ ״‬The study of comparative "Judeo-C um an” linguistics, comprising Karaite,
Krym fak and possibly Khazar, is still in its infancy. Even the concept of a "Judeo-
C um an” linguistic grouping is not widely accepted (the term is found only in Sevortjan
1967:111). For a bibliography of Karaite linguistics, see Baskakov ft at. 1974. It is in­
teresting that the Khazar phrase in the Khazar Hebrew document from c.930 is written
in runic and not in Hebrew script. O n Judeo-T urkic, sec also sections 3.32-3.323 below.
14 See, for example, Vasmer 1909, 1912; Budziszewska 1969:305, 309; Bondaletov
1973:82; Wexler 1985b.
‫ ״‬Sec Dieterich 1931 in section 3.15 below. A unique suggestion that O ttom an Jews
were responsible for the diffusion of Judezm o terms from Greek to Russian is made by
Vasm er 1909:53, fn .l. O n the possibility of Greek being a carrier of Judezm o proverbs
to Bulgarian, see KanJev 1979:67. O n the spread of Christianity via the Jew s, see discus­
sion in section 3.122, fn. 80 below. O n Jewish missionaries, called Bnitaxt, living north
of the Cum an territory along (he Black and Caspian Seas during the 13th century, see
the remarks of the contemporary Italian traveler, Giovanni de Piano Carpini (Sevortjan
1967:101-102).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 19

dication of whether this language shared a Judeo-G reek corpus with

Slavic languages themselves. Grecisms which may have been introduced
to Yiddish through the interm ediary of (Judeo-)Slavic are discussed in
section 3.134 below.
3.121 JG k he megale hemera. The expression ‘the great day’ in Judeo-
Greek designated the fast day known in Hebrew as jom kippur.36 This
m eaning is also found in Lat dies magnus;37 the ultimate source of the
Greek and Latin expressions may be J Aram jomdi r a b b d T he expres­
sion ‘great day ’ for Yom K ippur may be the basis for ‘(the) long day’
found in three neighboring non-Jewish languages, e.g. (Jew-)Cz dlouhy
den (Bohemia, M oravia)39, G (Alsace, Bavaria) and O Bavarian Y der
lange Tag,*0 H g hosszunap (the expressions are known in both Jewish and
non-Jewish circles). In Balkan Judezm o, the expression is attested, but
for a different fast day, e.g. G kjud el dia grande ‘Ti$ca ba’av (a fast day
com m em orating the destruction of the two Tem ples, 586 BC and 70
AD); day for accomplishing an im portant event (e.g. m arriage)’. A
parallel expression in Christian languages denotes ‘Easter’, e.g. R
velikden'\ see also expressions of the type ‘great week’, Gk he megale heb-
domas, megalobdomadon, Se velika nedelja, Alb java e madhe, Lat septimana
rrutior, Sp semana mayor ‘Holy W eek’.‫ יי‬O n the possibility of a Jewish in­
fluence on Christian terminology, see discussion of Sardinian It kenafiura
in section 3.122 below. For other Slavic terms for ‘Yom K ippur1, see sec­
tions 5.124 and 5.144 below.
3.122 JG k paraskeve. Gk paraskeve ‘preparation (especially for w ar)’
am ong Jews assumed the m eaning of ‘Friday’, i.e. ‘day of preparation
for the Sabbath (before Passover and in general)’. T he semantic innova­
tion is based on the Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic tradition of designating
‘Friday’ as ‘eve of the Sabbath’, since the Jewish Sabbath begins on sun­
down of Friday and ends on sundown of Saturday, e.g. He ctn v Sabbat
( > Y erev sabes), JA ram certv ‘day of preparation, eve of the Sabbath,
holiday; evening’; cdruvtd5 ‘holiday; Friday’. T he earliest attestations of

“ For Latin and Greek examples spanning the early Christian era up to the 16th cen­
tury, see Blondheim 1925:LX I-LXIII. See also Starr 1939:67 (citing a Byzantine text
from the early 11th century) and Sharf 1971:180.
” M. Weinreich 1:1973:88.
11 Sharf 1971:180.
‫ *י‬M. Weinreich 3:1973:94; 4:263, citing a contem porary Czech Jewish inform ant.
*° Philipp 1969:28; M. Weinreich 3:1973:91-92. T he earliest Yiddish examples arc
found in M argaritha 1530, Bodenschatz (1756, part 2, 103) and Philoparcho (1768:501).
41 Sandfeld 1930:35-36. Related Greek expressions for 'H oly W eek’ are aiso attested
in Balkan languages, e.g. Gk he lynne (hebdomas) (literally 'the week of cheese’), Bg, Se
sima nedelja, Rum siptdmana branzei. The term is also found outside (he Balkans, e.g. R
symaja (nedelja) The concept is also found in Byzantine Christian terminology to refer to
the last Saturday in Lent (ibid. 180; see also Zunz 1919:9-10).
20 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

the Judeo-G reek m eaning are found in the writings of the Je w ish
historian Flavius Josephus (36-after 105 AD) and in the New T estam en t
( ! 9t-2nd cc AD: in the m eaning , Friday before the Sabbath of th e
Passover’);*2 the earliest use of the Judeo-G reek m eaning in Greek n o n -
Jewish sources dates from the 3rd century.4’ Aside from Ju d eo -G reek ,
the only Jewish language with the Judeo-G recism is the dialect of K araite
spoken in Lithuania, see e.g. Trakai K ar baraski , Friday’ and kUibaraski
‘T hursday’ ( < ktfi ‘small’), but it is not clear whether the term was tak en
from Judeo- or standard G reek.44 T he Judeo-G reek term occurs in a
great many non-Jewish languages with a num ber of meanings, only som e
of which are attested in Slavic.
Slavic use of JG k paraskeve‫׳‬. (a) the standard or colloquial term for ‘F ri­
day ’, e.g. ChSl paraskevgii, paraskevgija, paraskev’gt;45 see also R u m R o m
parastuji, PolRom parascievin, 46 Geo p ’arask’evi, InguS p'arask'ce, C e£en
p ’erisk'in, Udi p ’arask’i,*7 Go paraskaiwe,4“ O Bavarian G Pferintag;4,
(b) a masculine, feminine (originally of saints) or family nam e (all e x ­
amples are of a feminine nam e unless otherwise stated), e.g. R Paraskeve
I'njanica,i0 Praskov'ja,M Paraia (baptismal name), Paraiin fam ,12 U k
Paraskev(i)a, Paraska, Paranja (dim ),15 SeCr Paraskev(ij)a, Paracevija (1766),

‫ ״‬Josephus 93:X V I, 6,2. New Testam ent passages and docum entation are given in
T hum b 1901:166 and Schurer 1905:7. For Medieval Judeo-G reek attestation from O x-
rid, Macedonia, c.1360, s e e j. Perlcs 1893:574. Parasktii ‘Friday’ appears on C h ristian
tombstones from Vienna (441 AD) and C atania (Schurer 1905:8). In the Judeo-G reek
Septuagint translation of the Bible, dating from c.300 BC and compiled in A lexandria.
Egypt, the term for ‘Friday’ is rather prosabbaton (e.g. Psalms 93). See discussion of this
term below and in section 3.125, fn. 100.
*J Stender-Petersen 1927:434.
44 In contrast, the H alyi dialect of Karaite uses ajngktn, rjnrkin ,Friday’ and kuejnrk:n
‘T hu rsd ay ’. The K araite m anner of designating ‘T hursday’ is common to a n u m b er of
T urkic languages, see e.g. T at ktiealna kon. Note also Uk mizynnyj dfn' ‘Sabbath’ (literally
,small day’) (vs. Vtlyk den' ‘Easter’ < ‘great day'). See also section 3.121 above.
45 V asm er 1906:389; 1907:201, 212, 263; Jagic 1913:300, 315; Machek 1971. The
C hurch Slavic terms appear in many texts spanning several centuries and em anating
from various locales (see details in Kurz 1973, fascicle 25).
“ Miklosich 3:1873:17, 21, 25, 29; 8:1877:32. The term appears in m any other
dialects but apparently not in East Slavic Rom ani.
47 The Caucasian examples are discussed in Abaev 1:1958:238. For further examples
from Caucasian languages, see von Erckert 1895:153.
41 Feist 1909.
45 Bruppachcr 1948:36, fn .l; Kranzm aycr 1960:20, 29, 38-39.
s" Dal1863-1866 ‫־‬.
Sl Superanskaja and Gusev 1979:517, who also record colloquial Praskoveja and addi­
tional abbreviated forms. For a detailed discussion of the pronunciation patterns of this
and other Greek names in Russian, see Uspenskij 1969:22, 30.
‫ ״‬Unbegaun 1972:107.
‫ ״‬Andrusyshen and Krett 1957. For O ld (I5th-17th century) and contem porary
Belorussian names, see Lastowski 1924 and Biryla 1:1966:179; Uscinovii 1966:196 re­
spectively.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 21

Paraskiva, Skevija. 54 Bg Petka is derived from native ‘Friday (market day?)’

(now petok) and may be a loan translation of the Judeo-G reek term . For
non-Slavic examples, see also Rum Paraski(e)va, Meglanite Sfeta
Paraskiva,55 G k Paraskeve, Paraskevas m a.5* Among Greek Jew s, the term
never serves as an anthroponym ;
(c) ‘preparation’, e.g. SeCr paraskavija\ Fr parascevi (1572).57
Non-Slavic languages use JG k paraskeve in meanings unattested in
Slavic: (a) a Christian ecclesiastical or learned term for ‘Friday’, e.g. Sp
parasceve ‘Friday eve’ (1737), It parasceve ‘Holy, Good Friday’;5®
(b) ‘W ednesday’, e.g. K ab berazew, Ubyx berask'd;59
(c) ‘fast; m ourning’, e.g. Os (Iron) barysk'i, (Digor) barxsk'x.60
(d) ‘small holiday, celebration’, e.g. Adyge (Abadzex dial) btreskeii.6‘
Traditionally, the reflexes of Gk paraskeve in both Slavic and non-Slavic
languages have been regarded as an ecclesiastical borrowing. For exam-
pie, G erm anists unanimously attribute O Bavarian G Pferintag ‘Friday’
(now extinct),62 together with other extant Bavarian regionalisms, to the
C hristian terminology introduced into Southeast G erm any by the Gothic
A rians in the 5th century, see e.g. Ertag ‘T uesday’ < G k ‘day of the god
A res’, Pfinztag ‘T hursday’ < Gk ‘fifth day’ and stG Pfingsten ‘W hitsun­
tid e ’ pi t < Gk ‘fiftieth day’ (see also discussion of OGY p jn k w 'f ~ -s
in section 3.134 below).65 Abaev also derives the reflexes of JG k paraskeve
in the Caucasian languages from a Byzantine Christian source (1958). A
learned Christian borrowing for the Grecism in many languages is cer­
tainly m andatory, e.g. the m eaning ‘p reparation’ and the late
chronology of the Old French reflex rule out any Jewish source (Judeo-
French presumably disappeared from France after the expulsion of the
Jew s in the late 14th century). In cases where the term means ‘Friday’,

‫ ״‬Skok 2:1972:607.
“ Romance examples are from Bruppacher 1948:166, fn. 1.
5‘ See Pape and Benseler 1911:1132. The feminine name is also encountered occa­
sionally in Italy and southern Gaul (Alfoldy 1969:260).
” See M aretif 1924 for Serbo-Croatian and von W artburg 7:1955 for French.
** For Spanish, see Corom inas 1973; for Italian, see Battisti and Alessio 1950-1957.
‫ ״‬Abaev 1:1958:238. For further examples from Caucasian languages, see von Er-
ckert 1895:153; from Caucasian and Turkic languages, see Samojlovif 1925:66. T he shift
from ‘Friday’ to ‘W ednesday’ is presumably a non-Jewish innovation.
*° Ibid. Abaev suggests that fasting took place on Fridays.
‘ ‫ י‬Von Erckert 1895:153.
Dated as early as the 8th century by Bruppacher 1948:36, fn. 1.
** The Goths in Byzantium became Arian Christians in the middle 4th century. See
also the discussion in Frings 1950:157, 160fT, 191; K ranzm ayer 1960: 20, 29 , 38-39;
Wasserzieher 1963:48; Sperber and von Polenz 1968:35-36. It would be useful to deter­
m ine whether the use of the term in Bavarian G erm an predated the 9th-10th centuries,
the assumed term inal date of Byzantine Jewish settlement in the area. G ranbech regards
C um an fabdl kun (13th c) as a “ C hristian” term (1942:230).
22 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

a Christian ecclesiastical source is also feasible; after all, the G re ek s

themselves use paraskeve to denote ‘Friday’. Nonetheless, there are five
reasons which make a Judeo-G reek etymon attractive for a n u m b e r of
target languages:
(a) The Church Slavic variants with g, g point to a colloquial ra th e r
than literary Greek source; 6■ 1 see e.g. Mod C retan Gk p a ra sc e v g S ItG k
paraievgwi, paraiegvi, Mod Cypriote Gk paralsejk’i.is See also R Proskov'ja
(alongside Paraskeva) fa with the replacement of Gk para- by SI pro-.6*
M oreover, it is hard to see how a form like O Bavarian G Pferintag could
be derived from Go paraskaiwe merely through textual transm ission. 67
(b) In some non-Slavic languages, the term is associated with a Jew ish
terminology, e.g. It parasceve also means ‘(Jewish) Friday’; see also O F r
jour de paraceuve ‘eve of the Jewish Sabbath’ (1310), C at parasceve ‘p rep a ra­
tion for the Jewish Passover’.6*
(c) We often find Jew ish patterns of discourse in a num ber of non-
Jewish languages as designations for holidays and days of the week. C o n ­
sider the designation of ‘S aturday’ or ‘Friday’ by terms for ‘holiday’ or
‘preparation’ in Russian slang and Bavarian G erm an, e.g. Orel R (sad-
dlem akers’ slg) piterik ‘holiday’ (<[?)pjal' ‘five’; see Bg petok above), E.
Franconian, S Austrian G Feierabend ‘S aturday’ ( ~ stG ‘eve o f a holiday,
evening of rest, time for leaving off work’),69 G secret language
(Schopfloch) joum roof' Friday’, pi. joum roffin ‘holidays’ ( < H e jom vac
‘sixth day’);70 Augsburg G Grecht-Tag ‘Saturday’,71 G Rusttag ‘F rid ay ’
(L uther’s translation of JG k prosabbaton in the New Testam ent 1534)

64 This poini was made by V asm er 1906:389; 1907:212. 263.

w Ex am pits from Southern Iialy are from Bruppacher 1948:166, fn. 1; from contem ­
porary Greek dialects, from Newton 1972:57. Greek forms with •/£-, •sktvge are also
found in the pre-W orld W ar I Anatolian dialects (Dawkins 1916:632). Newton regards
g epenthesis between ‫ ס‬and 1 as characteristic of Peloponnesian-Ionian and Northern
Greek dialects {ibid. 58).
•* Stender-Petersen and Jordal 1957:183. Shevelov notes that in Greek words
borrowed by Common Slavic before the middle 9th century, Greek a is rendered as o in
Slavic (e.g. MGk saiands *Satan* > OChSl sotona), but in later loans as a (e.g. R saUtnd)
(1965:384-385).
67 H. and R. Kahane suggest that the basis for the Old Bavarian form is a truncated
*pare•, acc pcrnn• (1970:366).
** See von W artburg 7:1955 for French; Alcovcr Sureda 8:1957 for Catalan. These
meanings suggest that coterritorial Judeo-French and Judeo-C atalan may also have used
these terms, but confirmation is lacking.
69 Avedisian 1963:262-263 (for G erm an); Kotkov 1949:252 (for Russian). Alternative*
ly, piUrik may be connected with pit' ‘to drink’.
70 Philipp 1969:42. See also Du *\%jom woof' Friday’ (van Bolhuis n.d.: 71; Moormann
1932:264). Alternatively, G roof, roffin may be a corruption of He tov *good’, as in Y jomief
— jonUf *holiday' (see also section 3.341 below).
71 Schmellcr 2:1877:31; J . Perles 1893:574.
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 23

(literally ‘day of preparation’); SvkRom parait’ovin denotes both ‘Friday’

and ‘holiday’.72 See also Adyge bereskeii above. In a num ber of
languages, following Jewish custom (see discussion above), ‘Friday’ and
‘Saturday’ are denoted by a common root, e.g. JG k prosabbaton ‘Friday’:
sabbaton ‘S aturday’ (see fn. 42 above and section 3.125, fn. 100 below),
G o fruma sabbato ‘Friday’: sabbato ‘Saturday’,75 CzRom parait’ovin ‘S atur­
d a y ’: parait’ovin jekto ‘Friday’ (literally ‘first S aturday')74; T u cuma ‘Fri*
d ay ’: cumartesi ‘S aturday’ (literally ‘Friday’ + ‘the following day'). See
also K ar (ki£i)baraski above.75 G Sonnabend ‘Sunday’, literally ‘sun’ +
‘evening’, may have originally denoted ‘evening before Sunday’.76 JL at
cena pura ‘Friday’ ( < ‘day of the pure meal on Passover, i.e. consisting
o f no yeast’) is found in Latin texts from the 2nd century AD and is still
the norm in almost all the dialects of Italian spoken in Sardinia, e.g. Sar­
dinian It kena^ura;’’7 also H e roi haianah ‘New Y ear’ (literally ‘head of the
y ea r’), which usually falls in September, is retained as Sardinian It
kaputanni ‘Septem ber’ (literally ‘head of the year’), presumably borrowed
from Jewish speakers.78
(d) T he non-Jewish linguistic territory in which we find reflexes of
J G k paraskeve ‘F riday’ coincides perfectly with the areas believed to have
been settled by Judeo-G reek speakers.79

,‫ נ‬Von Sowa 1887:12-13. See also Miklosich 3:1873:17, 25.

7* Noldeke 1901:162; S chiirtr 1905; Skok 1925:18; Bruppacher 1948:6, 57.
Miklosich 3:1873:21. See also ibid. 25.
74 Sec also Em poljpuhapaew ‘Saturday’ (literally ‘half Sunday’) cited by Kranzm ayer
1929:87. See also Schwyzer 1935:7, fn .l.
7‘ Frings 1966:31.
” T he term appears in the writings of Irenaus of Lyon, quoted, along with other early
sources, by Bruppacher 1948:29. For discussion of Sardinian Italian, see ibid; M . L.
W agner 1920:619; Blondheim 1925:LIX-LX; Bonfante 1949. Another Judeo-L atin terra
preserved in Sardinian Italian is purile, punlondzu 'unleavened bread’ (see M. L. W agner
2:1962:328). Korting notes that Lat cma denoted 'holy meal’ in ecclesiastical terminology
(1923, #2067). O n the strong impact of Jewish nomenclature on names of the week
am ong pagan speakers, see Schurer 1905:40.
’■ Bonfante 1949. T he loan translation of He ro! haianah is also found in G kjud kapo
d/ anjo (see W exler I982a:80), but this may be due to the influence of It capo <f anno ‘ 1st
Ja n u a ry ’. O n the pre-18th century Russian tradition of starting the year in September,
following Jewish practice, see Bonfante 1949:174, fn. 11. Note also Uk mariyk, an addi­
tional m onth in leap years, thought to be patterned on He ‫־‬,adar Sent (literally ‘second
A d ar’), which corresponds to parts of M arch and April (Moszyriski 2:1929:169).
” O f course, a close territorial overlap between Greek Jewish settlement and the non-
Jew ish languages borrowing paraskeve by itself would be insufficient evidence for a Judeo-
Greek impact. For example, GY kactj ‘butcher’ is found in many G erm an dialects—
though not always in areas populated historically by a significant Jewish population
(details in Althaus 1965). Similarly, Bg (S Rhodopian dial) papel'aika ~ pe- 'paper; book;
cigar; cigarette paper' < Ju d papel 'p ap e r' (Kandev 1979) is used in an area with
historically little Jewish population.
24 JE W IS H L IN G U IS T IC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

(e) A significant Judeo-G reek component can be identified in c o te r­

ritorial Jewish languages, e.g. Judeo-R om ance and Yiddish (see sectio n
3.13 below).
These facts, and the known role of the Jew s in spreading C h ristian ity
in Europe, make it plausible to posit a direct Judeo-G reek, as well a s an
indirect Judeo-G reek source via ecclesiastical or standard G reek for
paraskeve-rei\exes in Slavic and other European languages.40 O n th e b o r ­
rowing of H e Sabbat ‘Sabbath, S aturday’, see sections 3.125 an d 7.54
below.
3.123 JG k phylakteria. In Greek, phylakterion, pi phylakteria originally
m eant ‘guarded post, fort; safeguard; am ulet’. In the New T estam e n t,
the plurale tantum denoted the ‘prayer straps worn by male Jew s d u rin g
certain prayers’ (M atthew 23:5). In the Jewish meaning, the te rm has
spread to a num ber of Slavic and non-Slavic languages in E u ro p e, e.g.
U k filakterija,>x R-ChSl filaktirija,*1 M Lat phylaterium, late Lat phylacterium,
Eng phylactery, Fr phylactere. The term could have entered U k ra in ia n in­
itially through C hurch Slavic translations of the Old and New T estam e n !
(in the former case, via a Judeo-U krainian caique language?) o r th ro u g h
contact with spoken Judeo-G reek, but the absence of the term in collo­
quial Russian can only point to a learned loan in Russian C h u rc h Slavic.
See also discussion of Po dial zydoskie pacierze in section 5 .1 1 5 ; Uk
bohomillja, Jew-ESI bogomoliem in section 5.1511; ChSl zborbkb in section
5.1512, fn.136; O Po brama in section 5.25 below.
3.124. Gk rhetor, Gk rhetor ‘o rator’ appears in T aJm udic Ju d e o -
A ramaic as lajtor (Pjtwr), lefor ‘lawyer, advocate’. T he G re cism is not
known to me from any European Jewish language but its a p p e a ra n c e in
O R litoreja ‘secret w riting’ (late 15-early 16th c, secret la n g u a g e )®5 sug­
gests that it might have been known84 to Slavic-speaking J e w s . S ee also
O R ritor of similar m eaning and period.
3.125 JG k sambata. T he standard Slavic languages have re c e iv e d He
Sabbat ‘Sabbath, S aturday’ through two distinct paths o f d iffu sio n : the
East and South Slavic languages have u, a o r ; in the first s y lla b le , while
the West Slavic languages and Slovenian have 0, e.g. U k, B r, O R subota,
M odR subbota, Bg sibota, SeC r subota, M ac sabota vs. C z, P o , S v n , S o , Svk

•* On the role of Hellenized Jew s in spreading Christianity am ong p a g a n s , sec Thiel•

ing 1 9 !l:l3 ff, 67; von R auch 1956:41, 43, 59; Goodenough 1 9 5 6 -1 9 5 7 ; Baron
1957:208-209, 212. 221, 330, fn. 44; S ana 1959; Dvomik 1970:52, 261. S e e a ls o section
3.12, fn. 35 above.
*' £elexivs’kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886; Vasmer 1909:213.
‫ ״‬V asm er 3:1958:208 lists only the non-Jewish meanings ‘ta lism a n , a m u l e t ’.
‫ ״‬See Barxudarov rt al , 1975IT and Arxipov 1982b:15. Dal' derives t h e t e r m from the
Latinism Ultra 'letter' (1863-1866).
M See Kazakova and L u r’e 1955:265.
 JE W IS H L IN C U IST IC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 25

sobota.85 T he prevailing interpretation of the u 3 0 a isogloss is that forms

with 0 are derived from Lat sabbatum, while the other forms developed
from 0 which in turn is derived from a sequence of oral vowel and m in
Greek and possibly Balkan Latin, e.g. M Gk *sambaBon or Balkan Lat
*sambata.86 Reconstructed forms with mb are supported by the facts of
South Slavic as well as non-Slavic languages, e.g. Rum sambata, H g szom-
bat,87 Fr samedi (Old French dialects have m i),88 SEM ac srmbuta (only in
two vUlages northeast of Saloniki), SW (K ostur-K oria dials) srmba,89 Udi

•* Sec also ChSl sobota. — sobota. Cz-Svk sobota is recorded for Yiddish al three points
by the LCAAJ, It 229006, but this is probably a recent borrowing.
“ Sec the etymology proposed by Kiparskv 1934:130-133; Vasm er 3:1958:37. A
possible Greek example with -mb- is M G k Sambatas 'K iev' (Constantine Porphyrogenitus,
10th c), which Golb and Pritsak derive from the expression ‘Saturday (m arket)' (1982:53
and fn.41); see also Arxipov 1982b:2728‫־‬. D um ovo derives the m from an underlying
Com m on Slavic nasalized vowel in the morpheme ‘S aturday’ (1927:207); for further
discussion, see Il’inskij 1928; L jaiienko 1930. For a Khazar etymology of the word, see
Brutzkus 1922:51-52; 1944; for a Prakrit etymology, see Loziriski 1963; for Adyge (!),
see Caplenko 1970:135, 137-140. Sambatas is irrelevant if the reading of mb is /mo/ (see
discussion in Golden 1980:166). Schwyzer points out that while the Septuagint transia-
tion of the Bible uses $ for final and initial t (e.g. He tamir f a > 8 ), in Gk sabbata the
reflex is I A fricative pronunciation of He toe in postvocalic position is typical of a
num ber of Jewish languages and Hebrew reading traditions, e.g. Ashkenazic He Sabos,
Y lobes. O n the other hand. A rm labat* with aspirated t suggests a fricative pronuncia­
tion in Hebrew {ibid. 11-12). This argum ent is not so conclusive, since C hurch Slavic has
multiple reflexes, e.g. He natan ‘N athan’ > ChSl Natan» — Na9an*. Bruppacher pro­
vides a m ap of bb ~ mb reflexes in European languages (1948:178). For the geography
of terms for ‘S aturday’ in G erm an, see Frings 1950:160, m ap # 17 (including Romance
languages); Avedisian 1963:256; Konig 1981:186-188. M asson discusses the possibility
of deriving Gk sambykt ‘small triangular harp; instrum ent of siege' (first attested in the
writings of Aristotle, 5th c BC) from JA ram labbika‫ — ‘־‬i- (found in Daniel 3:5, 7)
(1967:91-93). T he Greek term is also found in O R samviJn, Lat sambuca, O H G sambukf.
A Semitic origin for the musical term is in doubt, since the Biblical Judeo-Aram aic
passage contains a num ber of Greek instrum ent terms. See also Bruppacher 1948:179.
*’ A H ungarian Greek text from Veszprfm dated before 1002 contains the form som-
bttou (Stanislav 1948:4), but it is unclear if this is the H ungarian word used in the Greek
text o r a Greek dialectal variant. A Rom ance form of the word appears in Hg Stabadka
m C r Subotua tp (literally ‘Saturday [m arket)’). O n the possibility of direct Greek bor­
rowings by H ungarian, see the discussion of Hg punkdsd *Pentecost’ in section 3.134
below. O n the presence of Iranian art forms in 9th century H ungary and the Danube
basin, see Gieysztor 1970:181 and Schramm 1981:80ff respectively. For a discussion of
A ustria as part of the southeast European territory in the early Christian era, see
Schram m 1981:26. T he study of the Byzantine impact on H ungarian would be of im por­
tance to Judeo-G reek and Judeo-Slavic linguistics (see M oraviik 1931; Kniezsa
1964:203-205). It is interesting that H ungary adopted the W estern rather than Eastern
form of Christianity, though Byzantine influence lasted there longer than in M oravia
(Bosl 1970:51; Seibt 1970:95). Note also that Slovenian, a South Slavic language, joins
West Slavic languages is not having a nasalized vowel in the first syllable of sobota.
*• Von W artburg 11:1964:2.
*’ It is significant that Macedonian forms with m are found now only on the southern
periphery of the M acedonian speech territory—in Albania, Greece and Bulgaria
(Vidoeski 1983:130, 132). See also Budziszewska 1974.
26 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Samat,90 SG Samstag, Bohemian, U pper Saxon G siml.9' Greek influence

could conceivably have reached French and neighboring G erm an lands
either through the Greek settlements in the Rhone and/or D an u b e
valley.93 We also find dissimilation of H e bb > mb in contem porary
Judeo-G reek and Greek dialects spoken in peripheral areas of the G re ek ­
speaking territory, see e.g. JG k sambaOa,9J SItGk samba (Otranto)** and
T u ju d samba(d).9i While there is no conclusive proof that the dissim ila­
tion began in Judeo-G reek,9®it seems clear that it m ust have b eg u n in
Jewish circles. Dissimilation of bb> mb can only be explained as a n a t­
tempt by speakers of a language without medial geminated consonants
to preserve a trace of Hebrew gemination in their merged H ebrew p ro ­
nunciation norms. Dissimilation is typical of Judeo-G reek dialects
spoken in the Eastern Empire from about 200 BC up to 200 AD, to ju d g e
from anthroponym s derived from H e sabbat, borne by Jews, Ju d a ize rs
and non-Jews alike.97 Dissimilation of geminated consonants also

*° Abaev 3:1979:5-6. In other contemporary language! of the Caucasus, we find

reflexes without m, e.g. Geo Sabati, Kab Jabot, Os sabat, K arafaj Sabit-kun (literally ‘Sarur-
day d ay ’—Prohle 1909:135), Arm Sabat*. For additional examples from C aucasian
languages, sec von Erckert 1895:154. See also Schwyzer 1935:12 and fn.2. A baev
believes the Ossete form could have come from Georgian or from Byzantine G reek ,
which is plausible in view of the lack of m (see discussion below). Samojlovif has d o u b ts
about a K hazar origin for Sabat in T urkic languages of the Volga, Caucasus and C rim e a
(1925:66), but Borovkov rejects this theory altogether (1932:42-43). T he abscnce o f m in
this word in New Testam ent Judeo-Greek is puzzling.
” This form is cited by Jungandreas (1928:81)—who derives it from Sonnabtnd th ro u g h
loss of -a-.
n Only Schwyzer raises the possibility of a direct Greek impact through the G reek and
Greek-speaking Syrian Christian population in Koln, M etz and T rier (1935:5, 8, fn. 1)
T he suggestion of an Asian Greek or “ O riental” source for mb was made by Feist 1909
and Stender-Petersen 1927:435. The most recent discussion is provided by Pfisicr
1980:78-84. See also Frings 1966:30-31, 33, 39, 56, fn. 1 and map #3.
” Roberts 1939; H. and R. Kahane 1970:366. Another Hebraism in Ju d eo -G reek
with dissimilation of bb to mb is He rabbi ‘R abbi’ (literally ‘my teacher’) which a p p e a rs
as rembi in a 13th century G reek text (possibly from T rabzon) (Davreux 1935:110). For
further examples of this form, see Starr 1939:66; Sharf 1971:178-179.
’* Bruppacher 1948:177, fn.3; V asm er 3:1958:37; H. and R. Kahane 1967:428:
Pfister 1980:80.
*' Dissimilation of He bb occurs in one other Hebrew loan in Bulgarian Ju d e z m o .
spoken on the periphery of the original Judeo-G reek territory, e.g. Bgjud m txn(m)pn
‘egotist, cunning individual’ < H e mjxapper ‘one who atones’.
96 H . and R. K ahane suggest a Syriac origin for mb (1967:433), but I am u n ab le to
confirm such a form in Syriac.
” T a m 1938:423; Tcherikover 1963:196-198, 200; W exler 198lc: 1)1, note 4 ; 130,
note 2. O n the contem porary Armenian Sambats sect, see G rinberg 1954:260-262; F rie d ­
m an 1959:1486. O n the use of such names by non-Jews, see Zgusta 1955:321-323, 332.
Cohen regards Sabtaj as originally a non-Jewish name (1969, chapter B; 1976:111).
Etymologically unexpected mb clusters in Slavic and Greek may also be independent of
Hebrew pronunciation norm s, e.g. ChSl Ambakumi < G k Ambakoum — Abb- < H e
haucqquq ma.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 27

characterizes the pronunciation of Hebrew and Arabic in non-Greek

Jew ish communities in Asia, e.g. in Judeo-C hinese (examples date from
the late 15th century) and to some extent in K araite, e.g. H e tfillih
‘prayer’ > T ra k a i Kar lefirvbla (m, - 5) vs. Haly£ K ar Ufilla, tefile, iyftlja,
C rim ean, T rakai K ar tifila\ Crim ean K ar Sambai ‘sexton’, landur ‘oven’
vs. T rakai, Haly£ K ar SamaS, tanur < H e Sammas, Idnnur—but see Sabbat
in all dialects.98 I know of no examples of dissimilated gemination in
European Jewish languages other than (classical-Byzantine) Judeo-G reek
and (marginally) Hellenized Balkan Judezm o. Today, the only Jewish
communities which still retain geminated consonants as such in their
reading norms of Hebrew are the Arabic-, Aramaic- and some Judeo-
Italian-speaking Jew s—all of whom have consonant gemination in their
native languages.99 Asian (and African?) Jew s apparently transm itted
dissimilated gemination in Hebrew loans to a num ber of Christian and
M uslim groups in Asia and Africa; this would account for forms like Pers
Sanbe [mb] ‘Saturday; (arch) week’ (as in caharSanbt ‘W ednesday’, literally
‘four’ + ‘week’) ,100 Amharic Sanbat, G e’ez Sanbat; fiuv Stmal-kon (with
the word ‘day’) ,101 Semat, Sumat ‘S aturday’.102
Like the case of JG k paraskeve noted above, the area of mb reflexes in
European languages also falls largely within the territory where Judeo-
G reek was spoken, e.g. East and South Slavic, Southern G erm an
(Samstagvs. NG Sonnabend: see fn. 86 above), H ungarian and Rum anian.
In Greek and Latin texts, mb seems to be typical of colloquial and Jewish
usage, while bb is typical of ecclesiastical and literary norm s.lflJ The
Slavic reflexes are assigned a feminine gender, which corresponds to the
gender assignment in Judeo-G reek, Judeo-L atin and Judeo-A ram aic. 104
3.126 JG k sxole. See sections 5.141-5.1411 below.

*• For Judeo-C hinese, see W exler 1985a. Consonant gemination in Arabic can also be
replaced by dissimilation (involving a nasal consonant) in the Arabic pronunciation
norm s of the Chinese Muslims (Wexler 1976:60-65). Dissimilation in native Karaite
vocabulary (Trakai dialect; others?) seems to aflect primarily 11 and j j (see Kowalski
1929:XXXI1; A ltbauer 1977[ 1957-1959]: 19. 21-22, 33; Moskovich an d T u k an 1980:94).
T h e dissimilation of 11 >nl is also found in the Turkic vocabulary of the Belorussian
T atars (see Woronowicz 1935:362 and fn. I; Kryczynski 1938:197, 220, 233).
” M orag 1971:1134-1135.
100 Pers lanbt is also found in T atar Belorussian but apparently only in the meaning
o f ‘Saturday, Jewish Sabbath' (Akiner 1973:82). See also Lat uxbbalum ‘S aturday’ vs. saA-
bata ‘week’, Gk proti sabbatou ‘Sunday’ (literally ‘on the first day of the week’); Galician
Po slg szabas ‘week’ (Ivano-Frankivs’k, formerly Stanistaw6w) ( < ? Y lab/s ‘Saturday’)
(Ludwikowski and Walczak 1922).
141 Paasonen 1950:156 (with the m orpheme *day’).
101 Moskovich and T ukan 1980:85.
Bruppacher 1948:179, fn. 2, 180, fn. 3.
IM See Skok 1925:18; Roberts 1939, but see Bruppacher 1948:58, 180. See also R
scveata in section 7.321, fn. 127 below.
28 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

3.127 JG k synagoge. T he Judeo-G reek term is a loan translation o f He

bet hakntstt, JA ram be(t) kniJla‫‘ נ‬synagogue’ (literally ‘house of the gather-
m g’). However, in Judeo-G reek, the term usually denoted ‘Jew ish co m ­
m unity’; it assumed the m eaning o f ‘synagogue’ only marginally, as e.g.
in the Theodotus inscription from Jerusalem thought to date from the
late 1st century A D , 105 and in N orth African Judeo-G reek. In o th e r
Jew ish languages, the Greek term is used in the m eaning ‘synagogue’ o n ­
ly in Judeo-Iberian (except C atalan) and North African Ju d e o -A rab ic. 106
Among Christians, the original m eaning of ‘Jewish com m unity’ is a t­
tested as late as the 7th century (see e.g. Spanish L atin);107 the m ean in g
‘synagogue’ became the norm in the non-Jewish languages of E u ro p e ,
including the Slavic languages (e.g. R sinagoga, Po synagoga)—
independently of Jewish practice. O ther term s for ‘synagogue’ are
discussed in sections 5.141-5.1412, 5.151-5.1512 below.
3.13 Judeo-G reek loans in European Jewish languages. Ju d eo -G reek
elements are found in all the Jewish successor languages of Ju d e o -
G reek—but nowhere more abundantly than in Judeo-R om ance an d Y id­
dish. These Grecisms have been diffused to European Jewish languages
in several ways. Taking Yiddish as an example we must delineate four
distinct channels of diffusion: Greek words and patterns of discourse
entered Palestinian Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic and passed th ro u g h (a)
vernacular Judeo-R om ance or (b) Judeo-Slavic to Yiddish; (c) en tered
Yiddish through direct contact with Greek speakers; (d) were borrow ed
from written Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic at all times in the h isto ry of
Yiddish. T o the best of my knowledge, no one has proposed the possibili­
ty of channels (b) or (c). Yet the Italian Jew s who are believed to have
setded in Bavaria in the 9th-10th centuries might also have been fluent
in Greek as well—since large parts of Italy had been under Byzantine
control through the 8th century. In actual practice, it is extrem ely dif­
ficult to distinguish Judeo-G recism s in Yiddish which might have en tered
that language directly from Greek from Judeo-G recism s that en tered
through Judeo-Slavic, since the phonological correspondences rarely p er­
mit an unam biguous interpretation. M oreover, m any of the G recism s in
Yiddish not found in Palestinian Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic or Ju d eo -
Rom ance languages have surface cognates in a num ber of Slavic
languages. O u r ability to identify direct Judeo-G reek loans m ight im ­
prove as our knowledge of Yiddish historical lexicology and the dialect
geography of Yiddish Grecisms improves.108

1<‫ ״‬Wexler 1 9 8 1 c :lll.

106 Ibid. 113 (citing Blumenkranz 1963:116).
10, Ibid. 113-115. O n 15th century Judeo-ltalian, see ibid. 114.
10* T he on-going publication of the Great Dictionary of the Yiddish L anguage (>er
Jofe and M ark 1961ff) should do much to further research in this area.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 29

Even Yiddish Grecisms that have surface cognates in Palestinian

H eb rew , Judeo-A ram aic or G erm an might still be regarded as direct bor­
row ings from Judeo-G reek or indirect borrowings through Judeo-Slavic.
I t would not do to decide such cases solely on the basis of surface phonetic
sim ilarity, since Jewish languages are notorious for their “ re-
lexification” , i.e. replacement of components by (surface) cognates taken
from newly coterritorial languages (see discussion of H e ‫נ‬avtr in section
3.134 and of Yiddish Slavicisms in section 6.32 below).109 O ne indication
o f a direct Judeo-G reek source for a Grecism in a successor Jewish
language might be attestation in a restricted geographical area. For ex­
am ple, am ong the Judeo-Iberian languages, (J)Gk dnaO'e’ma *curse’
seems to be found only in Judeo-C atalan and Judeo-Aragonese, e.g. alad-
ma, alalma ‘excommunication’;110 the term is not attested in such a form
in the cognate non-Jewish languages (see e.g. Sp anatema ‘anathem a,
curse, excommunication’ < Lat anathema). If a common Judeo-L atin
source is ruled out, we might opt for a direct Judeo-G reek source, say
in C ataluna or Valencia, where Judeo-G reek was known to have been in
use. T he term is not found in Judezm o, which is largely based on Iberian
Rom ance dialects not in contact with Judeo-G reek. But it is extremely
difficult to prove this assumption. After all, the near total lack of a com­
m on Hellenic corpus in European Jewish languages could simply be due
to the fragmentary survival of Grecisms or to incomplete study o f the sur­
viving texts. A key to identifying the channel of transmission of a
Grecism to Yiddish is the geography of the Grecism within Yiddish. For
example, Greek elements which entered Yiddish from Judeo-French are
typically encountered only in W estern Yiddish dialects, and often have
cognates in non-contiguous Judeo-R om ance languages, e.g. Judezm o,
Judeo-Italian, etc. Greek elements which entered Yiddish through
Judeo-Slavic are typical of all or primarily Eastern Yiddish dialects, but
enjoy marginal or no circulation in Judeo-French. In sections
3.131-3.134 immediately following, I wiU examine in detail only those
Yiddish Grecisms which are presumed to have come directly from Greek

104 For example, in Eastern Yiddish, alongside kest ‘chestnut tree’ (also found in early
G erm an Yiddish), we find the Slavicized surface cognate kailn ‘horse chestnut' < Po
kasztan■, native Y vinUn ‘to wish’ now coexists (in Eastern Yiddish dialects) with the
Slavicized surface cognate vintitven ‘congratulate, wish’ < Po winscowac < G wunschtn.
For further examples, see W exler 1982b and discussion in section 6.3 below.
110 Ekblom 1942-1943; Malkiel 1946. O n a Judeo-Greek presence in Southern Spain,
see the discussion of Elche, Alicante in section 3.1 above. A num ber of Judeo-Grecism s
also appear in North African Jewish languages, e.g. Algerian JA r Inuga ,synagogue‘ (first
attested in 13th century Iberian Arabic; see discussion in Wexler 198lc: 114-115);
N African JA r fafamon *nuptial bed' (Chetrit 1980:136; see also section 3.131 below). Such
elements are generally ascribed to a Judeo-R om ance adstratum , but a Judeo-Greek
substratum should also be explored.
30 J E W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

or indirectly through a Judeo-Slavic interm ediary; Grecisms received by

Yiddish through diffusion from Judeo-R om ance, Hebrew or Ju d e o -
Aramaic and non-Jewish languages are illustrated below briefly.
3.131 Yiddish Judeo-Grecisms received through Judeo-R om ance: O
Swiss Y fwlm‫ג‬, Ju d talamo. O Swiss Y twlmV + tolmt ‘bridal chair,
canopy’ (1290), DuY uftolmen ‘to place on a bier’,111 Balkan Ju d talamo
‘bridal canopy; seats of honor for the bride and her consorts; p ray er
shawl held over the head of the bride and bridegroom during the wedding
cerem ony’ are ultimately derived from Gk Oalamos ‘inner room, w o m an ’s
apartm ent; bedroom (especially of the lady of the house, of an u n m a r­
ried son); bridal chamber; store room (for valuables);’ see also SItG k
Qoloma ‘vault’. 111 The Grecism is also found in Judeo-French texts from
the 11th to the 14th centuries.113 The m eaning ‘chair’ seems to be unique
to the Jewish languages. T he surface cognates, Sp talamo, It talamo, Cat
talem, O C at talam are learned words m eaning ‘nuptial bed; thalam us’. It
remains to be determined whether Iberian Judezm o had the Ju d eo -
Grecism; if not, it might be possible to regard Balkan Ju d talamo as a loan
from coterritorial (Judeo-)Greek and not as a substrata! element in­
herited through Judeo-Latin. T he communality of corpus and m eaning
in Yiddish and Judezm o supports the hypothesis of a Judeo-R om ance
origin for the Yiddish Grecism. O n JA r talamon, see section 3.13, fn 110
above.
3.132 Yiddish Judeo-Grecism s diffused through Hebrew or Judeo-
Aramaic: Y apelropts — apitropos, Ju d apatropos ~ apo-; Y sandek, J u d san-
dak. Y apetropes — apitropos and Ju d apatropos — apo- ‘tutor, guard ian ’,
because of their form and meaning, have to be derived from synonymous
H e ‫נ‬apitropos — ‫*־‬apo- and not from the the original etymon, Gk ipitropos
‘steward, trustee, adm inistrator’; the term is unknown in G erm an and
in Iberian Romance. Y sandek, Ju d sandak ‘(Jewish) man holding the
baby while it is being circumcised’ on formed grounds could be derived
from the written Hebrew Grecism sandaq ‘ib’; see also J Aram sindik(n)os
< Gk syndikos ‘defender of a com munity; public advocate; one who helps
in a court ofj’ustice; (M od) m agistrate’.114 V ariants of this Aramaism are
H e sndjqru (Regensburg, 14th c), sndjqnjs (Ben MoSt, Bohemia, 13th c).

m For a comprehensive discussion of the term , see M. Weinreich 2:1973:50, 54; 4:70.
For Swiss Yiddish detestation from 1290, see Tim m 1977:29; the Dutch Yiddish term is
taken from Becm 1967:137. GcaJia finds the term in a m anuscript which he dates before
1200 (1980:55).
117 H. and R. Kahane 1967:428.
m References to the texts are given by Levy 1964:216. See tolmt ‘marriage* (in the
transliteration given by Banitt 1981:441), and discussion in Blondheim 1927:41.
114 See also Byzantine Gk synteknos *godfather‘ (J. Perles 1893:573).
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 31

sndqnjs (E. ben Jahuda, W orms, early 13th c ).“ s The surface cognates in
Rom ance and Germanic languages differ in form and meaning, e.g. Lat
syndicus (known since the 4th century AD) ‘m agistrate; accountant’ >
O lt sindico, It sindaco, Swiss G sindik, O C at sindic, O F r syndic.'16 In spite
o f a Palestinian attestation, Y sandek may have been received through
contact with a Judeo-G reek speech com munity. According to Beranek
(1965, map #98), the term is now restricted within G erm any, to N orth­
eastern G erm an Yiddish; if this distribution also characterized earlier
periods, then the Hebraism might have been part of the specific Hebrew
corpus of Judeo-Slavic. However, DuY sandek (Beem 1967) reduces the
likelihood of a Judeo-Slavic interm ediary, unless it could be shown to
have diffused from Eastern G erm an Yiddish (see also discussion of Dutch
Yiddish Slavicisms in section 6.2 below).
3.133 Diffusion of Grecisms to Yiddish from non-Jewish languages:
WY mini(. G , Swiss Y mini(, DuY minnesch ‘food that is neither dairy nor
m eat’ < M H G munich ‘castrated horse’ < Gk monaxos ‘m onk’. “ 7
3.134 Yiddish Judeo-G recism s borrowed directly or through a Judeo-
Slavic intermediary: Y katoves(nik), etc.; kile; pjnkw*§~ -s; O Y , JW SI
dwkws, He ifu'kas, etc.; JW SI gwn 3 ;‫(נ‬w)qdwn, etc.; Y, Ju d , K ar aver;
G H e tjpjt, J u d tapet(e)\ Y, J F r trop; J u d samba(d); Jew -C z dlouhy den\ K ar
baraski; Y sandek, J u d sandak. T here are a few Grecisms in the Judeo-W est
Slavic glosses, and still a larger num ber in Yiddish, which are not found
in Palestinian Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic or Judeo-R om ance. Grecisms
in Yiddish which cannot be ascribed to the Judeo-R om ance substratum
o f the language or to textual diffusion from the Greek component of w rit­
ten Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic can only be ascribed to direct contact
with Judeo-G reek or Judeo-Slavic, which itself had acquired a Judeo-
Greek component. I must treat Yiddish Grecisms allegedly taken from
Greek directly and indirectly through Judeo-Slavic together since I am
unable to distinguish the two cases.
Jofe derived EY katoves ‘je st’, katovesdik ‘facetious’, kalovesnik,
katavasnik, kalavusnik ‘prankster’ from R katavasija ‘church chant during
m atins’ (with surface cognates in Belorussian and U krainian) < Gk
katavasion ‘church hym n’ (without, however, addressing himself to the

1‫ ״‬J . Perles 1884:56-57.

114 H. and R. Kahane 1970:362-363. See also Korting 1923.
117 Beranek 1965, m ap § 79; Beem: 1967:79; M. Weinreich 1:1973:207. In Swiss Yid­
dish, (he term also means 'gelding' (Guggenheim -G runberg 1976:42), a m eaning which
is attested in G erm an between the 15th and 17th centuries (KJuge 1960). O n Swiss Y
munx/ + munt( ‘theater’ (1290), see Tim m 1977:26, 30. The LCAAJ, #130140 records
mini( as far east as Jutrosin and Kaliningrad, and par(t)vt as far west as Prague and
Regensburg.
32 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS

change of ■ija > 0 ) . " ‫ ״‬The term has also assumed the m eaning
‘disorder, confusion, jum ble’ in the three East Slavic languages. 1‘9 Jofe
(1959) cited “ O R ” katavasnik in the m eaning of ‘prankster’ as th e pro­
totype for the Yiddish derivatives with -nik, but no sources are g iv e n ; in
contemporary Russian, the term means rather ‘person who causes confu‫־‬
sion’.1J0 The semantic and formal differences between Russian a n d Yid­
dish raise the possibility that the Grecism entered Yiddish and th e East
Slavic languages independently. An East Slavic origin for Y katoits
becomes even more unlikely, when we note that the term a p p e a rs in
Eastern G erm an Yiddish as early as the mid-15th century, e.g . EGY
(H e) klvwt/ + ketoves (Iserlin 1440),1JI DuY ketowes ‘joking, silliness'
(Beem 1967); the earliest Russian attestation of katavasija is from 1419
(Barxudarov el al. 1975ff). M oreover, Iserlin’s spelling, following
H ebrew etymological norms, shows that this writer did not re g a rd the
term as a Slavicism. In fact, the coterritorial West Slavic languages lack
the Grecism. In the writings of Iserlin’s student, Josef b ar M ole, th e term
also appears with a Hebrew spelling, e.g. EGY (H e) ktfwt (1470); w riters
throughout the 15th and 16th centuries continued to assume th e word
was from Hebrew. A Yiddish phonetic spelling (required for all non-
H ebrew components in the language) is not encountered until th e 19th
century (see LifSic 1881; Ben-Jakov 1904). It would appear fro m its
presence in East G erm an and Dutch Yiddish that the Grecism might
have entered Yiddish from Judeo-G reek directly or indirectly via Judeo-
Slavic in the Sorbian-G erm an or Czech lands. T he classification as a
H ebrew component might have been facilitated by the fact that th e term
was unknown in the coterritorial West Slavic languages. In East Slavic
lands, the similarity between the Slavic and Yiddish surface cognates
might have prom pted the reclassification of the word as a Slavicism and
the switch to a phonetic orthography in the late 19th century (see also sec­
tion 3.13 and fn. 109 above).IJJ

"* Jofe 1959:78-79. Wolf cites the variant katewnik ‘joker’ (1962). Further v a ria n ts art
given by Prilucki 1926-1933 and Lifschutz 1952:51 and fn. 35.
"* Veselovskij derives O R Kalavasbiny, •sbevy fam (Novgorod 1544) from katacan/6
(1974:136).
IJ0 D al’ 1863-1866. T he fact that the Grecism is a Christian ecclesiastical te rm in the
East Slavic languages would not in itself mitigate against a direct East Slavic so u rce for
the Yiddish Grecism. After all, Slavicisms with Christian meanings are attested in Yid­
dish. For example, Y proven ‘observe, celebrate, carry on (e.g. Passover Seder)’ finds *
parallel in O Po prawie mszt ‘conduct m ass’ (Doroszewski 1958-1969), Uk pracyty ‘sav
repeatedly, persist; celebrate (mass, church service)’. See also " W R " (Br?) iid o cstj
krestcy and Y gejn a/ vikup discussed in section 5.1215 and fn. 55 below.
1J1 Jofe 1927:129; see also citations in Prilucki 1926-1933:292-297, 438. Iserlin was
bom in Regensburg in 1390 and died in W iener-Neustadt in 1460.
Prilucki also rejected ESI katavasija as the etymon on the grounds th a t the
penultim ate stress in Yiddish was not expected, tentatively suggesting instead one of the
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS 33

EY kile ‘rupture, hem ia’ could be of Slavic origin (see Cz kyla, Po kila,
Uk kyla) but a direct borrowing from Greek is not to be ruled out, since
the surface cognate exists in Greek, see e.g. Byzantine Gk kile, M odGk
koile[kili] ‘abdom en’, which has spread to A lbanian, North Italian and
Swiss G erm an dialects, e.g. Alb kuli, O V enetian It chilla (14th c),
Friulian It chile. 123
O Bavarian Y pjnkw’! — -si + pinko! — -s (o r/ - —as in East M iddle
G erm an dialects?) ‘(Christian) Pentecost’ is ultimately derived form Gk
[he] pentekosti fhimeraj ‘[the] 50th [day after Easter]’. T he term is known
to us from a Hebrew text composed by Iserlin.154 W e do not encounter
the Grecism in this form in Rom ance or Slavic languages (it is also
unknown in Hebrew), see e.g. Fr pentecote, R ‫־‬ChSl pjatikostii. Native
Slavic terms for this holiday include Po zielone swiqtki, Uk zeleni svjata
(literally ‘green holidays’), Uk trijeja ( < ‘three’), USo swjatki, LSo switki
(literally ‘holidays’), R pjatidesjatnica, Po pitcdziesiainica (literally ‘50th
d ay’); see also R troicyn den' ( < ‘T rin ity ’), Cz svaty duch, svatodulni soatky
( < ‘Holy G host’) .125 C oterritorial High G erm an shares the Greek term
with Yiddish but in a different form, e.g. stG fjingslen. Forms resembling
O G Y + pinko! — -s are attested in O Saxon G pincoston and M LG pinkest
(1305) , 126 but these are not dialects coterritorial with Yiddish. T he
H ungarian form of the Grecism is punkosd [ 5 ‫־‬d]. Three explanations for
O G Y + pinkoI — -s come to mind:
(a) T he Low G erm an form might also have been used in M iddle High

following Hebrew root!: k-t-p 'w rite', g-d-f'abute, revile’, q-f-c ‘destruction, plague', q-t-f
‘pluck’, k-f-v, k-d-vf + He -^(ab stract suffix)( 1926-1933:293-297). T his medley of Hebrew
etym a is altogether unconvincing. For further discussion, see G runbaum 1882:491 (who
rejects Gk kitlavos ‘game of Sicilian origin’ as the etymon but recommends k-l-0 or h-f-v)\
J . Perles 1884:177; M . Fraenkel 1948-1949; 1958. Kagan 1919 translates R kataoasija
‘church song’ by “ H e” qafovdsija* IkaioDasial.
l‫ ״‬H. and R . Kahane 1970:374; 1972:445. The Italian form is also discussed in Bat-
tisti and Alessio 1950-1957 and M aver 1958:202. Areas of N orthern Italy were under
Byzantine rule for large parts of the M iddle Ages (e.g. Ravenna was lost to Byzantine
control only in 751).
M. W einreich glosses the Yiddish term as ‘Christian sum m er holiday’ (1924b:300,
fn. 25). T he use of the double apostrophe in Medieval Hebrew was usually intended to
denote a foreign term or an acronym , or to express the w riter’s uncertainty over the
etymology.
1,5 O ther Yiddish terms include (H e) l v \l q — s-/ + Soanki — 1 ‫( ־‬Pinkos pozna, Krak6w
1595, cited by H arkavi 1899:22-23) — O Po Swiqtki(M odPo Zieloru swiqtki)‫׳‬, ModEY grin-
xogt, literally ‘green Christian holiday’, calqued on Polish and Ukrainian. T he Slavic
languages do not always agree on the m eaning of the root ‘holy’, see e.g. O R svjatok (12th
c), R Sejatki ‘Christm as time; period from Christm as to Epiphany’.
IM Feist 1909; Lexer 1872-1878; Kluge 1960. Gothic has paintekuste (Kluge 1960).
O th er Yiddish texts have a cognate closer to the High Germ an form, e.g. pjngffn
* PfinV in u* *he Dvkus horanl (1382), which E. Katz believes reflects a Central “ G erm an”
dialect of a century earlier (see lines 470 and 484) (1963). O n the differential accretion
o f ■t in M iddle High G erm an (but not in Yiddish), see S. A. Bim baum 1979:56.
34 J E W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

G erm an.117 T his might give us grounds for expanding the isogloss of
“ Middle Low G erm an” pinkest further to the south than is presently
postulated.128
(b) There may have been a m inor Low G erm an element in early G er­
man Yiddish. 129
(c) T he O ld Yiddish term should be derived from Judeo-G reek either
directly or through a Judeo-Slavic interm ediary. T here are several facts
in favor of the last hypothesis. First, the double apostrophe w ould not
have been used with native Germ anic words. Second, other C hristian
holiday terms in Iserlin’s text are designated by terms which were used
in Greek, though not necessarily of Greek origin, e.g. (H e) qln"<U + kalend
‘New Y ear’ < Lat calandae, k- ‘first day of the m onth’ could be from the
Judeo-R om ance substratum of Yiddish (see O F r challandes ‘C h ristm as',
etc.),150 but equally well from Greek (see early Byzantine Gk kalandai,
kale- ‘first day of the m onth’ < Latin), or from Judeo-Slavic (see LSo
koloda [arch] ‘New Y ear’s gift’, O C z kalendy ‘first day of the m onth’, O P 0
koltda ‘gift for the clergy at Christm as tim e’, M odPo 'ib; C hristm as
carol’) .131 Only njfl — ModY nitl ‘Christm as’ is unam biguously o f L atin
origin, see Lat (dies) natalis ‘(day of) C hrist’s birth ’. T he two term s are
unknown in G erm an, except for Prussian G Kalende ‘gift of fruits, etc.
presented in the fall to the pastor and the organist’ ( < Polish? ) .1‫ ״‬A
Judeo-French source for OGY pjnkw“I — -s seems unlikely on form al
grounds; moreover, Judeo-French influence in Iserlin’s Yiddish as well
as in the contemporary Yiddish dialects spoken east of the Elbe R iv e r is
relatively slight (on the geography of Judeo-R om ance elem ents in
W estern Yiddish, see discussion in section 6 below). Finally, th ere are
also a num ber of Slavicisms in Iserlin’s writings. Hg punkosd m ight also
have been diffused from Greek via Middle H igh G erm an or I ta lia n .1‫״‬
For the present-day area of Pfingstm and the border between Low and H igh G e r­
m an around 1500, see Frings 1950, maps # # 13 and 45 respectively. T he latter m ap
locates U pper Germ an in Bavaria, spreading as far northwards as Eisenach.
1.1 Were the Yiddish term from High G erm an, we should expect Y ‘fttk w " ! ■— s (see
stG Pferd — Y jrrd ‘horse').
1‫ ״‬Note that Kracauer regarded the surnam e Voss — Foss among 14th century
Frankfurt Jew s as of Low G erm an origin (1911:456, 610; see also C uno 1975:10). See
also discussion of G H e tjp)t below and JW SI merq in section 4 .1142 below, and W exler
1982b:381.
130 Von W artburg 1928-1968. In Judeo-Italian, q was used to denote i (see B anin
1949:70-71), following Italian practice; this practice is also attested in medieval Ju d e o -
French (Levy 1964). See also section 3.3112, fn. 353 below.
1.1 For Sorbian, sec Muckc 1911-1928; for Old Polish, see Nitsch and U rbaA cryk
1953IT; for Old Czech, see Machek 1971.
J . L. K. and W. Grim m 1854-1971.
m See Benk£ el al. 1967-1984, as well as the discussion of Hg szombal in section 3.125
and fn. 87 above. Svn binkolti is also regarded as a loan from Middle High G erm an
(Bezlaj 1976IT).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS 35

O Y , JW SI dwkws/ + dukus, EY dukes ‘duke’ < Byzantine Gk doukas,

which is a Hellenized form of Lat dux ‘leader’.154 Outside of Byzantine
G reek, the term is apparently found—among colloquial languages—only
in five Jewish languages, e.g. in Yiddish (earliest attestation is in the
Dukus horant, a G erm an Yiddish poem from 1382),135 on Polish coins
m inted by Jew s which have Hebrew and Polish inscriptions in Hebrew
characters (1242-1257),136 and in Balkan Judezm o as a family nam e.157
Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic have d'u’kas, dukus, etc. ‘duke; head officer
in the Rom an provinces’,1” dux (with final velar fricative; see also Bg-
C hSl duxb — duksi: Codex Suprasliensis, 11th c). A variant with ■as is
also found in Syriac.139 M ax Weinreich assumed that OGY dwkws (he
was unaware of the earlier Judeo-W est Slavic attestation and ignored the
H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic data), and fwlm‫‘ נ‬bridal canopy’ (also found
in the Dukus horant) were Grecisms passed on to Yiddish through its
Judeo-R om ance substratum . 140 But the absence of dwkws (unlike
tw lm ‫—נ‬see discussion in section 3.131 above) in Judeo-R om ance
languages and the Greek ending point either to a direct Judeo-G reek bor­
rowing by Yiddish or Judeo-Slavic speakers, or to an indirect borrowing
through their common written Hebrew adstratum .
JW S IgwnV + guna ‘coarse material, clothing’ (?) appears in a Hebrew
text from N orthern France dating from the first quarter of the 12th cen-
tu ry .141 In modern Czech, the term appears with n \ e.g. houni ‘hairy
m aterial' (see also Po gunia ‘coat of hairy m aterial’). In Old Czech or­
thography, n’ is frequently not distinguished from n. 142 In a Judeo West
Slavic gloss of the mid-13th century written by ben Azriel, Cz potemnlla
‘became d ark ’ is spelt potemneP (with vocalization), where the spelling e
(i.e. with the letter jod after ne) might reflect palatalization of the

154 Sec H. and R. Kahane 1970:401.

154 See M. Weinreich 1960. Plezia 1953(T does not record (he term in Polish Latin
docum ents. The Grecism continues as EY dukes ‘duke; powerful noble with a large
estate', dukst (Harkavy 1928; M . Weinreich 1960:111; Kutscher 1982:138) — G slg
duckeste (with JA ram -la3 f agent < GY?) (von Grolman 1822) ‘duchess’.
1,4 See discussion of the Polish coins with references in section 4.2 below.
1,7 See Balkan Ju d dwqV + dukas fam (c. 1530). (Em manuel 1:1963:73). T he name
is also known in Ashkenazic communities.
Found in the Mtdrai ’aba (imol), first published in Istanbul at the beginning of the
16th century. Most scholars believe the text was composed in Northern Palestine between
the late 8th century and 1000, but some have proposed the 6th century 21s well. Harkavy
1928 cites the Grecism in a Hebrew orthographic garb, e.g. dukes ‘duke’, duksah
‘duchess’.
1,9 See Krauss 2:1899:188-189, who cites a form with -as in Classical Arm enian, but
only du&s is attested in that language, derived by Azaryan from Byzantine Gk douks
(1971:688).
140 M . Weinreich 1960:111.
1,1 K ara (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:109, 113-114).
1‫ ״‬Gebauer 1:1963:368-369.
36 J E W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

preceding consonant.1” Reflexes with n ~ n’ are recorded in a n u m b e r

of non-contiguous Slavic languages, e.g. Bg guna — gunja ‘p e a sa n t’s
overgarm ent’144 and R guna — gunja ‘dissheveled clothing’.1‫ ״‬T h e
Bulgarian and Judeo-W est Slavic reflexes with n may point to a G reek
etymon, say M Gk gouna ‘fur, skin’, while the other Slavic surface
cognates may be derived from a different dialect of Greek (and p erh ap s
also borrowed at a different time), if not from another Indo-E uropean
language altogether (e.g. V asm er regards the Slavic terms, including
Bulgarian, as Iranian loans).146
T he 11th century N orthern French Jewish scholar Rashi (b. T ro y es
1040—d. 1105; active in W orms, c. 1055-1065) glosses JA ram maikilta‫נ‬
‘basin, tub, dish’ (Babylonian T alm ud, Avoda zara 51b, Baba nuci’a 84b)
by a term which, in some manuscripts, is described as a “ Slavicism ” .
T he alleged Slavicism appears in a variety of spellings in the extant
manuscripts and printed sources: *wqrj(n)/ + okrin (“ O rien tal” m s 1190;
G erm an mss 13th-15th cc; Italian ms 14th c?),147 \unqrjnl + onkrin
(Italian mss 14th-15th cc?; Soncino edition, Italy c. 1489), qwnqrjt
+ konkri (Venice 1521), 1wqwrjnl + okonn (Provencal ms?, 13th-early L4th
c: here the gloss is defined as “ G erm an” ), huqdwn/ + okdon (Soncino edi­
tion, Italy c. 1489). K upfer and Lewicki (1956:90) refer to the variant
’qdwnl + ak(a)don — e— 1‫( ־‬our readings), which is cited only in th e later
printed versions of the Babylonian Talm ud (e.g., 1886, 1897). T h e tex­
tual source of this variant is unknown to me. T he first variant cited.
+ okrin, has been identified by a num ber of scholars as O C z ok fin 148 T he
apparent ease of this solution, together with the statistical preponderance
of variants with + -n- nevertheless should not propel us to reject the
m inority variants with + -do- as scribal errors (H e r and d a n d y a n d w
are easily confused due to their formal similarities). M oreover, the

l‫ ״‬Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:182, 188. See also ScdinovA 1981:81, 87. T he technique
of m arking the palatalization of n and I by means of one or two jods after (and sometime*
by a single jod before) the consonant is typical of late 16th century Ju d e o -Italian (see
Banitt 1949:69-70). O n the relative stability ofJudeo-W est Slavic orthography com pared
to contemporary Czech, see Jakobson and Halle 1964:165 and $edinov& 1981:80
'** Gunja is the favored variant. See also SeCr gunj 'type of overgarm ent'.
1,5 Filin el at. 7:1972:231, 235-236. Gunja is far more widespread and ap p aren tly thr
older variant (see Barxudarov el at. 1975(T).
'•* Vasmer 1:1953:153. Georgiev el ai 1:1971 accept V asm er's view that the etvroon
is Old Iranian.
The dated “ O riental” manuscript defines the gloss as “ G erm an” , while o n e of the
G erm an m anuscripts also calls it "G erm an ” (bui this was erased by the term “ F re n c h ")
Jo n a Frankel believes that the epithet "S lavic" must have been added by a later scribe,
since Rashi was ignorant of any European language other than French. T h e details oi
the textual variants are given by Darm estcter and Blondheim 1929:103.
“ ■ See Harkavi 1867:47; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:94, fn. 2; Jak o b so n a n d Halle
1964:159.
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS 37

earliest attestation of okHn in Old Czech sources dates from the late 14th
century and appears to have the m eaning ‘plate; round shallow dish,
especially for serving food’.1” while Rashi explicitly defines the gloss as
a ‘long vessel for w ater’. It is possible that the printed versions of R ashi’s
com m entary are based on older m anuscripts which have since been lost,
and that the reading of the gloss + okrin was introduced by later scribes
fam iliar with Czech. Kupfer and Lewicki propose an analysis only for the
variant 3qdwn, ignoring even huqdwn. They sought to define ‫נ‬qdwn as a
cognate of CS1 *kadb—both of which they derived from M Gk kadion,
dim inutive of CIGk kados ‘ju g ’. 1’0 However, the ending -wn and the pro-
thetic vowel preclude the possibility that \w)qdwn could be a continua­
tion of the Com m on Slavic G recism .1M Nevertheless, it seems to me that
there are four reasons for regarding both variants with + -do- as
authentic:
(a) Gk kadion > Palestinian H e, JA ram *akadon ( > Judeo-G reek?) >
Judeo-W est Slavic. The reading + akadon is based on the following facts.
G reek loans both with an initial consonant cluster and a single consonant
often appear with prothetic , in Palestinian Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic,
e.g. Gk kleidi ‘key’ > JA ram ?aqlidaJ; Gk stadion ‘stadium ’ > He
‫נ‬ictddton; Gk persika ‘peach’ > JA ram ‫נ‬a/arsqin, H e ’a/arseq. A common
treatm ent of Gk -ion in Palestinian Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic is -wn/
+ -on, e.g. Gk kamarion ‘vault, arch’ > JA ram qtmaron, He qimron. 1SJ
(b) However, since 3qdwn itself is not found in Palestinian Hebrew or
Judeo-A ram aic sources, it is possible that the prothesis was added in this

149 The first Czech attestation is in the Evengaliaf VieUnsky (see H avrinek 10:1978). In
contem porary dialects, the term denotes a *(wooden) dish for kneading dough* (Machek
1971). T he term is common to m any Slavic languages, but has acquired a prothetic 0 ■
only in Czech, Slovak (0Ann) and Lower Sorbian (hokSin)—the latter two in the meaning
*trough*.
150 Kupfer and Lewicki 1936:93. T he first to suggest such an etymology appears to be
Cassel l847:8fT. T he ultimate source of the Grecism is Semitic, see e.g. He kad ,pitcher'.
Frisk first defined it as a *, M editerranean” element (1:1960), but later regarded it as a
Phoenician loan (3:1972). For a detailed description of the Greek Semitism, see Masson
1967:42-44.
151 Note that Y trop does not retain the Greek ending (see below). In Slavic target
languages as well as in Greek, the endings are both retained and dropped, e.g. R uksus
*vinegar* < Gk ohos, vs. R monastyr' ‘m onastery’ < MGk monasteri(o)n, ModGk
monostin See also discussion in Stender* Petersen and Jordal 1957:179. In a num ber of
Jew ish languages, we also observe a replacement of Gk •os by -on (acc?), e.g. Crim ean
K ar xoron *dance’ (vs. Saloniki Ju d xoro *Greek round dance') < Gk xoros; sec also North
African JA r falamon *bridal seat* < Gk Balamos, cited in section 3.131, fn. 113 above. The
variation calls for study.
,2 ‫ ג‬O th er reflexes of Gk -ton include - i > and -jn / in/, e.g. Gk putakion *writing tablet’
> JA ram pifqd* — pifqi(o)n. These developments are discussed in Ros£n 1980:232-234,
but without any attem pt to define the factors which favor one form of integration over
another.
38 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

word at a later date by speakers of a non-Semitic target language. T h is

view is strengthened by the fact that prothesis is even found with o n e
native word in Judeo-W est Slavic, e.g. JW SI *sqrwvdV + askrovada ~ e-
— i- ‘pan ’ (early 13th c) — Cz skrauada — skrovada.lii P rothesis
makes no sense in Slavic, where skr- is gram m atical, but it could be
motivated in a Judeo-French context, assuming that the word reached
Rom ance speakers with an initial consonant cluster, say *kdon; o r ­
thographic kd- [gd-j is grammatical in West Slavic, e.g. Cz kde ‘w h ere’ .
T he Grecism could then have been subjected to the same rules o f p ro ­
thesis that changed Lat sc(h)ola ‘school’ into Fr ecole, Y stok (now) ‘stick ’
into O N F rH e C)$twq ‘wooden pole; block placed on a prisoner’s feet’
(1 1th c, also in a text w ritten by Rashi).154 Now our problem is to explain
why Gk kad- > JSI *kd-. Such a process is atypical of Greek itself, since
the pretonic vowels that may be lost in Greek dialects do not include a. 155
However, we could assume such a development on Slavic territory,
where any non-native short a was rendered as 0; o (in certain positions)
subsequently became 2>, a back jer. T he back jer, in the so-called weak
position, was ultimately lost, e.g. V Lat commaier ‘godm other’ > C hSl
kbmotra, Cz kmotra\ VLat comile(m) ‘com panion, attendant’ > O R kbmetb
‘w arrior’, Cz kmet ‘peasant’.116 T he loss of weak jers in Slavic is d ated ,
depending on the language in question, between the 10th and 12th cen ­
turies.
(c) Finally, the Judeo-W est Slavic term may not be from Greek at all,
but continue the Hebrew etymon of the Greek term , i.e. H e kad ‘ja r, p it­
cher’ with the H ebrew dim inutive suffix -on (see seftr ‘book’: sifron
‘booklet’). Then prothesis could have developed later in Judeo-F rench,
according to the hypothesis postulated in (b) above. A diminutive suffix
is also found with the (Greek) loan in M altese, e.g. katusa ‘pipe’, with -a
f dim (though there is no *katus\ see bieb ‘door of house’: bieba ‘door of
cupboard’). A problem with a direct Hebrew derivation is that the

Btn M o it (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:215, 231). See also SedinovA 1981:79 and
discussion in scction 4.1152 below.
I‫ ״‬Rashi (Tim m 1985:49, 56-57, 61, 63). Guggenheim -Griinbcrg believes the shwa
diacritic used in the speUing of native words in an Ashkenazic G erm an text (i.e. G erm an
written in Hebrew charactcrs) from Zurich 1385 was intended to dismantle consonant
clusters (1955:209-210, 212-213). Finding no precedent for such a phenomenon in Yid­
dish dialects, Guggenheim -Grunberg ascribed this orthographic practice to the influence
of Hebrew, where the shwa diacritic denotes both h / and the absence of a vowel after
a consonant grapheme.
1‫ ״‬Reduction of unstressed high vowels is attested in Crim ean Greek, e.g. stGk mikrot
‘small’ — Crim ean Gk mho (Arapov 1965:122). For a similar phenomenon in C appado-
cian and Northern Greek dialects, see Dawkins 1916:62, 64, 192-193. Note also the loss
of the initial vowel in JG k(H e) prigoras m a (discussed in section 3.161 below).
See discussion in Shevelov 1965:437-438.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 39

Table 1.
Judeo-W est slavic \w)qdwn and its surface cognates in Slavic, Romance,
H ungarian and Arabic

G reek meaning in target examples

languages
kadion (a) '(small) container JW SI \w)qdwn ‘container for w ater’
for liquids only’
kados (b) 4large container Cz kad* *large tub (especially for wine)'; SeCr
for liquids* kada, Hg kad *(bath-)tub’ m
** (<0 *large container R dial k a d \lit stR kadka *large wooden
for solids and vessel for storing agricultural products’;
liquids' O U k kadb *dry m easure' (1470)'”
(d) •< .1 .‫י‬ " Lat cadus ‘large vessel for water, oil;
dry measure'; M Fr cadus (16th c), Sicilian
It catu *vessel for storing wine‘1*0
(0 ‘water pipe, pail; Egyptian Ar qadus 4irrigation pail’; 161
pan; weU’ Moroccan Ar qddus *irrigation pipe; bucket’;16*
Sp aicaduz, ar• ‘tube, pipe' (13th c, with the
accreted Ar definite article W‫ ;)״‬OSp cadozo
‘pan; well* (1300);165 Sicilian It catusu
*water pipe,,M
‫'״‬ (0 ‘ja r ‫׳‬ Lebanese Ar qddtise, N Palestinian Ar qottusc
(arch) *small ja r (for milk, honey, etc.)’ 145

H ebrew spelling is with kaf lid rather than with qof Iql, but in Jewish
languages, Hebrew words no longer recognized as such are often spelled
phonetically rather than etymologically, i.e. in the Hebrew m anner (see
Y mekn ‘erase’ < He mafiaq ‘he erased’ spelled phonetically vs. Y ernes
‘tr u th ’ < He hm it, spelled 3mt and not *m^s /ernes/; see also discussion of
katoves above).
T h e prothesis that sometimes appears with Slavic toponyms in
medieval Arabic texts would seem to be an internal Arabic development,

» ’ Hungarian has the richest set of derivatives of all the target languages.
­‫ •י‬Filin eta! 12:1977:209, 303.
15’ HrynfySyn 197 7-1978 .
1*0 Von W artburg 1928-1968. The form and chronology eliminate the likelihood that
R ashi’s "Slavic” gloss is of Judeo-French origin. Lat cadus also appears in Old English
(see Frings 1966:90).
W ehr 1968.
«»* Tedjini 1923.
,‘‫ י‬Corom inas 1973.
144 For a description of the double variants of Gk kados in Italian dialects, see Pellegrini
1-2:1972:55, 257. 473.
'« Frayha 1973.
40 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

unconnected with our problem, e.g. Ar 3kr3kw! + akriko — «- (12th c)

~ F o Krakow. 166
W hatever the origin of prothesis and -wn, JW SI Yw)qdwn is certainly
unique in form am ong the target languages which have the G re e k
Semitism, e.g. the Romance languages, H ungarian and Arabic; in
meaning, Judeo-W est Slavic resembles West, East Slavic, M id d le
French. Table 1 above compares JW SI \w)qdwn with the surface
cognates in European languages and Arabic.
Gk her ‘air, m ist’ appears in Hebrew and in a num ber of Je w ish
languages in two distinct forms: He }avfr ‘air’ vs. Y aver ‘air (poetic); b a d
odor’, Balkan J u d aver ‘air, atmosphere; wind, weather; character, p e r ­
sonality’, K ar aver (Trakai), aver (H alyi) ‘air’. A common form suggests
that the three Jewish languages borrowed the term from spoken
(Judeo-)Greek; were the Grecism borrowed via Hebrew, we would h a v e
expected a reflex with r. Alternatively, a Hebrew link in the chain o f
transmission of Gk air to the Jewish languages could be m aintained if w e
assume that the lowering of 1 > e took place in the Jewish languages ( a n
unlikely coincidence in so many non-coterritorial languages), or th a t
Hebrew originally had *3aver. 167 T he geography of the two reflexes in a ll
Jewish languages should be carefully studied.
Tjpjt! + tipit ~ + tepet ‘rug placed before the T orah ark in th e
synagogue’ is found in a late 13th century G erm an Hebrew te x t.'“ It is
unclear whether the term was also used in G erm an Yiddish, though s u r ­
face cognates are found in G erm an dialects as well, e.g. O H G teppid —
-th, which are usually derived from It lappeto < Lat tapetum < Gk tapes,
or Byzantine Gk tapeton. 169 However, Old High G erm an variants with -d

1<6 The toponym is spelled with prothetic ‫ נ‬in al-Idrisi (12th century), alongside
variants without prothesis in some manuscripts (sec Lewicki 1945:137, note 234). T h e
vocalization was suggested by L"rbanczyk 1964b Prothesis tends to be the p refe rred
means of dismantling foreign consonant clusters in the written language. Al-Idrisi's u s e
of prothesis may imitate Judeo-Arabic practice, which tends to be less receptive to w ritte n
Arabic norms than Muslims (though ibn J a ‘qub (al-Bakrij spells the toponym w ith o u t
prothesis). O n the existence of a Jewish form of G Worms in al-ldrisi, see Lew icki
1945:65-66. O f course, neither prothesis nor epenthesis is required by Arabic phonotac-
lies, since ■kr■ is found in written Arabic (e.g. *ikram 'honoring, regard’), while both kr-
and -kr■ are grammatical in spoken dialects (e.g. Syrian Ar krumftj 'vineyards' — w ritte n
Arabic kurum).
O n Ju d i > r in this word, see Baruh 1935:178; Bunis 1980:69; for He ,yavir >
*at’ir, see Kutscher 1982:138. Another possibility would be to derive He ,anr fro m
Pelasgian (vs. a Greek origin for the Jewish languages). O n the importance of Jew ish
languages for the reconstruction of pre-Diaspora Hebrew lexicon, see W exler
1 98 1 c : i 0 ‫ נ‬nr.
IM Salfeld 1898:296. See also discussion of this term in a 14th century text by I. Perles
1884:15.
IM Kluge I960; H. and R. Kahane 1970:389. See also M H G Ttppich — Y ttptx.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS 41

and -th are found primarily in areas around the Lower Rhine River and
the N orth Sea—far from the homeland of G erm an Yiddish; to accept a
com m on source for the G erm an and Yiddish data would oblige us to
reconstruct a much more southerly isogloss for the Old High G erm an
term (as in the case of O G Y + pjnkw"! — s above). Hence, it is plausible
to regard either Talm udic Aram (tpifd‫ג‬, topifdn or colloquial Judeo-G reek
as the source of the Old G erm an Yiddish form . 170 Balkan J u d lapet may
be of similar origin (but not the variant tapete, which has an Iberian form;
see Sp tapete, attested in a Latin text from 1112) .171
Y trop denotes variously ‘stress, emphasis; musical accents used in can-
tillating the T o ra h ’. In his French etymological dictionary, von W art-
b u rg cited t(»)rwp‫נ‬, trwf! + trop(e) (R ashi’s Judeo-French glosses) as the
oldest reflex of Gk tropos ‘mode of music; style’ in French. 172 Yet, on
sem antic and chronological grounds both, the Judeo-French term prob­
ably was not derived from the French surface cognates, e.g. O F r tropier
‘book of hours’ (1305), M odFr trope *use of an expression in a figurative
sense’ (known since 1554); we find no trace in French of the specific
Judeo-F rench m eaning o f ‘musical accents’. In Italian, tropo does not ap­
p ear to have acquired its present m eaning ‘song, melody’ until the 17th
cen tu ry .175 Von W artburg also mentions FrL at tropus ‘(m anner of) sing­
in g ’ in the writings of V enantius Fortunatus (b. after 530—d. c. 600).
H ow ever, Fortunatus’ usage was probably not typical of French Latin
n orm s, since (a) the author was a native of Treviso, N orthern Italy—an
area in which Byzantine Greek influences were strong and (b) Lat tropus
in this m eaning is not found in any other source.174. However, the way
is still not clear for a Judeo-L atin etymology for J F r + trop(e). Curiously,
L adino translations of R ashi’s commentaries published in Spain in 1485
a n d in Saloniki in 1516 give frwnpV + tronpa and frwnpwl + tronpo respect-
ively. 175 T he Ladino forms, unusual because of the nasal, lack cognates
in Ibero-R om ance dialects; hence, these may have been artificial Ladino
creations. Since the term is apparently unknown in the Hellenized
H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic texts from Palestine, and a Judeo-L atin in­
term ediary is apparently to be ruled out, I would assume that Gk tropos

1.0 See the Judeo-Aram aic surface cognates given in Krauss 1898:269. O n the diflu-
sion of the Rom ance Grecism in European languages, see H. and R. Kahane 1970:389.
1.1 Corom inas 1973.
171 13:1967:2. T he term was discussed by Darmesteter and Blondheim 1929:143;
H eller 1936. See also ModGk tropari ‘verse (of a prayer)’, Byzantine Gk tropa7i(o)n
‘m etrical composition; song in the church services’ (Lam pe 1961).
m Battisti and Alessio 1950-1957.
174 O n the Hellenization of Northern Italy, see Berschin 1969:254; H. and R . Kahane
1972:445. For the textual citations of tropus, see Saalfeld 1884, col 1154.
1‫ ״‬See D arm esteter and Blondheim 1929:143; Heller 1936:126.
42 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

could have been borrowed directly by Yiddish or Judeo-Slavic from

Judeo-G reek in Eastern Germ any. While the vast majority of R om ance
components shared by Yiddish and Judeo-R om ance are of Ju d eo -
Rom ance origin, it is possible that Yiddish was the purveyor of this
Judeo-Grecism to Judeo-French. Note also the presence of num erous
Judeo-Slavic glosses in the Hebrew-language commentaries of Rashi and
other Northern French Jew s, some of which were probably diffused
through G erm an Yiddish (see also the discussion in section 4.1 below).
A semantically related Greek term in Yiddish is Y p u t ~ pajet ‘liturgical
poem, hym n’ ( < Gk poieton ‘made, invented’), but this Grecism was
already known in Palestinian Judeo-A ram aic.
(Jew-)Czech dlouhy den. See section 3.121 above.
K ar baraski. See section 3.122 above.
T u ju d samba(d). See section 3.125 above.
Y sandek. See section 3.132 above.
3.14 A possible Judeo-G reek H ebraism in Yiddish: H e tfillah ‘prayerbook’.
T h e innovative m eaning ‘prayerbook’ for H e tfillah ‘pray er’ appears in W estern
Yiddish in the 13th century (see details in section 6.44 below); cognates are
found in medieval Judeo-Provencal, Balkan Ju d ezm o and Ju d e o -Ita lia n .17‘ In
counterdistinction, early 14th century Judeo-F rench appears to have used He
mahzor in the m eaning o f ‘prayerbook’. 1” If Judeo-Italian, Judeo-Provencal and
Balkan Judezm o are alone am ong the Judeo-R om ance languages in using He
tfillah in the new m eaning, we m ay be entitled to regard the innovation as Judeo-
G reek in origin, since all three Judeo-R om ance languages were in contact with
G reek. See also the discussion of Judeo-G reek anthroponym s retained in
W estern Yiddish but translated in Polish and East Slavic Yiddish in section
3.161 below.

3.15 A possible Judeo-G reek pattern of discourse in Yiddish: J(?)G k

tou poulidu to gala — Y fojglm ilx. Greek elements have been noted in both
standard and substandard Slavic dialects, but Dieterich stands alone in
suggesting that a Greek idiom might have spread to non-Balkan Slavic
languages through the medium of Hellenized Jews. His example is Gk
tou poulidu to gala ‘unimaginable wealth, something fantastic, very rare’
(literally ‘bird’s mUk’ — Eng hen’s tooth, nightingale's tongue).171 Dieterich
believes the expression is the basis for loan translations in both Balkan
and non-Balkan languages, not all of which are coterritorial with Greek.

17‘ See Judeo-R om ance references in Wexler 1981b: 116; 1981c: 103; 1982a:86.
177 See ' , ...quem Judei gallici vocant Moazot [note the deletion of* in He mahzor] ... etJudei
proi'inciaUi vocant Typhilloth. " (statement by the French Dominican Bernard G ui,
1261-1331, cited by Douais 1886:291).
17* Dieterich 1931:337, fn. 3. Note also V aim er's theory that Judeo-T at was the car­
rier of Hellenisms to Russian (cited in section 3.31 below).
 J E W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 43

Languages which are coterritorial with Greek include Bg pttie mleko, Se

p tiije mleko, C r ptiiije mlijeko, T u ku4 1 utu\ here we need not presuppose a
specifically Judeo-G reek interm ediary, as we might with languages not
coterritorial with Greek, such as Y fojglm ilx, Cz plait mleko, Svk p la it
m leko ,179 Po ptasie mleko, Br pluiynae malako, Uk plalaiet ptalynel ptyce moloko
and R p t i i ’e moloko. T he expression is also attested in M editerranean
Arabic dialects, but not always with the Greek meaning, e.g. Egyptian
urban A r laban cujfur has the Greek m eaning, but Palestinian urban Ar
laban 1a fifir (literally ‘birds’ milk’) means ‘exaggeration’; Palestinian
Bedouin Arabic appears not to have the expression at all. M ax Weinreich
claim ed that the expression with the Greek m eaning existed in Silesian
G erm an, but gave no sources.180
However, D ieterich’s suggestion of a Judeo-G reek origin or carrier for
‘b ird ’s milk’ in Slavic languages and Yiddish—later reiterated by Max
W einreich—cannot be accepted without qualification. There are alter­
native derivations for the Yiddish and Slavic expression which neither
D ieterich nor W einreich discussed. For example, Yiddish might have re­
ceived the expression in the Czech lands—directly from a dialect of col­
onial (Judeo*) Greek or from Judeo-W est Slavic—or in the East Slavic
and Polish lands from any coterritorial Slavic language. Relevant to this
discussion is the fact that the Hellenized Balkan Slavic languages early
becam e separated from the East and West Slavic languages by two non-
Slavic languages, H ungarian and R um anian—in which the expression
(at least now) only designates ‘vanilla pudding’, e.g. H g madartej, Rum
lapte de pasare. ‘8' There are also Czech and Slovak speakers for whom the
expression denotes a food term , e.g. ‘topping on vanilla pudding’. The
intrusion of H ungarian and Rum anian into the Slavic zone of ‘bird’s
m ilk’ raises the possibility that while Slavic languages south of the
H ungarian-R um anian speech territory could have received the expres­
sion from Greek direcdy, languages to the north of H ungarian and
R um anian might have received the expression through diffusion. Alter­
natively, the Czech use of the Greek expression may be due to the Slavic
dialect spoken originally in H ungary before the 8th-9th centuries. U nfor­
tunately, I cannot say how old the culinary term is in either H ungarian
o r Rum anian, or whether these languages ever had the original Greek

A Slovak informant offered the gloss ‘cock-and-bull story'. For additional m ean­
ings in Czech and Slovak, see discussion below.
>“ M . Weinreich 1956:629; 3:1973:72; 4:261.
>a1 The H ungarian example also means *Star of Bethlehem; om ithogalum ’. This is
also the meaning of G Vogtlmilch ( - MilchsUm) (see R<*zak 1920, under VogelmiUh),
(hough a Frankfurt informant recalls the meaning of ‘food' in nursery stories. The Polish
term also denotes a *kind of candy' (communication from Teresa Alt), but we lack
geographical precision.
44 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

meaning. M oreover, there is some evidence that the use of the expression
in East Slavic languages is geographically restricted; for example, som e
Belorussian speakers (e.g. in the N jasvil area) claim not to have h eard
the expression at all.12‫ ״‬If the absence of the expression in at least som e
Belorussian dialects proves to be old, it would support the hypothesis of
different sources for South and East Slavic. Until the age of the ex p res­
sion can be determined for each language, it will be impossible to
evaluate the paths of diffusion of the idiom and the likelihood of a Jew ish
carrier. 185 It is significant that the expression is also attested in C h ristian
Neo-Aramaic, e.g. xulwidsippurta (U rm i dial, Iranian K urdistan) an d in
Pers Siri nwrg.'e* It remains a m atter of speculation w hether the ultim ate
source of the expression is Greek (which diffused both eastward a‫ ת‬d
westward), Aramaic, or Iranian (whence it diffused westward) .1,5
Future research should seek to uncover additional G reek phrases and
term s where a Jewish interm ediary might be postulated. T he possibility
that Hcllenized Jews and Greeks created a peripheral zone of Balkan
phraseological features in Central and Eastern Europe would be of great
interest to Balkan areal linguistics.186 Another example of Jewish-G reek
contact may be the transmission by Yiddish of the Hebrew term for
‘G reece’ to G erm an and U krainian slang, see Y jovn ‘Greece (as a Jew ish
subculture area < He jaoan ‘G reece’—vs. grixnland ‘G reece’); Russian
soldier’ (by association of the two O rthodox countries) > (?) G jonet
(1510), jauner (1722), Gaun«1687) ‫‘ )־‬player; professional swindler, th ie f
(a reference to the popular view that Greeks were clever card players?),
Gaxinasprache ‘thieves’ talk’. 187 Boroxov also derives G s\g jenisch ‘clever;
belonging to thieves’ from the same root, but Wolf prefers a Rom ani
etymology for this term .188 O n a Yiddish origin for Uk slg wan ‘Red A r­
my soldier, R ussian’ (World W ar II), see H orbaf 1963a:21. Y jovn ‘R u s­
sian soldier’ finds a parallel in T rakai K ar jaoan ‘soldier’ (vs. H aly i K ar

1n I am grateful (o Father Alexander Nadson for the N jasvii datum . T he term

ptale/aho/ ptaidla motoka (gen sg) is cited by Nosovif 1870 (most of his materials come from
the Mahilew district). The term is used in Palessian Belorussian (inform ant) and in
H om el' (Lepeiaw 1981:116).
1,1 The earliest attestation is the expression brmffon gala ,any marvelous dainty; good
fortune' (in Aristophanes, OmiBes, line 1673; Sftkis, line 508; see also M. W einreich
1956:629).
1‫ ״‬I am grateful to Yona Sabar for these facts. See also Steingass 1892:773.
“ s Curiously, synonymous Po cymts ,something unusual, rem arkable' ( ~ Br cymus
‘something tasty; most interesting point; sweet carrot dish1) is of Jewish origin—from Y
cimes ‘vegetable, fruit stew’.
1,6 O n central and peripheral members of the Balkan Sprachbund, see H . Bim baum
1965:20, 23.
" ‫ ׳‬W olf 1956, H 1669.
Boroxov 1913:50, fn. 1; W olf 1956, #2346 (following S. A. Bim baum 1955:249).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 45

‘G reek, Russian, O rthodox’). If K araite is not influenced by Yiddish (I

lack inform ation from Crim ean Karaite), then the Yiddish-Karaite
m eaning ‘soldier’ may ultimately derive from contact with a colloquial
(Judeo-)G reek source.
3.16 Judeo-G reek influence in European Jew ish anthroponym ics. Pro­
p er names, because they tend to be culture-bound, could provide
valuable clues to Jewish migratory history and bilingual contact. Jewish
w om en’s names tend to be more receptive to coterritorial Christian influ­
ences than Jew ish m en’s names. T he latter have a closer link with
H ebrew names because of the role of men in the synagogue service. A
com parison of Hebrew nam ing practices in neighboring Jewish culture
zones would provide a framework for uncovering possible inter-Jewish
cultural contacts in the Slavic lands.
Judeo-G reek anthroponym s are found in all Jewish languages spoken
in the areas in which Judeo-G reek was formerly spoken. The same two
chronological strata for Judeo-G reek loans apply also to Judeo-G reek an-
throponym s. T here are Judeo-G reek names first borrowed by Palestinian
H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic which were diffused to European Jewish
languages, and Judeo-G reek names borrowed directly in a G reek­
speaking milieu in Europe. Both types of Greek anthroponym s appear in
Yiddish. For example, a num ber of Greek anthroponym s in Yiddish
(usually received through Judeo-R om ance) appear in the Slavic lands on­
ly in the Slavic translation equivalents. This fact is extremely im portant
for assessing the relative impact of Judeo-G reek on Germ anic and Slavic
Jew ries. T here are also Judeo-G reek anthroponym s which are unique to
Slavicized Eastern Yiddish; these may have come to Yiddish through a
Judeo-Slavic interm ediary. Loan translations of Greek anthroponym s
are more num erous than loan translations of Greek non-anthroponyms.
A classification of Judeo-G reek anthroponym ic influence in the
Ashkenazic culture area—both in G erm any and the Slavic lands—is
presented below.

3.161 Judeo-G reek anthroponym s in Yiddish first attested in Palestinian

sources: Y Ineur, J u d senior■, OW Y (H e) p(»)rig6ras; JES1 Tanxonooii, etc.; O W Y
todrts, J u d todros; EY badane(s); margolin, etc.
Y ineur and J u d senior (Balkan) fam, m a; (Iberian) fam are derived from Lat
senior ‘elder, senior’ n , a d j.1,9 T he L atin term is also used in French, Italian and

See Baer 1,1:1929 for Judezm o examples. O n the change of Lat s > Y /, see Faber
1982:89. T here is a surface cognate in O Br senion ,elder of the Evangelical church"
(1577) < Po senjor ‘elder of the family; large landowner with vassals; elder supervising
student or cleric’ (Bulyka 1972b:2%). See also the English Jewish name Isaac Sena (Latin
docum ent, C anterbury, early 12005), using the base form Lat senex ‘old’ (M . Adler
1939:63); Balkan Ju d (ben) major fam < Lat maior ‘m ajor’ (Emmanuel 1963-1965).
46 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Iberian Rom ance as an honorific term of address and in the Iberian P e n in su la

apparently as a C hristian male nam e as well, e.g. C at Senior (975).1,0 T h e Y id ­
dish nam e owes its form to a Judeo-R om ance morphological re in te rp re ta tio n of
the L atin root as H e in i ‘tw o’ + ,ur ‘light’. ” ' T he Ju d e o -R o m a n c e an-
throponym m ay in turn be a loan translation o f G k presbyteros ‘co m m u n ity e ld e r ’
o r gerontios ‘elder’, two epithets which frequently appear on Ju d e o -G re e k
synagogue inscriptions.1” T he Greek nam es themselves m ay have been c a lq u e d
on JA ram 1a 1‫׳‬a 5 ‘old m an, scholar; g randfather’; m a .l‫ ״‬In G erm any, th e nam e
also appears in a native loan translation, e.g. Y alter (spelled in the H e b rew
m an n er— Yfr); the latter is unknow n am ong G erm an C hristians. Z cakana fa.
borne by a Polish Jew ess (L at docum ent, Erfurt 1383) m ight be a H e b rew loan
translation of the A ram aic-G reek-Latin nam e (see He zqenah ‘old’ f) .1** T he
form Ineur is also found in Yiddish spoken in the Slavic lands.
O W Y (H e) p(/)rigoras m a (often with vocalization in the text) was in u s e in
G erm any between the years 1096 and 1349, to judge from tom bstone in sc rip ­
tions and d o cu m en ts.'” T h e nam e has a m uch older history am ong J e w s in
Judeo-R om ance com m unities (i.e. France and Italy) and in Ju d e o -G re e k co m ­
m unities in E urope, Palestine and Egypt, see e.g. FrL at Paragore (N a rb o n n e
688),1,15 ItLat Pareiorios (R om e, n .d .) .1” T h e nam e is first found in H e b rew texts
from the Greek culture area, in the form prjgwrjl + prtgori (Palestine, B croea
[Aleppo], Greece, before the 4th c. A D ).19• T he G reek etym on is not attested
as a masculine anthroponym in non-Jewish circles (but see Paregoros fa).'* 9 The
retention of the original vowel in the initial syllable in Latin, but not in H ebrew
spellings, could be a reflection of a m ore conservative w ritten norm ; on th e loss
of initial unstressed vowels in Judeo-G reek, see the discussion in section 3.134
above. T he Greek root literally m eans ‘com forter’ and m ay itself have b e en a
loan translation of the H ebrew nam es nwnahem and tanhum (o f B iblical and
T alm udic origin respectively).20‫ ״‬I have no exam ples of the Ju d e o -G re ek nam e

‘‫ ״י‬M eyer-Lubke 1923:10.

191 For French and Provencal Hebrew examples from the ll!h-13th centuries, set
Gross 1897:41; Seror 1981:143, 145, 154; for Portuguese and French exam ples, see
Laredo 1978:1 137-1138.
For the epithet presbyteros in Judeo-Greek inscriptions, see Deissm ann
1895:153-155; Frey l:l936:LXXXV fT, # # 5 9 5 , 597, 663, 692; M . W einreich
4:1973:75-76; for gerontios, see Frey 1:1936, # #663, 692. Presbyteros is the basis for the
word ‘priest’ in a num ber of Romance and G erm anic languages.
Cassuto 1932-1933:224 (citing Reinach 1893:169).
Stissmann 1915:62. Sussm ann’s derivation of this name from “ SI” zakon ‘law‘,
following a suggestion of A. Bruckner's, is unconvincing.
' ” Salfeld 1898:105, 183.
1,4 Cassuto 1932-1933:221 ff. T he name is unknown in the Iberian Peninsula
Frey 1:1936, #670.
Ibid, #497; 2:1952, # #926, 939, 944-945, 1041. For later Byzantine G reek at­
testation, see G um pertz 1956:350, fn. 31-32. In contem porary loanina, J G k parigtm
denotes ‘visit to mourners during the seven days following burial’ (op.cit., fn. 32).
m Pape and Benseler 1959.
200 Gum pertz 1956:350 and fn. 31. The etymology is also discussed by M . W einreich
2:1973:73; 4:106-107. See also the Balkan Judezm o use of He mhamdh ,co m fo rt’ as a
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 47

from Slavic sources, but there are m any examples of tanhum, e.g. JE SI (Br, Uk)
Mojziiu Tanxonovtcu dat (Brest 1569).201

A second Greek male anthroponym first found in Palestinian Judeo-

Greek and then again in Judeo-R om ance and Yiddish is Gk Oeodoros:202
e.g. Palestinian He tdd(6Xr)os, tpwdwrws! + teodoros•™3 Y todresen (G er­
man document from H ungary 1470);204 JW SI (Cz) Todros (Prague 16th
c);205 C atH e twdrwsl + todros;206 Prov Todrosi (Provencal text, Arles
1320s);507 Balkan Ju d twdrws m a (1560), twrdws fam (1621).208 The Greek

family name: naxmias fam (also in Iberian Judezm o). For G erm an (Yiddish) examples,
see Slommmtrost (M agdeburg, firs! half 15th161 ‫־‬K c) < Solomon + Trost( — EY trtjst ‘com*
passion*) (Kisch 19493:205), Trosthn (O chsenfun am M ain 1298) (Salfeld 1898:31). Tav-
jov observes that He ruhdmdh is pronounccd by Ashkenazic Jews with <2-vowcls as a
feminine anthroponym , but with 0 -vowel8 as the noun ‘compassion’ (1923c:316, fn. 1).
T h e name dates only from the M iddle Ages (Even-Shoshan 1964).
301 Beriadskij 2:1882, #290. For examples of He tanhum(d*) on 16th century tom b­
stones in Prague and V ienna, see Grunwald 1911:103. The change of (0)m > n in Judeo-
East Slavic names finds a m irror image in the Belorussian, Ukrainian and Polish
change of n > m found in Greek names, e.g. Uk Mykytc, Br Mikita — R Nikita < Gk
Nikitas, Nikitis; Po My kola, Cz Miktddi < Gk Nikolaas (see also Hg Mtklos). The Judeo-
East Slavic name appears in a num ber of spellings, see e.g. JESl(Br) Mojieia Tamxanovua
gen * Mojiesu Tanxamovifu — 7 a/-d at (Vilnius 1587) (^S 3:1867:289, 29J). Another ex­
am ple of the m — n interchange in a Jewish name is He nisan ‘seventh month of the
H ebrew calendar’ > Y nisn ' i b ma — JESI (Br, Uk) Moiko Misanovif (Br£st 1583) -
(Br) Nuana gen (Luc’k 1489) (Beriadskij 1:1882, # 23). (While Brest is part of the
Belorussian SSR, the southwest area of the Republic south of the Jasel’da River is
Ukrainian-speaking.) Probably unrelated is the interchange of m and n that occurs finally
in the spelling of Hebrew words in Francisk Skaryna’s foreword to his Belorussian Bible
translation (Vilnius 1517-1519), e.g. (m > ‫ )מ‬He divre hajdmtm ‘Chronicles’ > Br dibrt
hatomtn; (n > m) He ktcron ma (R uth 4:18) > Br Esrom (see also Altbauer 1977:1 17, 119;
Bulyka 1980:215). See also O C z Stphyn ‘Judges' (late 14th-early 15th c) < He lofiim
(Schropfer 1971:358, line 40) vs. Br Sojtim — &ofttm\ (!519) (Skaryna's forewords to )
K ings and 1 Judges respectively). I have no evidence of (he confusion of the two nasals
from any Jewish sourcc; nor is it clear yet whether the unetymological n o r m became
lexicali2 ed. T here is no discussion of this topic in the Slavic phonological literature (sec
also dc Vincenz 1970:247, fn. 76). See also discussion in section 3.341 below. The
analysis of Judeo-Slavic anthroponyms is complicated by the absence of historical die-
tionaries of Slavic Christian names from all areas. When such dictionaries are available
(e.g. Taszycki I965ff for Old Polish), names borne specifically by Slavic Jew s are not
always indicated.
m See also modern Greek constructions such as Bodows: 6060s (dim).
*« Krauss 1898:584; Frey 2:1952. 163, 260-261.
04‫ ב‬KovjSts 1938:305.
‫ג‬0‫ י‬Muneles 1966a:8.
206 C am era and MilUs 1956:197. In Latin documents the name appears as Tor(r)os {op.
cit , 200). See also the indices to Baer 1*2:1929-1936. T he name is not presently en­
countered in Balkan Judezm o. In the Iberian Peninsula the term is known both in
C atalan and Castilian areas (in the latter due to the westward diffusion from Hellenized
C ataluna?).
207 Gross 1897:85; see also 8, 39, 389, 408-409. See also ProvLat Taurot (N arbonne,
late 12th c) (Cassuto 1932-1933:230). O n the popularity of I *at Thtodorus and Theodotus
am ong Jew s in the Roman Empire (Asia M inor), see Solin 1980:310.
Emmanuel 1:1963:130 and 230 respectively. The name todros is found in the late
48 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

nam e means ‘gift of G od’ and is synonymous with H e tulan^el, n?tan-

jah(u). See also OGY (He) *t3ladrix (corrected from uf-azrix—with vocali­
zation in the text: W urzburg 1298);209 in G erm an Latin texts th e je w is h
nam e appears as Thidtrick (Koln, mid-12th c), Tidericus (1230).210 I have
not found the term east of the H ungarian and Czech speech territories.
In the East Slavic lands, a Slavic translation equivalent is found as a
Jewish male nam e, beginning with 16th century texts, e.g. JESI (B r)
Bohdanovii (H rodna Jew , Vilnius 1533),2,1 (Uk) Bohdan (L uc’k 1552).212
See also contemporary EY badaru fa, badanes fam (attested in V ilin iu s).21*
O n the surface, JESI (Br) Bohdanovil and EY badane(s) might a p p e ar to
be borrowed from the coterritorial Slavic languages, see e.g. Br Bahdan
ma, Bahdana fa. Among Slavs, the masculine anthroponym is attested in
Polish as early as 1136, and in U krainian in the late 14th century, but
in Belorussian only in the 16th-17th centuries; the feminine Bohdana was
rare in Belorussian in the 16th century.214 Bogdanowicz ~ Bahdanovic fam
is also very popular am ong Belorussian T atars.2,5 The popularity o f the
nam e among Jew s may have been stimulated by the fact that U k rain ian
Bokdan was not used as a saint’s nam e.216 However, a direct East Slavic
derivation for the Jewish anthroponym s is unattractive, since there are
relatively few Slavic personal names in use am ong Jew s in the Slavic
sources of this period. Hence, I wonder whether the Judeo-Slavic an-
throponyms were not in fact an early independent Jewish translation of
the (Judeo-)Greek name todros, composed at a time when the m ean in g of
the Greek name was still understood. Conversely, am ong the Ashkenazic
Jews in G erm any, the Judeo-G reek nam e is never found in a Y iddish
translation, which indicates that its meaning may have become o p aq u e
to Yiddish speakers, or that it had been introduced originally by
Rom ance-speaking im m igrants to G erm any and was not native to th e in-

17th century Yiddish memoirs of Gluckel of Ham eln, but it is unclear if the b e a re r was
a Portuguese or Ashkenazic Jew (see K aufm ann 1896),
209 Salfeld 1898:197, fn. 2, 415. According to Forsiem ann, the variants Thtalnch, Thut-
are rare among Christians (1:1900:1186, 1188).
, "‫ י‬Aronius 1902, ##259-260, 447. See also the examples cited in G ru n w a ld
1911:102, 115. A non-Jewish variant is Thtodeiich
1,1 BerSadskij 1:1882, #155.
Ibid. 2:1882, #27.
J1’ RubStejn 1922:91, 108; M. Weinreich 1924a:51.
J1* See de Vincenz 1970:253-254 for the Ukrainian, Biryla 1:1966:35, 175 for BcJorus-
sian and Taszycki 1965(T for Polish. Rum Bogdan—a baptismal nam e borrow ed from
South Slavic—is first attested in the early 13th century (de Vincenz 1970:254, fn . 5).
311 Stankevif 1933a: 115; Kryczyriski 1938:114.
»'* De Vincenz 1970:253 and fn 3.
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 49

digcnous G erm an Jew s.’17 OW Y (He) p(i)rigdras may have a similar

history (but note translations of JG k Kalonymos in section 3.1621 below).
A Greek loan in Judeo-A ram aic and Hebrew that appears to have
becom e a family name only in the Slavicized dialects of Yiddish is
margarites ‘pearl’ > JA ram marg(d)l1id3■, pi margaljdn, margoljan; margin, pi
margliot ‘pearl’ > Y margolin, margulies fam .218 In the first Yiddish
variant, -in may be the Slavic patronymic suffix or a Yiddish form of the
Judeo-A ram aic suffix -jan. T he geography of this Yiddish family nam e
raises the possibility of a Judeo-Slavic intermediary. Perl, the native Yid­
dish translation equivalent, functions as a feminine anthroponym . See
also discussion of He, JA ram tdmar in section 7.55 below.
3.162 Judeo-G reek anthroponym s in Yiddish first attested in Europe. T he
m ajo rity of the G reek nam es first used by Jew s in European surroundings are
o f specifically Judeo-G reek origin. T hese anthroponym s could have been taken
directly from Judeo-G reek, though in the case of Yiddish, there is the possibility
o f diffusion through Judeo-R om ance and Judeo-Slavic. Occasionally, European
J e w s in the M edieval period used G reek nam es of C hristian origin. O ne exam-
p ie is O G Y (H e) 3wfmph! + 0J(e)mia (Frankfurt 1241),J1* contem porary non-
Je w ish G Offfejmia,1™ O P 0 (0)femija, O B r Ol’xim (M insk 1 5 9 0 ) , Uk Fenna71'1
< G k Euphemia. For additional shared Greek nam es from Frankfurt (prior to
1400), see K racauer 1911:462, 605. See also discussion of G k Aleksandra in sec­
tio n 3.1621 below.

3.1621 Judeo-G reek anthroponym s in Yiddish taken directly from

Judeo-G reek or diffused through a Judeo-Slavic intermediary: Y fa jvu !
— fejbu!\ kalmen — Kalonymos, etc., J u d kalo ~ kolonomos; Y sender ~ sen-
dir, J u d sando\ OG Y p w p 3 ~ Poppelman. There are a num ber of Judeo-
G reek anthroponym s which are attested neither in Palestinian Hebrew
a n d Judeo-A ram aic sources nor in Judeo-R om ance communities; their
presence in Yiddish or in a Judeo-Slavic translation suggests direct con­
tact with a Judeo-G reek-speaking community.
A Yiddish male name of Greek origin that is apparently not attested
in any Judeo-R om ance speech com munity is fa jv ii (Kobryn 1583)221 —
fejb u ! < G k PhoTbos ma, literally ‘light’. T he name also appears am ong
Ashkenazim in Hebrew, Judeo-A ram aic and Slavic translation

1,7 Agus believes that the name was brought by individual Iberian Jews, and does not
entertain the possibility of a Judeo-G reek substratum in Yiddish (1962:3, fh. 2).
U nbegaun 1972:343.
*'• Salfeld 1898:14; Siper 1924:279.
t n Salfeld 1898:407.
Ml For Polish, see Taszycki 2(1): 1968:17ft; for Belorussian, see Biryla 1:1966.
m ielex ivs’kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886.
i4.S3:1867:289fr. S eealsoG slg FaiscM ‫־‬Jew ' (1862) (W olf 1956, # 1274) — discuss­
ed also in section 5.5213, fn. 236 below.
50 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS

equivalents, e.g. Y mejir ( < H e me}ir ‘illum inator’), irage ( C jA r a m iraga1

‘light’), JW SI (Po) Glownia, Glowitt(a), Glowisck (the latter form w ith a
Germ anic suffix?),22* (PoLat) Swyathly (Krakow 151 1).325 A m o n g non-
Jew s, the Greek etymon is only occasionally encountered, e.g. R Febus,
Po Fojbos, Dalm atian Lat Phoebus (especially common am ong m a n u m it­
ted slaves in Italy), Phyebe.n i It is unclear, however, w hether th e Slavic
names were used predominantly or exclusively by Jews.
A nother possible example of a Yiddish male anthroponym u n k n o w n
am ong Christians which may have been acquired through direct contact
with a Judeo-Greek-speaking com munity is kalmen, found in G e rm a n
and West Slavic C hristian documents in a variety of spellings (th e follow­
ing are all from G erm an sources unless otherwise stated), e.g . Kalman
(Erfurt 1350, 1368; Frankfurt, pre-1400), Cal(e)man (W u rzb u rg 1212;
Rothenburg o .T .; H eilbronn 1298), Kolman(in) (V ien n a 1423,
Regensburg 1470ff),227 Koler, Choler (Latin docum ent, B ratislava
1402-1404).228 In addition to the above forms, the Judeo-G reek ety m o n
Kalonymos, literally ‘good nam e’, is also attested in G erm any, as w ell as
in Southern France, Italy and the Balkans, see e.g. It Calonymos (C alab ria
982),229 Mac Kolonomos fam (contemporary M acedonia—alo n g sid e the
abbreviated Balkan Ju d Kalo).130 T he name is unknown a m o n g non-
Jewish Greeks. A pparently, it is only in the G erm an lands th a t w e en­
counter the two variants of the name side by side; in the Slavic lands.

2‫ ״‬Siper 1926b:259, 286, 296. Giouna (1204) is cited by Taszycki (1958:101), b ut it

is unclear if the bearer was a je w . Elsewhere, Taszycki also cites PoLat Glowtna (1466).
Glowna (Krak6w 1419), Cloivnya (Krakow 1429) (2,1:1968:132). See also the Je w ish fami­
ly nam e lapidus, presumably derived from the Yiddish pronunciation (lapidos) o f He
lapfdol (literally ,torches’) — Y lixtman (literally ‘light’ + 'm a n ’). T he H ebrew n a m e is
also found outside of Northern Europe (see Emmanuel 1-2:1963-1968 for th e Balkans)
Beriadskij 3:1903, #73.
’‫ ״‬Alfoldy 1969:264.
J‫ ״‬Stem and Hoeniger 1888; Salfeld 1898; K racauer 1911:450, 462; S u ssm an n 1915,
Siper I926b:287; Geyer and Sailer 1931:538; Strauss 1960.
K ovits 1938. Colomannus also appears in the same docum ent, but m ay be related
to Hg Kalman ma, fam—a native name derived by K £lm in from ‘rem ain d er’ (1978:37).
Curiously, the hypocoristic form in Hungarian is Kalo (ibid , 56).
” » Gross 1897:8, 85, 89; Cassuto 1932-1933:221fT; Blumenkranz 1963. S er also M
W einreich 1:1973:350-351.
Jw Abbreviated forms are also found in R ouen, see e.g. Calol (late 13th-carly 14th c),
contem porary Colo in Italy and T unis (Schaerf 1925:57; Eisenbeth 1936:108); th e T u n i­
sian nam e could have been brought from Italy. Another Judeo-G reek fam ily n a m e which
might have been a prototype of Kalo, etc. is Kalomili (literally ‘good nose’: see G k mjt/
‘nose’) found first in the 15th century in Balkan Jewish com m unities. G Y kalmen was
im ported (back) to Italy (in the 15th century?), where it appears in the form s Calimarx
ma and Calimani fam (Cassuto 1932-1933:230, fn. 2). In French dram atical lite ra tu re of
the 14th-15th centuries. Kalman was a typical Jewish name (Pflaum 1930:115). It is
unclear if Balkan Ju d kalmi ma is derived from the Judeo-G reek root.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 51

kalman is the only variant attested, and there are apparently no Slavic
translation equivalents.‫ ״‬l
T he historical association of the two variants of the nam e, e.g. a Gk
Kalonymos and a Yiddishized kalmen, is assured on two grounds: (a) Jews
nam ed either kalmen or kalonymos both appear in Hebrew docum ents with
the common Hebrew translation equivalent iem tov (e.g. Erfurt 122l);23a
(b) a mid-14th century Hebrew text from M ainz records the name
+ kalonymos while an accompanying Latin text records Caiman.™
M oreover, the two variants seem to coexist in a state of complementary
distribution, with kalonymos serving as a “ liturgical” name in mono­
lingual Hebrew texts and tombstone inscriptions (the first instance of the
latter is qlwnjmws, M ainz 1096)SJ4 vs. a m ore colloquial kalmen, which ap­
pears in G erm an and Latin documents. In Yiddish, both forms of the
Judeo-G reek nam e are spelled according to Hebrew etymological norms;
the spelling of kalmen as qlmn is surely motivated by paradigmatic
sim ilarity with Hebrew loans of the type badhdn ‘joker’ > Y batxn. If
kalonymos joined the corpus of Hebrew liturgical names required for use
in the synagogue, then we might assume that the origin of the nam e had
become obscure to Yiddish speakers. T hus, the translation equivalents
that abound both in G erm any and the Rom ance lands could only have
been coined when the etymology of kalonymos and/or kalman was still ap­
preciated: see e.g. He fem tov—attested in m any Jewish com munities— It
Bonone,i,i C atLat Bono-Nomine (1080-1081), Nomebonum (1095),256 Y
nmhjr — nmhjr! + namxir — namhir (Frankfurt 1241) *‫ ־‬G Lat
Nameguit.JJ7 T he chronology of each translation equivalent still needs to
be ascertained. T he problem is how to derive kalman and kalonymos from
a common Greek etymon. T o judge from its Greek shape, kalonymos may
have been a relatively newer import from Rom ance lands (note the reten­
tion of the Greek ending -os in Y todres < Gk todros). For example, it is
known that a rabbi bearing the Judeo-G reek nam e moved from Lucca

2,1 Though Unbegaun explains (he family nam e barsak found am ong Russian Jew s as
an acronym for He bin rabbi zalrmn kalonimis (jic] ,son of Rabbi Zalman Kalonim os’
(1972:353). But why should Y zalmen > s, and cannot k - kalmen? I do not know when
and where the acronym first appeared. W einryb claims that Kalonymos is known from
southern Poland but no sources are forthcoming (1962b:495).
2‫ ״‬Salfeld 1898:407.
2‫ ״‬M . Weinreich 3:1973:184.
” ♦ Salfeld 1898; Cassuto 1932-1933:230, fn. 2; M . W'einreich 1:1973:350-351;
3:374-377. For the complementary distribution of Gk 'lason and He jiholua‘ , JA ram j i i m 1
in 1st century Palestine, see R osin 1980:235.
«» Cassuto 1932-1933:221.
2,6 Miret y Sans and Schwab 1914:69; Baer 1,1:1929.
257 Stem and Hoeniger 1888; Salfeld 1898:407.
52 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

(near Pisa) to G erm any in about 1000.258 In fact, kalonymos within the
G erm an lands seems to be restricted in the main to W estern G erm any;
the eastern-most example of the nam e known to me is from V ienna (la te
12th c).239 Thus, we may regard Y kalmen as the original Yiddishized
(and Slavicized?) form, popular in the Slavic lands, which developed
before the re-importation of the Judeo-G reek etymon by Romance im ­
m igrants to W estern G erm any in the 11th century. T he absence of th e
Greek ending in kalmen means either that the nam e was derived from a
Judeo-G reek dialect where •os had been dropped (see discussion of Y, J F r
+ trop in section 3.134 above) or that the second component was adjusted
in the German lands to -man —a morphem e common to many native Y id ­
dish names, e.g. (from G erm an texts) Lieb(er)mann, Salman(nus), Heilm an,
Sussmann, etc.54®T o conclude, I would posit two separate developm ents
for JG k Kalonym(os) in Northern Europe: (a) an abbreviated form in
Judeo-Slavic and general Yiddish, and (b) a non-abridged form in Ju d e o -
Romance and in G erm an Yiddish. O n a Judeo-Slavic intermediary for
Yiddish names, see also discussion in section 3.161 above.
In G erm any, Gk Altksandros ‘Alexander’ is popular both among J e w s
and non-Jews, see e.g. (H e) Hksndrws! + altksandros (W einheim 1298)241
— Hksndr! + aleksander (W orms 13 7 7).242 T his name is also attested in
Palestinian sources.245 A hypocoristic form, made by truncating the first
two unstressed syllables, seems to be restricted to Yiddish and E uropean
non-Jewish languages which were historically coterritorial with G reek o r
which were receptive to Hellenization; sec e.g. OGY (G) SeruJir, Send(r)lein
(Frankfurt 14th c)244 — ModY sender, W Uk(Y) syndyr, 245 which is norm al-
‫ * ״‬See bin Gorion rl al 1935:351 and Lewicki 1956:26. See also the diffusion of Ju d e o -
Creek names from Italy to Southern France in the 12th century noted by S. S tem
(1956:40, in reference to Anatoli—discussed in section 3.163 below).
‫ י ״‬For German references, see Stem and Hoeniger 1888; Salfeld 1898; B rann.
Elbogen ft al. 1934, index. References from Slavicized areas of G erm any or from a d ja­
cent areas from the 13th-15th centuries are given in Aronius 1902, # #387. 410, 437
(W urzburg), Sussmann 1915 (Erfurt), G eyerand Sailer 1931:538 (Vienna). See also the
discussion of ptsah in section 3.341 below.
Neubauer and Stem 1892; S. A. Bim baum 1981:7, 9. Note that Y kalmm is spelled
qlmn. as if it were a Hebraism (see also Y zlmn for |zalm enj ma), perhaps on the model
of Yiddish Hebraisms with -n m agent, e.g. Y kafxn' beggar’ < He qabcan (see also section
3.3112, fn. 353 below).
‫ > ״‬Kober 1944:193.
J‫ ״‬Salfeld 1898. Grunwald 1911:100 and C uno 1975:15-16 give additional G erm an,
Czech and Alsatian examples.
See Dalman 1901 (citing ’ahksandrus ma in the 2nd Targum to Esther 1:2).
” * Kracaucr 1911:462; Cuno 1975:11. The addition of a second diminutive suffix ■Inn
suggests that sndr■ was no longer felt to be hypocoristic. In G erm an Yiddish, Alexander
seems to have become associated with Yiddish in-group names that begin with a sibilant,
e.g. Susskind(see a Germ an Latin text from c.1200), Sussmann (W . Stem 1974:228; Cuno
1975:48, fn. 417). (Blither is also paired with Sussmann. See also GY (He) sndsj3! + sandna
fa (Mockmuhl 1298) < Gk Altksandra (Salfeld 1898:417).
‫ ״ נ‬H orbaf 1965:11.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 53

ly not used am ong G erm an C hristians.24®Non-Jewish examples include

H g Sdndor, R um §andu (now no longer hypocoristic),247 Bg Sdn(d)o, Sande,
Sdndre, SdncT0 , Sane, San(k)o;liS Balkan Ju d sand6\w O s Sandyr, Geo San­
dro; It Sandro‫׳‬, Malt Xand(ru) [5-] ( < Sicilian). T he Hellenized
hypocoristic form in Yiddish m ay have passed through a Rom ance in­
term ediary since the abbreviated form is also found am ong Rom ance­
speaking Jew s, e.g. J F r Sandro (Bresse area [Ain, Saone-et-Loire, Ju ra]
1336), Sande (Bourgogne 13th c), Sandre (England 1277).250 In the Slavic
languages, the abbreviations of Aleksand(e)r are quite different, e.g. Po
Leksa, Olecha, Olechno, O Po Leksand(e)r, L a k s a n d r R Alek, Aleko, Aleksan,
A lik, Alja, Oleko; Uk (O)les’, Olel'ko, Oles'ko, Ksander;252 Se Leko (Muslims
in Bosnia and Hercegovina).255 T he Lemkian dialect of U krainian
spoken in southwest Galicia has (K)sander m a, (K)sandra fa,254 and
H ungarian influence accounts for Uk Hucul Sandor, Sandro m a.‫ ״‬i Forms
like R, Br Sanja, Sura, SaSa are closer to Yiddish, but they can also be ab­
breviations for Samuil ‘Sam uel’.256 G erm an hypocoristic forms which
truncate the initial two syllables begin with ks-, e.g. A ustrian G Xandl.i>7
Form s similar to the Yiddish hypocoristic occasionally also appear in
languages where direct Greek influence need not be postulated, but these

144 But see G slg senta ‘Alexander' (R appenau) (M oorm ann 1932:103). O n the
possibility that the name was used by Christians in 14th century Koln, see Langenbucher
1970:29.
247 For discussion of sindrou in a H ungarian Greek text from before 1002, see Stanislav
1948:8 (who derives the name from North Italian via Slavic). Hg Sdndor is not now
associated with Alexander (which is not used natively in Rum anian).
” * Iliev 1969.
‫ * ״‬David M . Bun is has pointed out to me that the Izmir journalist Alexander
Benghiatt (early 20th century) referred to himself as Sando. Such an abbreviation is not
com m on am ong Judezm o speakers and is not attested at all among Greek Christians,
who abbreviate AUksandros to Aleksir, but ModGk Altksandra fa > dim Sandra. It is also
possible that Ju d Sando should be derived from He lem fov ma (see Bunis 1980:88).
250 Seror 1981:177. Sandre is also the nam e of a French Christian (of Jewish origin?)
(St. Q uentin 1340) (op. eil.).
« ' Taszycki 3,2:1972.
252 Zelexivs'kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886; Superanskaja and Gusev 1979. For Old
Belorussian abbreviations from the first half of the 16th century, see Uscinovif 1975:15;
for contem porary Belorussian examples, see Lastowski 1924:763 and fn. I.
253 Smailovii 1977:73.
” * Verxratskyj 1902.429, 464.
255 De Vincenz 1970:252. Uk Hucul Senderuk fam looks like a borrowing from Yiddish
(ibid., 582; for other Yiddish names in use as baptismal names in U krainian, see ibid. ,
9 4 , 118, 271-272, 541). For Belorussian, see Biryla 3: 1982, 20-24, 26-27.
‫ * ״‬For a variety of regional Russian abbreviations, but none with the form Sand(r)o,
see Cum akova 1970:204-205 and Sim ina 1970:194. See also O R Sandyrb, fam (early 16th
c) (Veselovskij 1974:279). A. I. Popov proposes that W R ■Sajrny tp (Pskov, Novgorod),
attested since the 12th century, is derived from Aleksandr (1964:40).
Jakob 1929.
54 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

languages were not originally coterritorial with Yiddish, see e.g. Eng
Sandy ma, fa, Sandra fa; Le Sandra fa; Sp Sancho ma.
The O ld G erm an Yiddish male anthroponym (He) pw pV + popa —
+ popo may be a Hellenized abbreviation of ‘Joseph’ (see also contem ­
porary JG k pepos m a);’11 see also the Jewish family names (G) Popptlman
(Germ an text, W urzburg 1298),2i9JE n g (L a t)/>op#/imj(England 13thc).2w
3.163 Uncovering caiques of Judeo-G reek anthroponym s in Yiddish
and Judeo-Slavic. Y blume -— ime\ Florya\ JW SI Kwieta, Kvftna\ Y cejmex,
Ju d cemax\ Y pejrex, Ju d peragja — -xja\ Y golde; zlate ~ zlo-\ zorex, Ju d
zeragja — -xja; Y Jrejde; sime; JW SI St'astny\ JESI Stasnyj; Y dvojre; JESI
Piolka; EY badane(s); JESI Tanxanovic , etc; JW SI Glownia, etc; Swyathly.
T he widespread phenomenon of component translation within and
across a Jewish cultural area makes it exceedingly difficult to ascertain
the origin of synonymous anthroponym s. For example, a Judeo-Slavic
anthroponym might be a translation of a Yiddish prototype, the pro-
to ty p t of the latter, a translation of a Judeo-G reek name or simply an in­
dependent creation. A Judeo-Slavic prototype can be established only on
the basis of an earlier attestation for the Judeo-Slavic variant than for the
Yiddish variant, or preference for the nam e in the former Polabian and
Sorbian areas of Eastern Germany (see discussion of Y pejsex in section
3.341 below), or in Slavic areas far removed from contact with early Yid­
dish (e.g. in South or East Slavic lands). In uncovering potential caiques
of Judeo-G reek anthroponym s, it is imperative to operate in a broad
comparative framework; nevertheless, we must always reckon with the
possibility that similar nam ing patterns in contiguous and non­
contiguous Jewish communities might be independent realizations of
semantic universals. The corpus discussed below is illustrative; a press­
ing desideratum in Jewish linguistics is to collect all Yiddish names which
appear with Siavic translation equivalents.
A Yiddish feminine anthroponym derived from the root ‘flower’ which
may be regarded as a caique either of a Judeo-R om ance or a Judeo-
Greek prototype is GY (H e) blu/mV + blume (W orms 1096);261 (G) Plum
~ Pluemlein ~ -lin — -len, etc. (Germ an documents, Regensburg

‫ * ״‬The diminutive used by Greek Christians is Ztppos (Mouse 1973:21). Salfeld rejects
the association with the T alm udk Greek name />/>’, ppwsl + papo(s) and proposes a Ger•
manic etymon (1898:409).
Salfeld 1898:409; Siper 19263:292.
M. Adler 1939:111.
161 Neubauer and Stem 1892; S. A Bim baum 1981:7. A Hebrew tombstone dated
1253 in the Regensburg City Museum has the spelling ptwmV + plume.
 J E W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 55

1473-1476),262JW Sl(Cz) Bluma (1546),265 ModEY blume ~ -ime (vs. blum

‘flow er’). T he name is also known in a Slavic translation, e.g. JW Sl(Cz)
K wieta (Prague 1483),264 Kvltna (1546)265 ( < C z kvit ‘flower’; kvltny adj,
K vita fa); the Slavic names are not attested in any Yiddish sources. There
is no evidence that G erm an feminine names were broadly derived from
n ative roots for ‘flower’,266 but there are precedents in both Romance
a n d Greek nam ing traditions. A Judeo-R om ance translation equivalent
is also used in Old G erm an Yiddish, e.g. GY (Lat) Florya (Latin docu­
m e n t, M inden 1333).267 However, attestation of a Judeo-R om ance name
does not necessarily indicate that the name was common to Judeo-L atin,
since I find almost no examples in the Iberian Jewish nam e lists;268 the
A rabic translation equivalent zahra is used as a feminine anthroponym by
M oroccan Jew s (many of whom come originally from Spain), but this
could be due to the popularity of the nam e am ong M uslim s.269 An cx-
anim ation of the geography of Y blume in G erm any provides no clues to
its origin, since it is attested both in the former Slavic lands (e.g. around
R egensburg and Erfurt) as well as in non-Slavic lands adjacent to French
speech territory.270
T h e restricted distribution of ‘flower’ in Judeo-R om ance is the basis
of m y hypothesis that the Ashkenazic feminine anthroponym s derived
from the root ‘flower’ might continue a Byzantine rather than, or
alongside, a Romance nam ing pattern (see also discussion of H e ctmah
in fns. 274-5 below). Among the Slavic languages, it is primarily in the

‫ ג‬6‫ ג‬Strauss 1960:475.

‫ י*ג‬Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:377.
244 M uneles I966b:68.
Mi Bondv and Dvorsky 1906:377. See also Hefm an 1965:35, 40 and Muneles
1966a:7. '
76* Bechtel 1917:592ff; Schroder 1944:39. But see the name of a non-Jew from Gdansk
in a Belorussian document from 1546, Manus Bljum (Ber&adskij 1:1882, # 345). In the
G erm an secret language of Schopfloch, Blumche with the dim inutive suffix denotes a
‘frail, slender girl’ (Philipp 1969:23).
7•7 Brilling and Richtering 1967, #97. See also J Eng (Lat) Rocsta ‘R ose1, Fiona, FUur
<U Lys in 13th century England (M. Adler 1939:21). Additional French and English ex‫״‬
amples are given by Scror 1981:144-145.
**• An example is C at Floreta (Barcelona area 1380s) in a Christian document (Baer
1,1:1929:340). It would be worth checking if flower names are limited primarily to
Cataluna and the M editerranean coast, areas with an alleged Judeo-Greek substratum.
Outside of the Iberian Peninsula, the root rarely appears as a feminine anthroponym ,
see e.g. Balkan Ju d Jlor (1690), or as a family nam e, e.g. Dutch/Portuguese M arrano
Flores (Em m anuel 2:1968:443). The Hebrew translation equivalent is also rare among
Balkan Sephardim , see e.g. He perah (1530) (ibid. 1:1963:43). More productive is the
form with •jah ‫״‬G o d ', e.g. Balkan Ju d He pjrafijah (also in Italy, 16th c ){ibid. 1:1963:110).
See discussion below and fn. 274.
w l ‫״‬aredo 1978:99. The nam e is also widespread in non-North African dialects of
Arabic.
270 For examples from Frankfurt before 1400, sec Kracauer 1911:450.
56 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

South Slavic lands that we now encounter feminine an th ro p o n y m s

derived from ‘flower’, e.g. Bg Coeta ( <coet ‘flower’);271 here, we co u ld
postulate the influence of Greek, which provides abundant ex am p les of
feminine anthroponym s based on ‘flower’, e.g. Kalykion, Kalyke, Anffe an d
(dial) Tsilstka ( < T u (i(ek ‘flower’—the term ‘flower’ is the b asis of
feminine names in Altaic languages; see also discussion in section 3 .3 2 3
below).272 In contem porary Slovak, Kveta fa is encountered rarely and
K vlt ma and Kveta fa are attested in Old C zech.27, It is 211so conceivable
that the G erm an Jew s could have inherited the nam ing pattern from their
Judeo-R om ance forebearers, while the Slavic Jew s acquired the Slavic
translation equivalents from Judeo-G reek and/or Hellenized Ju d e o -
South Slavic speakers. T he Slavic roots for ‘flower’ do not exist in con­
tem porary Yiddish in any function whatsoever.
Greek prototypes are attractive for Balkan Sephardic family nam es
derived from H e ptrah ‘flower’ and ctmah ‘plant’, e.g. J u d peragja — -xja
(with He -jdh ‘G od’), since these names are almost non-existent in
Iberian records.274 T he Hebrew names ctmah and ptrah are occasionally
found in Ashkenazic communities as well.275
Ashkenazic Jew s have two feminine anthroponym s based on the term
‘gold(en)’, e.g. Y (He) guild3 (W orms 1096),276 Y(PoLat) Golda (K rakow
1400),277 ModEY golde ( < gold ‘gold’) and JW SI (Cz) zlfh / + zla t'a '
(Brno 1349),278 Slalka dim (Prague 1492) (unless this nam e is derived
from sladka ‘sweet’),279 JWS1(G) SlatU (Braunschweig 14th c ),2"

7,1 Ilfev 1969 gives examples of masculine and feminine anthroponym s. For Serbian
Muslims, see Smailovif 1977. See also discussion in Moszyriski 2,2: 1967-1968: 826.
*” Moravfik 1931:74.
i,s G ebauer 1903-1916. M oravfik notes that O H g Virag 'flower* was used as a
feminine anthroponym (1931:74). The term is not now so used, though other flower
terms are. H ungarian, like Yiddish, could have been heir to a Romance and/ or Greek
naming tradition.
*u For the name ptrahjah borne by a 12th century Syrian Jew , see S. Stem 1956:45,
for Moroccan Jewish names based on this root, see Laredo 1978:653, 1012. O n the use
of He ctmah and Judezm o translation equivalents in North Africa and Spain, e.g. brrdugo
(‘green'), kreskas ( ‘grow’), see Laredo 1978:90, 426*430, 675, 1032-1033. T he Jewish
name ctmah is attested only once in a Hebrew document from Pamplona 1325 (Baer
1,1:1929:963*964).
tn For an example of He ctmah from W iener-Neustadt 1480, see Schweinburg♦
Eibenschutz 1894:256; for 15th century Maltese Jewish examples (AVma), see Roth
1928-1931:197, 199. O n He ptrah, see also section 3.341 below.
274 Salfeld 1898.
Taszycki 2,1:1968:158.
*« M. Weinreich 2:1973:204; 4:272.
719 Muneles 1966b:70. Note Y zise fa < ,sweet’ f and Israeli He m*tuka fa < mMukd
f *sweet’.
w0 Siper I926b:287 (citing Riemer 1907:34).
 JE W IS H L IN G U IS T IC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 57

JW Sl(PoLat) Slottha (K rak6w 1455),281 M odEY zlale — zlo- fa. Max

W einreich suggested that since ‘golden’ never serves as a girl’s nam e in
Czech and is not broadly used by G erm ans as a feminine anthroponym
(there are only a few South G erm an examples mainly in com pound
nam es),“ ’ the Judeo-Slavic name should be regarded as a loan transla­
tion of Y golde (attested in G erm an and Slavic lands both), which itself
translates some form of Lat Aurelia fa <aurea ‘golden’ f (though no
R om ance translations of Y golde are recorded in G erm an Yiddish
sources).285 W einreich’s Rom ance derivation is certainly plausible—at
least for Y golde which is well docum ented in the Rhineland, but not for
zlate — zlo-, for which there is an indigenous model, e.g. O C z Zlatofi,™*
M odSvk Zlatko ma, M odCz Zlat(k)a fa. T he Czech, Slovak and Judeo-
W est Slavic anthroponym s could all be regarded as loan translations of
G k xrysion 'gold(en)’, which is the basis of num erous Greek an-
throponym s,285 since it is only in the South Slavic languages that
‘gold(en)’ (not in a compound name) productively serves as a feminine
anthroponym , e.g. Se Zlata (and derivatives) <zlata f ‘gold(en)’.286
H ence, JW SI + zlal'd', etc., consonant with both West and South Slavic
sound patterns, could be analyzed as (a) an original (Judeo-)South Slavic
translation of a Greek nam e, (b) a later Judeo-W est Slavic translation of
a Yiddish-Romance nam e or (c) a borrowing from Czech Christian nam ­
in g practice. A borrowing from Christian nomenclature is not particu­
larly compelling since there is no trace of the male counterpart am ong
th e Jew s, and there are Jewish names which do have a convincing Balkan
etymology (e.g. Y blume, JW SI [Cz] Kwieta, etc.). A better understanding
o f Yiddish-Judeo-W est Slavic bilingualism could help us unravel ques­
tions of this kind. T he isogloss of metal terms used as anthroponym s
should be checked carefully across Europe; for example, the Judeo-

Siper 1926b:258, 287.

J‫ ״‬Forstemann 1966:663-664; Schroder 19+4:41, 43.
“ J M . Weinreich 2:1973:204.
2** Miklosich 1860:65 (citing Palacky 1832).
1,4 For examples of G erm an nam es based on ‘golden’, see Robert 1963:19, 275, fn.
9 , 346, fn. 2.
T he name is found throughout Yugoslavia, but Smailovif claims it is especially
pop u lar among Muslims in Bosnia-Hercegovina (1978:286), and that it derives from the
n a m e of a Slavic goddess (1977:47). For Bulgarian, Serbian and Czech examples, see
M ikloiich 1860:65, 113. See also Bg Zlata, Zlatana fa (Sliven, Jam bol), Zlat(an)(Pirdop),
Zlatil — -in ma (Peltera, V arna) (Ilfev 1969). See also R , Uk Zlata fa < South Slavic
(L evfenko 1967:50). A C roatian etymology for JSI + zlat'a' was actually proposed by the
Yiddishist M . Mieses, but no evidence was brought forward (1924:232). While original
T u rk ish names arc in principle not adopted in Macedonia, the local nam e Zlatka fa was
translated in the 19th century into Turkish as Altana ( < T u allin ‘gold’); see also Mac
Aitanov fam (M arkov 1968:66).
58 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS

Iranian-speaking Jews in the Caucasus also appear to use metals as the

basis of feminine anthroponym s.287
S. Stern noted that a 12th century Sicilian Jewish poet bore the G reek
nam e Anatoli, while referring to himself in Hebrew as zjrahjah.2,6 T h e
m eaning of the Greek nam e is ‘sunrise; east’ (literally ‘upon’ + ‘ris e ’),
while H e ztrahjdh < ztrah ‘blossom’ + -jah ‘G od’ ~ zarah ‘he blossom ed;
(the sun) rose, shone’;289 note also contem porary Saloniki Ju d zeragja —
•xja fam. He zjrahjah, not unknown in Biblical or Talm udic sources, m ight
have been modeled on the Greek nam e, since a form of this root is a t­
tested in 13th-14th century texts from a num ber of lands where J u d e o -
Greek was formerly spoken, e.g. Greece, Provence, C ataluna an d
Southern Italy (T aranto).290 A variant of the nam e, based on the verb al
form of the root, e.g. H e zarah, appears in the Slavic lands, e.g. J W Sl(Po)
Zorach Charaskowicz (H rodna 1560),291 JESl(Br) Zarax Jakubovii (K o b ry n
1563),192Jacko Zaraxovii (H rodna 1560);295 the name appears in H ebrew
characters on Prague gravestones from the early 18th century, but w ith ­
out vocalization;29* see also Trakai K ar Zarachowicz fam .29s The o in the
first syUable of the Judeo-W est Slavic (Polish) form echoes the Y iddish
pronunciation of the Hebrew vowel qamdc\ the Cyrillic examples from
Belorussia, from the same area, do not have this typical Yiddish feature.
T he data examined above tentatively suggest a historical isogloss
separating Hellenized names based on the noun ztrah in the Ju d eo -

Weissenberg 1908:163. Sec also (he non-Jewish Hg Aranka fa < arany ‘gold’, which
may be historically connected with the Romance and/or Greek isoglosses. Israeli He
zihava, zjhavtl fa ( < zahai 'gold') continue (he naming tradition of Ashkenazic gold{ —
zlate, as well as parallel Asian nam ing traditions (?).
" • 1956:41, 43.
O n the association of AnatoU and z/rahjdh, see also Zunz 1865:466; Gross 1897:371.
375. T he name AnatoU is not now current in Grecce, but the chronology of its ob­
solescence is unknown to me.
0‫ ״‬J . Perles 1893:580; Gross 1897:313, 460, 510, 515-516; Baer 1,1:1929:666, Seror
1981:141, 179. For a tombstone inscription, see Frey 1:1936, #639. T he occasional ap­
pearance of Lat Zcrach among early 13th century Jews in C anterbury (M . Adler 1939:65.
72, 122) may be due to the migration of Jews from France or Provence. O therw ise, we
would have to assume that not all instances of He ztrah need be associated with a Judeo-
Greek-speaking milieu.
2,1 Beiiadskij 2:1882, #113. Theoretically, JW SI (Po) Zorach could also be derived
from He zoreah ‘shining’ (m sg participle). The omission of •e■ in the participial form is
characteristic of a num ber of Jewish languages, see e.g. K ar (Trakai, H alyf) mizbax
‘altar’ — He mizbeah (unless the etymon is He mizbah 'altar o f , the construct form ) -
H alyf K ar mizbejax (translated as ‘offering table’ and labeled as “ H ebrew " by Baskakov
et al. 1974), mizbtcha (Sulimowicz 36:1973:81); Bucharest Ju d mizbtax (Sala 1971:45,
113). It is unclear whether these diverse facts have a common historical origin.
Beriadskij 2:1882, # 185.
J‫ ״‬Ibid., #200.
Grunwald 1911:12.
n i Kowalski I929:XV; Baskakov tl al. 1974 (who also cite Zarax ma, 686).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 59

Rom ance area from those based on the verb zarah in the Judeo-Slavic
area. Contem porary Eastern European Ashkenazic Jew s also occasional­
ly use the substantival variant, but its age and geography still need to be
ascertained. T o the best of my knowledge, a verbal form zorax — zarax
is not encountered in G erm any or in the Iberian Peninsula—except for
C ataluna, an area which once contained Greek settlements (see above).
While a direct Judeo-G reek model seems plausible for Judeo-Slavic
forms of H e zarah, I would not rule out the Slavic Grecism as the pro­
totype, e.g. BrAnatolij. (O n Greek names shared by Jews and Christians,
see section 3.162 above.)
A num ber of Jewish anthroponym s of Slavic origin which have Yid­
dish and Greek translation equivalents are not attested now among Yid­
dish speakers, e.g. JW SI (Cz) St'astny (Prague 15th c),296 JESI (Br, Uk)
&asnyj (Br6st 1566) m a,297 JW Sl(Cz) Vesela fa (1546)298—literally
‘joy(ous)’ match native Y frtjde and sime fa ( < H e simhah ‘joy ’)299 as well
as Gk EuGymia fa, EuOymides ma. T he use of the term ‘jo y ’ is also well at•
tested in Judeo-R om ance languages.
JESI (Br, Uk) Plolka fa, literally ‘bee’ (L uc’k 1552, Br£st 1566)300 ~
Y duojre ( < H e dvorah) as well as Gk Melissa (‘bee’), Melissande (‘bee’ +
‘flower’) fa. Translation equivalents are not found in G erm an or
Rom ance languages.
See discussion of EY badane(s) and JESl(Br) Tanxonovic, etc. in section
3.161 above; JW Sl(Po) Glownia, etc., Swyathly above.

3.2 Judeo-Latin
T he possibility that Judeo-L atin speakers had contact with Slavs in
those areas of the Balkans which were to become Slavic-speaking after the
6 th century, is difficult to establish due to the absence of Judeo-L atin in­
scriptions and texts from there after the 6th century.’01 Judeo-R om ance
elem ents in the Yiddish spoken in G erm any and the Slavic lands offer lit-
tie elucidation since they can be conveniently ascribed to the Judeo-

2** Muneles 1966a:7. See further examples in H efm an 1965:36.

‫ ׳ ״‬Beriadskij 2:1882, # # 2 7 , 153.
” * Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:377.
2” He A > 0 in eirly G erm an Yiddish; for further discussion see section 6.4, fn. 157
below.
500 Beriadskij 3:1882, # #27, 153. Bystrori lists Pszczotka (‘bee1 dim) as a Polish Jewish
n am e, but without chronological or geographical detail (1936:238).
”” O n the spread of Latin into the Balkans, see Gerov 1980; Katific 1980; Solin
1980:325-329; U nterm ann 1980; Schramm 1981. O n Judeo-L atin speakers in North
A frica, see the testimony of St. Augustine (cited by M. W einreich 1:1973:97). O n Judeo-
L atin tombstones from Pannonia and the Balkans, see Baron 1957:207, 210, 332, fn. 50;
SeJem 1980:258-262 and section 3.1 above.
60 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

French and Judeo-Italian substrata of G erm an Yiddish or to a G reek in ­

term ediary (see discussion of O G Y (H e) + kalend in section 3 .134;
Aurelia, Florya fa in section 3.163 and the discussion in section 6 below).
O n the possibility that Qudeo-?) North Italian words associated w ith
Jew s may have been borrowed by the Slavs, see discussion of SI Ikola a n d
zid in sections 5.1411 and 5.511 respectively below.

3.3 (Judeo-)Asian languages

Asian linguistic components preserved in Old G erm an Yiddish a n d
non-Jewish languages of the Caucasus are valuable linguistic evidence
that Turkic-speaking K hazar Jews, Judeo-A ram aic- and -Ira n ia n ­
speaking Jews may have settled in the Slavic (presumably South U k ra i­
nian) lands, towards the end of the 1st m illennium .J0S At present, I can
only identify (a) two words in Yiddish of possibly Judeo-Iranian o rig in ;
(b) a term for ‘synagogue’ in Yiddish involving one of the Ju d eo -Iran ian
words that forms an onomasiological isogloss with African and A sian
languages and Classical Greek and Latin spoken by Jew s; (c) a possible
Iranian phrase in Yiddish; (d) a possible Judeo-A ram aic term in K h azar
Hebrew; (e) East European Jew ish anthroponym s of Hebrew origin
which are not typical of the corpus and/or pronunciation norm s of Y id ­
dish; (f) an innovative Judeo-Persian m eaning for a Hebrew loan in
Karaite. The presence of the Asian components in Yiddish was probably
due to diffusion through Judeo-Slavic, but an Asian Jewish physical
presence in the G erm an lands, alongside the Slavic Jew s, should not be
ruled out. U nfortunately, the Old Yiddish texts rarely provide attestation
of such material; furtherm ore, one Yiddish Iranianism is also found in
the East Slavic languages, which raises the possibility that the Asian co m ­
ponents in the Jewish languages might have been received through a
non-Jewish Slavic intermediary. In addition, the non-Jewish Slavic
languages and languages of the Caucasus offer a small corpus of H ebrew
elements, including anthroponym s, which conform to a non-Ashkenazic
pattern of pronunciation, but their immediate origin is unclear. W hile

For an "E astern ” origin of the Polish Jew s, see S. A. Bim baum 1926:1; A ltbauer
1929:106; Teszler 1942:6. Beranek proposed an “ A sian” origin for the first Jew s in
Palesse, but he neglected to olTer historical or linguistic evidence (1958:5). See also sec­
tion 1 above. The Soviet pre-W orld W ar II literature is also replete with assertions about
a pre-Ashkenazic substratum. For example. §apiro suggests that the first Jew s in
Belorussia and Lithuania were settlers from A rabia, Asia, Egypt, Greece, and especially
from the Caucasus and Volga regions. The languages of these settlers allegedly had an
impact on the Yiddish spoken in these areas (1939:119). $ul'm an also believes that V id-
dish has Slavicisms from the “ Eastern” Jews — but he does not make d e a r if they w ere
Slavic-speaking or not (1939:109).
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 61

th e Caucasus constitutes an independent Jewish culture area, the general

links between the Caucasus and the East Slavic lands makes a hypothesis
o f Jew ish contacts between the two areas attractive. Tw o pressing tasks
w hich confront Jewish interlinguistics are to explore further (a) the
geographical parallels between Iranian and Judeo-Iranian dialects, and
(b) the possibility of Judeo-Iranian—Judeo-Slavic contacts; these in­
vestigations should be conducted against the background of general
Iranian-Slavic contacts. ‫ נ‬0‫ג‬
3.31 (Judeo-)Iranian. The western-most branch of Judeo-Iranian is
Ju d e o -T a t, spoken now primarily in Daghestan. A Judeo-T at tradition
claim s that this Iranian Jewish com munity was responsible for converting
the K hazars to Judaism .104 Some historians believe that the Judeo-T ats
are descended from native Jew s and Alans (the ancestors of the modern-
day Ossetes) who converted to Jud aism .J0J T he existence of Alan
followers of Judaism is m entioned in the K hazar Hebrew correspondence
to H asdaj ibn Saprut■50‘ T he Iranian-speaking m ountain Jew s were first
observed by the Jewish traveler Eldad ha-Dani in the late 9th century.507
O n (Judeo-?)Tat as the purveyor of Grecisms to Russian peddlars’ slang
(ofenskij ja zy k ), see Vasm er 1909:5 and fn. 1 (and section 3.15, fn.178
above). There is also an Iranian presence recorded in the 3rd century AD
in D ura-E uropas—a city with an im portant Jewish settlement on the
E uphrates River in present-day Syria.508 O n Iranian names in use
am ong Rom an soldiers stationed in G erm any, see Solin 1980:323; on
Iran ian anthroponym ic influences in the Greek city states along the Black
Sea, see Zgusta 1955. Greek Jew s may also have settled in the K hazar
lands.309 O n the Iranian etymologies proposed for the Arabic term
‫נ‬arraddnijja (discussed in section 1, fn. 9 above), see Kmietowicz 1970. H.
Bim baum suggests that Jews in Kievan R us’ probably used some form
of M iddle Persian, but no evidence is forthcoming (1981a:232,
1981b:29-30).
3.311 (Judeo-)Iranian loans in Yiddish.
3.3111 Y dav(e)nen, daven-ful. For the expression ‘pray (Jews)’ contem ­

501 Shevelov 1965:614-617. For the suggestion that Ossete influenced the lenition of
CS1 *g in East Slavic dialects, see Abaev 1964a (with critique in Wexler 1977a:98). See
also Abaev 1964b for a putative Ossete-East Slavic grammatical isogloss, and Vasm er's
suggestion of a Judeo*Tat‫־‬East Slavic contact (cited below in section 3.31). See also sec­
tion 6.7 below. Fischer regards Russian as the source of a common Russian-Ossete ex­
pression of perfectivization by means of verbal prefixation (1977:219, 222).
504 Loewenthal 1952:62.
Baron 1957:208.
S(* See Golb and Pritsak 1982:102, 104, 106-107, 114*115.
507 E. N. Adler 1930:7-8.
For discussion of Iranian graflitti in the local synagogue, see Schmitt 1980:197-198.
Golden 1980:21; Golb and Pritsak 1982:30, 103.
62 J E W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

porary Eastern Yiddish uses the term dav(e)nen■, most W estern Yiddish
dialects use 'o’m , except those of G erm any and Bohemia which have
both term s.310 T he term ,o 'm is from O lt orate or O F r o(u)rer (13th c)
< L a t orare ‘pray’ (though the term is very rare in Judeo-French texts).
T he source of dav(e)nen is disputed, but several etymologies have been
proposed: (a) G erm anic,111 (b) “ O riental” , perhaps Iran ian ,3,2 (c)
L ithuanian,311 (d) G reek,314 and (e) L atin.311 T he Iranian hypothesis is
attractive on geographical and linguistic grounds. If we follow Max
W einreich and derive Y dao(e)nen from Iranian, then the ultim ate etymon
would be Ar dutva ‘prayer (as a concept rather than as a ritual)’. T h e fact
that dav(e)ntn only refers to praying by Jews (for non-Jews, Yiddish uses,
inter alia, moljen zix, etc. < Slavic) makes a specifically Jewish source
highly likely. The Arabic root is widespread in Islamic languages and,
via O ttom an Turkish, has spread to Balkan languages, see e.g. Pers doa,
O ttom an T u dua — duva, Cappadocian Gk dova, tovd,31* SeCr dova., n An
Arabic component could have spread to Turkic and Iranian languages
only after the 7th century; the Iranian (or Khazar?) Arabism might have
reached Yiddish through a Judeo-Slavic intermediary. If our analysis is
correct, then Yiddish would be the only West European language to have
inherited the Arabism through a non-O ttom an Turkish channel of diffu­
sion. The earliest known attestation of Y dav(e)nen on Slavic territory
comes from a Yiddish text from Tykocin, Poland (near Bialystok) dated
1550;118 on non-Slavic territory, the term is first encountered in 15th cen­
tury North Italian Yiddish (glossed by Kosover as ‘sing’).319 T he Italian
510 T he eastern limit of ,i 'm in colloquial Yiddish is impossible to determ ine since
Western Yiddish literary norms predominated in Eastern Yiddish circles until the early
19th century. Hence, attestation of the Judeo-R om ance component in a Krak6w Yiddish
text from 1579 (Shm eruk 1981b:34) might not reflect the situation in spoken Yiddish of
the time. The LCAAJ, # #229013, 229019 records o ’nt as far east as Silesia, e.g. at
Bytom and Pita For Western Yiddish, see Beranek 1965, m ap #92; Lowenstein 1969.
T he LCAAJ, #229018 records dav(t)nen at points quite far to the west, e.g. in the
Rhineland and in Luxembourg.
J‫ ״‬Kosover derives dav(t)nn1 from an older dojntn - M H G dotnm ‘resound, play, sing"
(1964:365-362). O n epenthetic v in dialects of Eastern Yiddish and Judeo-East Slavic, see
section 3.342 below. The oldest use of Y dojnen is from a North Italian manuscript from
the beginning of the 15th century (ibid. 367). See also Lowenstein 1969:27-28, m ap #7.
‫ > ״‬M. Weinreich 1956:626; 3:1973:85-87.
1,5 Jofe 1959:89-90; Copeland and Siisskind 1976:190-191.
>l4 Mieses suggests Gk d ti ‘want, ask for’ (1924:238).
‫נ‬,‫ י‬Lat divinare ,prophesy’ was suggested by W ilier 1915:398 (who translated the term
as, inlfr aim, ‘turn towards God, pray’ \su f\). See also M . Fraenkel 1961. For a critique
of these etymologies, see M. Weinreich 3:1973:85-87.
6‫ יי‬Dawkins 1916:674.
‫ ל ' י‬Skaljii 1966.
” • M. Weinreich 1956:626; 3:1973:85.
, , ‫ י‬Kosover 1964; Lowenstein 1969:27, fn. 13. Hence, Beranek’s claim that dae(1) m
in Western Yiddish was due to the migration of Eastern Yiddish speakers after the
X m el’nyc’kyj uprising in 1648 is to be rejected (1956:37-39).
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 63

Yiddish source suggests that the term was used in adjoining Bavarian
Yiddish—unless we are dealing with an Eastern Yiddish writer who settl­
ed in the Ashkenazic community of Northern Italy.
Added support for an Asian origin for dav(e)nen comes from the Eastern
Yiddish expression daven-sul ‘synagogue’, literally ‘pray’ + ‘synagogue’;
Sul is derived from Judeo-R om ance, though the semantic innovation of
using ‘school’ in the m eaning of ‘synagogue’ probably first developed in
Judeo-G reek (eg. sxole in Acts 19:9 seems to be the first example of the
new m eaning).320 The use of the root ‘pray’ to designate ‘synagogue’ was
typical of Judeo-L atin and Judeo-G reek (at least up to the 7th century
AD), and is still attested in a great many African and Asian Jewish
languages, e.g. JG k euxeTon (Egypt, 113 AD), oikos proseuxes (Septuagint,
Isaiah 60:7, Alexandria, 3rd c BC; literally ‘place of prayer’); pros-
eukterion (Egypt, writings of Philo, c. 1st c AD), proseuxe (Egypt, 3rd c BC;
Greece, c. 100 BC, literally ‘prayer’), JL a t proseucha (Juvenal, b.60?-
d.140?, Satires 3:296; synagogue inscription, Osijek, Yugoslavia, 3rd c
A D ),521 M oroccan, Iraqi Judeo-A rabic f la , 122 (J)Geo salocavi (literally
‘place of prayer’), JC hinese ll-bai-si (Kaifeng, H enan Province, 1489,
literally ‘prayer temple’).525 T he ultimate model for all these expressions
is H e bet tfillah (Isaiah 56:7), literally ‘house of prayer’, which occasional­
ly appears in the written Hebrew of speakers of Jewish languages, e.g.
C rim ean Karaite H ebrew .324 T he use of ‘pray’ to denote ‘synagogue’ is
occasionally attested in non-Jewish languages, e.g. Arm town agatl,ic^.32i
I n counterdistinction to the Jewish languages, the customary term for
‘synagogue’ in written Hebrew is bet kneset, literally ‘house of gathering’,

520 Sec (J)It scuola (1J 53), (J)Fr escoie (1183). ^J)Cat scoln (1391). W ithin Judeo-
R om ance, the term is unknown only in Judezm o and Judeo-Portuguese which use
reflexes o f (J ‫)?־‬Gk sjnagoge, e.g. JP t tsnoga (see section 3.127 above). Contemporaneous
C hristian Latin documents also use the term , e.g. Austrian Latin 1204, English Latin
12th-13th centuries (see Blondheim 1925:106-110, 115-119; Wexler 1981c: 125). In Latin
docum ents prior to the 12th century, ,synagogue’ is designated by synagoga (see e.g. the
G erm an Latin texts from the 5 t h 9 ‫־‬th centuries cited in Berg and Steur 1976).
321 Eventov 1971:31-32; Lifshitz 1975, #678a. Outside of Greece proper, proseuxe is
attested in Judeo-G reek inscriptions across a wide territory extending from Southern
S pain to the Black Sea littoral.
SM Salla ‘pray* and fata ,prayer’ arc common to both Jewish and non-Jewish dialects,
while fid is unknown in Muslim Arabic, though fold ,synagogue' is occasionally found
in written Arabic (see discussion in section 5.1511 below).
‫ ״ נ‬See Wexler 1981 c: 115, 117-118; 1985b for a comparative discussion.
M ann 2:1935:451 vs. T rakai K ar *church’ (ibid. 829, fn. 354a). See also Belgrade
J u d bed tefild ‘church’ (1862). O n the association of WY beis tefillo ‘church’ with tifle
‘ch u rch ’ (literally *abomination'), sec Beem 1967:132.
‫ גגג‬See Wexler 1981c:117. O , M H G beiahus, bete-t literally *house of prayer’, denoted
*church* and possibly also *synagogue’, but there is no parallel form in G erm an Yiddish
(W exler 1981c: 135, fn. 33).
64 JE W IS H LIN G U IS T IC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

which has become the most common pattern of expression in the non-
Jewish languages, e.g. Gk synagoge, Lat synagoga, conoenticulum, C lA rm
zogovaran; Ar knts, Pers kenest, konest, kanis(>) continue the cognate J A ra m
be(t) knrtta3.*16 Among Greek-speaking Jew s, synagoge usually denoted the
‘Jew ish com m unity’.” 7 Among non-Jewish languages, Persian seem s to
be unique in regularly using the root ‘pray’ to denote a native house of
worship, e.g. ‘m osque’, as in namazgah ( < namaz ‘obligatory M u slim
prayer’ + -gah m arker of place), namazxane ‘prayer house’ ( < ‘p ra y e r ’
+ xane ‘house, building’); Ar musaltan ‘place of p rayer’ could d esignate
both M uslim and non-M uslim edifices. For further discussion of te rm s
for ‘synagogue’ and ‘church’ < ‘pray’ in Jew ish and Slavic languages,
see sections 5.141-5.1412 below.
Positing an Asian provenience for Y dav(e)nen implies diffusion of a le x ­
ical item from east to west, while the general movement of Y iddish
speakers is from G erm any to the east; contem poraneous w estw ard
migrations of Yiddish speakers are also attested throughout the area b u t
on a much smaller scale (see discussion in section 6.1 below). T he c o n ­
tradiction between the general direction of G erm an Yiddish m igrations
and a putative westward diffusion for dav(e)nen can be resolved by a s su m ­
ing that the term might have been first acquired by Yiddish on Ju d e o -
West Slavic territory, and then diffused eastward by Yiddish after th e
12th- 13th centuries. Asian components in Yiddish which clearly diffused
from east to west are usually the names of imported cultural artifacts, a r e
not taken from a Jewish language, and never reach beyond the Y iddish
dialects of Eastern Poland. An example is T u pafa ‘jellied meat dish m a d e
from the leg of an animal; leg’ found, as a food term only, in the B alkan
languages, e.g. Balkan J u d paia, Rum pitfa. From R um anian, the te rm
spread to coterritorial Yiddish dialects (in the forms peia[j], pece) b u t
never spread further west than the Northwest Belorussian lands.118 F o r
other Turkic examples, see sections 5.4-5.42 below. Finally, we have to
posit a much later chronology for terms like Y petaj , etc. than fo r
dav(c)nen.
3.3112 EY sabas; O GY cwbw'V, EY Sibes. Yiddish speakers living in
the area encompassing the East Slavic lands (as far west as the Subcaj‫־‬-
pathian Ukraine), Lithuania and Poland use the term Saba! as a noun o r

m W exler 1981c: 117, 127IT.

1‫ ״‬Lat synagoga was used in the meaning o f ‘church’ up to the 5th century (B londheim
1927:41). See the Judeo-Iberian reflexes discussed in fn. 320 above.
” * The Turkish term is even found in the Judeo-Portuguese of the Dutch M arranos—
probably due to the impact of Balkan Judezm o (see Wexler 1982b;88-89). Com pare a ls o
the diffusion of Rum anianisms into Polish (see Nandri? 1934-1935), Belorussian a n d
Ukrainian (see Dzendzelivs'kyj 1958-1960); same of these terms are also found in c o te r­
ritorial Yiddish.
 JE W IS H L IN G U IS T IC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 65

interjection, signifying ‘an invitation to the guests at a wedding to con­

tribute money to the m usicians’.529 Yiddish musicians’ slang from
Poland also preserves the forms Sab, Sap, Hap and baS ‘m oney’, which may
be derived from SabaS.330 In fact, the reduced forms Sab and baS are inter­
changeable with SabaS in the m eaning ‘tip to musicians’ in Lithuanian
Y iddish.151 Prilucki is of the opinion that G slg schab ‘part of a prostitute’s
pay retained by the brothel’ is also related to the Yiddish m usicians’
te rm .552 The origin of Y SabaS was lost to Yiddish speakers at the turn of
the century, to judge from the plethora of recommended etymologies;555
bu t the source is clearly Iranian, e.g. Pers SabaS ‘money, tip (to the musi­
cians and dancers at weddings, banquets; to newly weds at the wedding);
brav o !’554 T he term in these meanings is also known am ong Jew s in
D aghestan (see J T a t SoboS)333 and in K urdistan.556 Ben-Ezra (following
D ov Sadan), believes the Iranianism reached Yiddish from U krainian
where it is a borrowing from T atar (1965:28). While such a chain of dif­
fusion is possible in principle, I harbor doubts. It is true that the term
is found in East Slavic, and even marginally in Polish,557 and in a
nu m b er of Turkic and Indie languages—but not with the Yiddish m ean­
ing; e.g. Pashtu, K urdish,558 U rdu, O ttom an Turkish and Azerbaj-

Liberm an 1960; Ben-Ezra 1965; Bar-El 1984:201-202. A future study should

establish in which cultures the custom prevails. Spectators and dancers at Greek wed­
dings also pay the Rom ani musicians (Dietrich 1983:293).
*M Prilucki 1918:276, 279, 290. See also Po musicians’ slg (W arsaw) bad (Wiec-
zorkiewicz 1974:410).
1,1 Op cil. 290, fn. 1. Wolf cites variants of schab in this m eaning as well as in the
m eanings of ‘portion of stolen goods; money paid to a person to m aintain his silence’ with
th e oldest attestation from 1851 (1956, #4764), but he derives the term , along with
synonym ous schappoll (1755), schapolis (1733), etc. from Y libolts ,ear of co m ’ ( < He lib-
boltl). W o lfs etymology of G slg schab is not convincing in view of the Yiddish and Slavic
d a ta . See also Weissenberg I913a:130, 133.
‫ ״‬J Prilucki 1918:276, fn. 3. See also R bai '2 kopecks’ (Dal' 1863-1866), Cz slg Mb
(O berpfalcer 1934:332) and Hg. slg sap (Benkfl el at. 1967-1984).
‫ ״‬J See details in Liberm an 1960. Note the spelling ibt in a Hebrew text from Lida,
Belorussia 1515 (Harkavi 1865:39ff; Levin 1984), showing that the author believed the
term was from He iabbat ‘S abbath’. See also fh. 347 below.
1‫ ״‬Ben-Ezra 1965. H arkavi 1865:3911appears to have been the first to propose an Ira­
n ian etymology (see also Levin 1984).
*‫ ״‬T he Judeo-T at term is an exclamation uttered by the girlfriends of the bride when
presents are being given to her at the wedding, or to the newly wed couple after the wed­
ding . See Prilucki 1918:276 and Ben-Ezra 1965 (with references).
” • Brauer gives !abaiej ‘gift’ (1947:100)—without specifying if the term is used in K ur­
dish or Judeo-N eo-A ram aic o r both. Yona Sabar informs me that the term !aba! is used
in K urdish and Christian Neo-Aramaic in the meanings ‘well done, bravo; money given
to m usicians at a wedding’ while in K urdish Judeo-Neo-Aram aic the term means ‘con•
trib u tio n of money given by the guests at a wedding to the new couple’.
J‫ ״‬Kariowicz el al. cite the term without indicating whether it is characteristic of the
Polish spoken in ethnic Polish, Belorussian or Ukrainian lands (1900-1927).
1J* Ja b a regards the Kurdish term as a loan from Persian (1879).
66 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

d ia n i preserve the term in the m eaning of ‘bravo!; appreciate, a p p ro v e’,

but the meaning ‘tip ’ (in any context) is not recorded in contem porary
standard dictionaries.1,9 In all three standard East Slavic languages,
!aba! is used in the m eaning of ‘time off from work; finish w ork;
enough!’; this m eaning is also attested in some Soviet Turkic la n ­
guages, e.g. T atar and Komi (due to interference from R ussian? ).540
East Slavic dialects have additional meanings which bear a ce rtain
similarity to the Persian m eaning of ‘tip’, e.g. R iabdiki ‘wood cuttings
taken home by carpenters from w ork’,541 (Don dial) na iabaldx ‘free, on
someone else’s expense’, na !dbaiax doexal ‘went by boat without row ing,
carried by the w ind’,542 Br Saba! ‘rest; advantage; enough’.545 Note also
Kab !aba! ‘Saturday’.544 If Po szabatura ‘leather bag, purse for m oney’ is
derived from dial szabasz, then we may have yet another connection w ith
the Iranian m eaning ‘tip’; Uk !abatura ‘paper bag, carton’ now has no
connection with ‘m oney’.s4i But if we relate Po szabatura and Uk !abatura
to Pers !aba!, we have to explain the presence of the t. I suggest that the
t might be due to confusion of the Iranianism with H e !abbat ‘S a b b a th ’,
where the t would be pronounced as a stop in m any non-Ashkenazic p ro ­
nunciation norms, see e.g. K ar sabat; see also O Br !abat (early 16th c),
O U k / abat (16th c), Po sabat, Li labatas. 546 T he m eaning ‘stop w ork’ in
East Slavic and Polish also suggests a merger of the Iranianism and the
Hebraism , since observant Jew s refrain from working on the S abbath.
In Russian, however, ‘Jewish S abbath’ is pronounced !aba! with initial
(Yiddish) stress. Slavic lexicographers often derive both R !aba! and !abas

1,9 11 is unclear if T u caba (spelt variously in O ttom an Turkish as diaba, diaba, diabah)
'g ratis' and Gk tzampa !diaba! ‘favor; gratis’ are related to the Persian term . But see
Anatolian T u !aba, foba ‘money collccted for musicians' (in the Mara{, G aziantep and
Seyhan districts) (Tietze 1967:155).
5,0 See Abdrazakov 1966 and Lytkin 1961 respectively. T he oldest Russian attestation
of Iaba! is in Gel’tergof 1771.
‫ ״‬l Dal’ 1863-1866. The same meaning is given for W Brjansk Br and Polessian Uk
(M yxajlo-Kocjubyns’ke) SabaSka (Rastorguev 1973 and Lysenko 1961:70). See also
Smolensk R SabaSka *top of a cut tree’ (Dobrovol'skij 1914). It is unclear if R iabasnik
‘bidens (large genus of herbs)' is related (V asm er 3:1958).
542 O vfinnikova 1976:198. See also R !aba! ‘free of charge; stop rowing’ (Dal'
1863-1866).
s‫ ״‬Nosovii 1870.
»« Von Erckert 1895:154.
J4> Kartowicz et al. regard Po szabatura as a loan from Ukrainian (citing sabattra)
(1900-1927). In Ukrainian, the word is also found as a family name.
5,4 The Old Belorussian form (along with variant Sabas 1616), is from Bulvka
1972b:358; 1980:184; the Lithuanian form coexists alongside Sabas(as), Saba (dial) (Senn
and Salys 4:1963); the Old Ukrainian form is taken from Ohijenko 1930. See also C i
sab(b)at ‘Sabbath; group of witches and spirits' (Pech 1948).
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 67

from Y fabes,**7 but to the best of my knowledge only V iner 1895 has ever
proposed Pers !abas as the etymon of the East Slavic forms (see also sec­
tion 7.321 below). Finally, another possible link between East Slavic and
the Persian m eaning ‘tip to musicians, dancers’ may be Uk sdba!
‘dancing on a holiday’.348
T he relationships between Yiddish, East Slavic and Persian are
presented in models A and B of table 2 below.

Table 2.
Two models for the diffusion of (Judeo•) Persian iabai to Eastern Yiddish

P ers Iabai ‘bravo’ — Pashtu, Judeo-N eo-A ram aic, U rdu, O ttom an Turkish,
J t (?) A zerbajdzhani, K irghiz’•’ ________
‘tip’ -> Judeo-Persian — (via Judeo-Slavic?) — | Yiddish |.
I (via Turkic?)
(?) ‘purse’ (Polish); ‘paper bag, carton’ (Ukrainian);
‘wood carried home by carpenters’ (Russian, Belorussian); ‘stop work;
free; enough’ (Russian, U krainian, Belorussian, Polish, T atar)” 0
M odel A. Y iabai is not derived from ESI iabai

Pers Iabai ‘bravo’ — same languages as above

I I (?)
‘tip‫־‬
1 (via Turkic?)“ 1
*East Slavic — (?) ‘purse’ (Polish); etc...
I_____
I Yiddish I
M odel B. Y iabai is derived from ESI iabai

‫ ״ נ‬See Dal’ 1863-1866. V asm er 3:1958 categorically rejects a T urkic origin (proposed
by Miklosich 2:1884:162 and K oii 9:1886:669) and advocates a Yiddish origin. Sipova
1976 apparently also rejects a T urkic origin, to judge from the exclusion of the term from
h er dictionary of Turkic components in Russian. Vasmer also lists R dial tabus
(Smolensk) but he does not specify whether the meaning is ‘Sabbath’ or ‘enough’ or both
(sec also PoY slg lap cited above) but Dobrovol’skij 1914 uses iabus (iidovskij) ‘(Jewish)
holiday’ to gloss R iabai. The two meanings ‘S abbath’ and ‘enough’ arc different not on­
ly in stress but also in derivational patterns, e.g. R iabaieoat' , -oval' ‘observe the Jewish
S ab b ath ’ vs. R iabdiit', Uk iabaiyty ‘finish working'. See also discussion of ESI iabai in
section 7.54 below. T he two stress patterns are listed separately in Filin et al. 17:1965,
b u t no separate etymon is suggested for iabai.
2 •‫ י י‬elexivs‘kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886
J‫ ״‬See Kirghiz iabas (rare) ‘brave, fine fellow’ (Judaxin 1965).
350 I regard ‘not w orking', along with the Russian meaning ‘wood taken home by
carpenters’ as a kind of tip.
3,1 I would also entertain the possibility of divergent Iranian or T urkic sources for the
surface cognates in various Slavic dialects. For example, Br xadidin and xadz'ain
(Babrujsk) ( — stR xozjain) ‘proprietor’ may owe their origins to different Turkic sources,
such as T at xodla vs. Cuv xoza (in Paasonen 1950, bui ’a) (see also W exler 1977a: 174 and
fn. 1). T he DABM 1963, m ap #334 gives the variants and their geography. See also the
discussion of Br mjalic' — meiu' ‘m osque’, mulla, etc. ‘religious teacher' in section 5
below.
68 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

Model A is the more appealing model for four reasons: (a) the Slavic
and Yiddish cognates are semantically disparate; (b) Jew ish languages
tend to preserve the form and/or meaning of a non-native com ponent
with greater fidelily than the non-Jewish target languages (see also sec­
tion 2 above and the examples of Slavicisms common to Yiddish and
G erm an in sections 6.2-6.225 below); the Iranian m eaning ‘tip ’ is (c)
unattested in any dialect of East Slavic or in any Turkic language spoken
north of A zerbajdiani speech territory,353 yet (d) is found in G erm a n
Hebrew cw bw 'i'/ + 'c’ubu'i' ‘small coin’ (in a study of R ashi’s Bible co m ­
m entary written by an anonym ous Rhineland Jew in the 13th-14th cen•
tury);355 see also ModEY iibes ‘small coin; trifle’. T he old W estern
Yiddish facts make an East Slavic carrier very doubtful. O n the assu m p ­
tion that iabai, Jibes and cw bw 's’ are all related, we may conclude th at
JP ers sabai reached Yiddish via a specifically Judeo-Slavic carrier in two
waves: (a) via Judeo-E ast and West Slavic, JP ers iabai first becam e
OW Y (He) cw bw 'i' with the phonetic changes reflecting perhaps a d ­
justm ents to the Yiddish sound pattern or dissimilation of i > c o r c ; as
iibei, the Judeo-Persianism was re-exported to Eastern Europe as Y iddish
expanded eastw ard;554 (b) via Judeo-W est or East Slavic, JP ers ia b a i was
borrowed a second time by Eastern Yiddish. If Smolensk R iabus ( z id o v
skij) ‘(Jewish) holiday’ (cited in fn. 347 above) is related to O G Y (H e)
c w b w 'i‘, then a Judeo-East Slavic interm ediary becomes highly likely—
since the dialect of Smolensk historically had close affinities with Belorus­
sian dialects to the west, where (in the area of Mahilew), a monolingual

1,7 The term is not attested in the K araite dictionary of Baskakov el al. 1974.
The manuscript was found in the Cairo Genizah and is now preserved in the
library of Trinity College, Cam bridge under the inventory num ber F. 12.135. T he w ord
appears in the chapter entitled b>xuiotaj, where Rashi was commenting on Leviticus
27:18. I am grateful to Josef Bar-El for calling my attention to the W estern Yiddish
source. See also Bar-El 1984. O n the pronunciation of the Hebrew letter cadi as ic,H in
medieval Judeo-Italian, see Banitt 1949:70-71; on Yiddish sibilant confusion, see F aber
1982:87-90. See also section 3.134, fn. 130 above. In contemporary Yiddish, lib ti is
spelled as ijbwi, as if it were of Hebrew origin. T his is probably since Hebrew n o u n s of
the form CjCivC arc pronounced in Yiddish with e in the second syllable (e.g. H e tim id
‘study’ > Y limed). Wolf 1956, # 4886 derives G slg Schibbusch ‘error’ (1822) from Y libel
(sic!) ‘bad, poor, worthless’ (sic!)—but the ultim ate source of the G erm an term is rather
He iibbui ‘complication, dislocation’. See also G slg (Hessen) schubes ~ schuwesgehm ‘go
to pieces; be lost’ (G unther 1912:192). G unther (ibid.) also derives G slg (H essen)
schi(e)wes ‘evening’, schirb ‘holiday’ from He itvtt ‘sitting’, but on semantic grounds
( ‘holiday’ — ‘wedding’), Pers iabai is a more likely source. Eastern Yiddish m ay have
restored i- (vs. OGY[He] cwbw'i*) through assimilation to -/ in the second syllable, or by
interference with iabai. See also discussion in section 3.1621, fn. 240 above.
could have developed from iabai through stress retraction and vowel harm ony,
e.g. iabai > ' label >iibei (see Y ponem -face': pmemer pi < He panim ‘face’ pi t). OGY
cwbw'i' may have been an attem pt to rcllect the vowel harm ony or an im proper
spelling—due to the formal similarities of He j and w.
 J E W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLA VIC LANDS 69

Slavic-speaking Jewish com munity was encountered in the 17th century

(see sections 4.3 and 6.57 below). M oreover, if the G erm an slang
v arian ts cited above with a in the first syllable (e.g. schab, etc.) are indeed
from Pers iabai, then we may have further evidence that the original form
of the Iranianism was known in the G erm an lands—though we cannot
rule out a later diffusion of EY iabai to G erm an dialects.
3.312 A Judeo-Iranian Hebraism in Karaite: hag. At present, 1 can on­
ly identify a single Judeo-Iranian element in Karaite. In both the C ri­
m ean and Lithuanian (Trakai) dialects of the language, xydz ( < Ar hadzdz
‘pilgrim age to M ekka’) is used in the m eaning o f ‘Karaite yearly festival’
(see also xydi el- ‘celebrate’).345 The semantic innovation seems to be due
to contam ination with the Hebrew surface cognate hag ‘holiday’, which
is found in Judeo-Persian as well.356 Alternatively, I could also assume
that both K araite and Judeo-Persian continue a common Judeo-A rabic
innovation, traces of which are now lost in the source language.357 A
Judeo-A rabic substratum in colloquial Karaite could come either from
the theological and scientific texts composed by Arabic-speaking Karaites
or from direct contact with spoken Judeo-A rabic in the Middle E ast.358
The systematic study of (Judeo-)Iranian elements in the Karaite dialects
remains an urgent desideratum of Jew ish interlinguistics.
3.313 Pers iiri morg. See section 3.15 above.
3.32 (Judeo• )Turkic. The Jew s have become speakers of Turkic
languages on a num ber of occasions. K hazar converts to Judaism after
the 8th century probably were the first Jewish speakers of a Turkic
language. T he Khazar Empire occupied the territory of the Ponto-
Caspian steppeland during the 8th to 10th centuries, until its defeat by
Kievan R us’. The Judaicized Khazars were predominantly T urkic­
speaking, but their language is not attested except for fragmentary,
mainly onomastic, m aterials.359 T he second association of Jew s with a
Turkic language was during the setdement of Greek- and/or Arabic-

In ihe K araite spoken in H alyi, West Ukraine, we find the Arabic cognate in the
forms adzj with a meaning closer to that of Arabic, i.e. 'pilgrimage (to the Holy L and)';
see also Crim ean K ar {jtru)xadit fam, literally ,pilgrim to Jerusalem ’ (Weissenberg
1914:104). Kariowicz cites the Serbian surface cognate (h)adi1(ja) in the meaning
‘pilgrimage to Jerusalem (for Christians], M ekka’ (1894*1905, under hadzy)\ see also
Smailovif 1977:259-260.
Paper 1978:109.
I know of no parallel development in Iraqi Judco-Arabic. See slPers hadi(di)
'pilgrimage to M ekka’. In his discussion of JA r hadi fam ( < ‘Jew who has performed
the pilgrimage to Jerusalem ’), Laredo implies a connection with He hag (1978:559).
Blondheim notes that some Judeo-Arabism s in Judeo-R om ance texts may be due
to the popularity of the Arabic literature written by Jews (1925; 145ff).
Golden 1980. O n K rym s'kyj’s classification of K hazarian T urkic, see Nikulin
1974:114-116.
70 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

speaking Karaites in the C rim ea perhaps two centuries later; this led to
the creation of K araite, a Judeo-Q iipiaq language. The history of a
related Crim ean Qip£aq language, Krym£ak, remains unclear.560 In re­
cent days, a Judaicized variant of Iranian A zerbajdiani has been
reported am ong Neo-Aramaic-speaking Kurdish Jews; this is apparendy
a recent development.361 The fate of the K hazar Jew s cannot be deter­
mined with certainty, though it has been suggested that they were ab­
sorbed by such heterogeneous groups as the K araites,562 by two groups
presently residing primarily in the Daghestan ASSR—the Judeo-Tats
(also known as "M o u n tain Jew s” )565 and the Kumyks (a M uslim peo-
pie),564 by the Crim ean K rym iaks,565 the Bukharan Jew s56* and the
Cossacks.567 T he existence of a K hazar Jewish community in Kiev in the
early 10th century is proven by a recently discovered Hebrew-Khazar
document from K iev.568 Theories about K hazar migrations to Hungary,
Czechoslovakia, Poland and Lusatia, or to the C em ihiv area of the
Ukraine in the l l t h 1 2 ‫־‬th centuries,569 cannot be established, while the
widespread allegation that K hazar toponyms can be found in Poland has
absolutely no basis.570 T he answer to the question of what ultimately
became of the K hazar Jewish population after the collapse of the Khazar
Empire in the late 10th century depends on two very im portant inter­
related events in East European history which are still not fully

O n "Ju d co -C u m an '’, see sections 3.1 and 3.12, fn. 33 above.

5,1 Michael Zand has called my attention to this development, which has yet to be
discussed in the literature.
*M Brutzkus 1930:347; Zaj^czkowski 1947. T his view was justly citicized by Pritsak
1949. O n Karaite-Khazar linguistic contacts, see also Nadel 1959. For a brief description
of the Karaite!!, see section 1, fn. 2 above.
Brutzkus 1930:347; 1937:41-42; 1939:30; Loewenthal 1952:63.
JM Brutzkus 1930:347. Kumyk is related to Karaite.
>‫ ״‬Ibid. 1930:347; 1939:30; 1944:116; Friedman 1959:1503-1504.
‫ * ״‬Brutzkus 1939:30.
Friedman quotes two recent writers who met Cossacks claiming direct Khazar des­
cent (as well as Cossacks who called themselves Subbotnik! in Russian) (1959:1511). On
Subbotniki as possible descendants of converts to Judaism , see ibid. 1961:18, Ukrainskij
1912:11-12 and Brutzkus 1932:522 (with a list of locales in Russia, the Ukraine and the
Caucasus where they resided). The family name Subotmk is attested am ong Jew s, but I
lack geographical details. See also section 3.341, fn. 388 below. Leroy-Beaulieu notes that
Subbotniki in Southern Russia and the Caucasus called themselves ghrry ( < He gn ‘pros-
elyle’ + R -y pi) (3: 1889: 518). In Russian, subbotnik denotes labor freely given to the
state on days off or overtime.
Gold and Pritsak 1982.
Rawita-Gawrortski 1924: Iff; Siper 1926b:25fT; Brutzkus 1930:347-348; 1939:22;
Shevelov 1979:211. HunfaJvy suggests that Hungarian Muslims of the 13th century were
descendants of the Bulgars and Khazars (1877:2181T).
‫?י‬° The claim was made, inter alia, by Brutzkus 1927, but has no foundation what‫׳‬
soever (see Altbauer 1977 (196lb]:48). For a no less fanciful Khazar-Hungarian
linguistic (non‫״‬toponymic) connection, sec H6m an 1:1940:151.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 71

und ersto o d: the rise of Kievan R us’ and the demise of the K hazar Em ­
p ire . But, even if K hazar groups did coexist with non-Turkic Jew s in the
U k ra in e after the 10th century, they would probably have shared the
sa m e fate of destruction and dispersal as all the peoples in the area during
th e T atar invasions of the 13th century. A better understanding of the
history of the contemporary non-Ashkenazic and non-Sephardic Jewish
com m unities in the C rim ea and the Caucasus, i.e. K rym fak and T at
Je w s , and the Karaites may ultimately shed light on the make-up of the
early East Slavic Jewish com m unities.371

3.321 A possible Judeo-T urkic substratum in Balkan Judezm o. T he sem antic

expansion of H e darom ‘south’ to denote both ‘south' and ‘noon’ in Balkan
J u d e z m o may be of T urkic origin. T his developm ent is rem iniscent of the
K a raite use of b o th H e cafon ‘n o rth ’ and He darom ‘south' in the dual m eanings
‘n o rth ; m idnight’ and ‘so u th ; n oon’ respectively.J7‫ ־‬T here is some evidence of
th is sem antic innovation in O ld T urkish (see e.g. gun ‘d a y ’: guney ‘south’ only).
T h e re is also a full parallel in Slavic and non-Slavic languages, but apparently
n o t in the South Slavic or other Balkan Indo-E uropean languages, e.g. O C z
pulnoc, Po potnoc, Br pownal, U k p iv n ii ‘north; m idnight'; O C z poledne, Po potud-
n it, Br paludnie, U k powden' ‘south; noon’.‫ ״‬J W hile the sem antic innovation in
B alkan Ju d ezm o could be a purely local developm ent, the sim ilarity with
K a raite and other T urkic languages makes a T u rk ic—but not necessarily
T u rk is h —source for the Balkan Ju d ezm o phenom enon attractive. Unlike Old
T u rk ish , where native com ponents are involved in the sem antic recalibration,
in the Jew ish languages it is only the H ebrew loans darom and cafon which are
afTected. C onnecting the Balkan Ju d ezm o developm ent to (Judeo-)T urkic re­
q u ires assum ing that T urkic speech patterns were introduced to Balkan Judez-
m o through a Turkicized Judeo-G reek; the historical basis for such a claim
needs study, though Evliya Qelebi, the celebrated 17th century T urkish
traveler, did record the presence of C rim ean Jew s in M acedonia.’74

Karaite assumes special importance not only because it is the only Qi'pfaq Turkic
language brought ( 0 the Belorussian and Ukrainian lands which survives to our day, but
also because it preserves some Hebrew elements not attested either in the written Hebrew
o r in the colloquial Jewish languages of other extant Jewish communities in the Caucasus
and C rim ea. For examples of Karaite Hebraisms, see Gottlober 1865:208-219; Furst
3:1869, section 8, fn. 138; M ann 2:1935:539 , 899; Moskovich and T ukan 1980:93.
5,1 See Wexler 1983b:33.
, , ‫ י‬See also Cz ttlrm i ‘evening’ adj; (arch) ‘north’; jiin i 'south’ adj; (arch) ‘noon’
(Sed inov£ 1981:81); Fr midi ‘noon; south*; Algerian Ar tifahra ‘north1: fahr *noon' (Ben
Sedira 1910). The large num ber of examples of semantic overlap in widely separated
languages raises the possibility of a semantic universal. Hebrew and G erm an share a
related set of m eanings, e.g. He *mo, G Abend ‘evening’: He ma'ardv, G Abendland ‘west’::
He zarah ,blossom, shine’, G Morgen ‘morning*: He mizrah, G Morgenland ‘east’. See also
G slg zojon *midnight; deep darkness; north' ( < He cafon) (Wolf 1956, #6381); no reflex
of He darom is cited by Wolf.
See Dimitrov 1972:220. This topic needs further study. A T atar population is still
found in D obrudia (e.g. the Gagauz).
 I
1

72 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

3.322 Alleged K hazar phonological interference in K hazar Hebrew.

Pritsak has proposed that the choice of the qof grapheme in Uk Khazar
H e qjjwv3‫‘ ־‬K iev’ (c. 930) reflects the “ H unno-B olgarian-Turkic” pro­
nunciation with back q —rather than the Iranian pronunciation with k .m
T he choice of qof over k a f Ikl in one example can hardly suffice as
evidence of K hazar impact, especially since qof is the preferred grapheme
for native Ikl in a num ber of Jewish languages, e.g. Yiddish, Judeo-
Polish, Judeo-W est Slavic (in the Czech lands) and Ju d eo -Italian .576
3.323 K hazar terms in Byzantine Greek and Russian. Gk tzitzakion liic-l
‘K hazar article of clothing’ was said by Constantine Porphyrogenitus
to have been introduced into Byzantium in the 8th century by the Khazar
wife of the Emperor Constantine Copronym us; the word seems to be
derived from Turkic *iic'ak ‘flower’—the original nam e of the Khazar
princess.577 Baskakov posits the ethnonym ‘K hazar’ as the basis of R
Kacarev (1735) and Kazarin(ov) (1890) fam (the forms may, alternatively,
come from an unspecified Greek root) (1979:135-136, 256). See also
discussion of Kum qagal in section 7.53 and alleged K hazar toponyms in
Poland in section 7.113, fn. 85 below.
3.33 Judeo-A ram aic. In section 2 above we described the position of
Judeo-A ram aic on the chain of Jewish language shift. A direct Judeo-
Aramaic substratum is not in doubt for Judeo-G reek and Judeo-Latin;
it may also be imputed for Judeo-G eorgian and for Judeo-A sian and
African languages created in the first millennium AD. In addition, there
is a variety of evidence suggesting that a Judeo-A ram aic population
might have persisted in Germanic lands late enough to have contact with
speakers of Yiddish and Judeo-Slavic. Tavjov appears to be the first
scholar to suggest that Jews from Palestine, Syria and Babylonia brought
Aramaic to G erm any (1923a:214).

3.331 A possible colloquial Judeo-A ram aic substratum in G erm an Yiddish.

T h ere are five reasons to suspect a Judeo-A ram aic-speaking com m unity in
W estern Europe towards the end of the first m illennium , (a) Jew ish and non-
Jew ish Aram aic speakers can be observed in W estern Europe as late as the 6th
cent ury. ‫( ילג‬b) T h e “ H ebrew ” corpus in Yiddish is largely identical in its

175
Golb and Pritsak 1982:55; see also 143.
17‘
See Gumowski 1975; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956 and Freedman 1972:54-55 respect-
ivelv.See also discussion in section 4.2 below.
»”See MoravJik 1931; Golden 1980:175-176.
A 51h century Syrian ivory carving has been discovered in Moravia (H ensd
1956:433, drawing #433). O n a 4th-5!h century Greek inscription from T rier referring
to immigranis from Syria, see Brehier 1903:17; Aramaic inscriptions found in the
Rhineland in the 1930s are discussed by Asaria 1959:35. See also mention of Syrians in
Orleans in a Latin document from 585 (Aronius 1902, #48). O n Syrians and Jews in
the Rom an Kmpire, see Solin 1980. Aramaic-speaking Jew s are known from Greece and
 J E W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 73

distributional and sem antic norm s with the late H ebrew com ponent found in
Ju d eo -A ram aic— with both differing from Biblical Hebrew norm s significantly.
T h is suggests transm ission of H ebraism s to Yiddish through colloquial (Judeo-
A ram aic) rather than textual (H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic) channels. For ex­
am ple, Yiddish continues H e jam fov instead of (older) Biblical H e mo^ed ‘holi-
d a y ’. 57’ (c) M oreover, some relics of a “ non-A shkenazic” pronunciation of
H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic com ponents in Yiddish (e.g. W Y k^al < H e qahal
vs. EY kol — kid: see discussion in section 7.53 below) further support the
hypothesis of a direct transm ission of A ram aic elem ents to Southeast G erm any.
In the 13th century (?) the pronunciation of most of the H ebrew and Judeo-
A ram aic com ponents was recalibrated to the new Ashkenazic pronunciation
norm s which were spreading eastw ard from the Rom anicized W estern part of
G e rm a n y .590 Also supporting the hypothesis of a direct transm ission of Judeo-
A ram aic to Yiddish are the facts (d) that the H ebrew and Judeo-A ram aic com ­
ponent is exceedingly uniform through tim e and space and (e) tends to p a r­
ticipate in the phonological laws which characterize the history of the individual
Y iddish dialects.
O n JA ram nudinah ‘city’ in K hazar H ebrew and W estern Yiddish, see section
3.332 below.
3.332 A possible Judeo-A ram aic im pact on K hazar H ebrew . T he possibility
th a t a colloquial Judeo-A ram aic com m unity m ight have had contact with Slavs
in the C rim ean area is difficult to establish since we lack inform ation on the shift
from A ram aic to Arabic and oth er languages in the M iddle East both am ong
Je w s and non-Jew s.5’ 1 U ntil such inform ation is forthcom ing, A ram aism s (and

Italy (Leon 1960:75, 307; W exler 1981c: 127). The diffusion of Aramaic am ong Euro­
pean Jews and non-Jews needs a deep study. O n the Aramaic component in Maltese,
see Borg ms. There are also Aramaic elements in the colloquial speech of Western Libyan
Jew s in Jebel Nefusa, observed by Slouschz at the turn of the century (though not iden­
tified as such by him) (1937:239-243).
‫ * ״‬D. K atz 1979:34; 1985. Though mo^ed is used in other Jewish languages, e.g.
K araite and Balkan Judezm o. yom tot also appears as a male anthroponym in the Iberian
Sephardic and Ashkenazic culture areas (see section 3.341 below). Yiddish has He mo'-ed
only in the expression xalrmojid ‘the intermediary weekdays between the first two and last
days of Passover and Sukkot’ ( < He hol-ham^nf).
These views are elaborated in D. Katz 1979:47fT; 1985. The LCAAJ, # #233010,
233013, 233015 plots the geography of I — s reflexes for the Hebrew lav graphem e in final
postvocalic position. From these maps we learn that 1 -forms predom inate in the
southwest com er of G erm any, though at Bad Kreuznach, both dales and daltt were
elicited. Curiously, G erm an slang lists often preserve multiple reflexes of both the
Hebrew qamac and tao graphem es, e.g. (the early Ashkenazic) a and t and (later
Ashkenazic) 6 and s. Examples are G slg da/Ul ‘four’ < He dalii fourth letter of the
Hebrew alphabet vs. delUs ‘door’ < He dtltl (Philoparcho 1768:496-497; Rapp
1952:241); mackum (attested since the early 16th c) vs. mokum (since the 18th c) ‘city’ <
H e maqdm ‘place’ (G unther 1912:159). (Philoparcho 1768:504-505 differentiates mackum
‘place’ from mocknm ‘city’; see also discussion in section 3.332 and fn. 384 below.) These
examples show the param ount importance of studying the pronunciation o f Hebrew
elem ents in G erm an dialects.
5,1 Among C hristians, it was never fully lost; see pockets of Aramaic in Syria and com ­
pact populations in Kurdistan (where it has also been acquired by Kurdish Jews).
74 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

H ebraism s) in C aucasian, T urkic and Indo-E uropean languages could be

assum ed to be either sub- or adstrataJ in origin. For exam ple, in a 10th century
K hazar H ebrew text, the term nudinah appears to have the Judeo-A ram aic
m eaning ‘m etropolis’ rath er than the H ebrew m eaning ‘state’,3,3 though we
m ighl want to posit, alternatively, interference from (Judeo-) A rabic, w here the
cognate madina m eans ‘city’.’*’ Occasionally, W estern Yiddish and G erm an
slang also use mxKnah in the m eaning of ‘city’ (the usual m eaning is ‘state’), see
e.g. DuY mediene 'flatland; Jew ish com m unities outside A m sterdam ; town,
village; nest’ (Beem 1967), G slg Mokum-Matina ‘A ugsburg’ (1823)’•*— unless
the word designates ‘province, state’ (A ugsburg was the capital of the ad­
m inistrative district of Schwaben and N euburg).

3.333 Judeo-A ram aism s in Slavic and languages of the Caucasus. On

putative (Judeo-)Aramaisms in non-Jewish languages of the Caucasus,
see sections 7.5-7.64 below.
3.34 Asian Jewish anthroponym s in the Slavic lands. T here are several
types of Hebrew anthroponym s found in the G erm an and Slavic Jewries
which point to a non-(W est) European origin: anthroponym s (a) derived
from the calendar cycle (see section 3.341) and (b) not commonly used
in West European Jewish communities (see section 3.342). O n the non-
Yiddish pronunciation of Hebrew names, see section 7.4 below.
3.341 Anthroponyms derived from the calendar cycle: He hannukah;
jom fov; mah jajita; ntsan; ptsah; tis^dh b>3dv. T he tradition of nam ing male
children born on a holiday by the nam e of the holiday itself is found in
a num ber of Jewish and non-Jewish groups, e.g. am ong Ashkenazic
Jew s, e.g. Y jom tof m a ,jo m le f — jonlef fam; ‘holiday’, both < H e jom (do,
literally ‘good day’. Such a nam ing practice also exists in Palestinian
Hebrew, e.g. baggaj m a < H e hag ‘holiday’, as well as in European non-
Jew ish and Turkic languages, e.g. Fr Noel, It Nalale ma ‘Christmas’
< L a t (dies) nalalis ‘(day) of (C hrist’s] b irth ’, R Paraskeoa fa < JG k ‘Fri­
day’ (see section 3.122 above);385 T atB r Bajramsuba, Bajramsuw(owicz),
Ramazan fam < T u bayram ‘festival’, ramazan ‘month of R am adan’ (< A r

St. Nino, the 4th century patron saint of Georgia, who hailed from Cappadocia. relate!
that she was able to converse with Aramaic-speaking Jews in Georgia (see T am anti
1910:183); on the possibility that the Slavic missionary St. Cyril knew Syriac, see Korol-
juk 1981:117. tbn Xordaflbeh’s passage on the languages spoken by the Jewish mer­
chants (Radhanites) does not include Aramaic (see section 1, fn. 9 above).
*•’ Golb and Pritsak 1982:117.
5,3 Note also the use of He (or JA ram ) bmdjntf + bimdinal ‘in the city o f in a Judeo-
Persian text from C hina (1619-1626) < Pers madint ‘city’ < Ar madina (see Wexler
1983a). In theory, the expression could be read as (Ar) bimadinat 'in the city o f. For
discussion of nudinah, see also Kokovcov 1932.
J‫ ״‬Wolf 1956, #3646; see also 1bid. #3502.
J‫ ״‬For G erm an examples, see Hirzel 1962:41-43.
 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 75

rama4an).'s*t T he practice of nam ing boys after holiday terms and special
days is also widespread am ong Jew s in M uslim countries,387 and the
Balkan Sephardim , see e.g. Ju d iabata, dim ia(ba)tula, sabatuhka fa < H e
Sabbat ‘S abbath’.588 Hence, while the Ashkenazic nam ing practice in
general could have roots in Palestine, W estern Europe and/or Asia,
specific names might still be identified as European or Asian in origin on
the basis of their geography. For example, the Ashkenazic use of H e jom
fov ‘holiday’ as a male nam e has its origins in Iberian Judezm o and
Judeo-F rench.389 Conversely, He hannukah m a ‘holiday of H annukah’ is
known to me in Europe only from a single 16th century Czech source,390
though it is widespread as a family nam e in Balkan (but not Iberian)
Sephardic, Greek, Georgian, K rym iak and Iranian (e.g. Bukharan,
K urdish, West Afghan) Jewish com m unities.591 A K hazar Hebrew docu­
m ent from Kiev, thought to date from c.930, contains this nam e, in addi­
tion to H e ptsah ma ‘Passover’.392 In Europe, the latter nam e is
frequendy encountered am ong Ashkenazim in the Slavic lands; it is rare
in Medieval G erm any, where it is often borne by Jew s known to have
resided in the East G erm an lands, including the historically Slavic-

T atar Belorussian examples are from Kryczyriski 1938:109-111. For Turkic ex­
am ples, see Golden 1980:167. For Serbian Muslim examples, see Smailovic 1977: 160,
349, 423-424. Veselovskij cites Bajram as a Russian family name from the late 15th cen­
tu ry (1974:21). Kakuk regards the practice as rare with native roots in Turkic languages
(1974:19-21). See also Hungarian C um an examples in Risonyi 1967:139, 145, and
H ungarian examples in K ilm £n 1978:44, 76.
, ‫ ’ י‬Samuel 1971:74, 86. In addition, in som ejew ish communities, e.g. the Moroccan,
boys bom on certain holidays may be given names that appear in stories connected with
those holidays, e.g. He rru>rd»xaj is given to boys bom on the holiday of Purim (see discus­
sion in section 7.16 below); nuaahtm (literally ‘com forter’) to boys born on the fast of
T iJ 'a h t » ’av (Laredo 1978:32, 151-152).
JM See also the proper names Br subotn'ik, subott'a ,bom on Saturday’ (DABM, com­
m entary 1963:358, m ap #21); Po Sobota fa (Moszyriski 2: 1968 : 830); Po szabasnik, sabat-
nik (in section 7.321 below) and Y Subotnik fam (see also section 3.32, fn. 367 above); see
also O R bajram* ~ bagramt ‘Muslim holiday’ (1472: Barxudarov et at 1975(f). For Slavic
nam es derived from ‘Friday’, see section 3.122, paragraph b above.
Baer 1,1:1929, index; Seror 1981:166. There are many translations of the name,
which may have its roots in Lat dits bonus, see e.g. SvkY Feyrtag (in a Latin [?] document,
Bratislava 1465-1467) (K ovits 1938), Y Jajrtog fam (Tavjov 1923d:345) ( — G Feiertag
‘holiday’); JP rov(L at) Bongoron (Avignon 14th c), Bondia (N arbonnc 1300), ProvHe
bwndj^hl + bondta (Perpignan 1413) (Seror 1981:141, 166-167). No Slavic translations of
the name are known to me.
,9° Muneles 1966a:9.
*** See M ann 1:1931:486, 525 for a 17th century (?) Kurdish example, xanukd is a sur­
nam e in 19th-20th century Saloniki Judezm o. See alsoJG k xanokas fam (information sup­
plied by an informant) and KaganofT 1977:48. For use of the term , as well as He purim
(discussed in section 7.16 below), as family names in K rym iak, see Weissenbcrg
1914:105, 109; Moskovich and T ukan 1982:9, fn. 26.
JM Golden 1980:167 (citing Baron 1957:202); Gorjanov 1945:276; Golb and Pritsak
1982, index.
76 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

speaking areas of G erm any. In addition to an example on a tombstone

inscription from Budapest 1278,553 the nam e is found in the writings of
Iserlin (b. Regensburg 1390—d. W iener-N eustadt 1460), and in
W iener-Neustadt 1455.” * Examples from non-Slavic areas appear in
Fulda (early 13th century),395 Bavaria (N urnberg 1298, Rothenburg 13th
century)394 and even occasionally the R hineland.397 Examples from the
Slavic lands are far more num erous, see e.g. JESl(Br) Senku Pesaxovifu
Mamotlivomu dat (Krakow 1487),398 Pesach — Pysach (Brest Jew , H rodna
docum ent 1495),599 Pesax Ezofovic (Pinsk 1506),400 (Br, Uk) Pejsax
Davydovii (Brest 1583)401 (note the distinctively Yiddish diphthongization
of He e > g); JW Sl(Cz) David Ptsachuv.*02 T he Hebrew term is also at­
tested in Polish and the East Slavic languages as a proper noun, e.g. Po
pejs(aeh)owka, R pejsaxovka ‘plum brandy’. It is unclear whether this com­
pound is a Jewish or C hristian innovation; the diphthong suggests a Yid­
dish pronunciation (see stY pqsex ), though ModPoY has pajsex.*<,> Note
also Y pejsaxuvkt ‘ib’ ( < Polish).404 In the Slavic lands, He ptsah often
shows adjustment to Slavic phonological norms, e.g. A[x] > k , in keeping
with the Old South Polish rule that final and preconsonantal x > k (in
Polish this feature is first found in 15th century manuscripts).405 See
JW Sl(Po) Pessac (Wroclaw 1351-1356),406 JESl(U k) Pesak (L uc’k
1552).407 The k reflex is also generalized to the position before a vowel
in the patronymic suffix, e.g. JW Sl(Po) Kusko Pyeszakowicz — Pesachowicz
(Pinsk 1553-J555)4“8 (note the sibilant confusion in the first variant),
Piesakowicz (Pinsk 1566).409 T he reflex k for final x even appears in Ger­

*« Kaufmann 1895:307; Scheiber 1960:81-82.

” * Schweinburg-Eibcnschutz 1894:263-264.
Salfeld 1898, index.
1,6 Zunz 1865:335 (for N iim berg); the name is also m entioned in ihe writings of Meir
bin Barux of Rothenburg (c. 1220-1293).
See ihe writings of Eliiztr bin Natan of M ainz (c. 1090-1170).
” * BcrSadskij 1:1882, #15.
' ‫ יי‬Rusanivs'kyj 1965:58. In H rodna Belorussian, pejsaxi pi ( < He ma?) is given as
a synonym of pqsy < Y pejes 'male ritual sideburns’ by Pawlenka 1973:62.
•°‫ ״‬BerSadskij 1:1882, #42.
« ' /4S 3:1867:289ff.
•0J Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:337.
«0 > vVexler 1982a. In other cases, a Polish Yiddish pronunciation seems to have spread
to Ukrainian, e.g. Uk trafinyj), trrf'non-kosher' (2elexivs’kyj and Ncdil’s’kyj 1882-1886)
< PoY Irajf vs. UkY trqf.
•"* Jofe 1928:242.
•“ Stieber 1973:69-70, 144.
0‫ *י‬Bondy and Dvorsky 1906, # 128.
♦<” BerSadskij 3:1903, #27.
•“ Ibid. 2:1882, #33.
‫ "י‬Ibid. 2:1882, #252.
 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 77

m a n docum ents, though this is not a requirem ent of the G erm an sound
p a tte rn , e.g. G Petsak (W iener-N eustadt 1455);410 this fact gives further
cause to believe that the nam e reached G erm any from the Slavic lands.41'
Slavic texts often have k for He h and x (both pronounced Ixl in non-
A rabic speech communities) in other Hebrew names, though this is not
req u ired by Slavic phonotactics other than South Polish, see e.g. He
ptrah ‘flower’ (see section 3.163 above) > (?) JESl(Br) Perku dat (nam e of
a Je w from Kiev, Vilnius document I486);412 He /w1A<w>JWSI(Cz)
Pinkos (14th c),4' 5 JESl(Br, Uk) Pinkasovii (Br£st 1569);414 H e \r h x a ‘I
w ill show you’ > O B r ore/co (1519).415 The change is also attested in
K araite, see Haly£ K ar Mordkowicz fam < H e morcbxaj ma (unless the k
reflects Polish influence) vs. K ar Simxa m a < H e simhah.416 An
“ E astern” origin also seems to characterize the Balkan Judezm o use of
H e ptsah , since the name is not found in Iberian records;417 in contem­
p o rary K araite communities, it is found am ong the U krainian, Belorus­
sian and Egyptian communities, but is unknown in Turkey and the
C rim e a .418 See also the discussion of hit as Ihl in section 4.4114 and of
Judeo-Slavic pronunciation norms in section 7.4 below.
O th er Ashkenazic family names used only in the Slavic lands which are
associated with days of the week, holidays or Hebrew month names in­
d u d e H e nisan ‘7th month of the Jewish calendar’ >JESl(B r) Nisana gen

•l0 See Schweinburg-Eibcnschutz 1895:113, index of names.

‫ • י י‬O nly ihe change of initial and preconsonantal x > k is attested in Czech (see
G eb au er 1:1963:46) and discussion of Cz kien in section 6.213 below). The change of x
> k in any position is unattested in Belorussian or Ukrainian.
412 Beriadskij 1:1882, #11. See also the discussion of ‘flower' as an anthroponym in
section 3.163 above and JES1(R) Perka nom (1489) in Sbomik russkogo islorueskogo oblltstoa
1892:23. T he form perku also appears in an anonymous Polish brochure from 1622: Ba-
taban interpreted it as He p tn q ‘chapter’ (1:1931:178), but I prefer to analyze the term
as the anthroponym .
,1J See the Prague synagogue by this name built at the end of the 13th or early 14th
century. O n the origin of the name and Czech Latin attestations from the 14th century,
see VolavkovS 1955: 35, 46.
4‫ ״‬Beriadskij 2:1882, #302. See also discussion of JESI(Br) Samaxa, etc. in section
7.114 below.
415 Skarvna, foreword to Esther. But see M odBr Marduxovil and Motdux (Blum and
Rich 1984: 164, 205).
*** Kowalski I929:LX IX and 108 respectively.
" 7 Ptsax is a family name in mid-18th century Istanbul (though the bearer of the name
might have been of Ashkenazic origin) and a masculine personal nam e in contemporary
Saloniki. At least one instance of the family name in Saloniki can be associated with an
Ashkenazic family (1745: see Emmanuel 2:1968:636). Laredo lists only one undated in­
stance of alfsahi ~ e (in his transliteration) for Moroccan lews — ClA r fafh ‘Passover’
(1978:152, 686).
,1‫ י‬I am grateful to M ordekhaj Avraham for this information.
78 JE W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

(L uc’k 1489), Misan (Trakai Jew , K rak6w docum ent 1523);4' 9 H e tiPah
bPav ‘Fast of the 9th of A v’ > Y tiiebov fam (Riga, W arsaw), H e mah jdfita
‘how beautiful you are’ (passage from the Song of Songs, sung on Friday
night at mealtime) > Y majofis fam .420
See also the discussion of possible Asian Jewish m odels'for Balkan
Judezm o in section 3.321 above.
3.342 Judeo-A rabic and Asian H ebrew anthroponym s: H e cdddq\ jdqdr,
mjvordx, natronaj', sacadjdh\ J A r hakim, majmun(a). Besides the H ebrew nam es that
are m ore popular in E astern than in W estern Yiddish circles, and in Balkan than
in Iberian Judezm o, we m ay note that W estern Yiddish sources preserve a
num ber of H ebrew nam es which are com m on in African and Asian Jew ish com­
m unities, but not in W estern E urope. For exam ple, JW SI Sadya m a (L atin docu­
m ent, Bratislava 1390, 1 4 0 0 )< H e sa'adjah;42' this nam e also appears am ong
Balkan Sephardic Jew s, but is not found in the records of Iberian male names,
e.g. J u d Sa(a)di, Saadya.4‫ ״‬See also G Y (H e) nfrwnj/ + natronaj (B onn, early 12th
century, Bischofsheim, G am burg 1298);423 mvwraxt \m»vorax (W einheim
1298)4‫ ״‬used as a surnam e in Balkan Judezm o and possibly the basis for the
m etathesized JE Sl(B r) Merovaxu m a dat (Jew from Kiev, n .p . 1490);, 7‫^' ״‬r — H e
jaqar (Koln 1266, Pforzheim 1267);m JE Sl(B r) Sadku dat (V ilnius 1486)< H e
cadoq.*'*''. T here are no Judeo-A rabic anthroponym s in Slavic sources, though
occasionally some do appear in G erm an Yiddish sources, where they m ay have

4,, See Beriadskij 1:1882, #23 and #76 respectively. O n the change of 11- > m-. see
section 3.161, fn. 201 above.
410 Tavjov 1923d:345: Loewe 1930:392. Loewe simply cites Y majofis fam “ from
M ariam pol” , but it is unclear which of the three towns with this name was intended (in
Galicia, the Kaunas district or Suwalki); Tavjov describes the name as very popular in
Lithuania (op cit., 338). See Po majofis, maju/es ‘song sung by Jew s at the Sabbath meal'
(Karlowicz tt al. 1900-1927; the variant majufis is cited by Bruckner 1915:144).
4.1 Kov&ts 1938. For further examples, see Grunwald 1911:98-99; Sussmann
1915:107.
4.1 The popularity of this name (literally ‘aid of G od’) am ong Arabic-speaking Jews
may be due to similarity with Ar sa'-id ma ‘happy’ (see Laredo 1978:94, 908-912).
4” C uno 1975:4 and Salfeld 1898 respectively. According to Zunz, the name is first
attested in the 7th century (1876b:21), but Even-Soian cites the 9th century in
M esopotamia (1964).
4‫ ״‬Salfeld 1898. See also G Weirach (W iener-Neustadt 1464) < (?) He bdrix
(Schweinburg-Eibenschiitz 1894:278; 1895:109, 114) and He brdxidh ma (M arburg 1474)
(1 bid. 1894:278). See also JESl(Br) Broxa Jakubooii (Tykocin 1567) (Berladskij 3:1903,
# 263) (vs. ModEY broxt fa). O n the attestation of He barxijahii, see Grunwald 1911:11.
4‫ ״‬Beriadskij 1:1882. #24.
4“ Salfeld 1898:478. For Moroccan and Italian examples, sec Laredo 1978:653. See
also discussion in Schwcinburg-Eibenschutz 1894:257, 276; M. Weinreich 2:1973:30ff;
4:45-46.
‫ ’ ״‬Brrtadskij 1:1882, #11. See also JESI(R) Sadko X om iti (1526-1527) (Sbonuk
russkogo istorifakogo obUeslva 1892:735). It is unclear whether O Br, O R Sadko and variants
are related (see Biryla 2: 1969, 360).
 J E W IS H L IN G U ISTIC STRA TA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS 79

been popular in Judeo-R om ance, e.g. GY (H e) mjjmwn (G artach 1298), m jjm um 3

(K dln 1255-1347) fa/ + majmun(a);*2> hkjml + hakim ~ *-(S peyer 1144-1145),*”
G H akym ~ -im (W iener-N eustadt 1474) m a.430 An inner wall in the synagogue
at U j utca 22 ( ‘New S treet’, form erly known as Zsido utca ‘Je w s’ S treet’) in
S opron, H ungary, contains a H ebrew inscription read by the Synagogue
M useum as s'wljmn br j h p l t ’ l q ’ q fwbjng3n ‘Sulem an bar Ja x i’el the deceased, of
the holy congregation of T u b in g e n ’. T he synagogue was constructed about
1300 and abandoned in the early 16th century, when the Jew s were expelled
from the town. If the given nam e has been correctly interpreted, we have an
instance of A r sulajman ( — H e ilomoA).451 Future research should seek to
determ ine w hether Arabic anthroponym s were diffused via Judeo-R om ance
speech territory or through the D anube basin—and in what periods. O n the
geography of Judeo-R om ance com ponents in G erm an Yiddish, see section 6
below.

A phonological feature of possible Asian Arabic origin is the ap­

pearance of an intervocalic v between 0 and a in Hebrew names recorded
in C hristian Slavic texts and am ong the Belorussian K araites, e.g.
JE S l(B r) HovaSa ma gen (H rodna 1551 )452 < (? ) He j d 3al, j ^ d i , jth d 3(H\
Navaxb (Smolensk Jew 1 4 8 9 ) , Novaxa ma gen (Trakai 1646),454 K arH e
novax*3> < He noah. A ltbauer also observes this feature in Belorussian
Yiddish, e.g. tuves — stY toes ‘error’ < H e fdcul. 456 Epenthetic v in He
noah is reminiscent of the Hebrew reading traditon of Eastern Arabic­
speaking Jews, who insert w and j before the Hebrew patah vowel diacritic

Stem and Hoeniger 1888; Salfeld 1898:403. Could this name be related to Mam-
mona recorded in a Latin text from Bourges 568 (see Aronius 1902, # 33)? M. Weinreich
lists majmoru as an "O rien tal’’ name (2:1973:30ff; 4:45-46). For discussion of this name
am o n g Moroccan and Spanish Jew s, see Laredo 1978:94, 813-819 Majmun(a) are Arabic
m ale and female names known at least since the 11th century, which possibly owe their
popularity to the fact that this was the name of the Spanish Jewish philosopher
M aim onides (1135-1204).
4,* Kober 1944:192—with references to W orms 1096 and other Rhineland locales, and
N um berg 1298 (see also Salfeld 1898). The name is extremely common in Iberian Judez-
m o (Baer 1,1:1929). Alternatively, the name might reflect a Judeo-French pronunciation
o f H e hajtm ma.
430 Schwcinburg-Eibenschutz 1894:278, 280.
4,1 I am personally unable to decipher the inscription, which is barely legible, but a
G erm an pronunciation of the name would require an initial 2 and a H ungarian pronun­
ciation / —less likely candidates for reconstruction. For discussion of the synagogue with
a rich bibliography, see Oivid 1981.
4” Bcriadskij 2:1882. #16.
453 Barxudarov rt al. 1975fT. Smolensk now belongs to the Russian, rather than
Belorussian, speech territory (see Shevelov 1953).
434 A IV K 28:1901.
4” Altbauer 1977 [1957-1959):33. See also Trakai K ar Nowachawict fam (Kowalski
1929:XV).
4« A ltbauer 1977 (I957-1959]:33.
80 JE W IS H LIN G U ISTIC STRATA IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS

in the position before final h, h and c (the choice of glide depends on the
quality of the preceding vowel).457 A Slavic origin for the epenthesis is
unlikely, since in coterritorial Belorussian, epenthetic (and prothetic) v
appears before rather than after a stressed rounded vowel, e.g. navuka
‘science’ ~ R nauka.4’* In the Hebrew names (including their Yiddish
pronunciation), stress precedes the epenthesis. O f course, the fact that
epenthetic and prothetic v are found in m any unrelated and non­
contiguous languages reduces the likelihood that the Karaite and East
Slavic phenomenon need be historically related. See also dao(e)nen in sec­
tion 3.3111, fn. 311 above.

3.4 Recapitulation.
T his survey of Judeo-G reek impact on non-Jewish languages and of
Judeo-G reek, Judeo-Iranian and possibly Judeo-T urkic and Judeo-
Aramaic impact on Yiddish has im portant bearing for Judeo-Slavic
linguistics for two reasons. First, the difficulty of ascribing all Yiddish
Grecisms to Hebrew, Judeo-A ram aic or Judeo-R om ance compels me to
postulate the presence of a Judeo-G reek com m unity in Northern
Europe—e.g. in Bavaria and Bohemia—alongside the Judeo-W est Slavic
community which is known to have been in existence since the 900s (see
section 4 below). A Greek presence in the area raises the possibility that
the Judeo-W est Slavic community itself was heavily Hellenized. Second,
since no Turkic or Iranian Jewish community is known to have existed
in the Yiddish hom eland—i.e. in the Rhineland and Bavaria— I con-
elude that Yiddish must have received its few Asian elements from a third
party. T hat third party could have been either a Judeo-G reek or Judeo-
Slavic community from W estern, Eastern or Southern Europe. Ample
evidence of widespread Slavic-Yiddish linguistic contacts in the Eastern
G erm an lands prior to the 11th century will be presented in section 6
below. Another im portant finding is that Judeo-G recism s may have
entered G erm an Yiddish (either directly of through a Judeo-Slavic in­
termediary) before passing into Judeo-French (see Y trop). T his develop►-
mcnt has a non-Jewish parallel in the alleged spread of Grecisms from
Rhineland G erm an into French (e.g. JG k sambata > G Samstag > Fr
samedi).

07 For Baghdad, see Morag 1977:55; for Aleppo, see K. Katz 1981:50*51. In H e b r e w
gram m ar, the vowel is known as the ' ‘furtive” patah. For an example with the front glide,
arc Aleppo He masgijak ‘supervisor’ — Israeli He masgtax.
*'* For details of Belorussian, see Wexler 1977a: 159-162.
 4 . T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K EN A ZIC
A N D N O N -SEPH A R D IC JE W S IN T H E SLAVIC LANDS,
10th-19th C E N T U R IE S
4.1 Ju d eo -W est Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters, mid-lOth-mid-13th centuries
4.11 Com ponent structure of the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses
4.111 Possible Sorbian and Polabian components
4.1111 JW SI — dum^Kj)
4.1112 JW SI Ibw
4.1113 JW SI Iwd
4.1114 JA r nwb grW, m’zn frg
4.112 South Slavic components
4.1121 JW SI gwn‫ג‬
4.1122 JW SI qnvqjm
4.1123 JW SI !Uvkj
4.1124 JW SI ftrebono
4.113 Greek components
4.1131 JW SI 3(wftdwn
4.1132 JW SI fit‫’!׳׳‬
4.114 Germ anic components
4.1141 JWSI
4.1142 JW SI nurq
4.1143 JW SI V ’
4.1144 JW SI rwsqw fils1
4.115 Unique features of Judeo-W est Slavic
4.1151 Verbal prefixes
4.1152 Vowel prothesis (?)
4.2 Judeo-W est Slavic inscriptions in Hebrew characters on coins, late 12th-late 13th
centuries
4.3 Judeo-E ast Slavic words and phrases in Hebrew characters, late 15th-17th cen­
turies
4.31 JESI / ‘A/*’; wjfwld — wwjt'piq
4 32 JESI lwbq\ Iwpq’
4.33 Periphrastic verb constructions: JESI mqdS bj’l
4.34 JESI £01’
4 .4 Judeo-E ast Slavic caique languages, 13th-16th centuries
4.41 Codex #262, late I5th-early 16th century
4.411 The impact of the Hebrew text
4.4111 Imitation of Hebrew syntax
4.4112 Im itation of Hebrew patterns of word formation and
phraseology
4.4113 Avoidance of Hebrew loan words
4.4114 Hebrew pronunciation norms
4.412 Com ponent structure
4.4121 Possible Judeo-W est Slavic elements: khimi; miloitniki; vladarb
4.4122 Unique Judeo-East Slavic elements: hdb; ba; ad(ov)niki:
mihstnikl
4.4123 Hebrew-East Slavic blends: Sahmoiur, elihou s n barantl\
ixltbcrb — brltyiacTh
4.4124 Possible Judeo-South Slavic elements
4.4125 Greek elements: kaUrhi; Juniki
4.5 Kareo-Slavic (?) in Cyrillic characters, early 19th century
4.6 S outh Slavic terms in Balkan Judezm o
82 T H E SLAVIC LA NCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

4. IN T R O D U C T IO N
O n the strength of the historical contacts between Slavs and Jew s
outlined in section 1 above, I assumed that Jew s might have become
speakers of Slavic as early as the 6th century. However, the paucity of
prim ary linguistic materials makes it difficult to reconstruct broad dialect
boundaries let alone isoglosses within Judeo-Slavic o r to ascertain the a p ­
proximate dates of creation of Judeo-Slavic dialects. T he approxim ately
150 West Slavic glosses in the Hebrew Responsa literature composed in
the Bohemian, Sorbian and possibly Polabian lands between the 10th
and 13th centuries leave no doubts about the existence of a Judeo-W est
Slavic cultural zone. Since these are texts which partly predate the arrival
of Yiddish-speaking Jew s in the Czech lands (see sections 4.1-4.2 below),
I regard any unique features in these texts as possible evidence of Ju d eo -
Slavic. T here are almost no phrases in these materials, hence no discus­
sion of syntax is possible. It is conceivable that some of the Judeo-W est
Slavic glosses, by virtue of their contingency on Hebrew liturgical texts,
may be reflections of a Judeo-W est Slavic caique rather than vernacular
language.
T he case for a Judeo-East Slavic culture zone is less certain, since the
only linguistic evidence is a handful of words and phrases transcribed in
Hebrew characters from the late 16th-17th centuries and a caique
translation of eight Books of the Old Testam ent in Cyrillic characters
dating from the late 15th or early 16th century, probably done by Jew s.
T he East Slavic materials, both in Hebrew and Cyrillic characters, can ­
not be attributed with certainty to monolingual Judeo-Slavic speakers,
since at the time of their composition, the majority of the Jewish popula­
tion settled in the Belorussian and U krainian lands was probably already
Yiddish-speaking (though not necessarily in all areas of Jewish settle­
m ent) (see section 6 below).1 T here are no Judeo-South Slavic materials
known to us, though some elements of possible South Slavic origin may
be identified tentatively in Judeo-W est Slavic and Yiddish; Jew s are
known to have resided in the South Slavic lands before the advent of the
Iberian Jews, but it is not entirely clear whether they were Slavic­
speaking.
In both the East and West Slavic culture zones, additional evidence for
Judaicized Slavic dialects comes in the form of Jewish anthroponym s and
possibly terminology in Slavic non-Jewish sources. W hile Jew s may have
migrated from South to West Slavic lands and possibly also from South

1 Karskij assumed the existence of Belorussian- (but not necessarily Judeo-

Belorussian*) speaking Jews simply on the basis of the Yiddish loans in Belorussian
(1:1904:171).
 T H E SLAVIC LAN CUA CES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 83

and West to East Slavic lands, there is no guarantee that there was in­
terference from one Judeo-Slavic language and culture zone on another.
Hence, it is more prudent to suppose, for the time being, that the
Judaicization of West and East Slavic languages essentially took place in­
dependency, and in distinct historical periods—though not necessarily
without m utual interference at later stages. South Slavic elements iden­
tified in the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses are not altogether certain, while
the Judeo-W est Slavicisms in the Judeo-East Slavic caique language may
owe their presence to the general Polonization of the West Belorussian
and U krainian lands rather than to any specific Jewish channels of dif­
fusion.
T he study of the Slavic languages used by Jew s, both individually and
in a com parative framework, can be divided into two stages. Up until
1956, there was little interest in the languages and cultures of the Slavic
Jews am ong linguists and specialists in Jewish language, history and
culture. Slavic materials w ritten by Jew s in both the West and East Slavic
cultural zones were known to 19th century scholars (see bibliography
below), but there were no systematic or comparative studies of all the
prim ary materials and no attem pt to uncover the outlines of Judeo-Slavic
speech from the coterritorial non-Jewish and successor Jewish languages.
The m ajor preoccupation until the late 1950s was determ ining whether
the glosses from the West and East Slavic lands could be taken as proof
that there existed an autochthonous Slavic-speaking Jew ry in the West
and East Slavic lands. Most scholars, though not always for objective
reasons, opted in favor of such a community, see e.g. Harkavi 1865,
1867; BerSadskij 1882-1903; Centnerszwerowa 1907; RubStejn 1913,
1922:69-114; Balaban 1920; Siper 1924, 1926b and Lurye 1928; Dubnov
1909, 1913 and W einryb 1957 represented the dissenting minority which
denied the existence of such a speech community and culture zone. The
year 1956 saw the publication of two studies which were to prepare the
way for a dram atic re-evaluation of the field of Judeo-Slavic linguistics:
M. W einreich published his essay “ Yiddish, K naanic, Slavic: the basic
relationships” , in which the case for Judaicized Slavic languages was
systematically argued for the first tim e.s F. Kupfer and T . Lewicki
reprinted the West Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters, together with a
linguistic and historical com mentary in their Zrodla hebrajskie do dzitjow
Siowtan 1 niektorych innych ludow s'rodkowej 1 wschodniej Europy (Wroclaw-

2 M . W einreich 1956; 1973. G runbaum , commenting on Harkavi 1867, suggested

that th e je w s in Poland and the East Slavic lands had once developed a Judaicized Slavic
analogous to Yiddish; this conclusion was based on the presence of a large Slavic compo­
nent in Yiddish. This remark was buried in a footnote without documentation (1882:88,
fn. 1).
84 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JEW S

W arsaw), though without considering the status of “Judeo-Slavic” .

While Kupfer and Lewicki’s linguistic commentary is m arred by serious
methodological flaws (see below), the book is nevertheless useful for
having assembled almost all of the Judeo-W est Slavic materials.
The major innovation of M ax W einreich was to insist on defining the
Slavic relics in Hebrew characters as Judaicized Slavic. It is not surprising
that it was the renowned Yiddishist who first made this formulation.
After all, Yiddish has a significant Slavic com ponent, much of which is
idiosyncratic and not directly ascribable to the influences of the Slavic
contact languages spoken by the Christians. Moreover, W einreich never
lost sight of the fact that Yiddish contained tangible clues to the cyclical
process of Judaicizing European languages that began with Judeo-Greek
and reached fruition with Judeo-R om ance. Scholars who failed to ap­
proach the Judeo-Slavic materials from the vantage-point of Jew ish in­
terlinguistics proved to be far less prone to appreciating the unique
Jewish linguistic features of the Judeo-Slavic materials. But there are
good reasons why most scholars, including Yiddishists, even after 1956,
have harbored scepticism about Judaicized Slavic languages and
cultures: (a) T he Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters em anating both
from West and East Slavic lands are too sparse to constitute an indepen­
dent source of information on Slavic Jewish culture and language
themselves; moreover, there are no extant original Slavic texts known to
have been written by Jews, (b) The historical records of Slavic Jew ry date
almost exclusively from the period following the settlement of the
Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jew s in the Slavic lands and are recorded
primarily in Hebrew, Yiddish or Judezm o documents, (c) T he study of
Byzantine and M odern Judeo-G reek is still in its infancy and hence could
hardly provide an impetus to the study of the Jewish successor languages
of Judeo-G reek. T he first two factors led many scholars to dismiss the
Judeo-Slavic materials as an “ ad hoc” language. Since 1956, the
burgeoning field of Jewish interlinguistics, which owes much to the
lasting contributions of such Yiddishists as M ax W einreich (1928, 1954,
1973), S. A. Birnbaum (1944, 1951) and M. Mieses (1915, 1924), has
given additional impetus to the study of Judeo-Slavic—by providing the
conceptual tools and an ever growing body of factual m aterial.’

J See Wexler 1981b. While two journals dedicated specifically to Sephardic languages
and Yiddish have been in existence for over forty years (e.g. Sefarad, M adrid I94HT and
Yidiie Iprax, New York 1941f!), it is only recently that two journals exclusively or partly
concerned with all Jewish language phenomena have appeared, the Jewish language review
(Haifa 198Iff) and the Mediterranean language review (Wiesbaden 19830). Curiously, in his
latest book, S. A. Bim baum omits mention of Judeo-Slavic (1979:15).
 T H E SLA VIC LA NGUACES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 85

T h e salient Jewish linguistic traits in the Judeo-Slavic relics are as

follows: (a) T he native com ponent of Judeo-Slavic differed appreciably
from that of the non-Jewish cognate dialects, e.g. Judeo-W est Slavic in
the Czech lands consisted prim arily of Czech elements, but seems to have
also included some Sorbian, Polabian and South Slavic elements not used
in Czech itself.4
(b) T he G erm anic com ponent in Judeo-W est Slavic appears to have
differed from that of the West Slavic languages both in corpus and in
form of integration.
(c) T he Judeo-W est and Judeo-East Slavic glosses also show unique
utilization of coterritorial Slavic material.
(d) T he Judeo-Slavic dialects were not always spoken in the same
areas as the non-Jewish cognate dialects, e.g. Judeo-South Slavic may
have been spoken in the West Slavic lands, and Judeo-W est Slavic, with
its predom inant Czech basis, seems to have been brought (together with,
or prior to, Yiddish) to Southwest Poland (Silesia) in the 14th century.5
The presence of Judeo-W est Slavicisms in all Yiddish dialects, both to the
west and east of Sorbian and Czech territory, also points to the migration
of Judeo-W est Slavic speakers beyond their original lands. We should
also entertain the possibility that Judeo-E ast Slavic speakers may also
have m igrated westward, e.g. from Podolia in the 13th-14th centuries in­
to the Subcarpathian Ukraine or Belorussia in order to escape the T atar
onslaught.6
In addition to the prim ary sources (which are discussed below), there
are a num ber of historical references to Slavic-speaking Jew s, though
usually without linguistic data, which are im portant in establishing the

• My characterization of the component make-up of Judeo-W est Slavic is necessarily

tentative, since the relationship of the Sorbian dialects to Czech and Polish in the
llth-13th centuries needs further clarification (see Polanski 1980:241-243). On the
border between Polabian and Sorbian in the second half of the first millennium, see
Shevelov 1965:1, Eichler and Witkowski 1970:35-36. T he Linus sorabicus in the 9th cen­
tury passed through Bardowiek, M agdeburg, Erfurt, Hallstadt, Forchheim, Brennberg,
Regensburg and Lorch (sec Frings 1950, m ap # 61; Konig 1981:58). O n Slavic set­
tlements in Northeast Bavaria, see Schwarz 1960. Early Jewish settlements in Polabian
territory are discussed in Livy 1892; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:203; Jakobson 1957:37;
Jakobson and Halle 1964:161, fn. 71. O n the Polabian impact on the Judeo-W est Slavic
glosses, see Jakobson 1957:40-42.
• Shmeruk 1981 b: 17.
• See Mousset 1938:29. Brutzkus supposes that the Jewish communities in Volhynia,
Galicia, Daghestan and the Crim ea survived the T atar invasions which destroyed Kievan
Rus’ in 1237-1240 (1939:26-28). However, there is no certainty that the monolingual
Judeo-East Slavic population noted in the 16th-17th centuries were descendants of the
original Jewish population in the area. It would be interesting to determine whether
Slavic Jews accompanied their Ashkenazic co-religionists in migrating from West
Belorussia and the Ukraine to Eastern Poland (see discussion in section 6.3 below).
86 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

existence of early Slavic Jewish communities. T he first reference to

peripatetic Jewish merchants (also residents of Slavic lands?) was in the
Arabic writings of the Persian geographer ibn Xordadbeh (see section 1,
fn. 9 above), but the first mention of a perm anent Jewish settlement in
the West Slavic lands (individuals or organized community?), contem ­
poraneous with the oldest Judeo-W est Slavic glosses, is found in the brief
writings in Arabic of Ibrahim ibn J a cqub (al-Isra el or a(‫־‬T0rt6$r), a
Jewish traveler from Tortosa, Cataluna, who visited Eastern G erm any
and Bohemia around 965.7 Ibn J a cqub encountered Jews in the Polabian
(and Sorbian?) lands, though he is silent about what languages they
spoke. While these Jews in principle could have been speakers of Judeo-
Greek, Judeo-A ram aic, Judeo-R om ance or even of Yiddish, there is
some indication that they may have used Slavic. Ibn J a cqub cites a
num ber of West Slavic toponyms in his accounts—sometimes in a Slavic
and sometimes in a G erm an form, but when describing his meetings with
the local Jews, he refers to their place of residence on the Saale R iver by
the Slavic name nwb gr’d/ + nov grad* rather than by the G erm an transla­
tion equivalent N ienburg (in the Bernburg district of Anhalt, G erm an
Democratic Republic). Even though ibn J a cqub’s choice of a Slavic
toponym cannot prove conclusively that his inform ants (Jews?) were
speakers of Slavic, it at least suggests that the town was populated by a
Slavic m ajority.9 Two additional facts support the hypothesis that the
Jews in Anhalt and Saxony could have been Slavic-speaking: contem­
porary Latin sources refer to the town of N ovgrad/N ienburg only by its
G erm an nam e,10 while other Polabian towns in ibn J a cq u b ’s account

7 T he account is known only from the quotations in later Arabic writers, of which the
oldest is At-masdtik wa-l-mamatik of Abu cU bajd al-Bakri, an Andalusian geographer of
the 11th century; passages are also found in the writings of Al-QazwinT, ibn Sacida (13th
century) and al-Him jan (15th century). O n the existence of different textual versions, see
Lewicki 1971. O n Christian testimony regarding Jews in Bohemia and Slovakia, see
Chaloupecky 1923:247-248.
• See Tykocinski 1934e:319; Kowalski 1946:49, 66-67, 87, 146. Kowalski’s suggested
reading with long vowels is based on the Arabic spelling and probably reflects the state
of affairs in Sorbian at the time (see Shevelov 1965:522ff). T he G erm an toponym also
appears in al-Idrisi (12th century) (sec Lewicki 1945:138). T he value of ibn J a ‘qub's
toponymic data is diminished since they are preserved in a second-hand form that was
recorded several centuries after the event took place. M oreover, some of the Judeo-West
Slavic glosses were written outside the Slavic lands by non-native speakers. See also sec­
tion 1 above for W einryb’s caution regarding the trustworthiness of secondary sources.
* This assumption was also made by Jakimowicz 1949:440, 443. For discussion of
Byzantine influence on Carolingian graves in Nienburg, sec Saal 1983: 56. Note also that
a Jew named Jacob de Budtssin appears in a Germ an list from Wroclaw 1356-1359, follow•
ing the Upper Sorbian form of the toponym, Budyiin, rather than G Bautztn (Levy
1892:227)—though it may have been the Polish scribe who favored the Sorbian form
10 Strohm aier 1979:151.
 T H E SLAVIC LANCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . A ND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 87

w ith which Jews are not associated, appear in a German(ized) form, e.g.
m ^zn frg (to be corrected to *mfy' frg)/ + mabijurg ‘M agdeburg’." O ne
toponym in the Czech lands where early Jewish settlements are known
to have existed also appears in a possibly Slavic form, e.g. br3gh — *fr^gh
( th e latter corrected from f z iC))/ + praga ‘Prague’ ~ O C z *praga, but ibn
J a £q u b ’s narrative makes no mention of Jew s there; however, the river
flow ing through Prague, the M oldau, is recorded as *mldhtih (corrected
from m lw hvh)/ + moldawa, from G Moldau rather than Cz Vltava.12 The
n u m b e r of Sorbian and Polabian toponyms in Jewish sources (either in
A rabic or in Hebrew) is extremely small. If most of the m ajor towns in
these areas are cited exclusively in their German(ized) form, this might
indicate that most of the urban centers, where Jewish settlements would
b e expected to predom inate, were founded and nam ed by G erm an
speakers (e.g. Meissen, founded in the 10th century on the site of an
earlier Slavic setdement known as Jahnd), or that Jews founded urban set­
tlem ents only after G erm an had bccomc the dom inant language there
(e.g. M agdeburg, M erseburg and Regensburg had Jewish settlements
before 1096; Halle, Leipzig, Meissen and Passau acquired Jewish set­
tlem ents in the period 1145-1238).13
Subsequent references to Jew s in the West Slavic lands are found in
the Seftr hadinim of Jahuda ben M eir ha-K ohen, who lived in the first half
o f the 11th century (the work is known from two 13th century G erm an
R abbinical texts)14 and the remarks of Kalonimos ben Sabtaj who lived
in the 10th century, which are preserved in the Sibole h a kktt of Cidkija
ben Avraham ha-Rofe (early 13th century).15 Sixteenth-century sources
infer that Slavic was the dom inant tongue of some Jews both in Poland
an d the East Slavic lands. For example, a passage in the Hebrew writings
o f Rabbi Slomo Luria (b. Poznan, c. 1510-1573, who was active in
Lublin), written c. 1550, speaks of the “ vulgar Yiddish” of some of the
Polish Jew s;16 this strongly suggests that Yiddish was not the native
" I follow the corrected readings of Kowalski 1946:49, 51, 56, 60. 64, 86, 146, 148.
■J See Kowalski 1946:14, 19, 48-50, 60. 64. 85, 88, 136, 142, 145-147 and 49, 88. 146
respectively. The river flows through G erm an and Slavic territory both. Curiously, Y
etliace follows the Czech form of the river.
” See Brann, Elbogen tt at. 1934 for the medieval Hebrew spellings of these towns.
14 T he text contains a mention of Greek Jews in prjmw), a toponym interpreted by
K upfer and Lewicki as *pijmwit + Przrmyst ( 1956:32ff; 41 -44). For objections to the iden-
lification of the toponym with the Galician town, see W einryb. cited in section 1, fn. 12
above, where various locales in the Czech lands are suggested: for a possible localization
in T huringia, see Eichler 1966:64; in Northeastern Bavaria, see Schwarz 1960:185-186,
217.
15 K upfer and Lewicki 1956:61 fT. T his passage describes Jewish settlements in
H ungary and Jewish trade between Regensburg and the East Slavic lands.
“ Luria 1812, chapter 4, sign 41, letter b (quoted by B.-C. Kac 1899:32; Boroxov
1913:55).
88 T H E SLA VIC LA NCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

language of all Jews in Eastern Poland as late as the 16th century. Note
also the early 17th century passage of M eir Kac, rabbi in M ahilew, in
which the author complains that not all Jews in Brest spoke Y iddish.”
Familiarity with East Slavic is also found am ong Yiddish speakers in
Eastern Poland; thus, in a Hebrew passage, written in the mid-16th cen­
tury, we read: “ ...it is known that in the language of Belorussia [ + rusia],
every g is pronounced as A.” 18 T he w riter of the passage, Slomo Luria,
spent some time in O strih and Brest, where he would have been exposed
to East Slavic. (On the migration of Jew s from East Slavic to Eastern
Polish lands in the late 15th‫־‬early 16th century, see discussion in section
6.3 below.) .
The earliest reference to monolingual Slavic-speaking Jew s in the East
Slavic lands comes from a Hebrew letter of introduction composed in
Saloniki for a monolingual Slavic-speaking Jew who was traveling to
Palestine via Egypt: “ ... a certain person from the com m unity of Russia
(rwsjV + rusia)... visited us in the com munity of Saloniki..., he knows
neither Hebrew nor Greek nor Arabic but only the language of Canaan
[“Judeo-Slavic” ] which the people in his homeland speak.” 19 Mann
dated the document at about 1000 on the basis of the calligraphy but later
dates have also been proposed.30 Since the publication of the document
by M arm orstein in 1921, many scholars have cited the term + rusia as
evidence of a monolingual Slavic-speakingjewish community in the East
Slavic lands,21 but the letter makes clear that Jew s in Saloniki were also
familiar with Slavic—presumably a dialect of (Judeo-?)South Slavic.*1

” See p. 20. col. 1 right of the Siedlce edition 1797.

'• Luria 1812, 31:72 (cited by B.‫־‬C .K ac 1899:32). For Belorussian toponyms in
Hebrew characters from the 16th-17th centuries, where CSl *g is reflected as h, see Wei-
ler 1977a:27, 72, 89, 100.
■’ Marmorstein 1921:92-97. T he letter is also reproduced by M ann 2:1922:192; StarT
1939:73 and fn. 119; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:269-270; Friedman 1959:1508; Weinrvb
1962b:467, fn. 3. The term rwsj3/ + rusia appears in the 10th century K hazar Hebrew
document studied by Schechter where it denotes a ,'Slavic" people (see also Golb and
Pritsak 1982:114). This may be the oldest use of the term in this meaning; R Rossijt
, Russia’ is not known before the late 15th century; in Medieval Arabic and Byzantine
Greek sources, the term rus, etc. denoted ‘Vikings’ (Vasmer 2:1955). Khazar Hebrew
sources also have the oldest reference to the city of Kiev (see section 1, fn. 7 above). On
the use of He kna*an(i) 'C anaanite' to denote ‘(Judeo-)Slavic', see sections 1, fn. 17 and
6.13. fn. 49 below.
n W einryb 1962b:483.
‫ ' נ‬See also Y rajsn ‘Belorussia’, rajsil ‘Belorussian language’—first attested in Czech
Yiddish of the mid-17th century (Sher 1978-1980:50).
” We lack at present details of Jewish settlement in mixed Slavic-Greek areas. To
judge from their family names, the local Jews and Karaites might have been Greek­
speaking. For example, the family nam e of the M acedonian K araite writer, Jahuda
Hadasi(s), who flourished in the middle 12th century, is based on the Greek toponym
Edessa (in the district of Pella, Greek M acedonia) rather than the Slavic equivalent (set
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 89

T h e next known reference to East Slavic-speaking Jew s is found in a

H ebrew gram m ar entitled Sejtr hasoham ( ‘*The O nyx Book” ) composed
in England by M051 ben Jicxak ha-Nasi’a in the second half of the 13th
century, which contains a Slavic etymology for the Hebrew root j-b-m
‘m arry one’s brother’s widow’, attributed to a certain jc V +jica (short for
jickaq ‘Isaac’?) from Cem ihiv, who had visited England.25 T here are also
references from the W estern Belorussian and U krainian lands to m ono­
lingual Slavic-speaking Jew s in the 16th-17th centuries, e.g. in Brest and
V ilnius, and in M eiybii, Podil’j'a (1556) (see discussion in sections 4
above and 4.31-4.32 below).24 T he most recent reference to a m ono­
lingual Slavic-speaking Jewish com munity in the U kraine dates from
1828.”
For the South Slavic area, in addition to the Saloniki docum ent cited
above, we have only a single mention in a protocol of the Rabbinical
C o u rt in Vidin, Bulgaria from 1595 of monolingual Slavic-speaking Jews
in Nikopol, Vidin and “ other cities” .26 I cannot determine until how
recendy such a community might have existed. The possibility of u n ­
covering South Slavicisms in Judeo-W est or Judeo-East Slavic is prob­
lem atic but deserves further study.

4.1 Judeo-West Slavic glosses in Hebrew characters, mid- 10th-mid- 13th centuries
T h e Hebrew writings of btn Azriel, ben J a ’akov, G. btn Jah u d a, btn
Jic x ak , btn MoSt, ben N atan, ha-Kohen, ha-Rofe, K ara and Rashi con­
ta in Judeo-W est Slavic glosses. All of these authors were born and active
in West Slavic lands, except for Rashi and G . btn Jahuda, who lived in

Bg Vodtn and G k Vodena ~ Vodind, 13th c: see V asm er 1941: 197, 316), but this might
sim ply reflect the use of Greek as an adm inistrative language. Pella was an area which
historically counted a sizeable Slavic-speaking population, and today still has a
M acedonian-speaking minority. Faber raises the possibility of an autochthonous Slavic­
speaking Jew ry in the Northern Balkans but cites no docum entation (1982:94).
‫ ״‬T he relevant passage is reprinted in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:173-175. Jica of Cer-
nihiv proposed that He j-b-m was related to CSI *jebati ‘have sexual relations’, evidently
construing the -m as the 1st person plural ending in East Slavic. The connection between
th e Hebrew and the Slavic roots is of course fanciful. See also section 1, fn. 7 above on
early Jewish-East Slavic contacts.
** Serkes 1697, sign 82, p. 60, col. 1 (cited by Boroxov 1913:56). Serkes was bom in
L ublin in 1561 and died in Krakow in 1640. See also RubStejn 1922:82-83; Rozental
1954:212-214. For Greek references attesting to the presence of Jews in 9th century
Bulgaria, see S tarr 1939:193ff.
« Levinzon 1828 (also cited by Mieses 1924:308-309 and M Weinreich 3:1973:84).
** See the Responsa of Rabbi Slomo Kohen, published in Saloniki in 1730 (mentioned
by M izan 1929:1192). The cities in which the monolingual South Slavic-speaking Jews
w ere said to reside are located in Northwest and Central Bulgaria, on the Rum anian
frontier. Alekseev notes that no South Slavic translations made directly from Hebrew by
B ulgarian Judaizers in the 14th century are known (1981:74).
90 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

N orthern France and the neighboring R hineland.‫ לג‬These writings have

been the subject of scholarly attention for well over a century.28 T he rele­
vant passages have been largely reprinted, together with a linguistic com­
m entary, by Kupfer and Lewicki 1956. A few Slavic glosses from the
Hebrew writings of the French scholar Rashi which were not reprinted
by Kupfer and Lewicki are discussed in G runw ald 1893; Judeo-Slavic
numismatic materials from Poland were first noted by H arkavi 1867 but
were treated to a comprehensive study only by Gumowski 1962, 1975.
Slavic toponyms from Jewish non-Slavic sources are discussed in Brann,
Elbogen et al. 1934 and Kowalski 1946. The last known Judeo-W est
Slavic glosses were written in the mid-13th century, but it is unclear how
long the language continued in use. Some scholars have assumed that the
existence of Slavic personal and family names am ong Jew s in mid-16th
century Czech docum ents proves that the Czech Jews were still speaking
(Judeo-?) Slavic at that tim e.” But even if a careful study of the frequen­
cy and geographical distribution of Slavic and Yiddish nam es in the
Czech lands were carried out, there is no certainty that the disuse of
Judeo-Slavic names is an indication of code-switching from Judeo-W est
Slavic, just as the continuation of such names would in itself be no certain
indication of the maintenance of Judeo-W est Slavic.
4.11 Com ponent structure of the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses. M ost of
the Slavic glosses found in the Responsa literature have immediate
cognates in Old Czech texts (see examples in section 6.1 below). But
there are also a num ber of Slavic components in Judeo-W est Slavic
which seem to bear closer formal and/or semantic similarity to cognates
in other Slavic languages. Studies of many genetically and geographically
unrelated Jewish languages have repeatedly dem onstrated the fusional
nature of most Jewish languages (especially those of type 1). K upfer and
Lewicki (1956), in their analysis of the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses, appear
to be aware of this fact when they characterize Judeo-W est Slavic as a
mosaic language—but their mosaic comprises bits and pieces from any

11 Note also the parallel flow of Polish, Czech and H ungarian travellers to Western
Europe, e.g. to France, Italy and Germ any in the 12th century, as well as the (low of
West European scholars and cultural influences to the East (Gieysztor 1970:189-190).
‫ ״‬Cassel 1847; W iener 1858; Ziemlich 1886; Grunwald 1893; Koenigsberger 1896;
Berliner 1903; Wellesz 1904; M arkon 1905; Mazon 1927; Altbauer 1928b; Darmesteler
and Blondheim 1929; Aptowitzer 1938; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956; Sadek 1956; Sadek
and H efm an 1962; Jakobson and Halle 1964; Trost 1968; S edinovi 1981; Jakobson
1985.
29 Kisch 1946:20-21; Trost 1968. For example, Slava fa was more popular am ong Jews
in the 17th than in the 18th century (Der allejudtsche Fritdhojin Prag 1960:15). O ther Slavic
feminine anthroponym s preferred by Jews in the 18th century are Ctma, DobruSt, Rami,
Radii, Sazava and Sladkd. O f these, Gebauer 1903-1916 cites thbrui ma, Dvbrujf fa; d n u
is a toponym. Harkavy )928 cites Y dobrui as the diminutive of dobrt.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUACES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 91

and all West and East Slavic dialects—posited solely on the basis of
superficial formal and/or semantic similarity with other Slavic languages,
past and present, and not from any appreciation of Jewish language
creativity.30 The two authors explicitly rejected a South Slavic compo­
nent in the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses as being geographically too distant
from Judeo-W est Slavic—apparendy oblivious to the fact that the Czech
and probably Pannonian Jews had a Byzantine Greek ethnogenesis and
that South Slavic elements are found in Judeo-W est Slavic and in
Y iddish.’1 While I concur with Kupfer and Lewicki that the language of
the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses reveals a marked fusional character, only
Sorbian, Polabian and South Slavic elements would be consistent with
the known facts of Jewish settlement in the Slavic lands. T he definition
of non-Czech Slavic components in the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses must
be m ade with care. Even if an element in the glosses appears to have a
cognate only in a South Slavic dialect, there is no reason to define it a
priori as a Judeo-South Slavic component; in earlier periods, the form
in question might have been a unique Judeo-W est Slavicism or an ele­
ment common to many West Slavic dialects. There appear to be no texts
with only Sorbian and Polabian, or only Czech components. For exam-
pie, b tn MoJSt’s Or zarua (first half of the 13th century) contains both
JW SI Iwd! ■ fW h a il’ ~ So lod [lud] (see section 4.1113 below) and JW SI
pfV + pata ‘heel’ — Cz pata, Svk pata (vs. LSo pjela, USo pjala, Plb
p'ota)*'1 JW SI Iwqyt! + loket ‘elbow’ — Cz loket (vs. LSo toks, USo lokc).‫״‬
O n the possibility of early Yiddish-Sorbian and South Polabian contact,
see section 6 below. The Judeo-W est Slavic glosses also contain unique
forms found in no other Slavic source (see sections 4.115-4.1152 below)
and G reek and G erm anic elements (see sections 4.113-4.1144 below).
The first scholar to define the language of the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses
as a fusion language consisting of West Slavic, Hebrew, Yiddish and
probably Judeo-G reek was M ax Weinreich (1956:625).
4.111 Possible Sorbian and Polabian components.
4.1111JWS1 *rfu/n\JWSI *dwnV + duna ‘Danube R iver’ (late 10th c)’4

10 O n the dangers of this approach, see W exler 1977b: 166ff (with special attention to
Judezmo).
” For additional critique of Kupfer and Lewicki 1956, see Jakobson and Halle 1964.
On the Byzantine background of the Czech and Pannonian Jews, see section 3 above.
Note also that U ihorod, in the Subcarpathian Ukraine, was under the control of a
Bulgarian prince in the 10th century (Mousset 1938:52). It is unclear whether the Slavic
once spoken in Hungary was structurally closer to South or West Slavic.
” Ben MoSt (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:220, 249).
‫ ״‬Ibid. (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:218, 242).
M Attested in the letter of the K hazar King Joseph to Hasdaj ibn &aprut, where it is
spelled incorrectly as rw n\ T he Hebrew graphemes r and d are very similar in shape (see
also Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:69).
92 T H E SLAVIC LA NGUACES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

~ dwn^j(j)! + dunaj (1 1th- 15th cc)35 — So, Cz, Po Dunaj, H g Duna

4.1112 JW SI ibw. JW SI Ibw/ + labu — -o ‘Elbe R iver’ (early 13th c)
— Plb Labu, Labi, So Lobjo (vs. Cz Labe\ Y elb, G Elbe).36
4.1113 JW SI Iwd. JW SI Iwd! + lod ,hail’ (first half of the 13th c) - So
lod [lud] ‘ice’ (vs. Cz led).*7 T he meaning ‘hail’ is not attested in any
Slavic language.
4.1 H 4 JW SI (Ar) nwb gr'd; m h n frg. See section 4 above.
4.112 South Slavic components.
4.1121 JW SI g w n \ Sec discussion in section 3.134 above.
4.1122 JW SI qrwqjm. JW SI qrwqjm! + krokim ‘beetles’ (1 1th c, French
Hebrew text).58 This is the only known instance of a Slavicism appearing
with a Hebrew plural marker. It is impossible to ascertain w hether •im
( < H e -im) was added by Rashi, the Judeo-French-speaking author o f the
text or by a later scribe, or was introduced into R ashi’s text together with
the noun.39 Kupfer and Lewicki’s appeal to Svn krok ‘croaking’ (an
onomatopoeic root which is attested in other Slavic languages as a verb)
has doubtful basis (1956:93).
4.1123 JW SI 's‘(wlcj. JW SI stwlcj ~ s-/ + Holey — s- pi ‘stilts’ (first half
of the 13th c)40 may have been borrowed directly from G Stelze ‘stilt’ or
from a Slavic form of the loan, see e.g. SeCr ilula,41 Po stolcy pi ‘stilts’
(vs. Cz stolec ‘small chair; armchair; throne’). The term is also found in
Yiddish in the form stoic ‘stilt’, which appears to be a borrowing of the
Judeo-W est Slavic G erm anism (or a later borrowing from Polish?). The
m eaning ‘stilt’ is unattested in Old Czech or in Old Polish.

‫ ״‬Tykocinski 1934a:88. Reflexes of G Donau and I.at Danubius also appear in the
Hebrew texts (op. a t ). Y iddish uses SI dunaj See also Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:65, 69,
228. Al-Idrisf has danu, dunu, etc. (12th c) (Lewicki 1945).
*• Btn MoSe (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:215, 228). Tykocinski 1934b:96 corrected
the spelling to Iby, to bring it closer to the presumed Czech etymon. This correction is
unw arranted. G Elbe is also attested in Hebrew texts (op. cit. ). Btn M oil lived for a period
in Meissen (Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:228). This is the only term in the Judeo-W est
Slavic glosses which Kupfer and Lcwicki define as ,,S orbian".
17 Bin M oit (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:218, 241). Kupfer and Lewicki propose
O Po tod (M odPo tod [lud]) as a source. The chronology of CS1 ’ea > 0 in West Slavic
is dated in the 11th century (see Shevelov 1965:4220", especially 428). Jakobson and Halle
rewrite the gloss as tjd, which they derived from Cz ltd ,ice' (1964:170). O n the problems
of scribal confusion between He j and w , and on the problems of textual normalization,
see section 3,134 above.
’* Rashi (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:90, 93).
” See also JW SI p(j)rjnwsl + perinos ,featherbeds' ( — Cz ptfina) with the Judeo-French
plural marker -1 , in the same passage in Rashi (discussed by M. Weinreich 1:1973:89:
3:80; Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:274).
•° Bin MoSt (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:223, 259-260).
•' Skok 1971-1974. Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:259 regard the Judeo-W est Slavic term
as a contamination of G Stelze and SI (sit!) stolec ,arm chair, throne’.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 93

4.1124 JW SI ftrebdno. Sec section 6.16 below.

4.113 Greek components. T here is one sure example of a Greek com­
p o n en t in Judeo-W est Slavic. See discussion of JW SI dwkws in section
3.1 3 4 above.
4.1131 JW SI \w )q d w n , etc. See section 3.134 above.
4.1132 JW SI g w n \ See section 3.134 above.
4.114 G erm anic components. There are a num ber of indications span­
n in g several centuries that Jew s in Eastern G erm any were bilingual in
Slavic and Germanic. For example, in the case of G erm anism s common
to Slavic and Judeo-W est Slavic, the form of the loans tends to be pre­
served best byJudco-W cst Slavic;42 in the case of West Slavicisms found
in both G erm an and G erm an Yiddish, the Slavicisms turn up further to
th e west in W estern Yiddish than in G erm an dialects (see further discus­
sion in sections 6.1-6.225 below).
4.1141 JW SI bm w jln\ JW SI bmwjln ‫נ‬/ + bamvelna ‘cotton’ (early 13th c)
appears to be a blend of M H G boumwolle (see M odG Baumwolle, Viennese
G Bamwol) and CSI *vblna ,wool’.45 T he blend is not unique to Judeo-
W est Slavic, except that the surface cognates in the contiguous West
Slavic languages generally lack m, see e.g. USo bawina , Cz bavlna, Po ba-
weina, O Br bavolna.44 O Po boumwol (1478) is a borrowing from G erm an
rath er than a loan blend.41 O CzY Pnw w jlh / + banvile (1650)4* and con­
tem porary Y (Po, Besserabian) baol also retain a nasal or nasalized
vow el—vs. ModstY baol n, baueln adj. Kupfer and Lewicki reconstruct
O C z *bamvlna and O Po *bamvelna on the basis of the Judeo-W est Slavic
attestatio n ,47 but there is no justification for extrapolating from the
Jew ish to the non-Jewish data, since Jew s, being more prone to bi­
lingualism than their non-Jewish Slavic neighbors, may have been uni­

‫ ״‬In a num ber of other speech communities where Jews and non-Jews are both
exposed to a common non-native source of enrichm ent, the Jews frequentJy show greater
fidelity to the non-native form. For Iberian examples, see W exler 1977b: 184-185; see also
sections 6.2-6.225 below for a comparison of Slavicisms common to Yiddish and German
dialects. O n Y r for Cz i and Po rz, see section 6.32 below.
‫ ״‬Btn M o k (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:216, 232). See also Cz nanoefe) ‘C hristm as’
< G Weihnachtftn), where the first syllable is a phonetic adaptation of G Weth- and the
rem aining segment a Czech translation of G Nacht ,night’. The Viennese term is cited
by Ja k o b 1929.
44 For the claim that Cz bo(m)- is of G erm an origin, see Bruckner 1957 and Rud-
nyc'kyj 1:1962:47. Machck 1971, however, derives the Czech and Germ an terms in­
dependently from It baoetla (said to be attested only in the 16th century), but the term
is found in 14th century Italian (Battisti and Alessio 1950-1957).
** Nitsch and Urbariczyk 1:1953-1955.
« Sher 1978-1980:56.
1956:232 ’‫ י‬. O n the mechnica) reconstruction of Judeo-W est Slavic terms on the basis
of O ld Czech and Old Polish forms, see also section 4.11 above.
94 T H E SLAVIC LA N CUA CES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

que in preserving the m in the G erm an loan. O n a Hebrew-Slavic

blended anthroponym attested in West and East Slavic lands, see section
4.34 below.
4.1142 JW SI merq. JW SI merq (with vocalization of the text)/ + rrurk**
‘celery’ (early 13th c) — LG Merk is also attested in 15th century Slavic
texts, e.g. O C z m ink, O Po mirzyk, marzyk. T he Judeo-W est Slavic form
preserves a closer resemblance to the G erm an etymon than the Slavic
forms, assuming the monosyllabic reading of the gloss is correct. I have
no evidence of this term from O ld W estern Yiddish. In view of the
reduced num ber of Low G erm an components in Old Yiddish, it may be
best to regard JW SI merq as a borrowing from G erm an rather than from
Yiddish.
4.1143 JW SI ‫?ןנ‬/<‫ג‬. JW SI qnwpj/ + konope ‘hem p’ appears in an early
13th century Hebrew document alongside the “ Ashkenazic” (GY) ‫מנ‬/<‫נ‬/
+ anj(a).** Kupfer and Lewicki read the Judeo-W est Slavic gloss as + an-
fa , noting that since such a form is not attested in G erm an dialects (which
have Hanf, Hanaf, Hanef),i0 it must be a borrowing from Y iddish.11 This
argum ent is unconvincing since there is no evidence that W estern Yid­
dish dialects ever lost h-\ the reconstruction of a final vowel is also ques­
tionable (see OCzY hartef 1650, still used in m odem Eastern Yiddish).iJ
The present text is not vocalized, but in early W estern Yiddish texts
which are, the final ‫ נ‬is not always an indication of a final vowel.15 The
adaptation of G-Y han(e)f as 3np ‫—נ‬without k —suggests that Judeo-W est
Slavic had not yet developed a voiceless glottal fricative from CS1 *g (a
change dated in Old U pper Sorbian and Old Czech to approximately the
13th century). The G ermanism is apparently unknown in West Slavic.54
4.1144 JW SI rwsqw h ls\ A Yiddish impact on the Judeo-W est Slavic
glosses may be seen in the use of the tav grapheme in the postvocalic posi­
tion to denote 1st, which is characteristic of the Yiddish norms of reading

4* Ben Azriel (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:185, 194). The term is not attested in
m odem Eastern Yiddish.
w Btn MoJ« (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:223, 257). O n a Slavic cognate of +honop€
in Yiddish, see also section 6.1 below. The cluster nj is ungramm atical in Hebrew.
40 Kluge 1960.
*' T his is the only Germanism in the Judeo-W est Slavic material which Kupfer and
Lewicki define as “ Yiddish” (1956:257).
” Sher 1978-1980:53.
” In a 1290 Beme Yiddish text, words with final J and the shwa diacritic under the
preceding consonant have Middle High G erm an cognates which end in a consonant, e.g.
hanp! +Aart/(Timm 1977:27).
u O n the possibility that both the Slavic and G erm an terms for ‘hem p’ are derived
from an “ Asian” language, see Vasm er 1:1953:615. Bruckner proposes that the German
term may have been borrowed from Slavic (1957:252-253).
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 95

Hebrew. T he example is JW SI rwsqw his ‫ — נ‬rwt- ‘(illness) became

stronger’ (1230-1250) ( ~CS1 *kos- ‘touch’?).55
See also JW SI ,I 'twlcj discussed in section 4.1123 above.
4.115 Unique features
4.1151 Verba] prefixation. The Judeo-W est Slavic glosses provide a
few examples of verbal prefixation which appear to lack a parallel in
other Slavic languages. An example from the writings of the Czech btn
Azriel (1230-1250) is *obznamenanisa3 (with vocalization)/ + obznamenati sa
‘come to one’s senses’.56 The verb stem is unattested in O ld Czech texts
with this prefix (see, however, Cz znamenati ‘mean, intend; bring some­
one to his senses’, OPo znamionai, M odPo znamionowac ‘characterize,
m ean ’). See also Judeo-East Slavic examples in section 4.4112 below.
4.1152 Vowel prothesis (’). In section 3.134 above we noted the spell­
ing in the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses of a prothetic 3 with Germ anic (and
possibly a Greek) loans, and with a single native Slavic term , e.g.
3sqrwvd J/ + askrovada, etc. ‘frying p an ’. Prothesis is not unknown in West
Slavic, but there are no examples with this word. In dialects of Slovak,
a prothetic vowel is sometimes found before clusters beginning with a so­
n an t (e.g. Svk omJa vs. Cz mie ‘m ass’; see also O C z okfi'n discussed in sec­
tion 3.134 above). In the East Slavic lands, Jewish speech provides no
exam ples of the prothesis which is found in dialects of Belorussian, e.g.
B r dial (a)pranik ‘laundry beetle’ ~ EY pral'nik (see discussion in section
6.57 below). O n the reasons for not ascribing 5 in ‫נ‬sqrwvd3 to Judeo-
French interefercnce, see section 3.134 above.

4 .2 Judeo-West Slavic inscriptions in Hebrew characters on coins, late 12th-late

13th centuries
T here are a num ber of coins minted by Jew s in Poland between the
la te 12th and late 13th centuries which contain Polish, Greek and
H ebrew words—all written in Hebrew characters; the numismatic
m aterials are far too sparse to permit meaningful comparison with the
non-num ism atic Judeo-W est Slavic data, but are of importance to Judeo-
Slavic linguistics since they attest to the presence of Slavic-speaking Jews
in Poland in the late 12th century. This predates by about a century the
earliest historical documentation of a Jewish presence in Kalisz and the
K ujaw y district. The coins, known since the 18th century, bear some of

‫ ״‬Btn Azriel (in Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:183, 190). See also A ltbauer 1977:124.
N ote also the use of idv III for Po s in a Yiddish document from the West Ukraine from
1590, e g . k yzj blwtf + Po kozubaUs ‘tax paid by Jews for the purpose of purchasing writing
rraterials for poor Christian students* (see also scction 5.113 below for further variants
a n d etymology) (Apteker 1590, cited in Shmeruk 1981b:51).
56 Kupfer and Lewicki 1956:182, 189.
96 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A S H K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

the oldest known inscriptions in a form of Polish; they have been the o b ­
ject of attention by numismatists and historians, but have rarely been
discussed by students of the Polish language.57 Altogether there are four
expressions in Polish: m iqw P qrl pwUqjis / M odPo Mieszko krol polski
‘Mieszko (III, the Elder), King of Poland (1181-1207)’; bwljsljj —
bwljsljwl O Po Bolezlai (c. 1166), Boltzlawi (1177), Bolezlaui (1198),59 M od-
Po Bolestaw, q ll tp / M odPo Kalisz ; knzdn — gnd (?) tp (1 181-1202)/OPo
Gnezdna (967),60 M odPo Gniezno. The orthography of the Polish Jew ish
inscriptions, which differs slightly from that of the other Judeo-W est
Slavic materials, offers one point of interest (assuming that the readings
of the inscriptions, some of which are only barely legible, is correct): o n
the coins, SI k is rendered by both H e ka f Ikl and by qof Iql, while in th e
Judeo-W est Slavic glosses, k is rendered almost always by q —an o r ­
thographic tradition followed in Yiddish as weU (except in the case o f
Hebrew loans, where q and k are used in accordance with the H ebrew
orthographic practice).6' Both Judeo-W est Slavic orthographic practices
fail to distinguish between the sound values of the two letters ka f and qoj.
T he single Grecism in the inscriptions, JW SI dwkws (1242-1257), is
discussed in section 3.134 above. T he Polish phrases dated 1425 a t ­
tributed to Jews which were recorded in Latin characters (in C h ristian
documents) reveal no differences with the Polish used by contem porary
non-Jews.62

4.3 Judeo-East Slavic words and phrases in Hebrew characters, late I5th-17th cm -
turies
Judeo-East Slavic materials written in Hebrew characters are far few er
than the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses and are several hundred y ea rs
” For a comprehensive survey of the materials, see Gumowski 1975, who also m en-
(ions the existence of coins with Hebrew inscriptions from Lausitz (c. 1160), Saxony (e .g .
;Meissen, 12th-13th centuries) and W urzburg (eariy 13th century) (ibid 109-110).
Gumowski believes the minters of the Polish coins hailed from G erm any (ibid. 34, 106fF).
but Jakobson thinks they were from the Czech lands (1957:46). T he only linguists to
discuss the coins, albeit superficially, were Harkavi (1867:69-76) and O h r (1905:2-3).
‫ • י‬In miqwP, H e lin could denote either HI or Isi, though in other coins, Po s is w ritten
with samex. On O Po Mesco see Rudnicki 1963:429.
Old Polish non-numismatic names are from Taszycki 1958:94.
60 Staszewski 1959:98. Arabic forms of the toponym lack d (see Lewicki 1945; U rban-
czyk 1964a).
‘ ‫ י‬Sporadic use of kaj for Slavic initial k is found in the glosses of btn Mole. See also
section 3.322 above.
•* These phrases were printed in Ringlblum 1:1932:117-118. The sole Hebrew w ord
Adassy, Adasstm fa ( < He hadassih) shows the impact of Polish dialects, most of which
lack h O n the spelling of Polish anthroponym s and toponyms in Hebrew characters from
the early 15th century, see ibid. 1926. Mieses cites a Polish-language publication in
Hebrew characters from Kolomyja 1914 (1919:136); Slavic materials in H ebrew
characters require study.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 97

younger. T he Judeo-East Slavic materials consist of glosses and occa­

sional phrases in Hebrew characters and a Judeo-East Slavic caique
translation of the Hebrew Bible. The first Judeo-East Slavic glosses are
found in M . Kac (printed in 1697 but containing earlier passages) and
reprinted in B.-C. Kac 1899, Dubnow 1909, Boroxov 1913:53-59, Wex-
ler 1973 and 1977a:42-43.
4.31 JESI f cbj"3; wjtwld — w wjt(psq. In JESI t (b j '3 / + tebja ~ + c-
‘you’ acc sg (Vilnius 1635)6J the spelling with fef It! contrasts with the
contemporaneous Po c and Br c' which had developed from CS1 V in the
mid-16th and 14th-16th centuries respectively, see e.g. M odPo ciebie,
M odBr cjabe.64 O rdinarily, H e ft !—historically a pharyngealized dental
stop— is used in European Hebrew to denote SI t, as in JESI w jfw ld( 1488)
— wjfwlt (1669) ma < Br Vitawt < Li Vytautas.‫ ״‬I would suggest three
explanations for the use o f ftf III in f b j ’ 3: CS1 V had not yet become af-
fricated (a) in a part of the Belorussian or Polish speech territory (this is
not very likely on the basis of non-Jewish textual evidence), (b) in Judeo-
Slavic speech only; (c) Jew s used an etymological spelling (which
reflected pronunciation?) for Slavicisms. T he third explanation is the
most convincing, and finds a parallel in the Yiddish treatm ent of Slavic
loans (see Y tiktin tp — Po Tykocin and discussion in section 6.32 below).
Affrication in Belorussian or Polish words is not reflected in Hebrew
spellings until possibly the 18th century, see e.g. JE Sl(H e) w w jlcpsq tp
(1780) — Br Vicebsk,6i where lav III —historically a dental stop—was pro­
nounced postvocallically as Isl in the Ashkenazic reading norms of
Hebrew.
4.32 JE S I lwbq3; Iwpq3. Mordaxaj J a ft (c. 1530-1612), a resident of
Brest, relates: “ Lw bq3 [ + lubka] is a w om an’s nam e in the language of
"R u ssia ,” 67 but people sometimes want to write Iw pk3 [ + lupka\ with p.
I said this cannot be, since lwbq3 with b in the language of “ Russia” is
*love’, as they say in “ R ussia” Iwbji [lubif] which means ‘you love h er’,
while Iwpq3[ + lupka] with p means ‘rob’, as they say Iwpji [ + lupiS] which
means ‘you ro b ’. So I said they should write with b and they thanked me.

41 W exler 1977a: 137.

M Ibid. 169-173 and Stieber 1973:67 respectively. The use of the jod grapheme to
denote a palatalized consonant finds a parallel in the use of_>■or ■in Polish texts beginning
with the middle of the 15th century (Siatkowski 1973:146-149).
“ M. Kac 1697, p. 26, col. 2 right; Siedlce 1797, p. 24, col. 1 left (cited by Boroxov
1913:56). In writing Belorussian in the Turko-Arabic script, the Belorussian T atars used
the cognate letters fa Ifl (a pharyngealized stop in Arabic) for Br I (and rarely for V ) and
la Itl for reflexes of O Br V (see Antonovii 1968:249ff).
“ W exler 1977a:137. See also discussion of JW SI s spelled with He tae in section
4.1144 above.
*’ The author seems to be using He rusidh in the m eaning of Y rajsn ‘Belorussia’. See
also section 4, fn. 19 above.
98 T H E SLAVIC LANGUACES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

I wrote this to warn that one needs to be precise in every language in the
writing of names, since every language has its own g ram m ar.” 64 This
passage shows that Jew s were accustomed to writing Slavic (though
presumably in Hebrew script). It is difficult to evaluate the significance
of the spelling Iw. Standard U krainian, Belorussian and Polish distin­
guish /’// in ljubyty, ljubic’, lubic ‘to love’ from l/i in lupyty, lupic' and lupU
‘beat, flay’. T he Jewish scribe either chose not to reflect the difference
between I and /’ in writing, or else spoke a dialect where a single lateral
was pronounced in both morphemes. For example, Belorussian occa­
sionally shows regional dispalatalization in ljubic' ‘to love’, though the
Ukrainian dialects currently spoken in the Br6st area do not (see e.g . Br
pulub’ic’ just south of Mahilew, at point # 586 of the D A B M ). T he com­
mon spelling of Iw might also reflect a (Judeo-)W est Slavic pattern o f pro­
nunciation; this phenomenon also characterizes the Yiddish integration
of Polish words, whereby Polish orthographic / and /Jw] are both pro­
nounced as I. This passage also shows that the author lacked assimilation
of a voiced consonant to a following voiceless consonant; at present, this
feature is typical of Southeast Belorussian dialects and North Ukrainian
dialects (and the standard language).69 T he Judeo-East Slavic data sug­
gest that the voicing assimilation in consonant clusters may not have
characterized the speech of the Brest area by the late 16th century, but
we must also keep in mind the problem of the Slavic com ponent merger
that characterizes coterritorial Yiddish and probably also Judeo-East
Slavic.
4.33 Periphrastic verb constructions: JESI mqdi bj"l. In many Euro­
pean Jewish languages, Hebrew masculine singular participles of both
simple and derived verbs tend to be integrated periphrastically with a
native auxiliary; rarely are Hebrew stems conjugated like native verbs,
e.g. Y zojxe zajn, K ar (Trakai, Halyf) zoxe bol- ,to m erit’ < He zoxth
‘m eriting’ + Y zajn , K ar bol- ‘be’. T he auxiliary is inflected for all gram•
matical categories, while the Hebrew verbal element is indeclinable.
W ithin Yiddish, periphrastic integration of Hebrew verbal material is
more characteristic of Eastern than W estern dialects.70 I know of only
one Judeo-East Slavic example in a phrase preserved in a Hebrew text
written by M. Kac (Vilnius 1635): j"* f b j “3 3stjm mqdi b j'll + ja UbjaJ ccbja
estym [mqdi] byw ‘by this (ring) I have sanctified you (i.e. declared you my

*• 1620, sign 129, p. 55, col. 2 (cited also in B.-C. Kac 1899:32; Boroxov 1913:59-60;
Altbauer 1977 |1965b):62, fn. 3).
49 For Belorussian data, see DABM 1963, map #46 and W exler 1977a:136-I39, for
U krainian, see Shevelov 1979:476-484.
70 For a detailed discussion, see Wexler 1971, 1974b, 1980a. See also reroarkj on
Hebrew sub-gram m ar in section 7.110 below.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 99

w ife)’, with the periphrastic mqdi byl ‘sanctify’ (literally ‘was sanctifying’)
< H e nuqaddel ‘sanctifying’.71 It is impossible to state from a single ex­
am ple whether the periphrastic conjugation was borrowed from coter-
ritoriaJ Yiddish (see Y mtkadei zajn ‘sanctify’) or was native to Judeo-East
Slavic. The earliest examples of the periphrastic construction in Yiddish
d ate from the early 15th century texts em anating from Frankfurt and
U lm .72 The demonstrative pronoun estyj is still attested in the Belorussian
dialects spoken in the Mahilew and Vicebsk districts.71
4.34 JE , WS1 ix n \ An example of a blended Hebrew - Slavic an-
throponym is JESI (Br) $a(x)nu dat (Luc’k Jew , document from Krakow
1487);7* PoHe ixnV +Jaxno (16th c, Lublin tombstone) ma; EY Saxnooic
fam < Y ia j ( < H e j i f cdjaAu ‘Isaiah’) + SI -xno.75 T he suffix is
widespread in West and East Slavic languages in hypocoristic forms from
as early as the 12th century, see e.g. O U k Maxno (12th c), Po Juchno
(1508) < Jerzy m a.76

4 .4 Judeo-East Slavic caique languages, 13th-16th centuries

In many Jewish communities, the Bible and other Hebrew and Judeo-
A ram aic liturgical texts were translated into the native Jewish language.
T h e language of translations differed radically from the spoken Jewish
language of the community by its extreme imitation of Hebrew word
order, phraseology and derivational patterns, and by the widespread re­
jection of outright loans from Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic. The transla­
tion language was never intended for spoken purposes, except perhaps
for formal declam ations.77 In section 2 above, I proposed calling such
translation languages “Judeo-X caique” languages. T he only extant
Judeo-Slavic caique text is the Judeo-East Slavic translation of eight
Books of the Bible (Daniel, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Job, Proverbs, Psalms,

, ‫ י‬Dubnov 1909:22 gives s()’m without the initial vowel. For discussion of JESl(Br)
*M/im, see Wexier 1971:477-478, fn. 9.
‫ יי‬See Cinberg 1937:27 (quoted in D. Katz 1979:23) and S. A. Birnbaum, 1979:153,
# 9 respectively.
75 K as'pjarovif 1927; Bjal’kevi? 1970; Ababurka 1973:2; Kryvicki and JaSkin 1981.
74 Rusanivs'kyj 1965:43.
' ‫ י‬M. W einreich noted that the nam e is unknown among G erm an Jews but proposed
only an “ O riental” source (4:1973:46). Note also Uk (Hucul) Saj(a) ma, a truncation of
Isaj(a) ‘Isaiah’ (de Vincenz 1970:168).
‫ ‘ ׳‬T ru b aiev 1968:36.
77 For a history of Yiddish caique translations of the Bible, see Staerk and Leitzmann
1923; for a discussion of the colloquialization of the Ladino caique language used by the
Portuguese M arranos in N onhem Europe and its eventual abandonm ent, see Wexler
1982a:68-75; Altbauer ms provides a comparative discussion of Jewish translation tech-
niqucs. £urawski is misinformed when he claims ■hat direct translations from the
Hebrew arc unknown in Medieval Europe (1:1967:165).
100 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

Ruth, Song of Songs), known as Codex #262. T he text, which is

believed to date from the late 15th or early 16th century, has been
described variously as “ Belorussian,” “ U krainian” and “ R ussian” in
language.78 T he existence of a Judeo-East Slavic caique text is cir­
cum stantial evidence for the existence of a colloquial Judeo-East Slavic
language in the 15th-16th centuries, since there appears to be no Jewish
community that uses a caique language in the absence of a colloquial
Jewish language. Bible translations made by Christians may also imitate
broadly the norms of Hebrew syntax and word-derivation, but rarely to
the extent of most Jewish translations.79
In addition to the Codex # 262, there are also a num ber of Slavic texts
dating from the 13th to 16th centuries known to have been translated
from Hebrew, though not all of them can be conclusively identified as
Jewish literary works.80 The slavish imitation of Hebrew syntax, word-
derivation and phraseology, familiarity with traditional Jewish Biblical
exegesis, correct analysis of the Hebrew text,81 as well as a non-Latinized

’■ Peretc regarded the language of the Codex as Ukrainian (1975:206), while Antipov
defines the language of the Codex as “ Southwest Russian” (1982a, p a n 1:11), and
Belorussian scholars regard the text as *,Belorussian” (see references in fh. 80 below).
Distinctive Belorussian features include akan'e, h for CSI ‘g, orthographic confusion of
u and v. O n the problems of distinguishing Belorussian from Ukrainian texts in this
period, see Shevelov 1974 (with rich bibliography). The label “ Kiev-Palessian” dialect
may be more accurate for the Codex than the anachronistic use of the term “ Belorus­
sian” or “ U krainian” (sec discussion in Shevelov 1953; W exler I977a:52-61 and section
6.57 below).
’* O n the possibility that Szymon Budny patterned his Polish Bible translation (the
Biblia nieswieska 1572) on the Hebrew text and consulted Jewish informants, see A ltbauer
1966:95 and fn. 14. For a discussion of the contem porary charges that Budny was a
“Ju d aizer” , see Kot 1953:29, 33.
*° Possible East and Church Slavic translations from Hebrew, and East and South
Slavic texts with non-Ashkenazic Hebraisms include the Psaltyr' lidovstvujuSfix (studied by
Speranskij 1907), the literature of the Judaizers (see Sobolevskij 1903; Peretc 1908;
1926; Lastowski 1926:337-338; Borodianski 1937; Rubinstein 1953-1954; R yan
1968:655-657; Altbauer 1977 [I960]; Ettinger 1960; Anifenka 1:1961:276-280; Shevelov
1979:403); “ Reib iidovbskogo jazyka” in the Novgorodskaja kormia (in Kovtun
1963:146-154, 398-420; N im iuk 1964:195-197); Lift ofMoses (Farrall 1981); the Book 0}
Enoch (10th-l 1th cc) (Vaillant 1952; Rubinstein 1962; Pines 1971); the Xronolagtja of An-
drej' RymSa (1581) (Lastowski 1926:424-427); Song of Songs, manuscript in the State
Historical M useum in Moscow (Sb. Sinod 558; see 2urawski 1:1967:157); Belorussian
Biblical books, beginning 17th century (Saltykov Sfcdrin Library, F.I.2; see Bulyka
I972b:358); Tajna tajnyx 16th century (Speranskij 1908; A n ijin k a 1:1961:276-280). See
also Alekseev 1980, 1981; Shapiro 1982. For a discussion of an East Slavic translation
of Esther from the 1 lth-12th century believed to have been based on the Hebrew text,
see MeSferskij 1978 (the manuscript is in the Lenin State Library, Moscow, in the
Trotckoe sobrame, no. 2 (2207]).
•' See A ltbauer 1977 11965b|:64 for examples of Biblical exegesis. Often the Codex of­
fers a correct analysis of the Hebrew structure where Christian Bible translations err, e.g.
JESIcq polomja boiie 'flame of G od’ correctly translates He !alhttnljah (Song of Songs 8:6)
vs. O U k plamy eja ‘her flame' (He lalhtettha) (O strih Bible 1581).
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 101

an d non-Hellenized transcription of Hebrew anthroponym s and

toponym s, all combine to make a Jewish authorship of the Codex #262
unassailable. T he Codex might have been earmarked for Jew s ignorant
o f Hebrew, but the fact that the translation is preserved in a Cyrillic
rath e r than Hebrew script, the traditional medium of all Jewish caique
translations (exccpt for the Ladino Bibles of 1553-1762 made for former
M arranos outside of the Iberian Peninsula), suggests that this particular
m anuscript may have been intended for a Christian readership.82 If this
m anuscript was copied down by a non-Jew, then the spelling norms are
irrelevant for us. The possibility that some of the Judeo-W est Slavic
fragm ents in the Responsa literature might also be a caique rather than
vernacular language was raised in section 4 above. A discussion of the
language of Codex # 262 follows.
4.41 Codex #262, late 15th-early 16th century. Codex #262 has been
discussed in the scholarly literature for about a century, yet despite fre­
q u en t citations, especially in current lexicographical studies, the full text,
together with a linguistic analysis, has not yet been published.83 Scholars
h av e long recognized that the importance of the Codex lies in the fact that
it is one of the first texts from the East Slavic lands containing large sec­
tions which are relatively free of C hurch Slavic influence. However, all
th e Soviet historical lexicographical studies totally ignore the caique
origin of the Codex. For example, the Historical Dictionary of the
Belorussian Language (Bulyka 1982IT) lists Belorussian lexical innova­
tions and Hebrew-Judeo-Aramaic loans found uniquely in the Codex
w ith no characterization of their origin; the reader hardly suspects that

•‫ ג‬Lastowski is of the opinion that Belorussian translations of the liturgy were intended
for Judaizing sects (1926:242), but connecting these texts with the Judaizers is prob­
lem atic since little is known about the sects. Karskij (1921:19) and Stankevil (1954:5)
believe the translation was used in the synagogue, while Florovskij (1940*1946:160*161)
a n d Ciievskij (1966:355) stipulate that it was intended for Jew s ignorant of Hebrew. The
fact that Hebrew names appear both in Hebrew and traditional C hurch Slavic forms sug­
gests that the translator and the scribe were not the same person (see Arxipov 1982a, part
1:13, 1982b: 16). Note also Karskij’s remark that while the work had been translated
directly from Hebrew, it was later adjusted to the C hurch Slavic translation (1896:27).
O n modern*day Russian-speaking Judaizers, see sections 3.125, fn. 97 and 3.32, fn. 367
above.
43 The only scholars in recent years to study the Codex systematically are A ltbauer (sec
1963, 1965, 1 9 6 6 ,1967a. 1967b, 1968b,1968c, 1970, 1972b,1977 [1961a. 1965, 1973b],
m s) and Arxipov 1982a, 1982b. Parts of the translation (Rut h, Daniel) have been
reprinted or photostatted and the text as a whole has been described in passing by Dobr-
janskij 1882: 441-443; Vladimirov 1888:239-241, 337-338, 342-344; Karskij 1893:88-116,
1896:26-34, 1921:18-21, 1955:56-73 and passim; Evseev 1902; Speranskij 1908:99-100,
fn. 3; H4ff; Lastowski 1926:241-243; Florovskij 1940-1946:159-160; £uraw9ki
1958:57-58, J : 1967:159-160, 165-166; A niienka it al. 1:1961:119-125; Baxan'kow it al.
1970 passim; Bulyka 1972b passim, 1982ff,, passim; Alekseev 1980, 1981. Altbauer is
presently preparing the publication of the five scrolls (ms).
102 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

these items do not reflect 15th-16th century Belorussian literary norms.

T he only merit of Bulyka’s dictionary for Judeo-Slavic linguistics is to
assemble “ Belorussianisms” that are attested uniquely in the Codex,
though many of the translations in the dictionary are erroneous. For ex­
ample, JESlcq aptiku acc sg (Job 41:23) is translated as ‘medicine’, though
the term actually translates He mtrqahdM ‘vessel for boiling spices’. The
Jewish translators used apt/ka in this new meaning, since mtrqahdh, deriv­
ed from the root r-q-h ‘concoct, spice, m ix’, also expresses the notion
‘pharm acy’ (as in bet mirqahat, literally ‘house of concoctions’). Skaryna’s
contemporaneous Belorussian translation (1517) renders He merqahah as
jakovy ehda masti kipftb .84 See further discussion in sections 4.411 and
4.4112 below.
Students of the Codex have regarded the non-East Slavic components
in the text as Church Slavicisms, e.g. nostb ( — nocb) *night’, zlato ( -
zoloto) ‘gold’. But the presence of num erous elements from the traditional
medium of Bible translations in the East Slavic lands is puzzling if a
Jewish readership was intended. The presence of a South Slavic compo­
nent in the Codex might be explained in two ways: (a) the text was
produced by Jews for the exclusive use of a Christian, or Judaicizing
readership;85 (b) the use of a South Slavic component would be natural
among Jews whose native language was South Slavic or whose caique
language tradition had originally developed in a South Slavic milieu. In
the second case, the South Slavic components of the Codex should be
defined as “ (Judeo-)Bulgarian” rather than “ Church Slavic” . Altbauer
has observed that in the Book of Daniel, portions which were originally
written in Judeo-A ram aic appear in “ Church Slavic” while in the
Hebrew portions of the Book of Daniel colloquial East Slavic elements
predom inate.86 The distribution of Church Slavic and East Slavic in the
Codex thus stands in opposition to the diglossic situation prevaUing in
the East Slavic lands at this tim e—namely, (colloquial) Aramaic:
(literary) Church Slavic:: (literary) Hebrew: (colloquial) East Slavic. At

** Here and there I compare the Codex # 262 with the first Belorussian Bible transla­
tion made by Skaryna 1517• 15 19, but such a comparison is of limited use, since Skaryna
modeled his translation on the Czech Bible which in turn was based on the Vulgate. Oc-
<asiona!ly, the Church Slavic O strih Bible (1581) is cited.
‫ ״‬In the absence of a Judeo-East Slavic Bible translation in Hebrew characters, there
is no way to determine if the Codex #262 was intended for several audiences, but there
is a prec edent in the Ladino Bible translations published in 18th century Italy where a
Hebrew scripi was used for Sephardic Jews (speakers of Judezm o) and a Latin script for
the descendants of the Portuguese and Spanish M arranos in Northern Europe. The
choice of script also entailed some linguistic changes as well (for details, see Wexler
I982b:68-71).
“ 1968:2. See also Arxipov 1982a. part 1:23IT; I982b:18-19.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 103

p resen t, there is no evidence of a Jewish caique language from the South

Slavic lands, and I do not know of any unique South Slavic elements in
th e Codex; but until a systematic comparison of Codex #262 and con­
tem poraneous Christian Bible translations from the Belorussian and
U k rain ian lands is made, it would be prem ature to accept 2uraw ski’s
claim that the language of Codex # 262 is “ C hurch Slavic” with Belorus­
sian features (1:1967:157fT.).
4.4-11 T he impact of the Hebrew text.
4.4111 Imitation of Hebrew syntax. The Codex #262 often follows
H ebrew syntactic norms, even at the expense of violating Slavic gram ­
m atical norms. Thus, because Belorussian and Ukrainian lack lcxical
m eans of expressing definiteness, the Hebrew definite article is rendered
in the Judeo-East Slavic caique language of the Codex by a
dem onstrative pronoun, e.g. H e ha-jtltd ‘the boy’ (R uth 4:16) > JESlcq
onoe ditf, H e ha-na^arah ‘the girl’ (Esther 2:13) > JESlcq tat molodica.87
A nother example of Hebrew syntactic interference is the treatm ent of the
Biblical Hebrew construction known as the tautologous infinitive, which
consists either of the infinitive followed by a finite verb (to express em ­
phasis) or of a finite verb followed by the infinitive (to express duration).
T h e Hebrew tautologous infinitive is translated in the Codex by a partici-
pie and a finite verb; such a construction is not found in Skaryna’s
translation (1517-1519). Examples (with the finite verb in final position)
are H e hugged huggad ‘it was told’ (R uth 2:11) > JESlcq poveda pov/dano
(vs. Skaryna povedeli sutb m n l 1519); H e haharel tahariH ‘you will be silent’
(E sther 4:14) > JESlcq molcaci zmolcisb (vs. Skaryna iy... budes moiiati
1519). The Slavic languages have a discontinuous construction involving
an infinitive and finite verb, which is first found in the 16th century
Polish Biblia Zqfia,B> and in colloquial Slavic languages as well—but not
in the same meaning as the Judeo-East Slavic construction, e.g. Po
moralnosc miec— to ja mam ‘as to morality, I have it’.89
T here are num erous examples in the Codex where Hebrew word order
has been grafted onto the Judeo-East Slavic text. For instance, He he-mar

17 See also discussion in Arxipov 1982a, part 3:l2ff; I982b:23. For the use of the
dem onstrative pronoun as a definite article in 16th century Polish Bible translations, see
A ltbauer 1966:90. In the Hebrew words below, — denotes a morpheme boundary, ex­
cept in the citation of roots where — separates the consonants in the discontinuous root
m orphem e.
•• A ltbauer 1963, 1966. 1968c:14.
89 Ohijenko 1941:63-64, who recommends a construction of infinitive + finite verb
rather than participle + finite verb for the Hebrew construction in Ukrainian Bible
translations (ibid. 67-69). For a comparative discussion, see Goldenber^ 1971.
S tankevii’s Belorussian translation of the Bible contains examples of participle + finite
verbs, e.g. He {0*01 Sd'a! ‘he indeed asked' (Genesis 43:7) > Br pytajuty, raspytavaw
(1973). For additional examples from the Codex, see Arxipov 1982a, part 3:5.
1 0 4 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . A ND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

Saddaj li mt'od ‘God has made my life very bitter’ (R uth 1:20) (literally
‘em bittered’ + ‘G od’ + ‘to m e’ + ‘m uch’) > JESlcq ogortilb sadai m n i
velmi (vs. Skaryna napolni me hsdb velbmi horkostfmi 1519); He ben-i u-oen-ex
‘between you and m e’ (R uth 1:17) (literally ‘between me and between
you’) > JESlcq m tzi mnoju i mezi toboju (vs. Skaryna [snw tb\ mtne rozliuHth
ot tebe 1519).
4.4112 Imitation of Hebrew patterns of word formation and
phraseology. The Codex often imitates Hebrew derivational patterns by
matching all forms of a Hebrew root with a single East Slavic stem, e.g.
He sakarut ‘youth’ (Ecclesiastes 11:10) > JESlcq lemostb ( = cemyj
‘black’) since Hebrew forms of the same root s-h-r, e.g. s&hfir, iahar,
denote ‘black’ and ‘dawn, darkness’ respectively (vs. Skaryna mladosti
1517). All forms of H e g-*-l ‘redeem ’ in R uth 4:3-7 are translated by a
common Belorussian stem—He ha-gd'el ‘the redeem er’, li-g3ol ‘to
redeem ’, ga3al ‘he redeemed’ and g>*uldt-f‘my redem ption’ are translated
as okupitelb, okupiti, okupi, okupenbe\ Skaryna’s translation uses three
separate roots: bliznemu, vladiti, kuplju (1519) while Stankevi£’s version
has svajaku, vykupic' , vykupe (1973).90 Hebrew derived verbs are often
paired with Belorussian prefixed verbs—though less commonly in the
case of the Hebrew hiptl form, a derived pattern which usually expresses
causation—a function not regularly expressed in Belorussian by a verbal
prefix.91 Examples are H e filt-dn ‘rule’ (Ecclesiastes 8:4), idlil ‘ruler* (Ec­
clesiastes 8:8 ; a plural form is given in Ecclesiastes 7:19), salat ‘he ru led ’
(Ecclesiastes 8:9) > JESlcq oladarb,9J voloditetb,9J vlodhevb (pi) and volodi-
lb respectively; in Skaryna 1518, the first three words are translated by
separate roots: kreposti, mod, vladeetb respectively.94 Occasionally, the

40 See also AJtbauer 1966:91, who adds the Polish translation equivalents from Budny
(1572): powincwrity, odkup(u’) , bliskosc. For further examples, see Arxipov 1982a. pan 2:4,
1982b:22. '
9, The Codex often translates Hebrew causative verbs periphrastically, with the aux­
iliary ‘give’ or ‘make*, e.g. He hirkhu ,they had (him) ride’ (Esther 6:11) > JE Slcq dali
emu e’zditi; He va-jj-amlix-ehd ‘he made her rale’ (Esther 2:17) > JESlcq outinil e f crceju\
haimi*ini *let me hear* (Song of Songs 8:13) > JESlcq dat m i uslylati vs. O U k uslyii mi
(O strih Bible 1581) (literally ‘listen to m e’). Similar constructions appear in Skaryna’s
translation. In Daniel 11:36, He hicliah ‘he succeeded’ is translated by a prefixed verb,
zviljazit, a verb which in East Slavic languages is not attested with a prefix, but see Po
zwy<t<zy< ‘be victorious’.
97 This term is not attested in Skrayna’s translation, nor in Church Slavic texts.
Vladarb is found in Old Ukrainian (15th century), where it is a loan from O Po wtodarz
— itAa- 4superintendant of the king's property’; a cognate is also found in O ld Czech (see
HrynfySyn 1977►1978). T he Judeo-East Slavic caique variant might be derived from
O C z vladaf.
5‫ י‬The surface cognate in Skaryna is vladetelh *ruler; owner’.
94 But the causative va-ja'ilit-ennu *he gave him power’ (Ecclesiastes 6:2) > JESlcq
dastb emu moa (vs. a paraphrase in Skaryna)
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 105

principle of root matching obliges the translator to create innovative

(often prefixed) verbs, e.g. H e giddel ‘he increased’ ( < gadol ‘big, large’)
(E sth er 3:1) > JESlcq oelidoual (vs. Skaryna 0 povyienii 1519); higdil Cojev)
‘([thejenem y) grew large’ (Lam entations 1:9) > JESlcq rozvelililsja
(Skaryna uses a different prefixed verb, privoznescs( 1519); H e va-jjtfav lib-0
*he was happy’ (literally ‘and-became-good his-heart’) (R uth 3:7) >
JE S lcq oudobr/lo (vs. Skaryna i by11 veselh 1519); He p-gabber ‘he en­
couraged, strengthened’ (Ecclesiastes 10:10) ( < gavar'hc overcame’) >
JE S lcq vlsxorobrcth (vs. Skaryna z velikoju praceju vyostreno budetb 1518).95
T h e compulsion to match each Belorussian root with a single Hebrew
counterpart may also account for the abolition of Belorussian mor-
phophonem ic alternations. For example, JESlcq blisk ‘brilliance, glitter’
(E sth er 1:6), unattested in Old Belorussian texts (for expected OES1
bleskb\ see M odBr bljask—a Polonism), may have been created from the
v erb blislali ‘to glitter’, in order to match the root l-h-v which denotes
both the verb and the noun (e.g. lahav ‘it glittered, burned’: lahav ‘glitter,
flam e’). Alternatively, Uk blysk implies a non-Jewish source for the
Judeo-E ast Slavic form; see also O R blisku loc (14th c).96
T h e Hebrew pattern of cognate objects also finds expression in the
C odex, e.g. He het3 halo? ‘he sinned’ (Lam entations 1:8) (literally ‘sin’
+ ‘he sinned’) > JESlcq hrixb zhr/iil (vs. Skaryna hrexomh sohreiil
1519—with an instrum ental complement, literally ‘by sin’ + ‘he
sin n ed ’).97 In R uth 2:13, the Hebrew text has two variants iifhdt-exa and
iifhot-exa ‘your m aidservant’; the Codex appears to match each variant
with a separate Slavic form, rob1>and raby respectively vs. a single variant
in Christian translations.
Alongside the loan translations illustrated above, there are also many
instances where the Codex does not follow Hebrew norms. O ne example
would be H e tahat vaitt ‘in place of V ashti’ (literally ‘under’ + ‘V ashti’)
(E sther 2:4) > JESlcq m/sto vaitii, which parallels Skaryna m/slo Vastii
1519; He va-tl-iiiaq la-htn ‘she kissed them ’ (R uth 1:9) (literally ‘...to
th e m ’) > JESlcq pocelovala ix (with a direct object), which parallels
Skaryna pocalovalajest ^(1519). In one case, the Codex, but not Christian
translations, deviates from Hebrew phrase structure, e.g. H e Hi loy ‘no

” T he process of m atching Hebrew derived verbs from ihe same root with a single
translation equivalent also characterizes the Sephardic Bible translations into Ladino (see
S lph ih a 1977:255).
*• See Sreznevskij 1893-1903, with the gloss ‘pavem ent’ (in a Russian translation of
the Book of Esther) due to the ambiguity of He t-c-j ‘glowing coal; pavem ent’. For the
various reflexes of OES1 bttsku in Ukrainian, see Matvijas 1984, m ap It 6.
” A nother example is He va-jja-ku... makkat hirtv ‘and they struck... with a blow of
the sw ord’ (E ither 9:5) > JESlcq biti... bitbrmt m d m ym i. Ohijenko 1941:67-69 discusses
the status of the cognate object in C hurch Slavic and colloquial Ukrainian.
106 T H E SLAVIC LANCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JEW S

one’ (literally ‘man no’) > JESlcq nixto (Esther 9:2) vs. ChSl celovtky
nikii (Codex #52).
4.4113 Avoidance of Hebrew loan words. Codex #262 has few
Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic loan words, other than anthroponym s,
toponyms, names of holidays and Hebrew months; other Jewish caique
languages share the low percentage of Hebraisms but differ in the
Hebrew corpus left untranslated. Examples of Hebrew loans left un­
translated are He Sabbat ‘Sabbath’ > JESlcq Sabat (Lam entations 2:6),
H e Saddaj epithet for God (R uth 1:21) > JE Slcq Sadai;98 He jtrusalajim
‘Jerusalem ’ (Lam entations 1:7) > JESlcq emSalaim'b — jarusolima gen
(Esther 2:6); H e micraim ‘Egypt’ > JESlcq micraim (Lam entations 5:6)
~ thipetskaja ‘Egyptian’ f adj (Daniel 11:42); Skaryna has none of these
Hebrew forms. T he reluctance of the Codex to retain other types of
Hebrew vocabulary is clear from a comparison of the Codex with C hris­
tian Bible translations into Slavic languages. For example, He ‫נ‬ifah , a
term of measurement (R uth 2:17), is translated as JESlcq smerou acc sg
in the Codex, and as tri m ay by Skaryna 1519, though Stankevif retains
Br tjy (1973);99 He mard‫‘ נ‬bitterness’ (R uth 1:20) is translated as JESlcq
horbkoju inst vs. Skaryna Mara (1519) and Stankevif Maroju (1973);100 He
bikemot pi ‘cattle’ (Job 40:15) > JESlcq skoti vs. Skaryna behelmoth‫׳‬b \m
He 7 !‫ג‬j>mini ‘man (from the tribe) of Ja m in i’ (Esther 2:5) > JE Slcq ot
binijamina gen (literally ‘from Benjam in’ with the high vowel in the first
syllable, see He binjamtn) vs. Skaryna otplemenc Emijna (1519), Stankevii
Venjaminec (1973 ) .101 T he replacement of one Hebrew expression by an­
other suggests that the latter was used in colloquial Judeo-Slavic (see sec­
tion 7.13 below). Conversely, there are rare instances where the Codex
retains Hebrew non-onomastic and non-calendar terms that are
translated in Christian texts, e.g. He bahaf ‘kind of white m arble’, sohtni
‘kind of m arble’ (Esther 1:6) > JESlcq bahata, zaxareta vs. Skaryna
mramorovymi (1519).'03
4.4114 Hebrew pronunciation norms. M any of the Hebrew names in
the Codex resemble the Hebrew etyma while the equivalents in
Skaryna’s contemporaneous translation of the Bible reflect a Greek
phonological filter (see examples above). T he Hebrew words in the

*• Note the lack of consonant gemination.

” The SijaUennye knigi has R ejy (1912): the Biblta sacra has Cz E fi (1867).
100 See R Maroju (1912), Cz Mara (1867), as well as Old Polish retention of the Hebrew
term (details in Altbauer 1966:89).
101 Sec R btgm al (1912); the Czech translation lacks the Hebrew term (1867).
I‫־‬J See R iz kotma V'miamtnova (1912), Cz z pokolenj Beniamin (1867). Tavjov cites Y 13•
jam tni as a rare family name from the Belorussian area (1923d:344).
See R mramomyj (1912); Cz mramorowt (1867). For further examples, see Arxipov
I982b:25.
 T H E SLAVIC LA NCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 1 0 7

C o d ex may offer important information on Judeo-East Slavic pronuncia­

tio n patterns. An example of a HeUenized—non-Hellenized doublet is
He ma > JESlcq misaelb (Daniel 1:6) -‫ ־‬misaila gen (Daniel 1:19),
S k ary n a Misailb (1519). Occasionally, Hebrew words in the Codex
reflect Belorussian phonological interference, e.g. the spelling of He
htibdn tp (Song of Songs 7:5) > JESlcq X ezbont loc has the characteristic
Belorussian feature of voicing assimilation in consonant clusters—vs.
S karyna E sbon/ (1518).104 Belorussian akan’e appears in JESlcq naami fa
(R u th 1:8) < He nocamt vs Skaryna Notma (1519); JESlcq jarusolima
‘Je ru sa le m ’ gen sg (Esther 2:6).105 T he rendition of H e p in e ma (Ruth
4:18) as JESIcq farecb (see also perecovy) suggests interference of Church
Slavic where the name appears with /- . O n the other hand, characteristic
phonetic features of Hebrew names in Christian documents are absent
in the Codex, e.g. there is none of the m and n confusion that appears
in Slavic documents and in Skaryna’s translation (see section 3.161,
fn. 201 and 3.341 above).
T he following features are revealing of Hebrew pronunciation norms:
(a) stop-fricative alternations are respected, i.e. postvocalic p, b, k are
realized a s/ , 0 , x, e.g. He (dved ma (R uth 4:17) > JESlcq dvedb,,oi He
bdvtl ‘Babylon’ (Esther 2:7) > JESlcq baaelbskij. In H e vixarkas ‘and
K ark as’ ma (Esther 1:10), the lenition of postvocalic k > x is imitated
in the Judeo-East Slavic caique language across a word boundary, prob­
ably because the Hebrew conjunction w- is spelled together with the
following word, i.e. JESlcq i xarbkasi loc.107 C hristian texts also have
som e of these alternations, following Greek, e.g. Bg-ChSl Vavilonb
‘Babylon’ (Codex Suprasliensis, 11th c). (b) Historically geminated con­
sonants are spelled as single consonants (see examples in section 4.4113
an d in fn. 98 above); Belorussian and U krainian lack medial geminated
consonants, except across a word boundary, (c) T he letter cajin has no
phonetic value, e.g. He bo'-az ma (R uth 2:1) > JESlcq boazb; He j a cagov
m a (Lam entations 1:17) > JESlcqjaAowi gen. (d) The Judeo-East Slavic

IM See also discussion of He htibon in section 7.62 below. There are a]so cases in Chris­
tian sources of progressive voicing assimilation in Hebrew words, e.g. He labtaj ma >
JW SI(Po) Schabdty dt Rwssm (Wroclaw 1351-1356) (Bondy and Dvorsky 1906, # 128);
JE Sl(B r) Sabdatm inst (H rodna 1532) (Beriadskij 1:1882, #244). T he assimilation prob­
ably has its basis in morphological, rather than phonological processes.
104 See also Altbauer 1977 [ 1961a]:60-61. The Judeo-East Slavic caique example
shows that the stress fell on one of the two Final syllables.
104 Spelled with Gk orruga.
Xarxas appears in the Russian play Artakserksovo dejstvo (1672) and in Skaryna’s
Belorussian-Church Slavic Bible translation (1517-1519); note also Catcaso in Latin and
Charcot in G erm an Lutheran Bibles of the 17th century (see Kudrjavcev 1957:302-303).
See also He tv-xilon ,and K ilon’ ma (R uth 1:2) > JESlcq 1 Xilbm — Skaryna Xelion
(1519).
1 0 8 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

caique language rendition of the Hebrew letter het is not uniform ; the
Codex has examples of x and h. Altbauer noted that the transcription of
He hit as JESlcq h , which is attested in three words, e.g. He rahel fa >
JESlcq rahtlb (R uth 4:11), He betlthtm ‘Bethlehem’ > JE Slcq betlehema
gen (R uth 1:1), is reminiscent of the Old West G erm an Yiddish pronun­
ciation of He hit as 0 (see section 6.4 and fn. 157 below).10* Hence,
A ltbauer concluded that the authors of the Codex were of G erm an Jewish
(Ashkenazic) origin. T his argument is hardly w arranted, since the prac­
tice of reading fit( as 0 in W estern G erm any (vs. Ixl in areas east o f the
Elbe River) had probably died out several centuries earlier; moreover,
the Codex has many more instances of He hit spelled as x, e.g. H e sohenl
‘kind of m arble’ (Esther 1:6) > JE Slcq saxareta gen; H e rtahson m a (Ruth
4:21) > JESlcq rutxlonb; He hur ma (Esther 1:6) > JE Slcq xum d a t.109
A more plausible explanation is to attribute the unclear distribution of
0 — x reflexes to the impact of the non-Jewish copyist (in Polish Bible
translations of the 16th-17th centuries these words also appear with h )." •
T he only basis for A ltbauer’s claim for a G erm an Jewish authorship or
influence might be that het becomes 0 in familiar names such as H e rihel
and betlehem, while hit - x in unfamiliar words of low circulation, which
are unlikely to be used in colloquial Yiddish speech.111 (e) T he Codex
makes no distinction between He a and a (both are rendered by a, in
distinction to Yiddish, where He a = /«/ but a = 101), see e.g. He ja^aqov
m a (Lamentations 1:17) > JESlcq jakova gen, H e tamar fa (R uth 4:12)
> JESlcq tamarb.112 Significantly, the Codex m aintains no Hebrew
phonological features which violate the Belorussian or U krainian sound
pattern. On partially “ Belorussianized” Hebrew anthroponym s, see sec­
tion 4.4123 below.
4.412 Com ponent structure. A thorough study of the Codex is a prere­
quisite to a detailed analysis of the component structure of the Judeo-East
Slavic caique language. It is already clear from preliminary investiga­

10‫ ״‬Altbauer 1977 [1961a]: 61. See also Br het% for He hsf, rather than (Skaryna,
foreword to lam entations, 1519).
109 Arxipov, noting that He v a jh i 'he was’ (Daniel 1:21) was translated by the Codex
as poitve ‘he lived* (1982a, part 2:6), assumed confusion of the Hebrew graphemes h and
h (vajhi ‘he lived’). The argum ent of a single instance of orthographic confusion is uncon­
vincing. Note also O R Agasjerus ma (1663) < He ?ahasverds where O R g may have replac*
cd h < He h (x) (Adrianova 1915; Barxudarov it al. 1975flf)? A precedent is O R Agnn
ma (Kiev lew 1488) < He 3aharon (Sbomik msskoeo istoriteskoeo obiiestva 1892:10).
1,0 See Altbauer ms,
Ml Attempts to formulate a rule that 0 and x are in complimentary distribution are
ill-advised in view of the paucity of examples. Note that even He h > 0 , e.g. jfhuddh
1Ju d e a ’ (Lam entations 1:3) > JESlcq ijuda. The change of He h > SI x is also found in
Jewish names in Christian texts, e.g. JKSI(Rr) Ixudo ma (H rodna 1523) (Beriadskij
3:1903. # 128); (Po) Ichudzxcz fam (H rodna 1560) ( < H e }*huddh) (ibid, 2:1882, #113)
1,3 See also discussion of this word in section 7.55 below.
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 109

tio n s that the Judeo-East Slavic caique language, like the Judeo-W est
Slavic glosses, had both a heterogeneous Slavic, as well as a unique non­
n ative corpus.
4.4121 Possible Judeo-W est Slavic elements: khim%\ holubice\
milostnikh', vila ; vladarb. T he presence of the Latinism khimt> Igiml ‘gold’
in the Codex and gjml + gim in 15th century Yiddish Bible translations
(see Lat gemma ‘jewel’) led A ltbauer to postulate the influence of Yiddish
Bible translations on the Judeo-East Slavic caique translation. 113 Despite
th e identical form of the Latinism in Yiddish and Judeo-East Slavic, this
arg u m en t is not altogether convincing since the distribution of the
Latinism is different in the two translation languages. Whereas the
C odex uses it to translate both He kettm and paz, Yiddish translations also
use the Latinism to translate He haruc (Proverbs 3:14); all three Hebrew
term s relate to gold.114 In all cases, Skaryna has ChSl zlato. T he Latin
root is also attested as a feminine anthroponym on a Frankfurt Jewish
tom bstone dated 1347.m T he facts are that the Latinism is not found in
S k ary n a’s Bible translation and is not known in East Slavic, but is well
attested in G erm an and West Slavic, e.g. O H G gimme ,jewel’,116 O Po
gamaj ‘ring with the V irgin; medal with a holy object’;117 see also the
variants gamaik — k — kameik ‘cam eo’;118 O C z gem(m)a ‘engraved jewel
o r semi-precious stone; ring with a stone; altar board studded with
gem s’.119 T he origin of the Latinism in both Yiddish and Judeo-East
Slavic is problematic. I conclude tentatively that the Judeo-East Slavic
term may have diffused (a) from Yiddish (possibly via a Judeo-W est
Slavic carrier) or (b) from Christian dialects of Slavic (Belorussian and
U krainian were heavily influenced by Polish at this time), or that (c) the
Yiddish Latinism was taken from Judeo-W est Slavic.
T h e Codex has a num ber of Slavic words either unknown altogether
in Belorussian or with unattested meanings there. Invariably, these
words have cognates in the West Slavic languages. Such terms are either
Judeo-E ast Slavic innovations prompted by the desire to imitate the
H ebrew text, or borrowings from colloquial Judeo-W est Slavic. A

1,5 See A ltbauer 1968b:5-6—with citation of the Biblical passages. Bulyka derives Br
k h im i from Hebrew (1972a). Curiously, He kittm pdz ‘expensive gold’ (Song of Songs
5:11) > R-ChSI zlato ktfazb (14th-15th cc), following the Septuagint xrysion ktfaz
(Alekseev 1981, part 1:51). Ktfaz < He ktfaz ‘like gold'. See also 1bid. 67.
" • For 15th century Yiddish attestation, see the Codex Ham b. 35, described in Staerk
and Leitzmann 1923:95. T he translation appears to have been composed in ihe
“ Sw abian-Bavarian” dialectal zone.
115 K racauer 1911:462.
118 Lexer 1872-1878.
Karfowicz cl al 1900-1927.
‫ • ״‬Nitsch and Urbariczyk 7:1973.
H av rin ek 1960-1971.
1 1 0 T H E SLAVIC LA N CUA CES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S

specifically Judeo-W est Slavic source could be attractive in the absence

of a cognate in non-Jewish Belorussian sources or if the form a n d /o r
meaning of the West Slavicism in the Codex differs from that o f the
cognate in Belorussian or the West Slavic source languages. T h e
possibility that the Codex might assist in recovering Judeo-W est Slavic
elements should be systematically explored. Consider JESlcq holubice
‘dove’ for H ejonati (literally ‘my dove’: Song of Songs 6:9) — Cz holubice
‘little pigeon’; JESlcq milostnikb, a translation of H e dodi ‘my lover’
(Song of Songs 2:9); Skaryna has milyi moi. Early 19th century T a ta r
Belorussian also has the term in this m eaning,120 but otherwise, the form
with -nik is attested with this meaning only in West Slavic languages, e.g.
Po milosnik ‘lover, param our, adm irer; (arch) friend, am ateur’; Cz
milostnik ‘lover, param our; favorite’. East Slavic languages use the word
in a different sense, see e.g. O Br milostnikb ‘favorite, am ateur’ (1519),121
Br milosnik ‘benefactor, well-wisher’ (19th c);122 O R milostnik ‘pet,
favorite’ ( l l t h - 12th cc).l2J
A nother West Slavic term is JESlcq habrieli ma (Daniel 9:21) < H e
ha vri\l ( — JESlcq havrih>, Daniel 8:16; Gk Gavriil, ChSl Gavriil, R
GavrilfoJ vs. Cz Gabriel). O rdinarily, He v ( < intervocalic b) is realized
as v in the Judeo-East Slavic caique language (see examples of stop leni-
tion in section 4.4114 above). T he variant with b has no basis in G reek
or the Slavic languages spoken by an O rthodox population, but is ex­
pected in Latin and the Slavic languages spoken by a Catholic popula­
tion, e.g. Czech, Polish, West U krainian and West Belorussian.124 Either
the translators of the Codex hailed from West Belorussia, or used a pro­
nunciation norm typical of Judeo-W est Slavic communities. A problem
with the West Belorussian hypothesis is that Catholicism does not appear
in these lands until the late 16th century. JESlcq vila appears as a transla­
tion of He rruholal ‘crazy, m ad’ (Ecclesiastes 2:2). No such noun is a t­
tested in Old Belorussian, though Belorussian has a cognate in the form
of vilic’ ‘swerve from the straight path; twist (spirit) .’125 T he term is
found in West Slavic, but with different meanings, see e.g. O Po wild

}2° Akiner 1980:170. The term is used to translate Ar habtb (allah) ‘beloved (of Allah)*,
an epithet for M uham m ad. A comparison of Jewish and Muslim Belorussian literature
would be instructive; for bibliography of the latter, see Wexler 1977a.
131 Skaryna (see Ani£enka 1977-1984),
McMillin 1973:222 cites the term from Dunin-M arcinkevii 1846. The term is not
listed in Atraxovit et al. 1977-1984. O U k mylostynnyk is glossed as ‘almsgiver* (H rynfvivn
1977-1978).
»as DaJ’ 1863-1866; Barxudarov et at. 1975IT.
134 Note also the existence uf v — b in JESl(Br) Ruvinom Abramoviitm Rubinoviiem inst
(Pinsk 1645) {A IV K 28:1901) < He r?*uven — Br Ruvim.
See M artynaw et at. 1978ff. O R vila (14th c) is attested only in the m eaning of
,nym ph, spirit* (Srcznevskij 1893-1903; Barxudarov et at. I975ff).
 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . A ND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 1 1 1

‘jo k er, dow n; swindler’, attested only since the 17th century;126 Cz, Svk
vila ‘fairy’. Absence of the term in Belorussian dialects might indicate a
specifically Judeo-W est Slavic source.
See also JESlcq vladarb discussed in section 4.4112 above.
4.4122 Unique Judeo-East Slavic caique elements: hdb\ ba\ ad(ov)nikb•,
milostnikb. Most innovative East Slavic elements in the Codex were in­
spired by the desire of the translators to imitate the Hebrew text (see ex­
am ples in section 4.4112 above), but there are also examples of
uniqueness in form or meaning which cannot be ascribed directly to the
H ebrew text. For example, the use of -nikh in ad(oo)nikh ‘spirits of the
d e a d ’ (Job 26:5), derived from adb ‘hell’, is a translation of He ha-njaHm
pi t (with the definite article ka-); the Hebrew term has no agentive
m arker and the root is not attested in a non-agentive meaning; Church
Slavic has only adovbnb adj. See also the possibility that milostnikb is a
uniq u e Judeo-East Slavic caique term in section 4.4121 above. We also
find abbreviations for God that appear to be unique to the Judeo-East
Slavic caique text, e.g. hdb for hospodb (R uth 1:6), ba gen ‘G od’ (for boha)
(R u th 2:12); Skaryna’s translation only has the abbreviation hsdb
(1519).157
4.4123 Hebrew-Judeo-East Slavic caique blends: Salbmona\ elihou
snb baraxbei, beltbcfb ~ beltySacrb. Codex #262 contains a num ber
o f anthroponym s which seem to be a blending of Hebrew and Belorus­
sian, e.g. JESlcq ialimona gen (R uth 4:21) — solomonovy (Proverbs 1:1)
< H e salmdh ma + Br Salomon ( — He ilomoh ‘Solomon’—which has a
sim ilar consonantal structure, S-l-m-h)‫׳‬, JESlcq elihou snb baraxbei ma (Job
32:2) (with Br syn ‘son o f’) < He ’elthu5 btn baraxbei, JESlcq beltbcrb
(D aniel 1:7) — beltylach, (Daniel 10:1)‘2• ma < He btltSa^car + Br carb
‘k in g ’. See also section 5.5215 below.
4.4124 Possible Judeo-South Slavic components. O n the theoretical
possibility of a Judeo-South Slavic component in the language of the
C odex, see the discussion in section 4.41 above. Note also the discussion

114 Bruckner 1957. Sec also O Po uiitowat ‘be frantic; mad about; rave, rage, carouse’.
F or cognates in other Slavic languages, see Skok 1971-1974. The Codex promises to offer
(he earliest attestations for many Slavic words.
I‫ ״‬T he 15th-16th century East Slavic text attributed to Fedor the Jew uses A2fc
(Speranskij 1907). Many Judeo-calque languages have unique abbreviations for He
’adonaj ‘G o d ’, see e.g. .A. in the Ladino translations made by the Portuguese M arranos
in H olland in the 16th- 18th centuries. See also the discussion of He jhw h in section 7.11
below.
” * T he spellings with and without^■ suggest variant readings of the Hebrew shwa
diacritic, which in some positions is pronounced as h ! — 0 and in others merely signals
the absence of a vowel in that position. See also Arxipov 198'2a, part 3:18. See also He
btulah ‘virgin’ which appears in the Russian Judaizing literature as betula (Seslokryt) and
btula ( Tajna tajnyx).
1 1 2 T H E SLAVIC LANGUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . A N D N O N -S E P H . JE W S

of a possible Judeo-South Slavic com ponent in Judeo-W est Slavic (in se c­

tions 4.112-4.1124 above).
4.4125 Greek components: katerhi•, fun ikb . T here are Greek term s in
the Codex #262 which are closer in form to the Greek etyma th an th e
surface cognates in Belorussian or other East Slavic languages, e .g .
JESlcq katerhi gen sg ‘boat with oars’ (Daniel 11:30) vs. O B r katarhi,
katorhb (early 17th c) < Gk katergon. 129 T he Codex has Junikb ‘d a te ’ fo r
He tamdr (Song of Songs 7:8) — O U k ^ n rtt (O strih Bible 1581); according
to V asm er (1953-1958), O R fin ik < Gk foiniks vs. O R fin ik — fu n ik
‘phoenix’ (14th c) < Gk foiniks 'ib',

4.5 Kareo-Slavic (?) in Cyrillic characters, early 19th century

A totally unexplored subject is the East Slavic and Polish norms of th e
K araites in the C rim ea, Belorussia and the U kraine. T he title page of A .
b. J . ha-Rofe’s Hebrew treatise of 1835 published in Jevpatorija contains
a Russian text in Cyrillic characters with a num ber of non-Russian Slavic
features. For example, ‘rabbi’ appears as rabina gen sg — Po rabin, U k
rabyn vs. R ravvin; ‘com m entary’ is komentar — Po komentarz, Uk komen-
tar(ij) vs. R (commentary. A Kareo-Slavic-Hebrew loanblend is Arona syna
Iosefa ‘Aaron son of Joseph’ gen sg < H e 3aharon btn josef vs. R Arona
Osipovica (see also JESlcq elihou srib baraxbei in section 4.4123 above) .110
T his characterization finds an echo in the impressionistic remarks o f a n
early 19th century observor who described the (Slavic?) speech o f the
Karaites in the West U kraine as “ ein Gemengsel von pohlnisch- u n d
russischer M undart mit m ehrern H ebraism en unterm engt” .151

4.6 South Slavic terms in Balkan Judezmo

Hebrew and Judezm o documents written by Balkan Sephardic Jew s
from as early as the late 16th century contain occasional Slavic terms.
T he characterization of the South Slavic corpus in Balkan Judezm o re-

'« Bulyka 1972b: 143.

150 The extent to which these examples reflect Kareo-Slavic speech has to be checked,
since the printer was an Ashkenazic Jew who may have originated in the Polish or U krai­
nian lands. He tav ‘rabbi’ > SI rabin, etc. is not the customary term in K araite, see xax■
am (vs. rabban ‘Je w ’). A curious Jew ish-Russian parallel is the case of an author named
in Hebrew Avraham Xaim bar Smuet Cvi Sabad ‘Abraham H aim , son of Samuel Cvi,
S abad’, who firs I called himself in Russian A. X. Sabad (1904), even though the second
initial is reserved in Russian for the patronym ic (in this case Smuel—Samuil)\ in the second
volume of his study, the same author appeared with the fully Russified name of Abram
SamuiloviS Sabad (1911).
m R ohrer 1804:146.
 T H E SLAVIC LANCUAGES O F T H E N O N -A SH K . AND N O N -S E P H . JE W S 113

m ains an im portant desideratum of Judeo-Slavic linguistics; at present,

only a few fragmentary rem arks are possible. In addition, a num ber of
South Slavicisms are also found in Greek and Judeo-G reek dialects; this
raises the possibility that Judezm o could have received Slavic elements
from coterritorial Greek dialects as well as from South Slavic directly.
T h e texts published by X ananel and ESkenazi from the western
Bulgarian area (1958-1960) suggest that Slavic elements used by the
B alkan Jews were not always derived from the coterritorial Slavic
dialects. For example, JSSl(Jud) gwbwg ‫ נ‬djbrwoV +guboga dibrova tp
(literally ‘deep, young forest’) (Vidin 1610)1JJ — N fiakavian S t guboka
‘d e e p ’ vs. Bg dilboka cbbrava.155 The same text also has wwz^r/ +■vozar
‘b oatm an , ferry driver’ *‫ ־‬M ac vozar, Se vozar vs. Bg voz(a) . 154

1,1 X ananel and ESkenazi 2:1960:227-228. The author was Salomon b. Aron Xason,
d.1621 in Saloniki; the date and place of his birth are not known.
I‫ ״‬See Skok 1971-1974. T he Cakavian dialect is spoken on the islands and at points
alo n g the Adriatic coast. Vidin borders the Stokavian dialect of Serbian.
134 M ladenov cites Bg *vozar' ‘boatm an’ only as a reconstructed form (1941). A com­
p ariso n of the geography of Slavicisms in Greek and Judeo-Greek is an im portant topic
aw aitin g a researcher.
 5. T ER M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES R E L A T IN G T O JEW S

5.1 Nalivc Slavic terms

5.11 Term s found only in West Slavic languages
5.111 O Po c/Uodnua, etc.
5.112 Cz dlouhy den
5.113 O Po kozubalec, etc.
5.114 O C z modia
5.115 Po dial zydoskie pacierze
5.12 T erm s found only in East Slavic languages
5.121 Uk balabux, etc.
5.122 Br btbuxi, etc.
5.123 Uk bohomillja, etc.
5.124 Uk bosyny, etc.
5.125 Br budki
5.126 Uk damyj
5.127 Uk kureni
5.128 Uk kurij
5.129 Uk nahrudnyk
5.1210 Uk r/zniki
5.1211 Br 1yza
5.1212 Uk !alanujka, lalamok
5.1213 Br slojany, slyjany
5.1214 Br z'a'kon
5.1215 W R iidovskie kresUy
5.13 Term s found only in South Slavic languages
5.14 Term s found in both West and East Slavic languages
5.141 T erm s for 'synagogue'
5.1411 Cz !kola, etc.
5.1412 O C z boznice, etc.
5.142 T erm s for ‘Jewish cem etery': Po okopisko, etc.
5.143 Br vykrest, etc.
5.144 Cz soudny den, etc.
5.15 Term s found in both East and South Slavic languages
5.151 Term s for ‘synagogue’
5.1511 Uk bohomit'nyeja, etc.
5.1512 O U k so(n)my!le, etc.
5.16 Term s found in all Slavic language groupings
5.161 ChSl (prazhm kl) opr&ntkh, etc.
5.162 ChSl pttkdes(tnicc, etc.
5.163 T erm s for ‘Sukkot’: O Po kuczka, etc.
5.164 O U k (holosnie) trubky, etc.
5.2 Latin and Germ an terms in West Slavic languages
5.21 Lat magisler
5.22 Lat pultus, G (Juden)putz ; Lat balneum, etc.
5.23 Lat rationale
5.24 Lat rotuluj, etc.
5.25 G Brdme
5.26 G Kirchhof
5.27 G Wandilgrlde
5.3 A Greek term common to all Slavic languages: andras
5.4 Turkic terms in Slavic languages
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JEW S 115

5.41 Clothing terms in West and East Slavic languages

5.411 Po chatat, etc.
5.412 Po ja(r)mulka, etc.
5.413 Po kaftan, etc.
5.42 Non-clothing terms in South and East Slavic languages
5 .5 T erm s for ‘Je w ’ in Slavic languages
5.51 Term s clearly predating the arrival of Ashkenazic and Sephardic
Jews in the Slavic lands
5.511 (J?)I« 'ditdto
5.512 Gk htbraios
5.52 Term s probably postdating the arrival of Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews in
the Slavic lands and terms of uncertain origin and chronology
5.521 Jewish languages
5.5211 Hebrew anthroponym s via a Yiddish carrier: bom■, godl; judl;
icik; jexiel; Smuet; xajrm; xaje , fajge
5.5212 Direct borrowing of a Hebrew anthroponym: hamdn
5.5213 Hebrew ethnonyms via a Turkic or Greek carrier:
Jtsrd V/, jihuAi\ qara^im
5.5214 Judezm o morphemes: -m te.fid zu
5.5215 A Judeo-Slavic(?) Hebrew anthroponym: moiko
5.522 Non-Jewish languages
5.5221 Gk andras
5.5222 Jewish traits and religious practice: Bg knvaf; nuiilka; remen;
Mac visok; Cz jordan; obfezanc; Po cebularz, cybuch; jordes; kasztan ;
klamczuch; k(t)apciuch; parch■, pogan(m), wychrzta; Kash k^Lti(k)a\}\T
abrazaniec; cybulnik , dwuszapnik; karosliwik; mordva‫־‬, nexryst';
nibahaczak; nidawiarak‫׳‬, parszyuka‫׳‬, pleszyuiy, vykresl, vyksta\ zakon•,
Uk cybul'ai', nexryst; R ntjrd' — •I’; skes; vykrest; Rom biboldo; Undo
5.5223 Names of unclear origin and chronology: Bg guit; karabaSal;
Mac cikus; Cz barn1a; haiile; kakrle; Po baltacz; bocio; kabtaj; teb; Br
alubok; hatapiaty; R brie, lac, galman; tartar

IN T R O D U C T IO N
T erm s in the Slavic languages which denote ‘Je w ’, aspects of the
Je w ish religion and culture, and traits attributed to the Jew s, either ex­
clusively or alongside meanings not associated with Jews, deserve to be
stu d ied as possible loans from Judeo-Slavic dialects, or loan translations
o f Judeo-Slavic, Judeo-G reek and Hebrew patterns of discourse. The
c o rp u s includes both native and non-native terms, the latter coming
m ain ly from non-Jewish languages such as Latin, Turkic and Germanic,
rarely from Greek, Hebrew, Yiddish and Judezm o. The G erm an terms
u se d by Slavs acquired their Jewish associations prior to reaching the
Slavic languages; the Greek and Turkic terms appear to have first ac*
q u ired Jewish associations in the Slavic languages, and then only
regionally. A num ber of native Slavic terms denoting Jewish holidays
a n d customs differ from the traditional nomenclature found in Hebrew
o r the Jewish languages. Theoretically, such a corpus could be (a) the
resu lt of non-Jewish misunderstanding of Jewish customs, or innovations
116 TERM S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES R EL A T IN C TO JE W S

created by (b) Slavic Jew s or (c) Judaizing sects. It is scarcely possible

at present to distinguish between Christian, Jewish and Ju d aizin g in ­
novations, since the religious and cultural patterns of the early Slavic
Jew s and Judaizing communities are poorly understood.1 M oreover, the
transfer of elements of folklore and ritual from one group to another is
often marked by distortion and disguise.2 For example, Yiddish has a
num ber of Slavicisms which have Christian connotations in the source
languages (e.g. proven discussed in section 3.134, fn. 120 above; trqbem
in section 6.16 below); this raises the question of whether the Slavic term s
were “ Ju daized” by Yiddish or Judeo-Slavic speakers. T he geography
of the terms in Slavic languages relating to Jew s varies considerably; only
two terms of Romance and Greek origin are found in nearly all o f the
Slavic languages, while other non-native and most of the native Slavic
term s tend to have a more restricted diffusion. I do not doubt that the
term s collected here have great value for the historian of Jewish-Slavic
contacts and Jewish migration patterns into the Slavic lands; it rem ains
to be seen to what extent they can be useful for the reconstruction o f the
pre-Slavic languages spoken by Jew s or of Judeo-Slavic.
Non-native terms in the Slavic languages which refer to non-
indigenous minority groups are frequently borrowed from the native
language of the minority group, or point to earlier associations o f the
m inority with a third speech com munity. T hus, Slavic terminology con­
nected with Rom a (Gypsies) contains a large percentage of R um anian
term s, e.g. Uk burdej ~ -ij ‘Rom ani tent; earthen h u t’ < R um bordei
‘mud h u t’; Mac kaiun ‘R om ’ < Rum cdtun ‘ham let’, catuna ‘thatched cot­
tage; aw ning’ (but SeCr katun ‘summer pasture in the m ountains with a
tent for the use of shepherds and enclosure for the anim als’).5 Turkic
groups or cultural artifacts are often designated by words of T urkic or
Arabic origin, e.g. Br, Uk buntuk, Po bunczuk ‘horse tail at the end of a
lance symbolizing power (of T urks)’ < T u boncuk ‘beads on the neck of

1 Deviation! from traditional Jewish nam ing practices need not rule out a Jewish
origin; consider, e.g. the innovative terminology and interpretation of the ritual among
the M arranos (Jews in Portugal and Spain who converted to Catholicism but continued
to practice elements of Judaism in secret) and the Chinese Jew s (see W exler 1982b and
1985a respectively). See also the discussion of the expression ‘festival of the h o rn ’ in sec­
tion 5.164 and fn. 151 below.
7 In their study of Christian terminology and motifs in Sephardic folk ballads, Ar-
m islead and Silverman noted that Christian references and terms were preserved (a) in
tact, (b) without their original m eaning, replaced by (c) Christian non-H ispanic terms
(e.g. Greek), (d) neutral or secular term s, (e) phonetically related nonsense words, and
(e) Jewish terms (1982:135-139).
J ScirlStoiu 1981:138. Sec Sandfeld 1930:99 for cognates. On Turkish term s for
‘R om ’ in Bulgarian, see section 5.5213, fn. 230 below.
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JE W S 117

a horse’. However, it is risky to draw inferences mechanically about an

ethnolect from the terms in a Slavic target language. For example,
stan d ard Belorussian denotes ,m osque’ by a Turkic Arabism, e.g. Br
m jalic' (ultim ately < Ar masdzid). While the origin of the term parallels
th a t of the concept, the Belorussian-speaking T atars of Q ipfaq descent
w ho first settled in the G rand Duchy of Lithuania in the early 15th cen­
tu ry denote ‘m osque’ by the surface cognates medic’ or metit. 4 T he varia­
tion in form raises the possibility that (a) the Belorussian norms of the
T a ta r com m unity, at least with regard to non-native components, dif­
fered from m ajority Belorussian norms, (b) the two groups borrowed the
com m on root from different sources and/or at different times, or (c) the
Belorussian T atar variants represent a regional originally non-M uslim
Belorussian pronunciation, no longer retained by non-M uslim s. See also
T a tB r mulla, molla, maila, munla, etc. ‘religious teacher’ vs. stBr mula <
A r mawla .5 Similarly, terms borrowed directly from Yiddish by European
languages often have Jewish associations, though this is not always true
o f the source etyma. Examples are G Schickse(l) ‘Jewish girl’ < Y iikse
‘C hristian girl’ < H e Stqtc ‘abom ination’;6 Uk balagula ‘Jewish
w agon(driver) ,7 Br balahol — •hula — -gula ‘(Jewish) wagondriver’ (but
also Br balahol ~ -hula ,w agon’),8 Lvov Po balagula ‘w agon(driver)’ < Y
balagole ‘w agondriver’ < H e ba^al£agalah (see section 7.311 below). It is a
m a tte r of speculation whether the lack of Jewish associations in Po
balagula, etc. attests to (a) an earlier borrowing in Polish than in East
Slavic languages, (b) secondary diffusion from U krainian or Belorussian
rath e r than direct borrowing from Yiddish,9 (c) sparsity of local Jewish
settlem ent or (d) absence of Jewish-Slavic contacts. A nother example is
Uk boroxy!spravljaty ~ vidpravljaty'0 ~ uidmovljaly," Br boroxi otpravljac’
,pray in a Jewish m anner’ (pej),IJ Uk zydivs'ki boruxy ‘m um bling’11 vs.
Lvov Po odprawiac bonuhy ‘sit alone’, 14 Br (Savoni, Stowbcy region) boruxi

* See Akincr 1973:73; 1980:327; W exler I981a:136.

5 W oronowicz 1935:362 and fn. 1; Antonovif 1968:393. See further discussion in
Sipova 1976:237. For Belorussian and Ukrainian Karaite pronunciations of the term , see
the references given in section 3.125, fn. 98 above.
8 lakob 1929; W olf 1956, #4837 (the earliest example is from 1726).
’ Zelexivs’kyj and N edil’s’kyj 1882-1886.
* Drucki-Padbjaricki 1929; M artynaw 1:1978. A traxovii gives balahol (arch) as
‘w agondriver who owns his own vehicle’ (1:1977).
* Kurzowa 1983:137. T he term is cited as an archaic regionalism by Doroszcwski
1958-1969.
10 2elexivs’kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886; Popowicz 1911.
11 Andrusvshen and Krett 1957.
11 Nosovii 1870.
11 Franko 1907:115.
M Kurzow a derives the expression from Ukrainian (1983:424). See also Po odpravtai
kutkt with sim ilar meaning (cited in section 5.163, fn. 147 below). ,
118 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JE W S

vadzic‘ ,doze in a sitting position’ (humorous, ironic) < Y borex < He

barux ,blessed’ (the opening line of many Hebrew benedictions); m a . 15 In
the region of UShorod, U krainian dialects use H g temeto ‘cemetery,
churchyard’ to denote a specifically Jewish cemetery, e.g. U3>meyt, u p ,
teymtyt’iv, no doubt since the indigenous Jews are H ungarian-speaking.1‘
However, Jewish elements received (a) through a non-Jewish in­
term ediary, (b) directly from written Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic or (c)
from a Jewish language other than Yiddish or Judezm o, seem to have
fewer Jewish associations. Consider, e.g. Uk Saxruvaty ,to swindle’ < G
schachem ,haggle, deceive in trade’ < Y saxen1 ‘to trade’ < H e sahar ‘he
traded’ (see also section 6.4, fn. 157 below), Cz pinka < Judeo-Aramaic
discussed in section 7.22 below, 17 and Slavic reflexes of H e qahal discuss­
ed in section 7.53 below.
In many languages, the terminology relating to Jews is sometimes ap­
plicable to other non-Jewish minorities as well (see the terms for ‘Jewish’
and ‘Protestant cem etery’ in Polish, discussed in section 5.26 below).1‘
T he central problem of comparative Jewish lexicology is to determine
when and where non-native and non-Jewish terms assumed Jewish
associations in the Slavic languages.

5.1 Native Slavic terms

The native Slavic corpus of terms relating to Jew s falls into six
categories in terms of geography: there are terms found (a) only in West

15 Mjacel’skaja and Kamarowska 1972:30. See also Br boroxi ‘Jewish m orning prayers’
(Nosovi£ 1874:206); (boroxoto)dund(1)c*, na-...-ic£a *doze, swaying in various directions,
like a Je w 1 (Nosovii 1870) < He barm: >aldk >adonaj *blessed art T hou, oh L ord1 (and no!
‘praise to you, G o d ’ as given by Nosovii 1874:206) (on Wo'my, see section 7.11 below).
See also Federowski 4:1935, # #434-435, 9703, Expressions with He bdrOx are often
found in non-Jewish languages, e.g. Fr brouhaha ‘tum ult’, possibly from He bdrux 3a/aA
‘blessed art T h o u '; He barux habd 5 ‘welcome’ (literally ‘blessed be the one who comes’)
is attested in Moroccan Muslim Arabic (Stillman 1978:138).
16 The geographical details are given in Dzendzelivs’kyj I: 1958, m ap #34.
17 See details in Wexler 1983a. The Judezm o impact on Balkan slang seems to be
much less significant than that of Yiddish on Germ an and the West and East Slavic
languages. The reason is that the contact between Judezm o and Balkan languages is
relatively recent (since the 16th century); moreover, the latter have access to Romani
vocabulary (see Wexler 1984).
18 For a non-Slavic example, see Pt almaiavt — almo- ‘Moorish cemetery* vs. almocat+r
— *bar ,Moorish, Jewish cemetery’ < Ar *almaqdbir *the graves’ (see W exler 1982a:77).
Jewish and Muslim minority groups often share a common religious terminology in
many non-Muslim lands (for discussion of Spain and C hina, see W'exler I982b:76*77,
83 and 1985a respectively). In Muslim Arabic, a common terminology often applies both
to Jews and Muslims (but not as a rule in Judeo-Arabic), e.g. Algerian Ar dzami
‘mosque1: dzamd elihud ‘synagogue’ (literally ,mosque of the Jew s’) vs. knisa ‘church’ (Ben
Sedira 1910).
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUACES RELA TIN G TO JE W S 119

Slavic, (b) only in East Slavic, (c) only in South Slavic, (d) in West and
E ast Slavic languages (the maximum area extends from Czech and
Slovak to Belorussian and U krainian), (e) in East and South Slavic and
(f) in all Slavic languages. T he geography of Slavicisms with Jewish
associations might give im portant clues to the chronology and origin of
th e terms and to their paths of diffusion to Slavic. For example, in the
absence of a proven Judeo-Slavic population in the Balkans, it is more
reasonable to regard words found in or derived from South Slavic as ear­
ly C hurch Slavic translations of Greek and Hebrew phraseology, which
diffused through ecclesiastical channels to colloquial East Slavic
languages. Slavicisms not found in South Slavic stand a better chance of
being of colloquial Judeo-Slavic origin.
5.11 T erm s found only in West Slavic languages.
5.111 O Po chlodnica, etc. O Po chlodnica (15th c), PoLat chlodnicza (1424)
‘Tabernacles, Sukkot holiday’ appear to be unknown outside of the
Polish area.19 O n East Slavic terms for this Jewish holiday, see sections
5.125, 5.127, 5.163 below.
5.112 Cz dlouhy den. See discussion in section3.121 above. O ther terms
for ‘Yom K ippur’ are discussed in sections 5.124 and 5.144 below.
5.113 O Po kozubalec, etc. O Po kozubalec — -s, kozubalec ‘tax paid by
Jew s for the purpose of purchasing writing materials for poor Christian
students’ are attested between the early 17th and late 18th centuries.20 A
still earlier attestation is Y k 3z j blwt (Prague 1590).21 The word appears
to consist of Po kozub, kazub ‘leather, fiber box (for berries, mushrooms,
dom esticated birds)’ with a Latinoid ending, widespread in the Slavic
jarg o n of students (see e.g. O C z sobotales ‘paym ent to students on S atur­
d a y ’ < Cz sobota).21
5.114 O C z modla. In the 14th and 15th century Czech translations of
the New Testam ent, modla is used in the meanings of synagogue, idol,
place of prayer (on m ountains), tem ple.23 V intr has noted that skola, a

‫ יי‬Nicsch and Urbariczyk 1953ff (whose earliest attestation is 1431) and Winkler
J960:100. In the Latin-Polish dictionary of 1424 studied by W inkler (Liber dispatala anti-
qua conlinens), chtodnuza is matched by the innovative Latin-Greek blend cenofaija (see Lat
cena ‘m eal’ + G\a fagion ,food’).
JO Kartowicz 1894-1905; Karlowicz el al 2:1902; Baiaban 1:1931:177, 392, 553-560
(for 1606); 2:1936:109 (for 1724); facing 368 (for 1783); Bruckner 1957; Klemensiewicz
2:1965:304 (for Baryka 1637).
21 T he author was Avraham Apteker, a native of Volodymyr-Volyns’kyj (cited in
Shm eruk 1981 b :51). O n the rendition of I d by /*/. see section 4.31 above.
” M achek 1971:565. See also the artificial Ukrainian Latinisms in Kotljarevskij 1808,
part 4, lines 46-47; part 6, line 84. For other examples and discussion, see H orbai
1966:10-11; 18-19. Could G slg midborus ‘desert, wilderness' (Philoparcho 1768:505) <
He midbar ,desert’ with a Latin ending?
” V intr 1977:63. See also G ebauer 1903-1916.
120 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LA N CUA CES RELA TIN G T O JE W S

widespread term for ‘synagogue’ in the contem porary West and East
Slavic languages, also appears in the Czech New Testam ent translations
as a minority variant. T he Olomouc and Prague Bibles of 1417 and 1488
respectively use modlitebnice, modlitevnice, though these term s also mean
‘place of prayer, tem ple’.24 Note also Jew -R molitvennyj dom, molitvennaja
skola, molel’nja as translations of He bet-midras ‘house of study and
prayer’.25
5.115 Po dial zydoskie pacierzt. See section 5.25 below. See also ex­
amples in section 5.5222 below.
5.12 Term s found only in East Slavic languages. Native terms
associated with Jew s that are limited to Belorussian and U krainian might
have developed in the 14th century, when the adjoining territories were
both part of the G rand Duchy of Lithuania. In view of the antiquity of
Jewish settlement in these lands, and the existence of Judeo-Slavic
dialects there, a Jewish origin for these term s is not to be excluded.
5.121 Uk balabux etc. The U krainian term means ‘Jewish twisted,
braided bread; blow made with the fist to the back’ (R om aniv);26 see also
balabuxa ‘loaf of bread; small cake, b u n ’ and Br balabusa, Po dial
balabuch.27 T he origin of the term is unclear.
5.122 Br bebuxi, etc. Br bebuxi pi t ‘large Jewish featherbeds, pillows’2'
— stBr bebaxi,29 NW Br bebexi30 pi t ‘intestines; tattered clothing’; Uk
bebexy pi t ‘intestines; featherbed and pillow (especially Jew ish)’;11 R
(Smolensk) bebuxi ‘pillows’—but note the phrase ja Itxte zidowskie bebuxi
razbrosaju ‘I will scatter your Jewish pillows’.52
5.123 Uk bokomillja, etc. See section 5.1511 below.
5.124 Uk bosyny, etc. Uk bosyny,‫ נג‬Br bosiny pi t denote ‘Yom Kippur;

« G cbauer 1903-1916.
” Vol'tke 1908-1913:231-234; Sabad 1904-1911. Note also ChSl dom* molitvMyt
*church’ (Freising documents, late !Oth-early 11th c) (Wiehl 1974:20).
w H orbaf 1965:25.
** R udnyc’kyj 1:1962:60. No Jewish meanings a rt listed for the Belorussian variant
balabuxa, etc. in Mackevif el al. 1:1979. See also M artvnaw 1:1978:286.
" Nosovi£ 1870:41. cited by Jofe 1965:435.
19 Atraxovii et al 1977-1984.
10 M ackrvif et al 1979ff.
n 2elcxivs’kvj and NedilV kvj 1882-1886; Andrusyshen and Krett 1957; M el'nvtuk
e ta l 1982 ' '
Dobrovol'skij 1914
51 Franko 1898:200, collected in 1880-1882 in villages in the Kolomyja and Stryj
districts; H hnfenko 1907*1909. The earliest attestation, bosim, appears in the Ukrainian
intermcdies of the late I7th-early 18th centuries (Hudzij 1960:79; Langer 1972:152)‫׳‬
These intermedies are part of a collection of ten intermcdies known as the Demids 'kyj zbtr-
nyk%believed to originate from K am 'janec’ Strumylovyj (see InUrmediji z dernws’koho zbtr*
nyka) The texts were first published bv H ordyns’kvj 1930:19-52 and reprinted by Hudzij
1960. '
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LA N CUA CES RELA TIN G TO JE W S 121

8 ‫־‬day period of mourning upon a relative’s death; walking barefooted’;14

see also Uk bosyny spravljaty ‘carry out the period of m ourning’.35 The
Belorussian expression sedzec’ u bosinax ‘be sad; yearn for’ (also ,be im ­
poverished’) (Turaw) seems to be related to the Jewish m eaning.56 T here
is no trace of the Judeo-G reek expression ‘the great day’ for ‘Yom Kip-
p u r ’ in Slavic languages other than Czech (see section 3.121 above). For
o th e r Slavic term s for ‘Yom K ippur’, see sections 3.121 and 5.112 above
a n d 5.144 below.
5.125 Br budki. The term denotes both ‘Sukkot’ and ‘boothes’.37
5.126 Uk damyj. T he term denotes both ‘error-free’ and ‘kosher’.38 See
also Uk damyk ‘Easter bread’, darna nedilja — vidna nediija ‘time when the
consecrated Easter bread is distributed’.
5.127 Uk kureni. The term means both ‘Sukkot’ and ‘tents’.39
5.128 Uk kurij. The term denotes both ‘Jewish chicken slaughterer’
a n d ‘capon’.40
5.129 Uk nakrudnyk, etc. T erm s for ‘Jewish highpriest’s cassock’
ab o u n d in Slavic languages in a Hebrew, G reek, Latin and Slavic form.
Slavic examples are Uk nahrudnyk, O R napletnikb, naplclnica (11th c),
naram nitb (14th c), naramnica (11th c), nasovecb (pre-1300), nasovbcb (13th
c) (the latter root also means ‘shoulder decoration, shoulder guard of a
m ilitary garm ent’).41 Gk ipomts also appears in O ld Russian as epomidb,
(j)epomida (1 1th c).4J Finally, the Hebrew term hjod ‘vest’, which is used
in th e Judeo-G reek Septuagint Bible translation (see e.g. Exodus 28:6),
also appears as O R efusi (12th-13th cc) and (j)efudb (16th c).43 The
spirantization of postvocalic He b, p , k and t to v , f , x, and s respectively
is know n in the Ashkenazic Hebrew reading norms, but does not extend
to d (and g)\ the latter stops are, however, spirantized in this position in

‫ י י‬Nosovi? 1870; Jofe 1965:442. T he Belorussian term is not listed in Atraxovif

1977-1984. T he m ourning period am ong the Jews is seven and not eight days (sec e.g.
[Jew-?) Cz stdAi live ‘sit for the 7-day mourning period' < He Siv'-ah ‘seven’: Pech 1948).
But note Tunisian J F r dracht de huitaine ‘mourning period’ ( < ? He drdlah ‘serm on’ +
F r d i huitaine ‘of an 8-day period, week’).
M Zelexivs'kyj and Nedil’s'kyj 1882-1886.
‫ ״‬Kryvicki et aI. 1982.
” Nosovid 1870; Jofe 1965:442.
J* 2elexiv«'kyj and N edil's’kyj 1882-1886.
** Ohijetiko 1938:458. But see kurin’ ‘tent’, with no Jewish associations in Hrinfenko
1907-1909 and Ohijenko 1979ff.
ielex iv s’kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886.
*' Barxudarov el al. 1975rf.
‫ ״‬Sreznevskij 1893-1903 cites a passage in a manuscript from the 1280s where
‘Jewish* jepomida is equated with 'E ast Slavic' nasovbc* (R e fi iidovskogo jazyka
1824:193).
41 Barxudarov et al. 1975ff.
122 T E R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G T O JE W S

the Judeo-A rabic reading norms of H ebrew .44 T he variant efush m ust be
derived from *efutb. See also section 5.23 below for a Latin term used in
Old Polish and Old Belorussian.
5.1210. Uk rtznikb. In the Carpathian U kraine, rlznikh has been
recorded in the m eaning ‘Jewish butcher’ — stUk riznyk ‘butcher’.45
5.1211 Br ryza. Br ryza ordinarily denotes a garm ent worn by the priest
during office; metal covering icons, revealing only the face and hands,
but in the ethnographic study of N .Ja.N ikiforovskij,46 rizu (acc sg) is used
in the meaning of prayer shawl (glossed by Y tales). I know of no other
source for the Jewish meaning. The same passage mentions the synonym
bohomolennemb (inst sg) (see section 5.1511 below).
5.1212 Uk salamejka, salamok. T he two terms denote ‘Je w ’s h a t’.4’
5.1213 Br stojany, styjany. T he terms (zidooskie) stojany, styjany (pi t) are
recorded in the Vicebsk district in the late 19th century in the meaning
‘day of Jewish prayer recited by the water, preceding the Jew ish New
Y ear’.48 In non-Jewish dialects of East Slavic, the term —in the singular
num ber—designates Christian practices, see e.g. R stojan’e ‘nocturnal
vigil in the church, on Thursday and Saturday of the fifth week of Lent;
recitation of the Evangels; praying while standing, prayer’.49
5.1214 Br z'd'kon. T he term denotes ‘Jewish faith;50 Je w ’ (respectful
term )51 — stBr zakon ‘law’. See also O C z zdkon ‘Pentateuch’ (late 14th
early 15th c),5s and discussion in section 5.5222 below.53 In the Church
4< M orag 1971.
« Tichy 1938:85.
** 1897:17, fn.265, sep pg,
*J 2elcxivs'kyj and NedilV kyj 1882-1886; Andrusyshen and Krctt 1957.
41 Nikiforovskij 1897:9, fn. 141 (scp pg), 107. Nikiforovskij notes that the event is bet•
ter known (am ong Belorussians) as tres , (trjasti) blox u vodu ‘shake the fleas into the water*
(ibid . . 9, fn. 141 sep pg).
•‫ י‬Dal* 1863-1866; Srcznevskij 1893-1903.
50 The unexpected stress position is given only by Nosovit 1870.
*’ This m eaning is also found in Skaryna (1517-1519) and in Old Ukrainian (Luc’k
1388)(see A n iiin k a 1977-1984 and Hryn£y5yn 1977-1978 respectively). In Codex #262,
He vtddto *and his religion' (Esther 9:1) is translated as vrjadb vs. O R zakon* in contem•
porary Christian translations.
” The term is attested in an Old Czech Bible prologue (Schropfer 1971:354, 370,
fn. 5).
” See also O R zakon* *laws of any religion', vtoroj zakon* (15th c) *5th Book o f Moses',
zakon* Moiseev* *part of the Bible attributed to M oses’ (12th~16th cc) (Barxudarov et a i,
I975ff). In contem porary Russian dialects, zakon has a wide variety of m eanings, e.g.
*marriage‫( ״‬Jaroslavl*, Smolensk, Tam bov, etc.), *marital fidelity‫( ״‬Olenec, Penza),
*spouse’ ^Jaroslavl', Kaluga, Kostroma, Moscow, P erm ', Samara, Simbirsk, Tula,
Vladim ir, V oronei), 'nausea during pregnancy’ (Rjazan*) (Filin et al. 10:1974). In the
T atar Belorussian document of c.1830 studied by Akiner (1980:217-218), zakon is used
with the adjective ‘Jew ish’ and *Christian’ to denote the *Jewish' and ‘Christian
religion’. An alternative expression for *Jewish religion’ is ad darohi zidovskaj ( < daroha
*road'), on the model of Ar firaf al-muslaqim *path of the upright' (i.e. *Islam’); this use
of A r firaf *road' is unknown in Arabic itself
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JE W S 123

Slavic Freising documents (late lOth-early 11th c), zakonbtiikl denotes

‘Jew ish , Christian priest’.54
5.1215 W R zidovskie krestcy. T he term zidovskie krestcy, of Christian
o rigin, is said to be used by Christians and Jews both to denote ‘P urim ’
(V ilnius area) < krestcy dim (?) ‘crosses’.55
See also examples in sections 5.5222-5.5223 below.
5.13 T erm s found only in South Slavic languages: See sections
5.5222-5.5223.
5.14 Term s found in both West and East Slavic languages. Term s
shared by both West and East Slavic languages appear to span either the
territo ry (a) from Czech and Slovak in the west to Belorussian and U krai­
nian in the east, or (b) from Polish to one or more of the East Slavic
languages. T he significance of these geographical alignments for the
relative chronology and origin of the terms has yet to be determ ined.56
5.141 Term s for ‘synagogue’. Native Slavic terms for ‘synagogue’ are
based on five roots or combinations of roots: (a) ‘school’, (b) ‘G od’ +
‘place’, (c) ‘G od’ + ‘pray’ + ‘place’, and (d) ‘gather’. Hebrew and
Jew ish languages all provide terms for ‘synagogue’ based on these com­
ponents, though the Jewish languages differ widely in their preferences.
O n e of the earliest Jewish expressions is Biblical He bet tfillah, literally
‘house of prayer’ (see details in section 3.3111 above); ‘school’ is found
in Judeo-G reek and all Judeo-R om ance languages (except for Iberian
Judeo-R om ance) and in Y iddish;57 expressions involving ‘G od’ arc
found in Hebrew also (e.g. bet 3el, bet hlohim, bet \loha, bet jh w h )is but are
rarely met with in Jewish languages or in the written Hebrew used by

u See Wiehl 1974:42 — vs. ModBr znkonnik *legal expert; law-abiding person* (Atrax*
ovif 1977-1984), (non-Soviet) ‘m ember of a religious order’ (communication from Father
A. Nadson).
‫ גג‬K aU ndar ... 1874:9. A topic of interest to Judeo-Slavic linguistics would be the dififu-
sion of Christian religious terminology to the Jews. Sec also sections 3.134, fn. 120 and
5.1213 above. Another example is NPoY gqn a j vikup ‘visit relatives (grandparents and
aunts) during Passover and receiving (generally colored) eggs from them ’ (literally 'go
on vikup ’) < Po wykup ‘redemption, ransom '. According to Herzog, the Yiddish expres­
sion is found in a small area of Northern Polish Yiddish from Mtawa in the west to
Brarisk in the east, but the association of colored eggs with a Jewish holiday (either
Passover or Lag boom er) is known over a broader area than the expression vikup
(1965:38, 41, m ap #2.32). T he age of the custom of painted eggs among Jews and Slavs
should be studied.
** Note also that a num ber of slang elements are shared by Polish and East Slavic
languages; most of these examples are Balkan. Greek and G erm an slang elements which
have diffused to the East Slavic languages through Polish (see Horba£ 1963b;267; Bud-
ziszewska 1969:309).
Note also the extension of He krustt ‘synagogue’ ( < ‘gathering’) to mean ‘school’
in an early 18th century Yemenite Hebrew text (Ratzaby 1978:134).
s# See I Kings 7:12, 40, 45, 51; I Chronicles 9:11, 13, 26; Judges 18:31.
124 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S

non-Hebrew-speaking Jewish com munities.59 The term ‘gather’ is found

in Hebrew, Judeo-A ram aic, Judeo-G reek and possibly Judeo-L atin, but
is less productively used in Jewish than in non-Jewish languages (see e.g.
Gk synagoge). O f all the European Jewish languages, Yiddish seems to
have the greatest variety of terms for ‘synagogue’, based on ‘school’,
‘gather’, ‘pray’, ‘study’ and ‘house, building’: (a) Sul, sil < Judeo-
Romance (see section 3.3111 above) ( — G SchuU ‘school’),60 (b)
bejsakneses < He bet hakntset, literally ‘house of the gathering’, (c) daven-
Sul, literally ‘synagogue for praying’ (on the origin of davfejnen ‘p ray ’, see
section 3.3111 above); (d) klojz, dim klajzl ‘small synagogue, house of
study, often restricted to some occupational or social group’ < Lat
clauslrum ‘closed place’ ( — G Kloster ‘monastery, convent, cloister’), (e)
bes-medres ‘small Orthodox synagogue, prayer and study house’, literally
‘house of study’61 < He bet midrds (f) sinagoge ‘non-Orthodox synagogue'
< a non-Jewish language (e.g. G Synagoge or Slavic).
5.1411 Cz Skola, etc. Cz Skola,61 P oszkola,6* B r,64 Uk65 Skola denote both
‫ ״‬An example is He bit Hlohim ,synagogue’, literally 'house of G od’, from a text com­
posed in Limoges, France, 10th century (see Blumenkranz 1978:39).
“ In Yiddish, ,(secular) school' is expressed by Sul or the recent G erm anism suit. The
Yiddish term has acquired the meaning of 'R ussian; w atchm an' in the Polish dialect of
the image vendors (Gorka 1901, glossary).
61 This expression may be a loan translation of a Judeo-R om ance term or a continua­
tion of an early Talm udic Hebrew use of the term as both ,school1 and ,synagogue’ (see
Krauss 1922:4).
67 For a citation from 1511-1528, see Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:217. T he term !kola
is still used in contem porary Czech to refer to the old synagogue in Prague, built in the
middle of the 13th century (Zmizelt Praiske ghtuo 1961:23).
The term First appears in a Latin-language privilege granted the Jew s by Kazimierc
the G reat in 1334 (see Bataban 1:1931:324). See also PoLat scholasticum acc sg (Krakow
1519) (Bersohn 1911, #21a). In standard Latin, the term means ,one who teaches,
studies rhetoric; scholar' (see also fn. 71 below). See GY (H e) Iqwtitr(*) fam (Mainz.
W orms 1096) (Salfeld 1898:413; Siper 1924:108); Gk sxolastikas ‘teacher of the Law'
(period, area?) (Krauss 1904:86), but in North African Latin, scholastuus only functions
as an adjective (Thieling 1911:73). It is unclear to what extent szkota now has the meaning
,synagogue’ among Christians. A ltbauer's claim that Jew -Po szkota (Vilnius) is due to the
influence of Y sul (1932b: 185) makes no sense. See also the use of szkota by a Polish Jew
noted by Altbauer 1934:13. Finally, O hr reproduces a Jewish-Polish song from the Hrod-
na district in which !kola appears in a Yiddishized form in a Yiddish phrase, e.g .fin i n
szkoks , from the synagogues' (1905:17).
*‫ י‬T he earliest attestation is from a Belorussian document in which the G rand Duchy
of Lithuania first granted privileges to the Ashkenazic (!) Jew s in 1388 (Sreznevsluj
3:1903:1597)—though the authenticity of this docum ent may be called into question
(communication by B. Strum ins’kyj). T he term also appears in the anonymous Belorus­
sian poem Taras na Pamasie , verse 5, first published in 1889, though probably written in
the early 19th century (M cM illin and Rich 1977:16). See also K as’pjarovi? 1927 (for the
Vicebsk di3iect)\Jidi!-vajsrusUer taSn-verterbux 1932. The Jewish meaning of the term is not
cited in Soviet dictionaries of standard Belorussian, but !kola ,synagogue’ is found in »
short story by the author V. Safanka from 1965.
“ 2elexivs’kyj and Nedil’s’kyj 1882-1886; Hrinfenko 1907-1909 (citing sources from
1874 and 1901).
 TERM S IN SLAVIC LANGUACES RELA TIN G T O JE W S 125

‘school’ and ‘synagogue’.66 H g iskola [15-], of Slavic origin, may once

have been used in the m eaning of synagogue too, to judge from OHg^o-
oskola (1746),67 a translation of Gk arxisynagoge ‘head of the Jewish com­
m u n ity ’ (vs. M odH gJoiskola ‘university, academy, institute’ < Jo ‘head’
+ iskola ‘school’). The eastern-most attestation of SI skola in the meaning
of synagogue appears to be in Smolensk R ussian.68 T he use of SI ‘school’
to designate ‘synagogue’ could theoretically be attributed to no less than
three Jew ish, and possibly even one non-Jewish, languages. Cz Skola, etc.
could be (a) a native Judeo-Slavic innovation or (b) a (Judeo-)Slavic loan
translation of JG k sxole\ (c) a Judeo-Slavic loan translation of Y Sul;69 (d)
a non-Jewish caique of Lat sc(h)ola. We know of no cases where *school’
> ‘church’ in a Christian language.
An argum ent against a direct translation of JG k sxole is the fact that
SI skola in the meaning of ‘synagogue’ is not found in any South Slavic
languages (for South Slavic terms, see sections 5.15-5.1512 below).
How ever, the absence of South Slavic attestation of Skola ‘synagogue’
need not establish a Romance-Yiddish interm ediary, since a direct
Judeo-G reek influence could have spread directly to the southern areas
of the East Slavic speech territory rather than through the Balkans.70 The
absence of any South Slavic Skola ‘synagogue’ also suggests that the con­
tem porary Balkan Judeo-G reek custom of not calling the ‘synagogue’ by
sxole had already taken root by the time of Jewish-South Slavic contact.71
A particularly strong argum ent against Yiddish is that the oldest use
o f Skola in Poland and Belorussia dates from the 14th century, when
Ashkenazic Jewish settlement in Eastern Poland and W estern Belorussia
was still extremely sparse. Hence, the likelihood of a direct Yiddish influ­
ence on Slavic for that period has to be ruled out; there are no East Slavic

“ It would be instructive to determine the geography of the m eaning ‘synagogue’ in

each Slavic language. For example, a non-Jewish informant from PuJicy (Salihorsk
d istrict, Belorussian Palesse) only uses bainica in the meaning ‘synagogue’; for him !kola
h as only the m eaning ‘school’. However, Seripulovskij records a folktale from this area
w ith !kola ‘synagogue’ (1911:56).
‘ 7 O ertel 1746:42. T he oldest attestation is 1495 (Benk<5 et a l. , 1967-1984). Ackerley’s
L ovari Rom ani materials, collected in Rum anian and H ungarian speech territory, con­
tain ! kola in the dual meanings of 'school; synagogue’ (1932:178). See also GRom
stk^rmask^ri — stkfrp■ 'school; synagogue’ (von Sowa 1898:72) and further discussion in
W ex ler 1984.
“ Dobrovol'skij 1914 gives the phrase !kola iidooskaja.
M See O U So zidowska schula ‘synagogue’ (1721) (Sw6tlik 1721:464—in his or-
ihography). So iuia also means 'school'; the Slavic form of the Grecism is not used in
S o rb ian .
70 I expressed preference for a Yiddish model for JESI(Br) !kola in W exler 19810:124.
71 In the book from 1148 written by Hadasi, a M acedonian K araite, we find He
sw ljqw sl + solikcs — + skolikos (?) ‘school orator’ (cited by J . Perles 1893:576). But this
ii n o t grounds for excluding the Jewish m eaning of the term for this period.
126 T E R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G T O JE W S

or Polish Yiddishisms known to date back to the late 14th-early 15th cen­
turies. Accepting Y Sul as the immediate model for JS1 Skola is predicated
on the assumption that bilingual Jewish speakers of Slavic were familiar
with the association of ‘school’ and ‘synagogue’ that prevailed in Ger­
m an or Yiddish, and copied the new meaning for Slavic, e.g. Y sul : SI
Skola ‘school’:: Y Sul: SI Skola ‘synagogue’. It is clear that G erm ans knew
the distinctive Jewish m eaning of Schul(e), since it appears often in Chris­
tian texts, including M artin L uther’s Bible translation (1534).
W e might assume that the Slavs coined the new meaning on the modd
of Medieval Latin; the Latin use of sc(h)ola as ‘synagogue’ is known at
least since the 12th century—including Polish Latin texts (see references
in section 3.3111, fn. 320 above).72 However, the use of SI Skola was not
universal among C hristians, since there are many compound expressions
of the type O U k zydivs’ka Skola ‘synagogue’ (2ytom yr 1583) (with the ad­
jective ‘Jew ish’).73 A big problem with assuming a non-Jewish origin for
the semantic innovation is the popularity of the family nam e Skol'nik
am ong Yiddish-speaking Jew s—a reference to the profession ‘synagogue
sexton’ (see also section 6.314 below). Examples are JW SI (Po) Scolnik,
Schkolnik (W arsaw, K rak6w, early 1400s),74 (PoLat) Scholnyk (Krakow
1495),75 (Cz) Skolnik (early 16th c)76—alongside native Y Sulman ‘sexton’,
which serves now only as a family nam e.77 In an 18th century Polish anti-
Semitic text from Krakow, szkolniki denotes ‘cantors’.78T he oldest attesta­
tion in Hebrew characters is JESl(Br) SqHnyqt + Skolnik (M ahilew 1640).’*
Slavic family names derived from the term Skola assume a number of

7T The details of the geography and chronology of Lat sc(h)0l4 in the meaning
*synagogue’ remain to be studied. Blondheim 1925:106-110, 115-119 gives citations from
Romance and G erm an Latin texts beginning with the 12th century. T he meaning
‘synagogue* may have developed from the non-Jewish meaning *place of gathering‘ used
in Imperial Rom e (Frey 1:1936, L X X X III), Nosovii, curiously, defines Br ikoU
*synagogue' as a “ L atin‘’ loan (1874:231), though Brandi derives Cz Skola from the
Greek translation of the Bible (1876).
73 Boj£uk 1965:53; Andrusyshen and Krett 1957. Sec also the parallel G erm an com­
pound Judens(huU ‘synagogue’ discussed in section 7.53 below.
74 Siper 1926a; 172-173. See 21130 Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:214, 217 for early 16th cen‫־‬
tury examples in Czech.
” Baiaban 2:1936:748.
Bondy and Dvorsky 1906:75, 217, 241, 376, 380.
77 In Yiddish, ‘sexton’ is expressed by sames < He Sarnmdi. See also / ‫ג‬Ivlmn / + sulnm
*sexton’ (?) in the writings of Iserlin (S. A. Bimbaum 1981:9) and JE ng(L at) Bentdtd dt
Scola fam (1260s, Oxford) (who performed this function: Roth 1951:99). T he geography
of iuiman in non-Stavicized G erm an Yiddish is unclear. Note, though, the synonymous
native GY Mesner fam (literally ‘sexton’) from Niim berg 1338 (M . Stem 1894-1896:18,
186). G erm an family names from the root SchuU ‘school’ include Schuimasttrt Schuler,
Schul(l)er (Brechenmacher 1957-1963).
71 H em as 1965: 111.
79 M. Kac 1697 (text dated 1640) (cited by Dubnov 1909:15).
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JEW S 127

forms, e.g. Uk S k il’nyk, Sko-, Skolyk, Skoljar, S k il’nyj, Br Skol’nik, etc,80

designating variously ‘school caretaker; student; teacher; school
principal’.•' Unfortunately, there does not seem to be any way to
reconstruct the geography of the Judeo-Slavic and Yiddish family name
variants for any historical period, but it is instructive to note that in a
list of Jewish names from Krak6w dated 1495, Judeo-Slavic family
nam es tend to be paired with Slavic or Hebrew personal names, whUe
G erm anic family names are paired with G erm anic or Hebrew personal
nam es, e.g. JW Sl(Po) Isaak Glownia, Salomon Scholnyk, Latossek Scholnyk vs.
W o lj Deulsch, Moyses Fischel.82 This distribution indicates that the Judeo-
Slavic variant may have been preferred by Judeo-Slavic speakers, while
Y iddish speakers from the west tended to use the Yiddish translation
equivalent. T he Jewish use of ikola also displays an independent
dynam ics in form as weU. For example, on the territory of the Ukraine,
th e o in the Jewish family name does not always become t as in coter­
ritorial Uk S k il’nyk\ this fact suggests that the Jewish family name was
eith er imported from a neighboring Slavic territory, or that Judeo-East
Slavic in the Ukraine never followed the O ld Ukrainian change of 0 >
j. 81 M oreover, while the Judeo-Slavic family name is attested on the ter­
rito ry of the Czech, Polish and East Slavic languages, the family name
seem s to be found among non-Jews primarily in the East Slavic lands.
T h e choice of / for the s of Lat sc(h)0 la ( < Gk sxole) is typical of many
Slavic loans from Germanic and Romance, though not from Greek, but
it is difficult to determine which Romance dialect underwent the change
o f s before a consonant to / . 8‫ י‬Even if the place of the contact could be
d eterm in ed, the problem would remain of ascertaining the source of the
m eaning ‘synagogue’ (see also discussion of a North Italian origin for
CS1 *zidi in section 5.511 below).

•‫ >׳‬R e d k o 1966:58; Biryla 2:1969.

2elexivs’kyj and Nedil’s'kyj 1882-1886 gloss the Ukrainian proper noun Skil'nyk as
‘stu d e n t, teacher (especially in a Judtnschulf)'.
‫ ״‬The text examined here was cited by Baiaban 2:1936:748. However, (here could be
exceptions if JW Sl(PoLat) Sloma Swyalhly (Krak6w 1511) (Beriadskij 3:1903, #73) is a
Y iddishized Hebrew male name (see Y {lojmt ma) combined with a Slavic surnam e. The
absence of a diphthong in the first syllable is also characteristic of Br Sloma ma (Jewish)
(K o las 1932), even though contiguous Yiddish had oj (see discussion in Herzog 1963,
c h a p te r 5). See also Uk(Hucul) S l ’omej fam (de Vincenz 1970:541).
*J The original family name of the late prime minister of Israel, Levi Eshkol, who
c a m e from O rativ, Ukraine, was Skolnik. The variant Skttnik is also attested as a family
n a m e am ong Jews. O n the change of Uk 0 > i, see Shevelov 1979:604ff. O f course, there
a r e also Ukrainian family names with 0 , see Skol'nyj , etc. above.
s* Sandfeld opts for a Venetian dialect of Italian (1926:45). but Shevelov has
counterexam ples of ! > s in this dialect (1965:591), though without commenting on the
so u rce of SI / kola (ibid. , 592). For a discussion of / — s variants in Slavic and non-Slavic
lang u ag es, see Skok 1971-1974.
128 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S

I conclude that the immediate source of (J)S1 Ikola ‘synagogue’ cannot

be determined with certainty, but it is conceivable that either Romanized
Yiddish or Balkan-Crimean Judeo-G reek could have provided source
models at different ends of the Slavic speech territory.
5.1412 O C z boznici, etc. O C z boznice,ts M odCz boinica, ESvk boznica,M
O Po boznica, M odPo b o z n i c a Kash (and Slovincian) bvozriica,** Br
boznica*9 Uk boznycja.90 T he Slavic term for ‘synagogue’ derived from the
root ‘G od’ covers the same areal as the synonym derived from the root
‘school’. Yet, while Ikola could be defined as a possible Jewish-origin
term , it is more difficult to find Jewish precedents for the second root.
Expressions with ‘G od’ in the Bible denote the Tem ple in Jerusalem
rather than a synagogue. Conversely, the root for ‘G od’ denotes
‘synagogue’ in a wide variety of non-Jewish languages in non-Slavic
lands, e.g. Syriac,91 G eorgian,9:1 Classical A rm enian” and O ld High
G erm an.94 Several scholars have posited a chain of loan translations be­
ginning with He bet hbh im , etc. ‘house of G od’ > Gk kyriakon ‘church’
( < ‘L ord’) > Go gudhus ‘church; synagogue’ > Slavic.95 If this chain
of caiques is correct, then Slavic ‘(house of) G od’ for ‘synagogue’ should
be derived from a C hristian rather than a Jewish nomenclature. Ex­
amples of ‘G o d ’ > ‘church’ in Slavic languages are num erous but not
usually standard, e.g. Uk dom bozij ( 1596),96 bohorrwlbja (Chelm 1440);
ChSl bogomolije ‘place of prayer; church’;97 xram gospodenh ( 17th c) (literal­

‫ ״‬Sadnik and Aitzetmuller I963IT.

K al a l 1924,
” Niisch and Urbariczyk 1953ff. V asm er citcs attestations of the m eaning ‘synagogue’
beginning with the 15th century (1:1953, under boinica).
■* Lorentz 1958-1975.
89 Palessian non-Jewish informant (Puiicy); Belorussianized Polish (Vilnius area)
(Zdaniukiewicz 1972:122). However, in most Belorussian dictionaries, the term is not
used in this meaning, see e.g. *icon board on the wall, icon cabinet, prayer room, prayer
house, church (for sectarians and non-Christians)' (Sadnik and Aitzetmuller I963fft:
‘temple, house of worship’ (Drucki-Padbjarecki 1929). T he geography of the meaning
,synagogue’ should be checked. For example, &at£mik states explicitly that in the
£ e rv e n ’ area, the term denotes any non-Christian temple—except the Jewish (1929).
Varlyha gives only the meaning ‘house of prayer’ for the Lahojsk district dialect (1970)
M See Stawski 1974ff, who gives attestation in all Slavic languages. Sadnik and Aiuet-
muller regard the Ukrainian form as a loan from Polish (1963(f). Sec also Uk dial
(Rom aniv) bofnye'i (H orbaf 1965:27), boinye’y (Terebovlja region) (ibid. 197lb : 150).
»> Vogt 1971:27.
” Krauss 1922:23.
” W exler 1981c: 117.
»• Moser 1964:35.
‫ יי‬Frings 1950:47-48; Vasmer 1:1953:100; Stawski 1:1974:345.
’* Nimfuk 1964:87. See also dom* boitt in the Freising documents of Church Slavic
(late lOth-early 11th cc) (Wiehl 1974:20).
*’ HrynfySyn 1:1977.
 T E R M S IN SLAVIC LA N CUA CES RELATING TO JE W S 129

ly ‘temple of the L ord’);98 SeCr bogomolje ‘pilgrimage; divine office;

p ray e r’, bogomolja ‘church, temple, place of prayer’ (see section 5.1511
below). A non-Jewish origin for Cz boznici, etc. finds further support in
th e large num ber of non-Jewish meanings associated with the term , e.g.
C z ‘heathen tem ple’, ESvk dial ‘house of prayer’, O Po ‘(pagan) temple,
m osque, orthodox church’,99 R boinica ‘small church; wall board for
icons; pagan tem ple’,100 Uk ‘temple, church (heterodox)’, Br ‘church (of
sectarians)’. The noun is not cited for Sorbian, but Sadnik and Aitzet-
m uller note an opposition in U pper Sorbian between the adjectives boii
‘(C hristian) G od’ vs. bohowy ‘(non-Christian) G od’.101 T he semantic n ar­
row ing in O ld Polish from ‘(pagan) temple, mosque, orthodox church,
synagogue’ to ‘synagogue’ uniquely may have occurred when the in­
digenous and heterodox churches came to be designated by separate
term s, e.g. Po koscioi ‘Catholic church’: cerkiew ‘O rthodox church’ (see
also R cerkov’ ‘Orthodox church’: kostel ‘Catholic church’), perhaps in the
w ake of the intense religious polemics of the 16th century. 102 See also the
discussion of Po kirkut, kierchdw, etc. ‘Protestant, Jewish cem etery’ >
‘Jew ish cem etery’ discussed in sections 5.142 and 5.26 below. M any
Slavic lexicographers believe the heterogeneous meanings associated with
the stem prove that ‘synagogue’ is a relatively late developm ent.10’
Conversely, I could conceive of a Jewish origin for Cz boinici, etc. on
th ree grounds: (a) In spite of the existence of non-Jewish meanings, Cz
boinici, etc. could still have been used in Judeo-Slavic exclusively in the
m eaning ‘synagogue’. Indeed, O ld Polish sources from the 16th-17th
centuries imply that boinica, when used by Jews, had this specific mean-
in g . 104 (b) T he coexistence of the meanings ‘church’, ‘synagogue’ and
‘pag an tem ple’ is found in Greek with terms of originally Jewish origin,

*• N im fuk 1973:526. See also ChSl ‘church, house of prayer, institution that cares for
the p o o r’ (Polnyj frravoslamyj. .. 1913).
** T h e term is used in a Polish text from 1639 to denote a K araite synagogue
(M orgensztem 1966, #49).
“•* D ’jaJenko 1899; Vasm er 1:1953. In mid-19th century H rodna, the Russian
auth o rities established a Jewish communal organization called in Russian, Boiniiyj dozor
‘synagogue patrol’ (Brozd 1938:243). T his expression is most likely an imitation of the
P olish or Belorussian meaning of the cognate.
101 5:1970:367. See also Pers xani xoda ‘Mekka; Kaaba; mosque' (literally ‘building,
h o u se ' + ‘G od’) vs. xanixoda (arch) ‘proprietor, homeowner’.
See Buttler 1978:76, who alio cites pejorative uses of the term and the use of ctrkuw
for ‘synagogue’ in the 16th century. In contemporary students' language from Szczecin,
boznua denotes a church building (Kaczmarek et al 1974:208).
1°‫ י‬Bruckner 1957; M artynaw 1:1978:274. In West Polish dialects, the term appears
w ith the adjective 'Jew ish', which suggests that boznica alone is not unambiguously
Je w ish , e.g. buznito zydoskc (L ubai 1980:55).
1‫ •״‬See Opec 1522; Maczyriski 1564 and Knapski 1621-1625 (cited by Bak, el al.
1:1966). H o rb ai, curiously, regards Romaniv Uk botnycja as a “ H ebraism ” (1965:19).
130 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES R EL A T IN G T O JE W S

e.g. (J)Gk synagoge ‘synagogue, church, pagan tem ple’, proseukterion

‘synagogue, church’.105 (c) A European language that does not employ
synagoge tends to use the coterritorial Jewish term , e.g. G (Juden)schule <
Y sul; Pt esnoga, Papiam entu (a Portuguese-derived Creole spoken in
C urasao) snoha < JP t esnoga ( < JG k synagoge) vs. stPt sinagoga; Po slg
bes(z)emedres(z) — m- < Y besmedreS ‘synagogue’.106
Finally, O hr reproduces a Jewish-Polish song from the H rodna district
in which Skola appears in a Yiddishized form in a Yiddish phrase, e.g.
fin die szkoies ‘from the synagogues’. 107
A relative chronology for the m eaning ‘synagogue’ in Polish may be
provided by Li baznycia ‘church’, a borrowing from Polish. Presumably,
this Polonism was introduced into Lithuanian, together with Christiani•
ty, in approximately the 14th century; there is no trace of the meaning
‘synagogue’ in Lithuanian.
5.142 Term s for ‘Jewish cemetery’: Po okopisko, etc. In m any parts of
Europe and the Arab world, the Jew ish cemetery has a separate designa­
tion in the non-Jewish language. For example, ‘garden’ > ‘Jewish
cem etery’ in M edCzLat hortus Judaeorum (Prague, 13th c), MedEngLat
gardinum (Oxford, mi d 1 3 ‫־‬th c);108 see also the discussion of Pt almocabar,
etc. in section 5, fn. 18 above, Po kirkut, etc. and OG Judenkiewer in sec­
tions 5.26 and 7.113 below. In Polish, U krainian and Belorussian the
root ‘dig’ (e.g. Po kopae, Uk kopaty, Br kopac’) is used to designate a
Jewish cemetery, e.g. Po okopisko (1434),109 okop (Lancut, Jarostaw ),110
okopowisko, Uk okopys’ko, okopySit, okip (2ytom yr),m vokopysko
( Rom aniv),112 O B r kopiSla (1389).113 T o the best of my knowledge, the
cemetery is generally not designated by derivatives of ‘dig’ in other
Slavic languages (a rare example is T ula R okop ‘churchyard,
cem etery’).114 In Polish and U krainian, the terms also have non-Jewish
meanings, see e.g. Rom aniv Uk ‘pit in the forest for disposing of dead

105 See section 3.3111 above and Wexler 1981c: 111-112, 117.
>°* K urka 1907:4; H orbai 1983:309.
1905:17 ’0‫י‬.
,0, See Steinherz 1927:434 and Roth 1951:108, fn. 1. See also M oroccan Ar ‫־־‬
classical A r rowda ‘garden’.
IM Nitsch and Urbariczyk 1953ff. Jewish-Polish also has okopisko (Brzezina 1979:49)
Nitsch 1954:204-205.
1,1 Hrinfenko 1907-1909.
111 H orbaf 1965:32.
*‫ יי‬Beriadskij 1:1882, #2. Nosovii lists kopiSle ‘Jewish cemetery' (1870), but set
kopiiia ‘place where ground has been dug' (H arrcki 1919) and R (Smolensk) kopiiit ,tk'
(Dobrovol’skij 1914). In the town of Kjana, some 30 kilometers east of Vilnius, the ex­
pression fraruuski akop designates the cemetery of French soldiers from the Napoleonic
campaigns of 1812-1813 (V jarin ii and Jankowski 1977:126).
" • Sreznevskij and Vostokov 1852.
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUACES RELATING T O JE W S 131

horses’. “ 5 In Polish and U krainian, Christian cemeteries are designated

productively by (a) the Latin loan, e.g. Po cmentarz, cmyn- (1415) ( < Lat
coemeterium, ctmi- < Gk koimeterion, literally ‘place of rest’), Uk cvyntar ( <
Po cmentarz) and the native terms for (b) ‘m ound, grave’, used often as
a piurale tantum , e.g. Uk mohylky ( < mohyla ‘m ound’), hrobky, hrobovysce
( < hrib, hrobu gen sg ‘grave’, hrebaty ‘bury’), Br mohilki, mohlicy, mahil'nyk
and (c) ‘place for lying dow n’, e.g. Uk kladovyiie, kladovys’ko ( < klasty
‘p u t, lay dow n’), Br klady, kladbisia (with variants). T he U krainian
dialect atlas makes no mention of okopys'ko, etc. " 6
A Jewish origin for Po okopisko, etc. might be argued for on several
grounds:
(a) T he lexical differentiation of parallel Jewish and non-Jewish a r­
tifacts and customs, while not typical of Slavic languages, is very
widespread in Yiddish and other Jewish languages. In Eastern Yiddish,
Jew ish cemeteries are usually designated by a Hebrew or native term ,
non-Jewish cemeteries by a Slavic loan, e.g. Y besojlem, besalmen,
bejsakvures ( < Hebrew), native Jeld (literally ‘field’), hejlikort (literally ‘ho­
ly place’), gut(e)ort (literally ‘good place’) ‘Jewish cemetery’ vs. cvinter,
cminter, (BrY) mo(ho)lkes, mahilnik, etc. ( < Slavic) ‘Christian
cem etery’; " 7 see also Moroccan Ju d simenterio (native) ‘Christian
cem etery’ vs. emqabar pi t ( < Arabic, literally ‘graves’) ‘Muslim
cem etery’ vs. meaara(< Hebrew, literally ‘cave’ ~ the Balkan Judezm o
use of He bet hahajim, bet haqvardt, bet colamim ) ‘(Jewish) cem etery’. 118 In
W estern Yiddish dialects which lack a significant Slavic component,
bifurcation is carried out by Hebrew, Romance and native components,
e.g. Alsatian Y bais aulem ( < Hebrew) ‘Jewish cem etery’ vs. tijlo-hoj ( <
H ebrew and native ho/, modeled on G KirchhoJ) ‘Christian cem etery’;
Alsatian Y dell ‘Christian burial’ ( < Fr deuil ‘m ourning; funeral proces-
sion’) .119 In Yiddish (and other Jewish languages), bifurcation encom­
passes a larger semantic field than in Slavic, see e.g. Y bagrobn, Jar-
(native) ‘bury (general)’ vs. brengn cu kvure (native + He qvurah ‘burial’),
mekaber zajn ( < He nuqabber ‘burying’ + zajn ‘be’) ‘bury (Jews)’; Y
mispalel zajn, tjile tun ( < Hebrew), betn got (native), dav(e)nen ( < Judeo-
Iranian, see section 3.3111 above) ‘pray (Jews)’ vs. moljen zix, etc. ‘pray
(C hristians)’ < Uk molytysja ‘pray (general)’. There are only occasional
examples of lexical bifurcation in the Slavic languages, see e.g. Uk

1,5 H o rb ai 1965:32.
116 M atvijaj 1984, maps # # 165, 348.
For the geography of Belorussian Yiddish terms for 'C hristian cem etery', see
G reen 1969:237-238, map #8. For Belorussian data, see the D A B M 1963, map #318.
“ • See Benoliel 1926:362; Armistead and Silverman 1982:144.
"* Pfrim m er 1959:366.
132 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATINC T O JE W S

molytysja ‘pray (general)’ vs. boruxy vidmovljaty, etc. ‘pray in a Jew ish man­
ner’ (pej) (see section 5 above), R (Siberian) mogil’nik ‘non-Christian
cem etery’ vs. (st) kladbitfe ‘cem etery’. 120
(b) If Yiddish denotes Slavic religious activities and artifacts by Slavic
loans, it is not unreasonable to see a Jewish origin in the Slavic term s for
‘Jewish cem etery’.
(c) Po okopisko, etc. is identical in meaning and very close in geography
to reflexes of He qtvtr ‘grave’ (see qavar ‘he buried’) attested in O ld Polish
Latin sources and in Polish and Russian slang (discussed in detail in sec­
tion 7.113 below). The present-day variants of Po okopisko, etc. appear
in Lvov (U krainian SSR), Laricut and Jaroslaw, in the K rosno district
and in the area east of ZamoSc and Bilgoraj121—i.e. in locales that border
on the territory of Sandomierz and Krak6w, where O ld Polish Latin
reflexes of Hebrew-Judeo-Aramaic qtvtr have surfaced. T he closeness of
the (new) okopisko—(old) qtvtr areals is suggestive. T he presence of
-ys(')ko (rather than -yUt) in Uk okopy's 'ko'22 points to a West Ukrainian
origin—adj’acent to the Polish facts. O f course, I cannot conclusively rule
out the hypothesis that the specific m eaning ‘Jewish cem etery’ represents
a specialization of m eaning that took place in Slavic without Jew ish in­
terference (see the discussion of Po kirkut, etc. in section 5.26 below).
In the village of Kasina, just east of Vilnius, the Belorussian expression
zydowski m ahil’nik is used to denote the cemetery in which unbaptised
children and atheists were buried; no Jews were ever buried th ere.1‫״‬
5.143 Br vykrisl, vykst(k)a, etc. In a num ber of Slavic languages, the
term ‘baptise’ serves as the basis for the term Jew . See details in section
5.5222 below.
5.144 Cz soudny den, etc. In contrast to the term s ‘long d ay ’ and
‘barefooted’ which denote ‘Yom K ippur’ only in Czech and Belorussian-
U krainian respectively (see Cz dlouhy dm in section 5.112 and U k bosyny,
etc. in section 5.124 above), West and East Slavic languages share a com­
mon term for ‘Yom K ippur’ in Cz soudny den, Po sqdny dzieri, R sudnyj
den . This term also denotes ‘day of judgem ent’ (in till Slavic languages)
and has no basis in Hebrew or Jewish terminology (H e jom kippur is
literally ‘day of repentance’).

120 Filin et al. 18:1982:91. Occasionally, Po cnuntarz is combined with the adjective
‘Jewish* to denote a ,Jewish cemetery* (see Baiaban 1913). See also T atB r zirec *Muslim
cem etery’ vs. ktadavuka ‘general cemetery* ( < Po kiadowisko) (from the text c. 1830
studied by Akiner 1980:316); musuimanskij ummel' ‘the Muslims* ( < Ar *ummah *nation*)
vs. zidovsKij narod ,the Jews* {ibid. 396).
‘3' Nitsch 1954.
192 Franko 1908:479; Andrusyshen and Krctt 1957,
143 Vjar£ni£ and Jankowski 1977:122. O n the reverse association of *unbaptised* >
*Jew*, see discussion in section 5.5222 below.
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC• LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JE W S 133

5.15 T erm s found in both East and South Slavic languages. It is uncer­
tain w hether term s common to East and South Slavic languages are in­
dependent innovations or Church Slavic term s which spread to East
Slavic recensions o f the language and from there to colloquial East Slavic
languages.
5.151 Term s for ‘synagogue’.
5.1511 Uk bohomil’nycja, etc. As we noted in section 5.141 above, the
use of ‘pray’ + ‘house’ is the basis for the term ‘synagogue’ in Biblical
H ebrew and in a num ber of Jewish languages. T he root for ‘p ray ’ in the
m eaning of ‘synagogue’ is known to us from Old Czech, see modla,
modlitebnice, modlitevnicf discussed in section 5.114 above. The use of a
com pound consisting of ‘G od’ + ‘p ray’ + ‘place’ is found in a num ber
o f Slavic languages, but not necessarily to designate ‘synagogue’, e.g. Uk
bohomil’nycja ‘synagogue’124—also ‘devout woman; oratory, place of
p ray e r’;125 see also Br bahamol’nja ‘house of prayer’,126 R (Old Believers’
dial, NE Poland) molenna ‘(Old Believers’) church’. 127 A second variant
consisting of the roots ‘G od’ + ‘pray’ also has a facultative Jewish m ean­
ing, e.g. Uk bohomilje (19th c ),l2e Br bahamolle ‘Jewish prayer garm ent’,129
U k bohomillja ‘phylacteries’110 vs. M odstUk ‘pilgrimage; divine office’;
Br bahamol, bahamalenne, bahamolle, T atB r bahamolje, boho- ‘divine of-
f!ce’; m R bogomol’e ‘pilgrim age’; SeCr bogomolje ‘pilgrimage; divine of­
fice, prayer’, bogomolja ‘church, temple, place of prayer’. Belorussian
variants from Vicebsk are bohomolennemT> (inst sg), zidovskaho bohomolennja
(gen sg). ‘synagogue’. ' 52 Note also the contemporary Jew -Br bogomoliem
inst sg ‘phylacteries’ (in Yiddish characters; Barysaw area 1928),155 The
glosses ‘Jewish prayer garm ent’ and ‘phylacteries’ for U krainian and

1,4 2elexivs’kyj and N edilVkyj 1882-1886.

I‫ ״‬Andrusyshen and Krett 1957.
126 Atraxovi? 1977-1984.
Grek-Pabisowa 1968:16.
13* 2elexivs’kyj and N edilVkyj 1882-1886. The term appears in a Ukrainian trans­
lation of the Bible from 1860 (M atthew 23:5) (2iteckij 1905:41).
1‫ ״‬S atim ik 1929 (C irv en ’ district); Martynaw 1:1978:261; Palesse informant. See
also the m eaning ,clothing’ (humoristic) in Satem ik 1929 and Uk iy d w s ’ke bohomillja
‘Jew ish objects of veneration’ (Andrusyshcn and Krett 1957).
Ohijenko 1:1927:313.
'»■ Akiner 1980:228.
1,1 Nikiforovskij 1897:12, fn. 265 (sep pg), 198 (recorded in 1879).
m Goldberg 1928:596-597, who observes that the song is rarely sung by non-Jews.
T he Y g graphem e may have specifically denoted Br g, h or symbolized any Slavic reflex
of CS1 *g (see also discussion of Y t + nasal for Po 4 and Y r - Cz f, Po « in sections
6.312, fn. 112 and 6.32 below). T he earliest example of the root in this m eaning known
to me is R bogomel't (Ukrainskij 1912:5). T he Slavic use of ‘pray ’ to denote ‘phylactery’
or ‘prayer shawl' finds a parallel in Latin, e.g. prtucirutc orario ‘dressed in a prayer shawl'
(Lyons 582) (Aronius 1902, # 46).
134 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S

Belorussian illustrate the confusion which we noted in sections 3.123

above and 7.14 below. T he Jewish meaning ‘synagogue’ seems to be
relatively recent in some languages, to judge from such com pound ex­
pressions as SeCr jevrejska bogomolja, R evrejskaja molel’nja ‘synagogue’. See
also discussion of Uk zydivs'ka Skola in section 5.1411 and O C z modla in
section 5.114 above.
5.1512 OUk-ChSl so(n)mySte, etc. The use of the concept ‘gather’ to
designate ‘synagogue’ seems to be restricted to South Slavic languages
and the East Slavic recensions of Church Slavic, e.g. OUk-ChSl
so(n)mySce (mid-17th c);114 OBr-ChSl sonimiSce;i3i ChSl sT»nbmb,
sbnhmiSte, ST>bon, shboriSte;IJ6 SeCr sajmlSte jevrejsko, skupStina, zbom ua 157
T he source model is Gk synagoge, ultimately patterned on H e bet kntstt
and JA ram be(t) kniStaJ. See also SeCr (Bosnia) tifut(h)ana, etc.
‘synagogue’ of Turkish origin discussed in section 5.5213 below.
5.16 Term s found in all Slavic language groupings.
5.161 ChSl (prazbnikb) opresnhkb, etc. The Hebrew expression hag
hamacot ‘festival of the unleavened bread, Passover' appears in a variety
of European languages, including Slavic, see e.g. Gk hemera ton azymon,
Lat dies azymorum, ChSl (prazbnikb) opresnhkb, Cz presnice,tis O B r praznik
opresnocnyi, svjato oprtsnocnoe.139
5.162 ChSl p(tbdes(tnice. This term in Skaryna’s Bible translation
(1517-1519) denotes both Christian ‘Pentecost’ and Jewish ‘Shavuot’
(see discussion in section 3.134 above);140 see also arch Po pifcdziesiqtnica
‘Christian Pentecost’. T he term is clearly of Christian origin.
5.163 Term s for ‘Sukkot’: O Po kuczka, etc. The only Jewish holiday
designated by a Slavic term common to all three Slavic language bran­
ches is ‘Sukkot, Feast of the Tabernacles’. See e.g. O Po kuczka (16th c),
kucza, kacza, PoLat cunccia;'41 the term is uniquely a plurale tantum in the

IJ4 Nim fuk 1973:391 vs. zobranjt (1596) (Nim fuk 1964). sobranie, sobor (Nimfuk
1973:173), ChSl (Skaryna) ‘church’ (Anifenka 1:1977:329). See also ChSl sbort ‘com­
munity (of Israel)’ (ibid. 215)—also modeled on He kntstt which has this meaning. See
Po zbor ,religious community; Protestant community, church; synod, gathering’
(Doroszewski 1958-1969).
1‫ ״‬Skaryna 1517-1519. See also Parukaw 1980:23 on sonmiUe, sobor and sobranit
1,6 Jagic notes that stnhmisU is older than shboriSU, though the Praxapostolus §i$atova
(Serbia, 14th century) has mainly sbnbmiltr and iU iim i, with only one attestation of
siborilte (1913:401-402). Ohijenko cites ChSl iborhki, ‘phylactery’ (1:1927:311).
Ivekovic and Broz 1901; Skok 1971-1974 (who gives the authors of the three terms)
In contemporary Serbo-Croatian, sajmislt means ,bazaar, market square', sKupitint
‘assembly’, zbomica 'm eeting room".
” * Kurz 19591T.
' ‫ יי‬Skaryna 1517-1519 (sec Aniienka 1977-1984).
140 Sec also Polnyj pravoslavnyj... 2:1913:1879; Kurz 19591T for Church Slavic forms
141 Nitsch and Urbariczyk 1953ff. Kucza is first attested in the writings of Vl^czynski
(16th century) (Kurzowa 1983:311).
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JE W S 135

East and South Slavic languages, e.g. Br ku/ki,'*2 Uk kucky (since

1627),1.3 SW R kuiti, kucki, M. ChSl kuic'i, kostiu> ‘tents’; R-ChSl kuscnyj
prazdni/cb, prazdnik kuiinogo pofbeentja, kuiinoe potbeenie, kufrpolbcenie
( 1073141‫־‬h c) ‘holiday of the tents’.146 The Slavic terms translate He suk-
kot pi ‘booths, tents; Sukkot’. The presence in Polish of u and cz III points
to an East Slavic source (for another example of a possible Judeo-East
Slavic term diffusing to Czech Yiddish, see section 6.54 below).147 The
C z dial kuia and ESvk kulka ‘shanty, hovel’ (which apparently lack the
specifically Jewish holiday meaning), might also be an East Slavicism,
diffused through Polish. 148 The root is found in colloquial South Slavic
languages but not with the Jewish meaning, see Bg h sta , SeCr kuca, Svn
koca ‘hom e’. I speculate that the Jewish m eaning of the plurale tantum
with -Ik- originated either in East or South Slavic territory, later
spreading from the former territory to Polish. The root does not appear
with •ka in South Slavic languages. The only term in Yiddish is sukes ~
si- < He sukkot. For additional synonyms restricted to a single Slavic
language, see O Po chlodnica (see section 5 .1 11 above), Br budki (see sec­
tion 5.125 above), Uk kureni (see section 5.127 above).
5.164 O U k (holosnie) trubky, etc. This term for ‘Jewish New Y ear’
(literally ‘noisy trum pets’) is first found in late 17th-early 18th century
texts. 149 In Yiddish and Judezm o the Jewish New Year is called He ros
haianah (literally ‘head of the year’). The expression is also found in R us­
sian and Belorussian C hurch Slavic a s prazdnikb trubh and Polish as Swicto

145 Nosovif 1870. See also Br Napraznik kuscnyt, Prazmkb kuicnyi in Skaryna's
forewords to Leviticus and Genesis respectively (1519).
141 Hrinfenko 1907-1909, The term is first attested in the C hurch Slavic writings of
the U krainian Pam ba Berynda 1627, and in a Ukrainian intermedy (in the form kucky
with sibilant confusion) from the late 17th—early 18th century (see Intermedxji z der~
m v s ’koko zbimyka). See also section 6.7 below. H orbai, curiously, regards Uk kucky as a
“ H ebraism ” (1965:19). M artynaw notes that in Polessie, (Uk) kutkt has the Jewish
m eaning, inter alia, only In the west central regions (1971:161*162); other meanings are
*old, small, filthy hut; fence in a trough; temporary dwelling'.
144 D al' 1863-1866; Filin et at. 16:1980:192. Roxkind and Skljar 1940 appear to be the
last lexicographers to cite R kuiii. Liftic 1866 gives R ku.h'epcu'mte R kuiki is glossed as
‘Passover* by K ram er 1966:40.
145 D ’jafenko 1899; Machek 1971.
146 Barxudarov et ai. 1975IT.
147 Bruckner, however, rejects an East Slavic etymon (1957:279). Po kucza ‘store, but­
cher shop; tent* is first attested in the 14th century. See also Po dial kucki (Vilnius-Trakai
area) (Zdaniukiewicz 1972:122, 164) and Lvov Po odpraviac kutkx 'sulk; sit alone like a
Jew during Sukkot' (Kurzowa 1983:192-193, 274, 331, 336), Kurzowa notes that Lvov
Polish informants could rarely identify kuczkt as ,tents' (ibid. 193).
14‫ ״‬M achek 1971:304.
149 fntermediji z demios ,koho zbimyka (in Hudzij 1960:80, 190). The term is not recorded
in i^elcxivs’kyj and NedilV kyj 1882-1886 or in any subsequent major Ukrainian die-
tionary.
136 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JEW S

trabek, or simply trqbki^ *Jewish New Y e a r’ (literally 4holiday of the

tru m p e ts’) .150 B yzantine (non-Jew ish) G reek provides a possible p rece­
d ent for Slavic in expressions of the type ie aorta ion salpiggon *Jewish New
Y e a r’ (A natolia 13th c) (literally ‘festival of th e tru m p e ts’) . 151 T h e
synagogue service for the N ew Y ear involves the blow ing of th e ra m ’s
h o rn , b u t as far as I know , no Jew ish com m unity has ever d enoted the
holiday as 'Festival of the R a m ’s h o rn 5.

5.2 Latin and German terms in West Slavic languages

Seven W est Slavic term s borrow ed from L atin and G erm an which
have Jew ish associations are discussed below ; in m ost cases, the
specifically Jew ish attestations are also encountered in the source
languages. O n ly one of th e term s is found in Y iddish, b u t n ot with
specifically Jew ish associations. T h e five L atin term s constitute a sm all
fraction of the M edieval L atin v o cabulary recorded w ith Jew ish associa-
tio n s.152 T h ere seem to be no G reek term s w ith m eanings associated w ith
Jew s th a t have spread to S lavic,153 th o u g h one G reek w ord has developed
Jew ish associations in Slavic (see section 5.3 below).
5.21 L at magister. Lat magister ‘m aster; ra b b i’ (9th c )154 > G Meister
(E rfu rt 1346-1348):, Sckulmeister (Z urich 1347)1‫ > צצ‬C z mistr (late

150 Polnyj pravoslavnyj.., 2 :1 9 1 3 :1 8 8 0 (b ut ibid. 2194‫ ׳‬glossed in correctly as *first d ay o f

the seven th m o n th '). S ee also Br Napraznik trub1> in S k a ry n a ’s forew ord to L ev iticu s
(P ra g u e 1519).
lJl D a v reu x 1 9 3 5 :101. T h e text is b eliev ed co em an ate from the M o n a stery o f
S o u m e la , n ear T r a b z o n . T u rk ey . F o r further exam p les o f the exp re ssio n , see the L a tin
and G reek w ritings o f P op e C lem en t I (late 1st cen tu ry A D ), reprin ted in M ig n e
1 :1 8 5 7 :1 4 5 5 -1 4 5 6 ; for an ex a m p le from the first quarter o f the U t h centu ry, sec Starr
19 3 9 :6 6 , 180. G k salpigks 'orig in a lly m ea n t ‘tru m p et', b ut in the S ep tu a g in t tran slation
o f the B ib le, is u sed to translate H e sofar ‘ra m ’s h o r n ’ (see e.g . the first verses o f J o sh u a
6) (1 a m gratefu l to J o h n G lucker for this in form ation ). T h e exp ressio n Pascua del cuemo
'F estival o f the h o r n 1, is fou n d in late 15ch‫־‬early 16th cen tu ry Iberian C h ristia n sources
and m ay be either a C h ristian in n o v a tio n or the term actu ally in u se a m o n g S p an ish
M a rran os (W e x le r 1982a:80). L at dies ~ festum dangoris is cited by Iken 1 7 4 1 :1 3 8 , 3 2 5 .
152 For ex a m p le , term s like Lat publicanus ‘farm er o f taxes; sin ful J e w 5 (H . and R .
K a h a n e 1 9 7 2 :438), sabhaltzare ‘celeb rate the J ew ish S abb ath ' (L y o n 8 4 6 ) (A ro n iu s 1902,
# 107) are n o t fou nd in S lavic or S lavic L atin texts. T h e com p leted p u b lica tio n o f die-
tio n a ries o f M e d iev a l L atin recen sion s in the S lavic lan d s will en ab le us to ex p a n d the
corpus o f L atin term s w ith J e w is h a ssociation s (see, for exam p le, P lezia 1953ff). S ee also
sectio n 5 .2 7 , fn . 183 b elow . I do not d iscu ss here H eb rew elem en ts in tro d u ced to S lavic
la n g u a g es th rou gh a C hristian L atin in term ed iary (see K aras 1972).
S ee also sectio n 5 .2 7 , fn. 183 b elow .
104 A ron iu s 1902. # 8 6 . S ee also K u rb iso w n a 1967:155. N o te also (J)Fr Mestre 4ra b b i’
(P aris 1292) (S eror 1981:151).
' ‫ יצ‬B eran ek 1956:39; C u n o 1975:12, 23. T h e secon d term com p rises the Y id d ish w ord
for ‘s y n a g o g u e ’ (see section 5 .1 4 1 1 ab ove)
 T E R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JE W S 137

14-15c)146 > O Po mistrz (1564 ‫ ־‬from Czech), PoLat magister (Warsaw

1425).157 T he Jewish m eaning is found neither with the Eastern Yiddish
cognates majster ‘master craftsm an’, majnster ‘mechanic, repairm an,
workshop proprietor’, nor with M odG Meister ‘m aster (craftsman),
c h ie f. The existence of the compound Judenmeister ‘rabbi’ (literally
‘m aster of the Jew s’) suggests that the term usually had non-Jewish
associations.158 Moreover, the use of Lat magister to denote ‘rabbi’ is not
typical of all recensions of Medieval Latin, see e.g. SpLat magister ‘doc­
to r’ (vs. rabi ‘rabbi’), EngLat ‘doctor; rabbi’; the details of the geography
of magister as ‘rabbi’ in all Medieval Latin recensions need to be ascer­
tained.
5.22 Lat puteus, G (Juden)putz; Lat balneum, etc. Lat puteus ‘well’ and
balneum ‘b ath ’ regionally have acquired Jewish associations, e.g. the two
term s appear (with and without Judaeorum ‘of the Jew s’) in the meaning
of Jew ish ritual bath in G erm an and Polish Latin beginning with the 13th
cen tu ry . 159 Lat puteus is the basis of Fr puits, Du put ‘well’, M H G phutze
‘well; puddle; pool’, which, at least in Southwest G erm any acquired the
m eaning of ‘(Jewish) ritual bath’, e.g. Putz (K oln-T rier area) ,160 G Juden-
putz (Koln 1270);161 see also PoLat balneatoriam acc sg ‘Jewish ritual
b a th ’ (Krakow 1374).
5.23 Lat rationale. M edLat rationale ‘pectoral of the Jewish High Priest;
bishop’s church ornam ent’ is attested as O Po racyjonal (16th c) and as Br
rational1 (c. 17th c) ‘cassock of a Jewish archpriest’. 163 See also section
5.129 above.
5.24 Lat rotulus, etc. Austrian Lat rotulus ‘scroll of the T o ra h ’ (1244),164
G Rodal(e) (Meissen 1357-1387)165 > CzLat rodale (m id-14th c),166 PoLat
rodale (1580) ‘tripod on which a Jew stands with one leg while taking an
o a th ’167 vs. Po rodaly ‘scrolls of the T orah ’;16®PoLat rotula ‘yellow patch
to be worn by Jew s on their garm ents’ (K rak6w 1553).169 See also G juden

IJ* Bondy and Dvorsky 1906 (for 1546); V intr 1977:81. But Machek 1971 gives the
term majstr in the meaning of theologian only.
1‫ ״‬Siper 1926a: 174. The Old Polish form is found in Maczyriski 1564.
Aronius 1902, #86.
15’ See data in Siper 1926a:147; Baiaban 1:1931:72; M . Weinreich 1:1973:95.
Frings 1950, m ap #20 gives the distribution of the term in G erm an dialects.
141 M . W einreich 1:1973:211.
1‫ ״‬Baiaban 1:1931:6, fn. II.
■“ Bulyka 1980:180.
'« Kisch 1949b:512.
/ but 1949a:87, 254; 1949b:512.
'** Ibid. 1949a:254.
“ 7 Ibid 1949b:514, fn. 191, quoting Bloch 1892:95ff.
'** Lilientaiowa 1904:168.
“ * Baiaban 1:1931:87. For H ungarian Latin examples from the mid-13th century in
the Jew ish m eaning, see Cassel 1850:124, fn. 60. See also Siper 1926a:l70-l7J.

1
138 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JE W S

rodel ‘T alm ud’ (W urzburg 13th c; Prague 14th c) .170 It is presently

unclear where the Jewish meanings first developed, though in many
recensions of Latin, they are apparently unknown, e.g. EngLat rotulo
‘roll’.171
5.25 G Brame, etc. Po brama, pi •y is attested in a Polish Latin text from
1490 as ‘phylactery’.175 In contemporaneous Polish literature, the term
also denoted ‘embellishments worn by women on their feet or hands; the
rim of a garm ent, jewelry’. T he term is ultimately from G erm an (see stG
Brame ‘fur trimm ing; edge’, verbrdmen ‘embellish garm ent’) and is found
in other West Slavic languages as well, e.g. C z prym(ek) ‘trim m ing, braid,
border o f cloth, lace’. In fact, this is the only G erm an term in Slavic that
I know of where the Jewish association is not inherited from the German
etymon. It is difficult to determ ine whether the shift in Polish from
‘embellishment on a garm ent, jew elry’ to ‘phylactery’ took place in a
Jewish or Christian speech community. In East Slavic languages, the
Judeo-G reek term is used, e.g. Uk filakterija (see section 3.123 above).
Native Po dial (Olkusz) zydoskie pacierze (ironic) (literally ‘Jewish
prayers’)17’ calls attention to the fragments written on parchment
enclosed in the attached boxes; see also R ladanki, Uk ladanky ‘amulets',
O G Denkztdel (literally ‘written rem inder’, attested in L uther 1534 ‫־־‬
ModG DenkzeOet). T he designation of ‘prayer’ and ‘phylacteries’ by a
common root is characteristic of Hebrew as well, see tfillah ‘prayer’: pi
tfilldt and tfilltn pi t (with the Judeo-A ram aic plural ending)
‘phylacteries’. For unique East Slavic synonymous com pounds based on
the roots ‘G od’ + ‘prayer’, see section 5.1511 above; on the confusion
in non-Jewish languages between ‘phylacteries’ and ‘prayer shawl’, see
sections 3.123 above and 7.14, fn. 29 below.
5.26 G Kirchhof. MG Kirchhof ‘churchyard, graveyard’ assumes the
m eaning of ‘Jewish cemetery’ when combined with the word ‘Je w ’, e.g.
ioddenkerchove (Meissen 1357174, (1387 ‫ ־‬PoG Juden-kirchowf (Krakow
1481).175 G Kirchhof is the basis for arch Cz krehov ‘graveyard’, for which

170 Lexer 1872-1878.

171 M. Adler 1939:242, 375. Du Cange glosses Med I.at rolulum, pi -1 as ‘Books of the
Mosaic Law and (he T alm ud' but no geographical or chronological detail is provided
(6:1954). CILat rotula meant ‘little wheel’.
1‫ ״‬Nitsch and Urbariczyk 1:1953-1955. The Jewish meaning of the term is cited
neither in B^k d a l 2:1967 nor in Sadnik and Aitzetmuller 4:1968, #204a. O n recom­
mended terms for a 19th centurv Ukrainian translation of the Bible, see discussion in
2iteckij 1905:41. '
1,1 Ciszewski 1927.
174 Kisch I949a:85, fn. 4. See ahoyoden &r<-Ao/(Wes(fa]en 1361) (Brilling and Richter-
ing 1967, #204).
175 Siper 1926a: 160.
 TERM S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JEW S 139

I can find no specifically Jew ish associations.176 Polish is th e only Slavic

language in w hich the G erm an ism , kirkut, kierchow, etc., w ith o u t th e ad ­
jective ‘Je w ish ’, denotes a ‘Je w is h ’ o r ‘P ro testan t cem etery ’. 1” T h e
m eaning ‘Jew ish cem etery ’ is Erst attested in a Polish L atin docum ent
from 1553 (referring to th e Jew ish co m m unity in K azim ierz, near
K rakow ), e.g. ad ameterium judaeorum kierchow vocilatum,us b u t this exam -
pie does not exclude the possibility th at the w ord could still have denoted
a non-Jew ish cem etery in 16th century Polish. A m ong 19th-20th century
Polish lexicographers, only K arfow icz distinguishes betw een ki(e)rchow
‘P ro testan t cem etery’ a n d kierkot, -kut ‘Jew ish cem e tery ’ (1894-1905).
T h e Silesian dialects o f Polish, b o rd erin g G erm an , use kierchqf (note the
g reater resem blance w ith the G erm an etym on) as 1cem etery ’ in
general’—including a C atholic o n e .179 A ltb au er believes the original
m ean in g of the Polish G erm an ism w as ‘P ro testan t cem etery ’, b u t as
P rotestantism w aned in Poland after the m id-17th cen tu ry , and the Jew s
becam e the only large m inority in the coun try , the term cam e to
designate a ‘Jew ish cem etery ’ alm ost exclusively (1954); w e m ay ad d th at
certain P ro testan t sects, reached P o lan d from G erm an y . H ow ever, the
fact th a t in contem porary R h in elan d G erm an , the simplex keifee ‘ch u rch ­
y a rd ’ denotes ‘Jew ish cem e tery ’ (vs. kersfhoj‘C h ristian cem e tery ’), raises
the possibility th a t the Jew ish associations first developed in G erm a n y
an d later spread to P o lish .180 See also discussion o f Po okopisko in section
5.142 above.
5.27 G Wandilgeldk. G Wandilgelde (1396),181 A u strian L at wandel1sz
‘pecuniary penalty (paid by Je w s)’ > O P o wandil (1364).183

175 M ach ek 1 9 7 1 :293. A lso d erived from G Kirchhof is O C z biiiov , ce m e te r y ’, also w ith ­
o u t specific J ew ish association s. T h e con tem p orary standard C zech term is hrbitov < G
Friedhof(w ith in terferen ce from C z hrob 4g r a v e ’). S ec also C z G Judenfreytkof {p lace?, 1430)
(B o n d y an d D v o rsk y 1906. # 2 1 9 ).
]-17 A ltb au er 1954; N itsch 1954.
L7S B ersadskij 3 :1 9 0 3 , # 1 5 5 .
173 N itsch 1 9 5 4 :204.
180 m W ein reich 3:1 9 7 3 :2 1 5 (citin g M u lle r 3 :1 9 3 5 -1 9 3 8 :1 2 2 6 ).
1SJ K isch 1 9 4 % :4 9 5 , fn. 59.
1S2 C asse] 1 8 5 0 :1 2 3 , fn . 60.
183 Bersadskij 3 :1 9 0 3 , # 1. paragrap h 16, w h o cites the d efin ition o f th e term g iv e n b y
M a ciejo w sk i: 'p en alty p aid b y J ew s in the even t o f an u n taxed transport o f g o o d s in the
g u ise o f a d eceased p e r so n 5 (1 8 7 8 :2 3 ). F or P o L a t vandelin the m ea n in g ‘fin e for attack in g
a s y n a g o g u e 5 (1505),. see O h ryzk o 1859. f. 313 (p. 142) (also cited b y G arbacevskij 1874).
M a n y la n g u a g es h ave tax term s relatin g specifically to J ew s (see also O P o kozubalec‫ י‬etc.
d iscu ssed in sectio n 5 .1 1 3 a b ove), b ut th ese term s are rarely o f J ew ish orig in . A J ew ish
o rig in m ay be ten a b le for P t genesim 4tax paid b y J ew s for the room in w hich rabbis e x ­
p o u n d the L aw ; the room it s e lf < ( ? )J A r knis ‘sy n a g o g u e ’ + H e -im pi (a ttested since
th e m id -15th c) (see W ex ler 19 8 2 b :77), S ee also d iscu ssion o f G k kefalition — -etion ‘tax
o n J ew s an d p a g a n s ‫( '־‬A n d read es 1 928:313-315; L ew icki 2 , i : 1 9 6 9 [-1 9 7 7 ]:2 5 : 71) and
G L a t bede, precaria (13th c) (K iscb I 9 4 9 b :4 3 6 , fn . 102).
140 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING TO JE W S

5.3 A Greek term common to all Slavic languages: andras. See section 5.5221
below.
5.4 Turkic terms in Slavic languages.
5.41 Clothing terms in West and East Slavic languages. There are a
num ber of Turkic clothing terms that are used in West and East Slavic
languages; a fraction of these Slavic Turkicisms are also found in coter­
ritorial Eastern Y iddish.184 In the Slavic languages the terms were never
associated with Jewish dress specifically, but they have acquired
facultative Jewish associations in some of the Slavic languages and Yid­
dish. It remains to be established whether the Jewish associations arose
first in Slavic or in Yiddish, and whether there was a connection between
the two sets of target languages. W ithin Slavic, the Turkicisms appeared
to have diffused from East to West Slavic, i.e. from U krainian to
Polish;185 the dynamics of the term within Yiddish dialects are unknown.
T he retention of these clothing terms among Jew s is revealing about the
history of dress styles among ethnic groups.
5.411 Po chalat, etc. While Y xalat ‘robe, frock, housecoat’ has no
specific Jewish connotations, Po chalat and Uk xalat denote a ‘long coat
worn by Jew s’. 186 The etymon is O ttom an T u h il’at ‘robe of honor’ <
Ar xilca. The term lacks Jewish associations in the other Slavic languages,
see e.g. R xalat ‘bathrobe; Oriental robe’ (mainly a female article of
clothing) . " 7
5.412 Poja(r)muika, etc. Y jarmlke ‘cap; (Jewish) skullcap’ has a surface
cognate in Polish and the East Slavic languages, e.g. Po ja(r)mulka ‘cap’
(attested since the 15th c) ,188 R ermolka ‘cap’ (especially applied to Cen­
tral Asia) with no Jewish associations vs. Uk jarmulka ~ jarmurka
(especially worn by Jew s) .189 The etymon may be T u yagmurluk ‘raincoat,
roof over a doorway’. It is of interest to note that large sections of N orth­
ern Polish and Lvov Yiddish do not use the Turkicism at all, preferring
native kepi.190 Since I do not know how far to the west the term is used

114 Junaleeva 1982 discusses over forty Turkic clothing terms in the Slavic languages.
1#i Karlowicz et al. 1900-1927 and Bruckner 1957 derive Po chaial and jarmutka from
Turkish, via U krainian. HorbaC curiously derives Uk Jarmurka from Hebrew (1965:19)
See also discussion of Uk serdak in section 6.54 below.
1.6 Brzezina notes that in the Polish of neighboring Krak6w and Chrzan6w , chalat
means ‘schoolgirl's apron' (1979:133). The derivation is given in Sipova 1976.
1.7 Junaleeva 1982:11.
IM Bruckner 1957. Junaleeva records the earliest use in East Slavic in the 17th century
(1982:10). In A. M ark, the Yiddish form has been Polonized, e.g . jarmulke [1929].
|M 2clexivs'kyj and NedilVkyj 1882-1886. See also Uk Salamejka, ialamok in section
5.1212 above.
190 Herzog 1965:63-64, map #3.27; 263, m ap #6.17. For Lvov Yiddish* Brzezina
gives kaf»b, k ’epeh (1979:133). Though Wolf Moskovich notes that a Lvov Yiddish in­
formant used jarmlke in the narrowed meaning of *Chassidic cap*.
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G T O JE W S 141

in Polish dialects, I cannot determine if the Yiddish term was borrowed

repeatedly from several coterritorial Slavic languages or diffused from
East Slavic (Yiddish) to Polish Yiddish. In any case, the initial stress in
Yiddish (vs. a Slavic penultim ate stress) suggests a relatively early bor­
rowing.
5.413 Po kaftan, etc. Po kaftan, Br, Uk kaptan and Y kaftn,'9' like the
T urkish source kaftan, denote a ‘long outer robe’; it is only in Czech and
Slovak that kaftan now denotes a ‘type of long overcoat (especially worn
by observant male Jew s)’.192 An East Slavic source for Y kaftn is unlikely
since Belorussian and U krainian tend to replace non-native / by p . 195
5.42 Non-clothing term s in South and East Slavic languages. For
T u rk ic non-clothing terms in South, and marginally in East Slavic
languages which relate to Jews, see section 5.5213 below.

5.5 Terms jo r 'Jew' in Slavic languages

Slavic dialects differ in their designations for ‘Je w ’. In the standard
dialects, terms for ‘Je w ’ come from Rom ance (possibly Judeo-
R om ance), Greek and Turkish; elsewhere, in addition to the standard
nom enclature, there is a large variety of terms, both native and non­
native (including a num ber of Yiddish and Judezm o-origin terms). The
Slavic terms for ‘Jew ’ of Rom ance and Greek origin were borrowed as
ready-m ade ethnonyms and clearly predate the arrival of the Ashkenazic
a n d Sephardic Jews in the Slavic lands; terms from G erm an, Yiddish and
Ju d e zm o postdate the settlement of the Ashkenazic and Sephardic Jews;
th e chronology of the Turkic terms relative to Ashkenazic and Sephardic
settlem ent is uncertain. T he age, and very often the etymology of the
native Slavic dialectal terms used for ‘Je w ’ cannot be determined;
sim ilarly with the age of the Greek terms used in non-standard Slavic—
m ost of which cluster in the South Slavic languages and in Polish.
5.51 T erm s clearly predating the arrival of Ashkenazic and Sephardic
Je w s in the Slavic lands.

1.1 Polonized to kaftan in A. M ark [ 1929]. See also discussion of Y kapcn — kapcan in
section 7.112 below. In tbe Codex #262, He taxrix 'ro b e' is translated as JESlcq kaftan
(E sth er 8:15).
1.1 M achek 1971; Supm n 1974:69-72. In 19th century G erm an, Kaftan denoted a
‘long overgarment worn by Polish male Jew s' (O pel’baum 1971:86). Curiously,
Bruckner defines Po kaftan as a “Jew ish" word (1957:212). Kaftan is attested in Balkan
languages and Hungarian but with no Jewish associations. O n the distinction in Belorus­
sian between kaftan ‘male garm ent' and kaptan ‘female garm ent’, see Junaleeva 1982:51.
1M Junaleeva proposes, in addition, that Belorussian and Ukrainian forms with p are
o ld er than those with / —citing O Turkic kaptan (1982:51). The East Slavic Turkicism was
first used in the 15th century (ibid. , 10).
142 TERM S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JEW S

5.511 (J?)It *1izideo. T h e term for ‘J e w ’ com m on to all Slavic

languages is ultim ately derived from L at iudaeus, e.g. C z, Svk, U So zid,
Svn zid, S eC r Z 1d(0 vin),i9i Po zyd, U k , B r,195 LSo zyd, C hS l zid, zidin,
zidovin‫׳‬, R zid (pej, vs. stR evrej, see belo w ).196 T h e Slavic term for ‘J e w ’
has also spread to contiguous non-Slavic languages, e.g, Li zydas, Le
z'Vds, P oR om zydos, zydano,137 R u m jidov, jidan. H g zsido is usually
derived from Slavic,198 b u t a d irect R om ance source should not be ruled
o ut. In parts of the South an d E ast Slavic territo ry , th e te rm for ‘J e w ’
has assum ed the m ean in g o f ‘leg en d ary g ia n t’, e.g. N B g, ESe zid, Bg
zidovec, dzidavec; R Zidovin, n am e of a m ighty giant in the R u ssian byliny,
w ith w hom I l’ja M u ro m ec and D o b ry n ja N ikitic w aged n u m ero u s bat-
ties.199 'Rxxr. jidov also has the d ual m e a n in g .200 A native lo an translation
is M ac visok (see section 5.5222 below). In th e South B ulgarian and
M acedon ian areas, the ‘g ian ts’ are referred to as ehni, literally
‘G reek s’.201 U k kozarljuha ‘strong, courageous w a rrio r' m ay be derived
from hozar ‘K h a z a r’.2m
T raditionally, CS1 *zidb ‘J e w ’ has been derived, th ro u g h the stage
*zudb, from (N )It giudeo203 an d assigned to th e sm all corpus of C h ristian
term s received by the Slavs from N o rth e rn Italy in the 6th-7th centuries

184 W estern dialects o f S erb o-C roatian h ave th e R o m a n c e v ariant w h ile eastern
d ia lects h ave accep ted th e T u rk ish term , e .g . Cifut, Cifutin, C iv-, d£ifut(in) (Skok
1 9 7 1 -1 9 7 4 ). In w estern d ialects o f S erb o-C roatian , Cifut has a p ejorative m ea n in g . J o n k e
w rites th at Zidov has p ejorative co n n o ta tio n s for so m e speakers— in o p p o sitio n to n eu tral
Jivrejin (1 9 6 5 :3 0 3 )
135 S ee also O B r zidelb ‘J e w ’ (H r o d n a 1558) (U sc in o v ic 1968:1 5 0 ). N o te also the u n e x ­
p e tte d suffix -el' in B r cyceF d iscu ssed in sectio n 7 .1 4 b elow .
1913 T h e r e are R u ssia n fam ily n am es b ased on b oth roots (see U n h e g a u n 1 9 7 2 :1 3 2 ,
135). O n the recent p ejorative q uality o f R zid , see H . B irn b au m 1981 b:32. S ee also R
ne tot zid , kto ecrej, a tot zid kto zid ‘a H e b r ew is n o t a J ew ; a J ew is a J e w ’ (Jellinek
2 :1 8 8 2 :9 7 ). A n in terestin g sem an tic shift b etw een R z y d a a ’tn ‘p a g a n , ev il, d ish o n est p er­
s o n ’, z yd a e’inkh ‘w itch , ev il, shrew ish ‫־‬w o m a n ’ an d zyt ‘J e w ’ is fo u n d in th e R u ssia n
sp eech o f O ld B elievers in X orth east P o la n d , arou n d A u g u sto w (G rek -P a b iso w a and
M a r y n ia k o w a 1980).
157 F icow sk i 1 9 6 5 .3 8 0 .
158 H o m a n derives th e term from S lo v en ia n (1:1 9 4 0 :1 5 1 ); see also H . B irn b au m
19 8 1 b :3 4 , fn. 9. T h e old est attestation from H u n g a ria n is in a L atin text dated 1244
(B en k o et a l 3 :1976).
195 B erlin 1 9 19:166-167; G o ld e n 1 980:16. M oH ova rejects th e d eriv a tio n of S oSl
‘g ia n t’ from ‘J e w ’ (follow in g M la d e n o v 1941) (1 9 7 3 :1 0 1 -1 0 2 ); e v e n so , this w o u ld not
rule ou t the later association o f the (w o roots, W ein ryb d ates the asso c ia tio n o f J ew s and
g ia n ts in R u ssia n literatu re to the ll t h - 1 3 t h cen tu ries (1 9 6 2 b :4 8 7 -4 8 8 ).
200 T h e B u lgarian an d R u m a n ia n form s are d iscu ssed in G eo rg iev et at.
7:1 9 6 9 :5 4 3 -5 4 4 ; the S lav ic form s b y M a tl 1 9 5 6 :294, 306.
201 M a tl 1956:300, 3 0 6 .
202 Pritsak 1963:930.
S m ila u er 1944:8; V a sm e r 1:1953; K ra n zm a y er 1960:39; S h e v elo v 19 6 5 :2 6 5 , 267;
S tieb er 1966; M ach ek 1971, V a sm e r rejects the K h a za r ety m o lo g y for z id p rop osed b y
K ors (1 9 0 8 :5 5 -5 6 ) (1 :1 9 5 3 :4 2 3 ).
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S 143

(see also SeCr kriz, Cz kh z ‘cross’ and discussion of SI skola in section

5.1411 above). While Slavic ecclesiastical terminology consists primarily
o f Greek loans or Church Slavic loan translations of Greek patterns of
discourse, zid(ovXin), found in Church Slavic texts from the 9th century,
predates the appearance of the Greek-derived synonym (j)evrit ( < Gk
hebraios).20* Alternatively, the Rom anism might have been borrowed
from an Italian dialect in which the original Lat 11 had become fronted
to f; such a development is attested in the Romance dialects of Gaul and
large parts of Northern Italy.205 We have no idea how the term ‘Je w ’ was
pronounced in Judeo-V ulgar Latin, but in Balkan Judezm o, ‘Jew;
Jew ish ’ m; ‘Judezm o language’ appears as dzudjo — dzidjo. This is the
only root in the language in which u undergoes fronting to i —perhaps
d u e to the encircling palatal environm ent (vs. dzudta ‘Jewess; Jew ish’ f,
dzudezmo ‘Judezm o language’). The possibility of a Judeo-Italian
substratal feature in Balkan Judezm o should also be entertained.206 O n
the reflexes of He phudi ~ Ar jahudi, see section 5.5213 below.
5.512 Gk hebraios. The Greek term is the source of Br jawrej,207 Uk
jevrej, R evrej, ChSl (j)evr/t, Bg, Mac evrein, SeCr Jevrejm. T he term is not
used in the West Slavic languages. Conversely, a num ber of Slavic
languages (e.g. Church Slavic, Ukrainian) use both the Greek and the
(Judeo-?)Rom ance terms for ‘Je w ’, to distinguish between ‘Jew (in the
Biblical period)’ and ‘(contemporary) Je w ’ respectively; in Russian, the
G reek term is standard, the Rom ance term (introduced from Polish or
an o th er East Slavic language?) pejorative (at least since the 18th cen­
tury?). In East Slavic, affected terms tend to be formed only from the
R om ance root, e.g. Uk zydjuk ,shabby Je w ’, zydjuha ‘dirty Je w ’, zydyk
‘young, poor little Jew ’, zydok ‘(poor) little Je w ’;308 R (Arxangel’sk,
T am bov) zidovin ‘miser’.209
5.52 T erm s probably postdating the arrival of Ashkenazic and Sephar-

204 Ja g ic 1913:310.
J0S G ra n d g e n t 1970:139. See also S ten d er-P etersen 1927:349-350.
T h e age o f this developm ent is u n k n o w n . I am grateful to D avid M . Hums for the
J u d e z m o facts. O n o th er possibly B alkan su b stratal features in Ju d e z m o , see sections
3 .1 3 4 , 3.1621, 3.163, 3.321 above an d 7.53 below.
101 T h e cu rre n t stB r jawrej was rejected by som e B elorussian p u rists in the interbellum
p e rio d as a R ussianism in favor of kebrej (D ubow ka 1929:108). See also hebraj (bookish)
(L a sto w sk i 1924). A U k rain ian dialogue o f a G reek addressing a Jew in a U k ra in ia n in-
te rtn e d y o f 1736-1737 has htbreos (H o rb atsch 1966:164; the text is rep rin ted in H udzij
19 6 0 ). See also G k omtos [ovrios) (pej) (also discussed by N ew ton 1972:56) and R um
eireu: ovrei (pej) ’J e w '.
i0• Ziteckij prefers iudej -J e w ’ to zyd in the U k ra in ia n tran slatio n of th e Bible because
o f th e negative connotations o f the la tte r (1905:34).
*°* Sreznevskij an d Vostokov 1852.
144 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G T O JE W S

die Jew s in the Slavic lands and terms of uncertain origin and
chronology.
5.521 Jewish languages. Slavic speakers frequently designate ‘Je w ’ by
(a) Hebrew anthroponym s, which were for the most part received
through a Yiddish (and sometimes also G erm an slang) interm ediary, (b)
Hebrew ethnonyms and (c) Judezm o morphemes.
5.5211. Hebrew anthroponym s via a Yiddish carrier: Y borex; godl;
ju d l ; icik\ jexiel; smuel; xaim; xaje; jajge. A nthroponyms frequently assume
secondary ethnonymic functions, e.g. Po (Jjantek ma > Lvov U k jantek
,Pole’.210 But nowhere is this process as productive as in the case of Slavic
ethnonyms for ,Jew ’. Examples are Y borex ma > O Po Boruchowit pi
(1626) (see also section 5 above);211 Br borex ‘Jew ; dirty person’ (pej)•212
A term common to Czech, Polish, U krainian and Russian slang which
might be of Yiddish origin is Cz kotel, Uk (Lvov) kudlaj, (organgrinders'
slg) gudlaj, gud(z), etc.,213 Br gad,21* (Br?—attested between the Smolensk
and Mahilew governments, 18th c) kudlq\2,i (Sluck poor people’s slg)
gudlaj,216 Po gudlaj, k-, kudlecz ,dissheveled person’212 < (a) Y godl ‘impor­
tant person, celebrity’, (b) Y gadlen ‘conceited, vain person' ( < H e gadol
‘big’ + ■an agent)218 or (c) GY giidle, G Jiidle fa,219 EY ju d l ma. See also
Cz kudel ‘bad knife’—an object sold by itinerant Czech (Jewish?) ped-
dlars; Uk kudlaj ‘shaggy-headed dog, m an’.220 Uk icik, (W orld W ar 1
slang) icyk < Y icik, hypocoristic of jicxok ma < He jichaq ‘Isaac’;221 Uk
(Volhynian tailors’ slg) xyl' ma, xejla, x y l’ka fa, x y l’uus’kyj adj < Y jexul
ma < H e jihP el.222 USo imul(o) (pej),223 R /mu/5(pej)224 < Y smuel ma <

»'» Horbad 1966:39.

2.1 Fo u n d in an an o n y m o u s rh ym ed b ro ch u re from K rak6w J626 (rep rin te d in
B aiaban 1:1931:555).
2.2 N osovtf 1870; Federow ski 4:1935, # 12033. Sec also borox — -ux *dirty like a J ew '
(K arsk ij 1:1904:172). In Y iddish m u sician s' slang, borwe(er) is listed as *frisky male,
female* (W eissenberg 1913:134).
2.3 All form s are from H orba£ 1957:35, 40; I963a:19.
2.4 Bondaletov 1973:82. U nless the term is related to G Jud* ‘Jew* (see B r judka
*Jewess’ in section 5.5213 a n d Y godl below).
‫ג‬,‫ ג‬T ra x te n b e rg 1908:102-103.
7.4 Scepuro 1881, ap p en d ix xxv.
717 K u rk a 1907.
711 T h e term is no! cited by W olf 1956.
219 C h ry san d e r 1750:9.
230 Bcllm ann 1971:180, citing K n o th e 1888:330. See also Po slg (ochw e$nicki) gud^a^ek
'k n ife ', Gudt^a\ *Jew' (B udziszew ska 1955:141)—collected in the K om ri district and
C zestochow a.
‫ י ג ג‬See £ elexivs'kyj an d N e d ilV k y j 1882-1886; H orba£ 1963a:9, 19. T h e U krainian
term m ay be from G Uzig%a pejorative term for *Jew*.
222 T h e exam ples arc from D zendzelivs’kyj, w ho proposes H e hillel m a as the etymon
(1977:316, 321). b u t \ jexul m a ( < H e pht^el) elim inates the problem o f explaining why
H e h m ight becom e U k x —though U k rain ian has both fricatives. T h e loss o f the initial
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES R EL A TIN G T O JE W S 145

H e Smu^el ‘Sam uel’. Cz keim, kaim < Y xaim ma < He hajim;225 Po dial
(which?) chaja ‘Jew ess’ (pej) < Y xaje fa < He hajjah ‘anim al’; fa;226 Po
(Lvov) fajga ‘Jew ess’ < Y jajge fa.227
5.5212 Direct borrowing of a Hebrew anthroponym : haman. See
discussion in section 7.16 below.
5.5213 Hebrew ethnonyms via a Turkic or G erm an carrier: jisra'ei,
j»hud \ ; qdraHm. T he Hebrew ethnonym jisra^el ‘Israel’ becomes T atB r
izraaliik ‘Je w ’ (early 19th c) (with Br -iyk agent) vs. Br Izrail’ ‘Israel’.22*
U k rain ian and a num ber of Balkan Slavic and non-Slavic languages
d enote ‘Je w ’ by a pejorative Turkic term derived from H e j>hudt ‘Je w ’,
e.g. T u Qifit, Cifut, Dzifut — {-, fufut (arch).259 T he existence of a T urkish
term reflects not only the fact that the South Slavic lands were long under
O tto m an dom ination, but also that m any of the Jews who settled in these
lands beginning with the 16th century were Iberian Jew s hailing from
m etropolitan T urkey.250 In the contem porary Balkan languages, the
syllable j t - is rem iniscent o f th e tre a tm e n t o f H e ‫נ‬axal ‘he a te ’ by U k rain ian V olhynian
ta ilo rs ’ slang (see section 7.51 below).
J‫ ״‬Bielfeldt 1933:33. T h e S o rb ian term has a p arallel in G slg Sckmuhl (1906) (W olf
1956, #5 0 3 6 ).
« • K ra m e r 1966:93.
m See W exler 1983a. B aiaban cites kaim if in a n a n o n y m o u s Polish brochure from
1622 (1:1931:178). T h e oldest exam p le o f G Krim ‘J e w ’ ap p ears to be from 1510 (see
W olf 1956, 824). See also the discussion o f H e -x > •k in section 3.341 above. Y iddish
a n th ro p o n y m s m ay also be used by su b sta n d a rd Slavic an d G e rm a n in m eanings o th e r
th a n ‘J e w ’, e.g . G slg Feit(e)t ‘p rim itiv e pocketknife’ < (?) Y fa jlt m a (Jak ob 1929; W olf
1956, # 1325): C z slg rathla , g irl’ (T re im e r 1937:49), B r (V erx n jad zv in sk a rea) raxlja ‘dis-
sheveled w o m a n ’ (S atalav a 1975:154), ‘slovenly sluggish m a n , w o m a n ’ (N osovi? 1870;
B ajkow an d N ekraW vif 1925), 'slo p p y , ugly an d fat w o m a n ' (M scislaw district)
(K ry v ick i a n d M ack ev if 1975:127), R slg roxlja ,slovenly w om an; m a n ’ (S aratov: see
V a sm e r 1953-1958) vs. Lvov U k ruehla ‘old, d irty , neglected Jew e ss’ (K u rzo w a 1983:225,
326, 355, 385) < Y roxl fa < H e rdhtl ‘R ac h e l’. Svn rahjt, rahta ‘w eak, fragile’ probably
has n o th in g to d o w ith the H eb rew term (see V asm er 1953-1958; Skok 1971-1974); in
fact, E ast Slavic form s m ay also be deriv ed from R ryxljrj etc. ‘c ru m b ly, podgy1. In
B elorussian, roxlja also m eans ‘R ac h e l’ (N osoviJ 1870; BahuS£vi£ 1894:26). In Polish and
U k ra in ia n slan g , rachla, etc. is attested as ‘w om an; lo v e r’ (E streich er 1903:75; H o rb a f
1983:314). See also C z Rtbtka, r- ‘repulsive w o m a n ’, u ltim ately from H e nvqah fa (Pech
1948). In G e rm a n slang, H ebrew w ords are often used as d esig n atio n s fo r 'Jew (ess)’, e.g.
A u stria n G SchabuI ‘J e w ’ ( < Y Sains < H e labbat ‘S a b b a th ’); see also Katie ‘Jew e ss’,
K auli ■whore’ < Y kale < H e kallah ‫־‬b rid e ’ (Jak o b 1929; W olf 1956, # 2431).
»» K artow icz 1894-1905.
»” K u rz o w a 1983:157.
s‫ ״‬A k in e r 1973:69; 1980:226 (cited in h e r tra n slite ra tio n o f th e T u rk o -A ra b ic script).
See th e v a ria n t izraektyk in W oronow icz 1935:359.
T h e earliest attestatio n in T u rk ish in Cifut (1533) (Stachow ski 1975:44).
1,0 O n th e p a tte rn s o f m igration o f the S ep h ard ic Jew s in to th e South Slavic lands, see
W exler 1977b: 168, fn. 23; on th e fact th a t B alkan Ju d e z m o is relatively m ore receptive
to T u rk is h en ric h m e n t th an the c o territo rial Slavic languages, see W ex ler 1981b: 129,
fn. 52-53. T u rk ish ism s also retain th e ir form b e tte r in Ju d e z m o , for ex am p le, Skopje J u d
uda 'r o o m ' is clo ser to T u ode th a n co territo rial M ac adaja (arch ), Se odaja. R u m odau,
G k odas (I a m g rateful to R achel N ad ler for the J u d e z m o d a tu m ). O n the spread of
146 TE R M S IK SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G TO JEW S

T urkicism is now archaic, pejorative o r su b stan d ard . E xam ples are Bg

Cifutin, S eC r Civut, Cifutin, (hypercorrect) Cioa ‘J e w ’, avutanti ‘(deal in
sm all) tra d e ’, (Bosnia) cifut(h)a,na — civ- ‘synagogue’ (w ith hane ‘ro o m ’);
M o d G k tsifoutes [cifutis] (pej) ‘J e w ’; R u m ciujut ‘Jew ; sw indler; strange
p erso n ’.231 T h e R u m a n ia n form m ay be the source o f U k cjufutka
‘Jew e ss’ attested in an 18th cen tu ry in term e d y .233 A tru n cated form o f
the root also appears in M aced o n ian an d B ulgarian professional
languages an d in the C aucasus, e.g. M ac (C ig u lar dial of P rilep, Bitola,
O x rid and Skopje) dzui,l u SW Bg (secret lg) C au casia n exam ples
are K ab zut, O s (Iron) dzuit, (D igor) dziwitt.'ii5 T h e possibility th at the
tru n cated form s did n ot o riginate in O tto m a n T u rk ish — b u t say in an
Ira n ia n language— should be explored.
T h e G erm an reflex of H ejahudi ‘J e w ’, G Jude, appears as B rjW , Br,
U k judka f,236 M ac juda ‘Je w (pej); traito r; u n b eliev er’.337 See also T a tB r
jehudczyk ‘J e w ’ < A r jahudi + B r -cyk ag en t.238 Also p ro b ab ly derived
from H e jzh u d i is Bg (secret language based on the K oskov dialect) iaxu
~ iaxo.239 Lvov Po karaim, U k karajim from H e qdra^m ‘K a ra ite s’ have
becom e pejorative term s for ‘U k ra in ia n ’.240

T u rk ish m u sica l gen res to th e B alkans th rou gh the R o m a , see D ietrich 1983:2 8 9 ff. In ad ­
d itio n to R u m a n ia n term in o lo g y (see sectio n 5, fn. 3 ab ove), B alkan S la v ic la n g u a g es
h a v e also acq u ired T u rk ish term s re la tin g to R o m a , e .g . B g cengene ~ ci- ‘R o m ’ < T u
Qingene (an d v a rian ts), cari-hasija ~ Seri-, caribasija ‘R o m a n i leader; co m m a n d er o f tro o p s’
(arch ) < T u (eribast (G r a n n es 1 980:23, 33).
531 Skaljic 1966;’ Skok 1 9 7 1-1974.
232 Interlu d e to S tefan otok os (18th cen tu ry) (in H u d zij 1960:1 5 2 ). S ee also H o rb a c
1966:8. ’
™ G ab ju v 1900:872. S ee also G k R o m iz u i, T u R o m j a f ,J e w ’ (A sco li 1 865:13).
234 G e o rg iev et a l 7:1 9 6 9 :5 4 3 .
235 A b a e v f :1 9 5 8:400. F or the claim th at J ew s w ere called Ghyssar in “ C a u c a sia n ”
la n g u a g es, see M ieses 1924:290.
586 L astow sk i 1924 (w h o cites th e w ord in a song, hej, karcmamc'ka judka, d aj harelacki
xutka ‘oh , J e w ish la d y tavern ow ner, g iv e us a little vod k a q u ick ’); L an ger 19 7 2 :1 3 3 ,
U n less the term is from luda ‘J u d a s Iscariot; traitor, h y p o c rite’ . T h e term is also fou nd
in som e d ialects o f R o m a n i, e .g . H g , P o R o m jW o j (M ik lo sich 2 :1 8 7 2 :7 4 ). S ee also O B r
zidka ‘J e w e s s ’ (late 16th -late 17th c) (P a w len k a 1978:90) ~ JE SI (B r, U k ) fam (Brest
1 518) (B ersadskij 1 :1 8 8 2 , # 6 8 )‫—־‬a tran slation o f H e jsh u dit ‘J ew ess; J u d ith ’ (?). N o te
a lso Br judovka ‘v illa in ’ (vs. judka ‘J e w e ss') (N o so v ic 1870; J o fe 1 9 6 5 :4 3 9 ). S ee a lso Le
iidavs (pej) 'p erson w ho b eh aves like a J e w ’ ( £ . F raen kel 2 :1 9 6 5 :1 3 0 4 -1 3 0 5 ). W o lf s die-
tio n ary o f G erm an slan g co n ta in s a w ea lth o f term s for ‘J e w ’ : Biboldo, Blattenkmn, C haim ,
F aisckd, J aich , Kaim (cken), Mausckel, Schamserler, Schigerl. Schlaier, Schlaume. Schmuki,
Schnitzer, Tschindo (1 9 5 6 ). S om e o f th ese term s are also fou nd in S lavic la n g u a g es.
K on esk i 1 9 6 M 9 6 6 .
238 W o ro n o w icz 1935:359; A k in er 1980:227. A 9th cen tu ry list o f m o n k s from L u xeil
co n tain s S lavic n a m es, in clu d in g Iodisin, w hirl! B urr b eliev es m a y be from C hS l
!judejbskt (19 6 4 :5 6 ),
235 S ism an ov 1895:45; S toilov 1926:168.
240 H orbac 1966:39; 1983:321; K u rz o w a 1 9 8 3 :181. ■
 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELA TIN G T O JE W S 147

5.5214 Judezm o morphemes: -ente, fidzu. Two Balkan Judezm o m or­

phem es which have assumed the m eaning of ‘Je w ’ in M acedonian are
fid zu < Ju d ‘son’241 and (secret bricklayers’ slg) ventevec.242 SiSmanov
derived vmtevec from Ju d -ente, a common suffix (e.g. J u d indiferenle ‘indif­
feren t’, enleramente ‘entirely’) + Mac •ec agent, but this still leaves
unansw ered ihe problem of the 0 -. Since M acedonian lacks prothetic con­
sonants before initial vowels, it may be preferable to regard v- as part of
the root, i.e. vente ‘twenty’—a num eral with broad cultural significance
in Judezm o. For example, Nehama notes (under oentana ‘group of twenty
objects’) that Sephardic children used to collect apricot pits which they
counted in groups of twenty; these pits served as coins in numerous
children’s games, especially during the fast day of Ti5ca b s5av (1977).
5.5215 A Judeo-East Slavic Hebrew anthroponym (?): Molko. Mosko
m a appears as an epithet for ‘Je w ’ in the 17th-18th century U krainian
interm edies.245 T he term seems to be a blend of He mohh ‘Moses’ and
SI -ko dim , while standard Slavic forms of the name are derived from
H ebrew via Gk Moyses or Lat Moses, e.g. Uk M usij, R Mojsej. See discus­
sion on blended anthroponym s in sections 4.34 and 4.4123 above.
5.522 Non-Jewish languages.
5.5221 Gk andras. A Greek term which is widespread in South, West
and East Slavic slang has acquired the meaning ‘Je w ’ in South Slavic,
e.g. Gk andras ‘m an’ > M ac (bricklayers’ slg) andrea2** (Cigular dial of
Prilep, etc.—see dzut in section 5.5213 above) andre ‘Je w ’245 vs. Po andrus
‘crim inal‫ ׳‬, (slg) ‘street boy’,246 Bg andre ‘crim inal’,247 Uk (organgrinders’
slg) (j)andrus,248 R (peddlars’, image vendors’ slg) (v)andrus ‘brother’.249
5.5222 Jewish traits and religious practice. The following function as
substandard term s for ‘Je w ’. Bg (secret language of the KoSkov dial)

‫ ״‬l S iJm anov 1895:33. See Saloniki J u d fiiu .

242 1895:37. T h e term is also cited by G ab ju v 1900:846; JaS ar-N asteva 1978:56.
**’ L a n g e r 1972:133. T h e n am e is w idespread in G alician U k rain ian proverbs (see
F ra n k o 1907:106, 111). T h e fam ily n am e Moskovic is attested am o n g Jew s an d K araites
b o th (c o m m u n ic a tio n from W olf M oskovich). Uk M usij was avoided as a b aptism al nam e
in th e H ucu l are a because o f its associations w ith " J e w is h " Molko (de V incenz
1970:118-119). See also discussion in section 6 .7 , fn. 232 below.
144 G a b ju v 1900:845.
245 Ibid. 872.
‫ ־ ״‬K artow icz el at. 1900-1927 give a d d itio n al v arian ts, e.g. andrut, andrys, Angrez,
Jedrus, w ithout geographical ch aracterizatio n .
14' Jaw o rsk ij 1901:277.
*** E streich er 1903; K u rk a 1907; Ludw ikow ski an d W alczak 1922. See also K ash
suihandrys ‘th in p e rso n ’, H g slg andris ‘p o lic e m an ’, C z slg odrtch ‘p e rso n ’ (T rc im e r
1937:54, fn. 1, 55), Po mahidrys (K u rzo w a 1983).
349 V a sm e r 1909:5, 32. See also Blau 1874:578; V asm er 11:1906:392. O n Br andrus,
see M arty n aw 1:1978:113. In O ld R u ssia n , andrusb m eant ‘frien d '.
148 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S

krtvaj < ‘blood’;250 nuzitka ‘scissors’ (said to refer to the “ strap” , i.e.
phylacteries, worn by observant male Jews during certain prayers);“ 1see
also Bg remtn ‘Jew ; strap’;252 Mac (Djulgev or bricklayers’ slg) cisok
‘high, tall’;253 Cz slg Jordan ‘Jordan R iver’254 (and Po jordes?)',2ii Po
cebularz, Uk (E Galician) cybul’a z ,25® (Lvov) cybuch (pej),257 Br cybulnik
‘onion m erchant’;258 Uk (Kiev 1930s) dovhonosyk ‘long-nosed’;259 Po
kasztan ‘chestnut’;260 ktamczuch ‘liar’;261 k(i)apciuch ‘footware’;262 Po parch,
Br, Uk parx ‘mange, scab’, Po parszywiec ‘skunk, stinkard’;2“ SWKash
k^uta ‘goatee; m ane of a horse’, kPttika ‘goat; lamb; goatee’;264 Br
duiuszapnik ‘two-hatted person’;265 karosliwik ‘mangy person’;266 mordva
‘Jew s’ < ‘mischievous children; noisy gathering (especially of Jew s)’;26’
nibahaczak ,unfortunate, poor person’;268 parszyuka f ‘mangy w om an’;269
pleszywy ‘balding; priest’;270 / ‫׳‬ky/ux,271 (E Mahilew) plejttix272 ‘J e w ’ ~ stBr

‫ * ״‬Sioilov 1926:168.
C ollected in Sofia from speakers hailing from th e villages o f K onop^ie a n d the dir-
p an district (G abjuv 1900:864).
‫ ״‬J SiSmanov 1895:44.
‫ ״‬i G ab ju v 1900:846. Sec section 5.511 above.
‫ * ״‬T re im e r 1937:49, w ho proposes H e ]ihudi as the ety m on. N ote also G slg Jordan
‘c ro w b a r’ (1735), which W olf derives from H e ja r t’ dajjan ‘o ne w ho fears the ju d g e ’ (1956,
# 2 3 6 8 ). N o te JE S I(B r, Ukl~at) Moyse Iordan m a an d fam (B rest 1515) (B erJadskij 3:1903,
# 8 9 ). 11 is possible th a t Iordan is b eing used here as a C h ristia n epith et for ‘J e w ’ and is
n o t a n ativ e Ju d eo -S lav ic family n am e.
‫ ’ ״‬Sec also C z jordeska 'Je w ess’.
« • H o rb a i 1963b:269.
K urzow a claim s the term is restricted to So u th L ittle P oland a n d the a re a between
Ihe V istula and the San R ivers (1983:283).
” * Fedcrow ski 4:1935, # 12036. T h e association w ith Jew s derives from the fact that
th e cybul'nik was an onion-filled pastry p o p u lar am o n g Jew s (N ikiforovskij 1895:5. fn 58.
sep pg).
H o rb a i 1966:27. See also Qjew?)R Dotgonos fam.
‫־‬M Brzezina 1979:132.
Ludw ikow ski an d W alczak 1922.
K urzow a 1983:180, 284-285. T h e term is from the d istricts o f D 4brow y T am and
T a m o b rze g .
s‫ ״‬T av jo v 19 2 3 b :2 9 1; Federow ski 4:1935, #120 6 7 ; B rzezina 1979:132. O n the use of
the term in W estern an d E astern Y iddish, see section 6 .1 4 below.
SM Lorentz 1958-1975.
Federowski 4:1935, # 11428.
Ibid. #12047
N osovif 1870; 1874:216; Nikiforovskij 1897:7, fn. 107 (sep pg), 70. Might the
Jew ish associations have developed by crossing w ith JE S1(R ) Morda m a (1489) < He
mordjxaj (see Sbomik russkogo istoriieskogo obHestva 1892:23)?
Federowski 4:1935, #12061. See also Y nebex in section 6.12 below .
Ibid. #11618.
770 Ibid. # 11633. See also Y gaUx ‘p rie st1 < H e gatiah *tonsured’ (discussed in section
7.71 below). ‘B aldness’ is the basis o f Po (m o u n tain ) R o m xa/0 ‘J e w ’ ( — Soviet, GRom
xaio ‘R u ssia n ’) < ‘b a ld ’ derived from the root ‘c u t’ (D an k a 1983:30-31).
271 N osovif 1870.
"* B jal'kevif 1970.
 TERM S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES R EL A T IN G TO JE W S 149

pljajtux ‘u n p le a s a n tp e rso n ’; zakon ‘Jew ish faith; law ’;273 Lvov U k s lg biher
‘bearded m a n ’.274 It is curious th at distinctive religious practices such as
circum cision or the absence o f b ap tism are rarely the basis for term s for
‘J e w ’ in the Slavic stan d a rd languages, th o u g h they are found in slang
and professional dialects, e.g . Po slg pogan(in) ( ~ stPo ‘p a g a n ’; [arch]
‘atheist, n o n -C h ristia n ’);275 R (p e d d lars‘ slg) nefef ~ -d’ ( < ‘u n b a p tis­
e d ’ ?),s76 skes < (?) axves < H e jhw h ‘G o d ’ (the tetra g ra m n ia to n read by
Je w s as yadonaj in H ebrew ; see section 7.11 below); U k nexryst (17th-18th
cc);177 vyxryst, -ka f;278 B r nexryst (sicl)279 ‘u n b a p tised ’; vykrest, vyksta ‘con­
verted J e w ’, vykstka f < vykrescic’, vykscic’ ‘b ap tiz e ’; R vykrest (w ritings of
C exov), Po wychrzta ‘converted J e w ' < mychrzcic ‘to convert to C hris-
tia n ity 1; N W B r abrazaniec ‘cut, p ru n ed ; circum cised; J e w ’;SB0 nidawiarak
‘disbeliever, J e w ’;281 C z obfezanc ‘J e w ’ < obfezat ‘circum cise’. I t is in ­
teresting th at term s for ‘J e w ’ are rarely based on occupational te rm s.282
5.5223 N am es of unclear origin an d chronology. A n u m b e r o f term s
for ‘J e w ’ in Slavic sub stan d ard dialects whose origin is u n clear include
Bg (secret tailors’ dial) gus(;2lii (N evrokop district) kam bastuf84 M ac
(B itola blind peoples’ slg) cikus\2s5 C z slg barma‫׳‬, im hahle\2sl kakrle;MS Po

273 S ee sectio n 5 .1 2 1 4 ab ove.

2:4 A c co rd in g to H o r b a i, R o m biboldo is th e b asis o f this term as w ell a s O d essa 51g
bobjor ‘n on -th ief; v ic tim ’ (19 6 3 b :2 7 5 ).
2,5 K u rk a 1907; L u d w ik ow sk i an d W a lc za k 1922.
276 T h is is th e e ty m o lo g y p rop osed b y A rap ov 1 9 6 5 :123. S ee also B o n d a leto v 1970:21.
For a reverse d ev elo p m e n t, see B g dial evtejce ,u n b ap tised ch ild ’ < ‘J e w ’ (G e o rg iev el al.
6 :1 9 6 8 :4 7 5 ).
277 L a n g er 1972:147.
574 T h e term also fu n ction s as a fam ily n a m e for J ew ish con verts to C h ristian ity; see
P o Wychrzta (de V in c e n z 1 9 7 0 :3 1 0 , fn. 19, 3 2 5 -3 2 6 ). S ee also U k (H u c u l) Virsta, Veisuk
fam ( < ‘con verted J e w 1) (op.cit., 3 1 0 )— w ith c r o s s in g in the first exa m p le w ith U k uira
'fa ith ’? For ad d ition al B eloru ssian term s, see N ik iforovsk ij 1 8 9 7 :7 , fn . 107 (sep p g), 70,
O n fam ily n a m es u n iq u e to J e w is h con verts to C h ristia n ity , see Bystrori 1936:2 4 6 ff. T h e
n a m es o f C h ristian con verts to J u d a ism also d eserve study; for R u ssia n J u d a iz e r s ’
n a m es, see U krain sk ij 1912:14.
275 Sbornik pamjatnikon... 1866:210. S ee also d iscu ssio n o f Br vykrest 'Jew co n v erted to
C h r istia n ity ’ in section 5 .1 4 3 ab ove.
280 F ed erow sk i 4 :1 9 3 5 , # 1 2 0 2 9 .
281 Ib id ., # 1 2 0 6 1 , S ee also P o niedowiarek ‘scep tic'.
282 O c cu p a tio n a l term s h ave assu m ed the m ea n in g J e w in G erm a n sla n g , e.g ,
Eimebdcler and Rachejainer (W estfalen ) cited by J u tte 1 9 7 8 :1 0 3 , 153.
283 A rn a u d o v 1906 -1 9 0 7 :2 , T h e dialect is spoken in L a za ro -P o le and other v illa g es in
the D eb a r district.
ss4 D o p s ln ite ln i b ele zk i-.. 18 9 8 :5 5 . T h e e ty m o lo g y su g g ested h ere is ‘eater ( o f C hris­
tia n b lo o d )’. S e e also R karabca, -cun , th ief, g ra ft-ta k er o f T u rk ic orig in (S ip o v a 1976),
T u karabaf ‘C hristian clergym an ; m o n k , friar’ and P o K a r kar(a)vas ‘fem a le servant; g irl’
(see Z ajgczkow ski 1949a:162).
ssi G ilev 1900:877,
286 T re iin er 1937:27.

282 Ibid. 27, 4 9 , 6 5. C o u ld th e sou rce b e .Y heH ma?

258 Ibid. 4 0.
150 TE R M S IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES RELATING T O JE W S

baitacz;289 bocio ‘Jewish paw nbroker’;290 kabiaj, leb;291 Br alubok, hatapia■

ty;292 R brie;293 lac;29* galman, tartar.291

m Jaw o rsk ij 1901:277; R cy ch m an 1965:163 (w ho suggests a T u rk ic source, but can­

not provide the etym on).
« ° Estrcicher 1903.
W1 T h e Polish term s are cited in K u rk a 1907; Ludw ikow ski and W alczak 1922
‫ ”ל‬Federow ski 4:1935, ft # 1 2 0 2 9 . 12042.
2,5 Potapov 1923; K av erin 1930; L arin 1931; H o rb a£ 1978:9.
K averin 1930.
w T h ese two e th n o n y m s ap p ea r in a R ussian slang publication based on informants
from O dessa, K h ark o v . M oscow , T a sh k e n t. A lm a-A ta an d o th e r locales (Vorivoda
1971). C o u ld galman be d erived from He hdman (see section 7.16 below)?
6. R E C O V E R IN G JU D E O -SL A V IC AND EARLY W EST SLAVIC
C O M P O N E N T S FRO M YID D ISH AND HEBREW

6.1 Probable Ju d eo -W est Slavicism s in Y iddish an d H ebrew

6 . 11 W Y bok
6.12 W Y nebic — EY nebex
6.13 G H e nmc
6 . 14 W , EY parx
6 .1 5 O E Y prjdjg
6.16 Y trejb(er)n
6.17 Y zejde
6 .2 W est Slavicism s com m on to Y iddish an d G erm an
6.21 S orbian an d C zech com p o n en ts in Yiddish
6.211 W Y kowU( ~ EY kojUi
6.212 Y krecme(rXkt)
6.213 W Y krejn — xr- — EY xrqn
6.22 Pu tativ e Sorbian an d C zech com ponents in Y iddish
6.221 Y baji
6.222 Y Mime
6.223 Y grenec
6.224 Y jojx
6.225 W Y smejte ‫ ׳ י‬EY smctcne
6 .3 N on*coterritoriality o f Y iddish Slavicism s an d th eir Slavic etym a
6.31 D erivational suffixes
6.311 Y -*f
6.312 Y -(1yak
6.313 Y ■ek
6.314 Y -nik
6.32 T h e in teg ratio n o f Slavic sounds in Y iddish
6 .4 R cco v crin g the H ebrew , Ju d eo -A ram aic and o th e r non -n ativ e corpus o f Ju d eo -
Slavic
6.41 *C ircum cision’
6 .4 2 ‘Dowry‫’׳‬
6 .43 ‘Food th at is neith er milk n o r meat*
6 .4 4 *Prayerbook*
6 .4 5 *Ritual u n d erg arm en t for m ales’
6 .4 6 ‘S earch for leaven at Passover time*
6 .47 ‘S lav’
6 .4 8 *Sunflow er'
6 .5 Y iddish-Slavic an d H ebrew -Slavic blends
6.51 JW 'Sl bmwjln*
6 .52 Y cvu(j)ak
6 .53 Y dobre-mazl
6 .5 4 Y lajbserdak, etc.
6 .55 Y pameUx
6 .5 6 U k pejsae
6 .5 7 Y sejfer-pralOnik
6 .6 B ilingual Slavic-Y iddish a n d m onolingual Slavic folklore o f the A shkenazic Jew s
6 .7 S tereoty p ed Slavic speech o f the A shkenazic Jew s, 1 7 t h 1 8 ‫ ־‬lh cen turies
152 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

6 . IN T R O D U C T IO N
Yiddish first crystallized in two areas of Germany: in a monolingual
G erm an area (the Rhineland) and in a bilingual German-Slavic area
(Eastern and Southern G erm any). In the former area, Judeo-R om ance
(Judeo-French primarily?) speakers probably found no prior Jew ish set­
tlements, but in the latter area, the Judeo-R om ance (Judeo-Italian
primarily?) settlers very likely encountered Judeo-G reek and Ju d eo -
Slavic communities. Hence, the contact of Yiddish with Sorbian and
possibly South Polabian can be dated as early as the 9th-10th centuries.1
T he eastward migration of Yiddish speakers that began in the 11th cen­
tury brought the language into contact with all the other W estern Slavic
languages (except probably Kashubian-Slovincian); subsequent m igra­
tion in the late 14th century brought Yiddish into Belorussian and U k rai­
nian territory, culminating in the contact with Russian in the 19th
century. Yiddish is rich in loans from all the Slavic languages with which
it has come in contact. T he South Slavic contact with Judezm o begins
in the 16th century, and is of lesser intensity than the Slavic impact on
Yiddish, though a systematic study of South Slavicisms in Balkan Judez-
mo may alter this charactcrization.2
T he border between the two G erm an Jew ries—one marginally o r
heavily Slavicized, the other intensely Rom anicized—appears to have
stabilized from the earliest times at approximately the Elbe River. T h e
outlines of this original division can still be recovered from a num ber o f
isoglosses within G erm an Yiddish territory. I discussed the geography o f
G erm an Jewish ritual traditions in section 3.11 above; below I will show
that (a) the geography of a num ber of (Judeo-)Slavicisms in G erm an Y id­
dish is in complementary distribution with that of Judeo-R om anicism s,
and (b) that many isoglosses of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic com ponents
coincide with the isoglosses of Slavicisms/ Romanicisms in the vicinity o f
the Elbe River.
While some (Judeo-)Romance components are found in all dialects o f
Yiddish, e.g. EY Ujenen — DuY laajen, newer laajaitn ‘read’, a still larger
num ber are restricted to the western part of the W estern Yiddish speech
territory, e.g. DuY praajen ‘invite’, planjenen — -nx- ‘cry’, schpousering
‘wedding ring’, Swiss Y bilz>l ‘girl (servant)’, frim sili( ‘noodles’, sargm»s
‘shroud’;3 see earlier colnl (preserved in Eastern Yiddish) vs. later W Y

’ N ote also ihe discussion of Polabian an d So rb ian com p o n ents in Ju d eo -W e st Slavic

in sections 4 an d 4 111 above.
2 N ote also the relatively m in o r J u d e z m o im pact on the B alkan languages (section 5,
fn. 17 above).
* Fnm sjltf (related to F r vermicel/es) was know n, b u t a p p aren tly not used, in 16lh‫ ־‬l71h
c en tu ry Southw est Poland (see K osover 1958:67*69). T h e R o m anism s bat>*n ,to drink*.
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W EST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 153

{diet, id- ‘Sabbath food prepared on Friday’.4 The existence of two

d istin ct Rom ance areals in Yiddish could have a num ber of explanations:
(a ) the greater num ber of Judeo-R om ance components in W estern Yid­
d ish dialects is a function of an originally more intensive Judeo-R om ance
setdem ent in the Rhineland than in Central and Eastern G erm any; (b)
Y iddish Romanicisms found exclusively to the west of the Elbe River are
a later stratum of loans—acquired from the new French Jewish settle­
m e n t following the banishm ent of the Jew s from France in 1394, and
restricted to the newer Jewish communities which replaced the earlier
Jew ish setdem ents in the Rhineland destroyed during the Black Death
(1347-1350); (c) originally, the corpus of Judeo-R om anicism s was com­
m o n to all dialects of G erm an Yiddish; the currently lower percentage of
R o m ance elements in dialects east of the Elbe River is the result of
grad u al depletion in a Slavic environm ent. Since the region of the Elbe
R iv er appears also to serve as the border for m any non-Romance
linguistic isoglosses in Yiddish (see discussion above and below), I favor
an explanation like (a) or (b) which sees the Elbe River as a major
(post-12th century?) barrier for Judeo-R om ance settlement and the ex­
pansion of Judeo-Rom anicism s. T he Elbe River is also the dividing line
for onomasiological isoglosses of native Germ anic origin. For example,
a Bavarian Hebrew source from 1470 recorded that Bavarian riiiqa!
+ reseka (with vocalization in the text) ‘festive wedding bread’ is known
as htn-prwtl + xasnprol (literally ‘bridegroom ’s bread’) am ong Rhineland
Je w s .5 T he Bavarian Yiddish term is also found in the Yiddish dialects
to the east, see e.g. OPoY rcsjtqV + resitke ‘wedding pastry’6 and OCzY
rc!jgj/ + reiege ‘baked goods served on the occasion of a circumcision’
(P rague 1619).7 The term is also known in A ustrian and Bavarian G er­
m an , but in a slightly different form, e.g. (contemporary) mche semmel

dormm ‘to sleep‘, p ik l ‘g irl’, p la n jm n — -nx- ‘to c ry ’, sargmjs ‘s h ro u d ’, inter alia, a re

restricted to W est G e rm a n Y iddish according to B eranek (1965, m aps # # 2 2 , 24-26, 80);
B eran e k 's d a ta h e re a n d elsew here are n o t alw ays reliable, an d m u st be verified in-
d e p e n d e n d y . See L C A A J, q u e stio n n aire # 235003 for th e g eography o f dormm (R h in e la n d
and S w itz e rla n d ) an d #223001 for piicl. F o r etym ologies, see Beem 1967.
' S ee F a b e r 1982:87. F o r the g eography o f th e v a ria n ts in G e rm a n Y iddish, see
B eranek 1965, m a p # 6 7 . A n u m b e r o f Y iddish R o m an ism s a rc also found in G e rm a n ;
it w ould be in terestin g to c o m p are th e geography o f R o m an ism s in the tw o G erm anic
lan guages.
1 B a r M o b 1470, 1, 101 (cited by K osover 1958:109, fn. 359).
* S ee K o so v er 1958:110 a n d fn. 361 (citing B aiaban in th e Frankfurter Jahrbuch 11,
1916, 95). T h e te rm is also reco rd ed in 19th cen tu ry E astern Slavic Y iddish and E astern
Polish Y iddish (see K osover 1958:111-112). See also L an d au an d W achstein 1911:17, fn.
4.
’ See L a n d a u an d W achstein 1911:16, fn. 4.
154 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

‘crispy roll’,8 resch, rosch ‘baked or broiled hard on the surface’.9 T h e

possibility that Slavic might have shaped the formation of native
isoglosscs in G erm an Yiddish and G erm an should be explored.
Specifying the reasons why the Elbe River became a barrier is a
challenge for students of Old Yiddish linguistics and G erm an Jew‫׳‬ish
history. For the present, I am unable to uncover any significant parallels
in non-Jewish dialects. A problem is that we are ignorant of the extent
to which Slavic speech was retained in the areas east of the Elbe River
between the 10th and 12th centuries when the G erm ans began to setde
the areas.10 It would be worth exploring whether there is any connection
between the geography of Romance and Slavic components in G erm an
Yiddish and political developments such as (a) the boundary between the
Empire of the Hohenstaufen (early 12th-mid-13th centuries) and the
Duchies of Bavaria and Austria or (b) the areas in which the M agdeburg
Law was in effect.11 A further topic that requires study is the extent to
which G erm an and G erm an Yiddish shared a Rom ance com ponent.

6.1 Probable Judeo-West Slavicisms in Yiddish and Hebrew

T he identification of Judeo-Slavicisms in Yiddish dialects is extremely
complicated due to the exposure of Yiddish to an enorm ous num ber of
Slavic languages and to interdialectal interference within Y iddish.12 T he
bulk of the Slavic corpus in Yiddish (now statistically greatest in the
Polish and East Slavic dialects of the language) can be readily ascribed
to one of the coterritorial non-Jewish dialects of Slavic. T he Yiddish
Slavicisms which might hold attraction for the student of Judeo-Slavic
* B cnedikt et al. 1979.
* J a k o b 1929. F o r fu rth er isoglosscs sep aratin g B ohem ian Y iddish from W est F ra n c o ­
nian Y iddish, involving n ative and H eb rew c o m p o n en ts, see B eranek 1961:289.
10 It is know n th at S alzb u rg , Passau (an d B rem en) b ecam e centers for m issionary
activity am o n g the Slavs east o f the Elbe R iver in the 9 th cen tu ry , w ith R e g e n sb u rg a n d
M ag d e b u rg following in the 10th cen tu ry (Bosl 1970:55; Seibt 1970:94-95); M ag d e b u rg
an d th e are a south o f it had a Slavic popu latio n in th e late 10th century (Bosl 1970:56).
See discussion o f the Jew s n ear M ag d e b u rg in Ib rah im ibn J a 'q u b 's 10th cen tu ry A rabic
account (noted in section 4 above). A ccording to Schw arz, Slavic speakers in T h u rin g ia
could still be noted as late as the 13th-14th cen tu ries (1960:383). Frank] is o f the opin io n
th at Jew s settled in Slavic-speaking areas of E astern G e rm a n y m uch earlier th a n the G e r­
m an s them selves (1884:5; see also M ieses 1924:271)— b u t F ran kl does not distinguish be­
tw een Y iddish-speaking “ co lo n iz ers" an d indigenous Slavic-speaking Jew s. T h e rem ark
by J o h a n n e s of Saxony in the late 13th cen tu ry suggests (hat L usatian Je w s spoke
S o rbian.
" T h e re are a few isoglosses which bisect th e G e rm a n speech te rrito ry a long the Elbe
R iv er, see e.g. K onig 1981:52-53, 212. P ritsak regards the Elbe R iver as the dividing
line betw een a P ersian-type settlem ent to th e east a n d a W est G e rm a n ic -R o m an c e type
to the west in the 8lh-10th cen tu ries (1981:22).
' ‫ נ‬Exposure to m an y Slavic languages results in the blen d in g o f Slavic cognates w ithin
Y iddish, see the exam ple of Y podlekt — padUge in section 6.3 below.
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S 155

are those components, mainJy of West Slavic origin, which differ in form,
m eaning, grammatical function, derivational pattern or geography from
the non-Jewish cognates. But even then, the problem arises of how to
distinguish between Judeo-Slavic loans and innovative patterns of in­
tegration in Yiddish. Judeo-W est Slavicisms that can be identified with
som e certainty have meanings associated with Jewish religious practice
an d culture, and are attested in both W estern and Eastern dialects of
Yiddish. O n possible Judeo-East Slavicisms in Yiddish, see sections 6.54
and 6.57 below. Slavicisms shared by Yiddish and G erm an dialects offer
a rough idea of what (Judeo-) Slavicisms might have been first borrowed
by Yiddish on Sorbian, South Polabian or Czech territory.15 It is signifi­
cant that many (Judeo-) West Slavicisms are also found in Yiddish
dialects spoken quite far to the west of the historical German-Slavic
language border, e.g. in W estern G erm an, Dutch, Swiss and Alsatian
Y iddish. These forms could either attest to a very early diffusion of
(Judeo-)W est Slavicisms to W estern Yiddish (when Romanicisms could
be freely diffused to the east?) or relatively recent borrowings from the
Eastern Yiddish dialects brought to W estern Europe by Eastern Euro­
pean Jew ish settlers in the migrations following the mid-17th century.
But the commonality of the corpus in so many non-contiguous W estern
Y iddish dialects makes the second hypothesis unattractive.14
T h e (Judeo-)Slavtcisms in Yiddish invite comparison with the alleged
Judeo-Slavic corpus in the Slavic languages and the Judeo-W est Slavic
glosses. There are three im portant conclusions: (a) the num ber of Judeo-
Slavicisms identified so far in Yiddish is smaller than the putative

‫ ״‬T h e re is no evidence th a t Jew s m igrated from C zech to East Slavic lands directly
w ithout p rio r settlem ent in Poland (sec S. A. B im b au m ]981:27; S h m eruk J9 8 lb 15).
1* T h e re are a few Slavicism s shared by E astern an d W estern Y iddish dialects which
c a n n o t be derived sm oothly from S orbian or C zech. O n e term is Y xapn *catch* s d /.e ’
(E t A lsatian ), *steal’ (D u) (see also D u slg chappen *steal*— Beem 1967). T h e Slavicism
is fo u n d now only in East Slavic an d Polish, e.g . Po chapac, U k xapaty *snatch, g a th e r up*.
W h ile K iparsk y advocates a Slavic origin for (he term (1934:30), M . W einreich favors
a G e rm a n ic source (1959:95, 101, fn. 27). T h e second Slavicism is EY xoi *at least;
alth o u g h ; one m ight as w ell‘ (followed by a v erb ), O C zY xoit *at least1 (1619) (L an d a u
and W achstein 1 9 I1 :X L I), G Y xoit *although' (L ow enstein 1969:18); for D utch and
A lsatian exam ples, see Beem 1967 an d P frim m er 1959:367 respectively. C u rio u sly , in a
G e rm a n Y iddish text o f 1828 from F u rth , the Slavicism is spelled k tih, i.e. according to
H e b re w orth o g rap h ical n o rm s (see C o p elan d an d Susskind 1976:12, 157, 294-295). Selig
cites chodich* in the m ean in g ,on m y a c c o u n t’ in G e rm a n Y iddish (1767). T h e possible
Slavic e ty m a are Po choc, Uk xotja(j), xof(a) ‘th o u g h , ai least’. W hile loksn ‘kind of cake,
n oodle’ is widely recorded in G e rm a n Y iddish (see L C A A J, # # 236002-3), th ere is no
trace o f the Slavicism in S orbian o r C zech (b u t see Po tokszyny pi, Br, U k loklyna). See
also section 6.3 , fn. 96 below. T h e presence o f these three Slavicism s in W estern Yiddish
dialects seem s to be d u e to interference from E astern Y iddish dialects. ( am unable to
d eterm in e the ag e o f th e Slavicism s in W estern Y iddish. See also the discussion of E, WY
par(*)v4 in section 6.43 below.
156 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W EST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

n u m b er of Judeo-Slavicism s posited for the Slavic languages them selves

(see section 5 above). T h ere also ap p ears to be alm ost no overlap betw een
the Slavic corpus of Y iddish (m ost o f w hich is o f W est Slavic origin) and
(b) the alleged Jud eo -S lav ic corpus retain ed in the Slavic languages (m ost
of w hich is found in Polish and th e East Slavic languages) o r (c) the ex­
tan t Ju d eo -W est Slavic glosses. O f the approxim ately 150 W est Slavic
term s preserved in th e H ebrew R esponsa litera tu re from the B ohem ian,
S o u th ern G erm an an d N o rth ern French lands, only twelve term s appear
in Y iddish; m ost of them ap p ea r in 12th- early 13th cen tu ry sources. For
Y iddish we lack early attestatio n for m an y o f these Slavicisms, b u t the
loans could be quite old in Y iddish, to ju d g e from th eir phonological
shape, e.g. stress on th e initial syllable (which is typical of early C zech
and O ld Polish lo an s),15 possibly r for C z f, Po rz (see section 6.32 below).
Some of the term s com m on to Y iddish and Ju d eo -W est Slavic now have
a distinctly Polish o r E ast Slavic form in Y iddish; this could m ean either
th a t early Sorbian or Czech loans in Y iddish were b ro u g h t closer in form
to the Polish and E ast Slavic cognates (i.e. re-lexified— see also section
6.3 below), or th a t these Slavicisms w ere borrow ings from Polish and
East Slavic of later d ate, and have no connection w ith the Ju d eo -W est
Slavic cognates. T h e existence of Polish or E ast Slavic com ponents in
Y iddish with initial stress is no sure p ro o f of an early bo rro w in g since the
earlier “ C zech-O ld P o lish ” p a tte rn of in teg ratio n could have b een ap ­
plied to later borrow ings from Slavic, regardless of th eir origin. O f the
corpus of twelve Slavic term s shared by Ju d eo -W est Slavic an d Y iddish,
six can be derived from S o rb ian o r C zech, while two are o f G erm anic
origin (dates in parentheses refer to Ju d eo -W est Slavic attestation):
(m id - llth century) Y plejce ‘sh o u ld er’ ~ JW S I pic*, C z, O P o piece
‘shoulder b lad e’;16 Y trejb(er)71 ‘rem ove fat and veins from the m eat to
ren d er it kosher’ ~ JW S I tdrebdno (w ith vocalization in the text), O C z
triebiti, M odC z tfibit ‘cleanse (usually in relation to the h a rv e st)’;17 (first
h alf of the 12th century) Y d ’egexc ‘ta r ’ ~ JW 'Sl djgt, C z dehet;18 (late 12th

15 G reen speaks o f stress in P olish b eco m in g fixed o n th e p en u ltim a te syllable

in the 15th cen tu ry (1 9 6 9 :2 1 9 ), q u o tin g E n tw istle and M o r iso n 1949:2 9 3 ff. Stieber,
h o w ever, posits a ch an ge from m ovab le to fixed p en u ltim a te stress d u r in g th e 12th ce n ­
tury (1 9 7 3 :72£f), p a ssin g th rou gh a stage o f fixed in itial stress b y a b o u t th e 14th‫ ־‬l5 t h ce n ­
tu ries (op. cit 73). Y id d ish S lavicism s from East S lavic an d p osc-15th ce n tu ry P o lish tend
to h ave u n p red ictab le stress p atterns,
16 G . b5n J s h u d a (in K u p fer and L ew icki 1956:27, 31), T h e au thor o f this tex t lived
in N orth ern France an d the R h in e la n d b etw een c .9 6 0 — first h a lf o f the 1 1th cen tu ry. H is
b o ok , k n ow n as the " M a in z C o m m e n ta r y ” , w as w ritten b efore 1040.
17 G . ben J3h u d a (in K u p fer and L ew icki 1 9 5 6 :2 6 -2 8 ). T h e sh w a d ia critic sign als the
ab sen ce o f a vow el after t an d not the E ast Slavic featu re o f polnoglasie. S ee also d iscu ssion
o f this w ord in sectio n 6 .1 6 b elow .
16 B&n N a ta n (in K u p fer and L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :1 3 0 , 137).
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 157

century) Y jagde ‘b e rry ’ ~ J W S Ijgwdj, O C z *jagoda, M o d C z jakoda;'9 Y

lopete ‘sp ad e’ ~ JW S I Iw p f, C z lopata, U S o, P o lopata;2° Y belme ‘c a ta ra c t’
~ JW S I bjjlmw, O C z belmo, P o bielmo■21 Y baveln ‘co tto n ’ ( < C z bavlna,
Po bawetnd) — JW S I bmwjln‫ < נ‬M H G boumwolh x CS1 *vhlna ‘co tto n ’;22
Y pjavke ‘leec h ’ ( < P o pijawka, C z pijavka) ~ JW S I pjwcj { < C z p i-
javice):23 (first h alf of the 13th century) Y stoic ‘stilt’ ~ JW TS1 (s ‘twlcj pi
( < G Stelze).'1‘' T h ree Y iddish Slavicism s w ith a Polish o r E ast Slavic form
b u t w ith a stress p attern th a t resem bles that of O ld Polish and C zech are
Y skovrode ‘frying p a n ’ ~ P o skowroda vs. JW S I 3'sqrwvd‫ — נ‬O C z skrovada,
skravada;25 stY konopl’es, dial Y konop’e, kanopl’e, kanop’e ‘h e m p ’ — U k
kow pli (usually pi t), P o konopie (pi t) vs. JW S I qnwpj ~ U S o konopej, Cz
konope.;26 Y matike ‘h o e’ < B r matyka vs. JW S I m wtjq: ~ U S o, C z motyka. 27
It is difficult to assess the significance o f the asy m m etry betw een the
basically Ju d eo -W est Slavic im pact on Y iddish and th e Ju d e o -E a st Slavic
im pact on the Slavic languages. In add itio n to the ex p lan atio n th at the
techniques for uncovering Ju d e o -E a st Slavicisms in Y iddish are presently
inadequate, a m eager Ju d e o -E a st Slavic elem ent in Y iddish m ig h t also
suggest (a) th at the Ju d e o -E a st Slavic com ponent in the E ast Slavic set­
tlem ents an d Polish should be d ated to the period p rio r to the A shkenazic
settlem ents in the East Slavic lands; th a t the indigenous Jew s eith er (b)
lacked sufficient prestige or n u m b ers to influence th e language and
culture o f the A shkenazic im m ig ran ts who w ere fast becom ing the m a ­
jo rity in the E ast Slavic lands, or (c) th a t th e ir lang u ag e h a d already
becom e obsolete by th e tim e of the A shkenazic colonization o f E astern
E urope. W e have seen evidence th a t Yiddish- and Ju d eo-S lavic-speaking
com m unities coexisted in som e p arts of P o lan d , B elorussia an d the

‫־‬s B m M oS t (in K u p fer and L ew icki 1 9 3 6 :217, 238). S ee also O C z Y jades (1 6 5 0 ) (S h e r

1 9 7 8 -1 9 8 0 :5 2 ).
20 Ibid. (in K u p fer a n d L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :218, 241-242).
21 Ibid. (in K u p fer and L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :2 1 6 , 232). J u d e o -W e st S la v ic offers th e oldest
W est S lavic attestation , sin ce SJawski gives th e 14th cen tu ry for C zech , the 15th century'
for th e P o lish and 11th ce n tu ry for th e R u ssia n cogn ates (1 :1 9 7 4 :2 4 2 ).
22 S ee e ty m o lo g ies in section 4 .1 1 4 1 , fn. 44 above.
23 B sn M ose (in K u p fer an d L ew icki 1 9 5 6 :221, 2 5 1-252).
‫ ־'׳‬Ibid. (in K u p fer and L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :2 2 3 . 2 5 9 -2 6 0 ). S ee also section 4 .1 1 2 3 ab ove.
25 Ibid. (in K u p fer and L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :2 1 5 , 2 3 1 , w ho u n n ecessarily correct the J u d e o -
W est S lavic form to read * :‘sqvw rdy), Y id d ish has also b orrow ed th e E ast S la v ic co g n a te,
e .g . Y skoverede < U k skooorodd.
26 Ibid. (in K u p fer an d L ew ick i 1 9 5 6 :223, 2 5 7 ). Y id dish varian ts w ith I’ look like E ast
S la v ic loan s, w h e re ep en th etic I’ is th e n o rm , b u t variants w ith I(') are n ot a ltogether
u n k n o w n in W est S lavic, e .g . K a sh konopie, P o kropla ‘d ro p ’ (S tieb er 1 9 7 3 :1 4 ). N o te th at
th e stand ard Y id d ish va ria n t h as in itia l stress corresp on d in g to p en u ltim a te stress in
B elo ru ssian . G reen regard s the term as an early B eloru ssian ism in Y id d ish (1 9 6 9 :2 2 3 ).
For a m ap o f th e Y id d ish v a ria n ts, see op. cit. 237, m ap # 7 .
‫ ״‬Ben M ose (in K u p fer and L ew ick i 195 6 :2 1 8 -2 1 9 , 244).
158 JU D EO *SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

Ukraine for at least 150 years.2* These facts support hypothesis (b). But
m uch more information on Judeo-East Slavic—Yiddish interrelations is
needed, specifically about where and to what extent the two com munities
were in fact coterritorial; as far as I know, these questions have never
been entertained by historical dem ographers. It might be possible to
reconstruct the major monolingual Judeo-Slavic communities on the
basis of the Slavicization of local Yiddish dialects. For example, it has
been suggested that the phonology of Yiddish in Belorussia is more
Slavicized than that of Polish Yiddish;2* and in fact both W estern and
Eastern Central Belorussia were areas with Yiddish settlements dating
back to the late 14th and early 16th centuries respectively and with a
Judeo-Slavic population that survived at least up until the mid-17th cen­
tury. T he fact that the present-day isoglosses of Belorussian Yiddish ap ­
pear to be considerably younger than the mid-17th century need not
contradict the above conclusions; the early isoglosses may have been
altered by subsequent Jewish migration from Poland or by war and
banishm ent.30 For example, a num ber of Belorussian and U krainian
features early acquired by Yiddish in what is now the southwest com er
of the Belorussian SSR (Ukrainian-speaking south of the Jasel’da River)
have been diffused to points far to the east of the country.31 The publica­
tion of The Language and Culture Atlas o j Ashkenazic Jewry ( L C A A J) should
make it possible to identify further areas of early, relatively intensive
Slavicization. O n the other hand, if we accept the view that the Slaviciza-
tion of Yiddish in Poland and the East Slavic lands only began to assume
massive proportions In the 16th-17th centuries,32 then we would have to
ascribe most of the Slavicisms in Yiddish to non-Jewish dialects.33

” See the m id-17th cen tu ry testim onies from V ilnius a n d Brest th a t th e re w ere Jew s
in these locales w ho spoke only Slavic (also discussed in section 4 above).
” U. W einreich 1952:374, fn. 65. W einreich also claim s th a t the East U k ra in ia n Y id­
dish lexicon shows a h eavier co territo rial Slavic im p rin t th a n that o f Polish Y iddish
(1962:13). I have to reject H e rz o g ’s rem ark th a t th ere is no reason w hy Slavic influence
should have been g reater in one are a th an an o th e r (1965:236). 11 w ould also be useful
to study the relative im pact of stan d a rd vs. dialectal Slavic on Y iddish th ro u g h tim e (see
U . W einreich 1963:353).
,c See U . W einreich 1969:87-89, 100 on the relative new ness o f B elorussian Y iddish
isoglosses. Belorussian lands were not ravaged by the X m e l'n y c 'k y j c am p aig n s o f the
m id-17th century.
11 See discussion of Br, PoY oiert ‘lak e’ — S W B r oztra (vs. stB r ooitra a n d P o jtz io n ,
U k ozero) in U. W einreich 1969:97-98. See also discussion of Y m td in section 6 .3 below.
M A dvanced by G itlits 1936 an d B ihari 1969:174.
” A late chronology for the Slavicization o f Y iddish forces us to reject the view voiced
by G o ld (an d u n su b sta n tia te d ) that an initial contact betw een Ju d eo -W e st Slavic and
Y iddish p reconditioned Y iddish speakers to accepting linguistic en ric h m e n t from the
non-Jew ish Slavs (1981:27). T h e extensive Slavicization o f Y iddish after the 16th century
has to be sought in o th e r factors. But G o ld 's suggestion m ight be acceptable if he m eans
thereby th at strategies for in te g ra tin g Slavic loans that developed in the East G erm an
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S 159

6.11 GY bok. T he Slavic term for ‘G od’ is attested in a Bavarian Yid­

dish m anuscript from 1580, in reference to M uham m ad and J u p ite r.54
T h e etymon could be LSo bog, O C z boh (M odCz buh [bux]). The term
is not attested in G erm an dialects; as a mocking term for C hrist, Bock ap­
pears in an anti-Semitic tractate written by a converted lew from Worms
(1712).”
6.12 WY rtebif — EY rubex. This term serves as an interjection or noun
m eaning ‘poor, unfortunate (person)’.56 There are also derivatives (in
E astern Yiddish only?) such as ncbtxdik ‘wretched’, nebexl ‘wretch,
helpless person’. The base form is well known in W estern Yiddish
dialects far to the west of the German-Slavic language border, see e.g.
Alsatian Y newich,57 GY rubi( ‘poor thing’.58 T he earliest dated attesta­
tion of the Slavicism is from a G erm an Yiddish text of the early 16th
cen tu ry .” From W estern Yiddish, the term has spread to G erm an and
D utch slang, e.g. G slg rubbich (1822),40 Du slg nebbis(ch) ‘nothing,
naught; lost’, aggenebbisj, 0 - ( <?ach ‘oh’).41 T he extreme westward diffu­
sion of the term suggests that we are dealing with an early loan from a
W est Slavic language, possibly from USo njeboh ‘deceased’ or O C z nebohy
‘deceased’; M odCz ‘unfortunate, poor’.42 Yiddish scholars traditionally
regard Judeo-C zech as the source of the term in Y iddish,45 but the

la n d s co n tin u e to be applied to su bsequent loans from C zech , Polish an d the East Slavic
lan g u ag es (see discussion above an d in section 6 .3 below).
M R eutlin g en 1580 (cited by Pau k er 1959:157; M . W einreich 3:1973:207. 283). I
follow here P a u k e r’s tra n sliteratio n .
‫ ״‬See Schudt 1714, part 2, book 6, ch ap ter 33, 249—citin g a w ork by C h ristoph
W allich , D it M ty triu h t Synagoga (n .p . 1712), w here Bock is glossed as Got! ‘G o d ’ . T h e fact
th a t th e term is glossed proves th at this is not G Bock, Y bok ‘ra m ’.
“ See the expression do1 m tjdl ntbex ‘th e p o o r g irl’ vs. th e cu sto m ary o rd e r of adjective
before n o u n , e.g . synonym ous dos umgliklcxts mtjdl.
57 P frim m er 1959:369.
*» L ow enstein 1969:18. Sec LC A A J, # 228002.
** J o fe 1965:430. T h e text was com posed by Elia B axur, a n ative o f G erm a n y who
w orked in N o rth e rn Italy. F o r early 17th cen tu ry attestatio n from P rag u e Y iddish, see
J o fe 1927:133. T h e term is also used in a m an u scrip t com posed by M sn ax em O ld e n d o rf
(p reserv ed a t C am b rid g e U n iv ersity ), w ho lived in 1504 in M estre, n e a r V enice (see Jo fe
1927:133; M . W ein reich 1927:23-25). Fuks cites the term in a text w hich m ay have been
w ritten in the late 15th century (1 :1965:7, fn. 1).
‫ י‬° W o lf 1956, #3 8 2 7 .
*' V a n B olhuis n .d .; Beem 1967:83; E ndt 1982. T h e co m p o u n d is unk now n in D utch
Y iddish.
41 I f the W estern Y iddish evidence had been lacking, we w ould have been obliged to
co n sid e r non-W est Slavic cognates as well. e .g . U k ntboh [-*], nrboha ‘p o or d e v il'. T h e
possibility o f w estw ard diffusion from Ju d eo -C z e ch to Ju d e o -S o rb ia n lands should be ex­
plo red in the b ro ad context o f C zech linguistic influence on S o rb ian . U n fo rtu n ate ly , I
c a n n o t d e te rm in e the ap p ro x im ate d a te of the sem antic shift in C zech from 'deceased'
to ‘u n fo rtu n a te , p o o r'.
** M . W ein reich 2:1973:201-202; 3:72. For a su m m ary o f th e Slavic an d non-Slavic
etym ologies th a t have been proposed, see Fuks 1:1965:7, fn. I.
160 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

presence of the Slavicism in dialects of W estern Yiddish spoken in non-

Slavicized areas makes a Sorbian (or even Polabian) origin particularly
attractive. The case for a specifically Judeo-W est Slavic source could b e
made on the grounds that the form nebohy is not used in Czech as a n o u n
(see rather Cz nebozdk, ubozak) or as an interjection.44
6.13 G H e nmc. G H e nmc! + nemec ‘G erm an’ is attested in a n u m b er
of Hebrew sourccs, but is unknown in contemporary Yiddish dialects,
except as a family name. T he earliest Hebrew attestation, Ve nmc! + h r t f
nemec ‘land of the G erm ans’ appears in the letter written by the K h azar
King Joseph to Hasdaj ibn Saprui, the representative of the C aliph o f
C ordoba in the late 10th century.45 Brann and others gloss the expression
as ‘land of the Nemetes’, from the Celtic (and later Latin) nam e for
‘Speyer’, e.g. Lat Nemetensis civilas, Nemeta — -t ‫ ־־‬-is — -um, Nemidone,
etc.46 T he translation was am ended by Avneri to ‘land of the G e rm a n ’
in his notes to the second edition of Brann, Elbogen, et al. , without m e n ­
tioning that the basis for the change was the Slavic term for ‘G e rm a n ’,
e.g. So Nemc < nfrny ‘m ute’, i.e. ‘one who cannot speak Slavic’.47 T w o
Hebrew texts composed by authors from Speyer (dated Koln 1382, an d
possibly the mid-15th century respectively) contain a toponym spelled / ’
dvr, which Brann, Jakobsohn and Rosenthal read as +10 ddvar ‘no
w ord’—and interpreted as a Jewish name for Speyer.48 If this reading is
correct, it would show that Rhineland Jews in the 14th-15th centuries
understood the connection between So Nemc ‘G erm an’ and nemy
‘m ute’.19 It is, nevertheless, surprising that Jews in Speyer—a town so
*• Jew ish d ialects often differ from the cognate non-Jew ish dialects in th e ir d e riv a tio n a l
processes. A n exam ple is J F r + Men! ‘food p re p a re d on Friday to be eaten on S a tu rd a y '
< (J ) L at calmtrm ‘w a rm in g ’; th e su b stan tiv izatio n of present active participles is a ty p ic a l
o f French (see W exler 1978).
‫ ״‬T h e m essen g er’s n am e was J a caq01 >btn Elitier N tm tc (see M odelski 1910:16, 109;
S ip er 1926a: 14; Kokovcov 1932:72, fn. 5).
46 B ran n , Jak o b so h n , et al. 1:1934:326, 346, fn. 1; Elbogen 1 934:X V II; J a k o b s o n
1957:45; Jak o b so n an d H alle 1964:171-172. T h e oldest a ttestatio n o f the root is G k
Nemitzoi ‘G e rm a n s ’ in the D f ceremoniis aulat byzantimu o f C o n sta n tin e P o rp h y ro g e n iiu s
(10th cen tu ry ) (2, 398; rep rin ted in M igne 112:1857).
*J 1963:541. T h e source o f G H e nmc co u ld , o f course, be any Slavic la nguage.
** 1934:346, fn. 1. G ross proposes altern ativ ely th a t H e !, dvr should be re a d a s +• to
dvar, a Biblical to p o n y m (e.g. 2 Sam uel 17:27) th at was assigned, on phonetic g ro u n d s ,
to Y lota ‘L o rrain e a n d n e ig h b o rin g R h in e la n d ' ( — G Lothnngen ‘L o r r a in e ’ )
(1897:296-297). Jew ish toponym s from the Slavic lands have yet to be collected a n d a n a ­
lyzed w ith the thoroughness th at ch aracterizes G ro ss's tre a tm e n t o f F ren ch J e w is h
toponym s (1897).
49 T h e w ord is not cited at all by K up fer an d Lewicki 1956. A second connection b e ­
tw een the Jew s a n d Speyer is p erh ap s Y iapiro — ■a, spin fam , unless these n a m e s a r e
to be d erived from J A ra m lappir ‘excellent, h a n d so m e ' (see U n b e g au n 1972:348). O n t h e
use of m edieval H e knacan ‘C a n a a n ’ in the m eaning ‘G e rm a n y ’— in a d d itio n to ‘S la v -
d o m ’— see P. R ieg er 1937. O n the use o f M ed H e *aSkmaz to d enote G erm an ic a n d S la v ic
groups, see M odelski 1910:84(1; P. R ieg er 1936; Lewicki 1960:41 an d section 1, fn . 9
above.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC A ND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 161

d istant from Polabian and Sorbian speech te rrito ry —w ould have had a
know ledge of som e Slavic term s (though n ot necessarily fluency m a
Slavic language); th ou g h S peyer was an im p o rtan t Jew ish cen ter in the
M iddle Ages and m ay have a ttracted Slavic Jew s. T h ese facts give us a
basis for assum ing th at know ledge o f Slavic extended m u ch fu rth e r to the
west am ong G erm an Jew s th a n am o n g G e rm a n s.50
6.14 W , EY parx. T h e Slavic term for ‘m an g e, scales’ is used in both
W estern and E astern dialects o f Y iddish, e.g . parx (D uY ) ‘scalp infection;
u np leasan t p erso n ’ ~ (EY ) ‘ulcer; stingy person (pej)’. Po parch, U k , Br
parx have becom e a pejorative te rm for ‘J e w ’. C u riously, D u slg parrag,
etc. ( < D utch Y iddish) has also developed this m e a n in g .51 T h e presence
of the Slavicism in W estern Y iddish suggests th at the bo rro w in g was
m ade in Slavicized G erm an y ; see e.g. LSo parch ‘scales’.52
6.15 O E Y prjdjg. A n u n d a te d m an u scrip t from the m iddle o f the 16th
century, from the B elorussian area, contains a Y iddish phrase w ith the
Slavic term prjdjg! + prejdig ‘fo rep art of an a n im a l’.53 D u b n o v considered
the term to be originally a Slavic C h ristian b u tch er term , b u t this analysis
is unconvincing since the Slavic surface cognates are n ot em ployed as
food term s, e.g. see P o przodek, B r peradok, R predok, U k peredok 1front part
of som ething, e.g. w ag o n ’. In m an y Slavic languages, the te rm —
com bined w ith the suffix -nica, etc.— is connected w ith the n otion of
‘c lo th ’, e.g. O P o przednica (1486),54 C z pfednice ‘front p a rt o f a co at’, LSo
psedlica f ‘sp in n er’; B r pjarednik,^ YLperednik ‘a p ro n ’. T h e non-pleophonic
form of O B rY prjdjg (vs. *pere-) points to a W est Slavic etym on, b u t there
is some evidence th a t Jew s often gave a “ W e st” Slavic form to East
Slavic loans (in Y iddish, Judeo-S lavic, b oth?), e.g. H e tkrsP ! + cerslo

50 A d d itio n a l ev id e n c e o f a J u d e o -S la v ic p resen ce in th e R h in e la n d m a y b e fo u n d in
G H e h z n 7‫ ־‬+ krazna fa (S p e y er 13 8 4 ), i f this is related to U S o krasna, C z krdsnd ‘b eautiful;
re d ’ . T h is ety m o n is co m p ellin g sin ce there is a G erm a n Y id d ish tran slation eq u iv a len t,
e .g . (H e ) s'nljn/ + senlin fa (S p e y er 1407), E Y sejndl (d im ) (see K o b er 1 9 4 4 :2 0 7 . 2 0 9 ). See
a lso th e p resen ce o f W est S lavic glosses in th e H e b r ew w ritin g s o f the G erm an a n d French
J e w s , th o u g h th is could b e d u e to con tact o n th e w ritten le v el. T h e S la v ic term for 'G er­
m a n s ’ also ap pears as B alk an J u d nemci ‘ A u stria n s’ (B u n is 1980), b u t th ro u g h an indirect
ch a in o f tra n sm issio n , i.e . < O tto m a n T u nemfe ‘A u stria' < A r nimsd < M G k Nemitzoi
(? ) vs. Se N em ci , G e rm a n ’ pi, B u ch arest J u d nemci 'ib .' < R u m Neamt sg (S ala 1971:61,
111). T h e root has b o th m ea n in g s in T u rk ish . O n the p o ssib ility o f a S la v ic co n trib u tio n
to th e creation o f n ew G e rm a n “ trib e s’ ' in W estern as w ell as in E astern G e rm a n y , see
B o sl 1 970:69.
51 S ee M o o r m a n n 1 9 3 2 :2 7 5 , 339. T h iele m en tio n s Parrack as a b y -n a m e o f a G erm an
J e w is h th ie f from 1818 (2 :1 8 4 0 :7 7 ).
ss S ee M u c k e 1911-1928; V a sm e r 195 3 -1 9 5 8 .
53 L u ria 15 7 4 , n o . 20 (cited b y D u b n o v 1909:13; J o fe 19 2 8 :2 4 2 ). T h is m a y be the
o ld est ex a m p le o f a Y id d ish W est S lavicism w ith r — C z f, P o rz (see section 6 .3 2 b elo w ).
54 N itsch an d U rb a n c zy k 7 :1 9 7 3 -1 9 7 7 :7 .
55 For the geograp h y o f B r pjarednik, see th e D A B M 1963, m ap # 3 3 0 .
162 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N EN TS

‘p lo u g h sh are’ (L ublin 1612) can only be derived from U k cereslo (vs. Po

trzoslo, U So crjoslo, etc .).56 T h e term + prejdig, as well as Y trejb(er)n
following, suggest th at Ju d eo -W est Slavic term inology m ay have
dom inated the sem antic field of slaughtering and b u tc h e rin g .57 T h e re is
also a strong (Judeo-)W est Slavic im p rin t in Y iddish baking (see sections
6.211, 6.222 below) as well as food term inology (see sections 6.1, 6.212,
6.224, 6.225, 6.3 below).
6.16 Y trejb(er)n. A Y iddish Slavicism w ith a fairly secure Ju d eo -W est
Slavic etym ology is trejb(er)n ‘re n d e r m ea t kosher by rem oving forbidden
fat and veins’ ~ O C z triebiti (M o d C z tfibit) ‘rem ove defects, errors;
b rin g to com pletion; im prove, cultivate, purify (usually in relation to the
h arv est)’; U So trjebic ‘cleanse; clear (forest); castrate (fowl)1. T h is is one
of the few Judeo-W est Slavicisms recorded in a m i d - llth century source
(see section 6.1 above); it is also attested th ro u g h o u t E astern Y iddish and
in the northeast areas of G erm an Y iddish. I assum e th at th e term was
borrow ed w ith its specifically Jew ish m ean in g from Judeo-Slavic-
speaking Jew s. It is unlikely th a t the Slavicism w ould have developed its
special Jew ish m ean in g am o n g A shkenazic Jew s who w ould have had
alternative term s. F or exam ple, o th er dialects of W estern Y iddish use
either J R m n porsn (B avaria, B ohem ia, R h in elan d ) or native ranign
(M o rav ia, L ow er A u stria an d w estern H u n g a ry ).58 T h is is the only
onom asiological isogloss for W estern Y iddish involving, inter aha, a
Ju d eo -R o m an ce and a Ju deo-S lavic te rm ; u n fo rtu n ate ly , the an tiquity
and original b oundaries o f the porsn-trejb(er)n-ranign split can n o t be d e te r­
m ined. T h e earliest attestation o f Y trejb(er)n dates from a work w ritten
in 1574 by Slomo L u ria, a rab b i active in L u b lin .59 T h e stem also a p ­
pears with a Slavic agentive suffix, e.g. trejbac ‘person who rem oves the
fat and veins from the m e a r (see also section 6.311 below ). T h e root has
also been noted in G e rm a n toponym s in N o rth eastern B a v a ria .60
T h e possibility th a t Y trejb(er)n a n d JW S I t(2)rebono m ight corne from a
Ju d eo -S o u th Slavic source also has to be considered, in view of the fact
th at in the Jew ish languages an d C h u rch Slavic (including the East Slavic
recensions of the language), th e root has a m ean in g associated w ith

515 C . Jafe 1612. T h e au thor h ailed from K r em ja n ec1. S ig n ific a n tly , Jaft lab eled the
term as H e bV’rl + bilson rusia ‘in the la n g u a g e o f R u s s ia ’. S ee also M . W cin reicb
4 :1 9 7 3 :2 5 1 .
” S ee F ab er 1982:94.
58 B eran ek 1965, m ap # 9 3 , S e e also J G z Reiniger fa m (P r a g u e 16 1 9 ) (L a n d a u and
W a ch stein 1 911:35, fn. 1). T h e J u d e o -F re n c h term is listed in L e v y 19 6 4 . F or an o th er
ex a m p le o f syn on ym s o f d iverse origin s in E astern Y id d ish , see sectio n 6 .4 5 , fn. 168
b elow .
59 J o fe 1965:430.
60 S ch w arz 1960 :2 3 8 -2 3 9 , 2 4 1 -2 4 3 , 247.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W EST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 163

‘holiness’, e.g. C hS l treba ‘sacrifice, (sacrificial) ta b le ’, trebiti ‘cleanse,

p u rg e ’, tribiste ‘a lta r’, trebhnikh (R -C hS l) ‘ritual b o o k ’, (C hSl) ‘holy area,
tem ple; a lta r7 (vs. C hSl istrebiti ‘clean; sweep away clouds’, O R terebiti
‘d e a r, u p root; castrate an im als’, U k terebyty ‘peel, shell; eat greedily;
clear a field’) .61
6.17 EY zejde. A ltb au er derives EY zejde ‘g ra n d fa th e r’ from LSo zed
(now ‘fellow; good-fo r-n o th in g ’) on phonetic g rounds; in o th er Slavic
languages, the cognate ap p ears w ith the original d, e.g. C z ded (see CzY
deide),62 U k did‫״‬, U So died, Po dziad ( < d'-) ‘gran d fath er; old m a n ’ .63 T h e
term has not diffused to W estern Y iddish dialects west o f the Elbe R iver,
w here a native term prevails (see e.g. D uY hark).

6.2 Wesl Slavicisms common to Yiddish, and German

G erm an dialects have inco rp o rated a n u m b e r o f loans from Slavic
languages, A com parison of shared Slavicisms in Y iddish and G erm an
provides a rough index of w hich Slavicisms m ight have entered the Y id ­
dish spoken in G erm an , S orbian an d Czech territo ry betw een th e 10th
an d 13th centuries; we can distinguish betw een C zech and S o rb ian origin
for a com m on Y iddish -G erm an Slavicism only in a few cases, since most
o f the corpus is found in b o th W'est Slavic languages, as well as P olish,64‫־‬
A com parison of Y iddish and G e rm a n Slavicisms reveals th at Y iddish
tends to preserve the form and m ean in g of the Slavic etym on w ith greater
fidelity th a n the G erm an dialects (see sections 4.114 and fn. 42 above,
sections 6.211-6.225, 6.32 below). Y iddish usually assigns the Slavicism
to the literary register, while th e G e rm a n Slavicisms tend to be regional.
T h e integration and calibration of these putative W est Slavicisms in Y id ­
dish suggest th at know ledge o f the Slavic source languages in the b i­
lingual G erm an-S lavic lands wras m ore w idespread am o n g Jew s than
am ong G e rm an s.65 I ra th e r d o u b t th a t a closer resem blance betw een

61 K iparsk y 1934:55; V a sm e r 1953-1958; Sadn ik an d A itzetm iiller 1955; K u p fer and

L ew ick i 1956:27 (citin g B ru ck n er 1 9 5 7 :5 7 9 -5 8 0 ). I f th e U k r a in ia n m e a n in g ‘eat g re ed ily ’
1 s d erived from ‘ritual fo o d ’, then th e h y p o th esis o f a (Ju d eo-)S ou th S la v ic o rig in for Y

trejb(er)n b eco m es less ap p ea lin g . W ieh i d efin es C hS l treba as a ‘p a g a n o fferin g ’ in the

F r eisin g d ocu m en ts (1 9 7 4 :1 1 8 ).
61 F or th e geograp h y o f this term , see B eran ek 1965, m ap # 101. T h e S lavic root for
1g ra n d m oth er’ , on the o th er h a n d , is fou nd in b oth G erm a n d ialects (b y the 12 th centu ry
at the latest) an d in G e rm a n Y id d ish (see B ellm an n 1 9 7 1 :1 4 7 -1 4 8 and B eran ek 1965.
m a p # 1 0 0 respective}}'). See also M . W ein reich 4 :1 9 7 3 :2 7 4 -2 7 6 .
53 19 7 7 [ 1 9 6 5 a ]: 105. T h e r e is n o trace o f a form w ith z in C zech d ialects.
64 M . W ein r eich seem s to h ave b een the first to p rop ose that Y id d ish S lavicism s shared
b y G erm an d ialects m ig h t be o f S orb ian origin (1 9 2 8 :2 3 ).
65 S ee section s 4 .1 1 4 1 and 6 .1 3 ab ove. For further com p ariso n o f Y id d ish w ith
S la v icized C olon ial G erm an , K a r a ite and R o m a n i d ialects, see W ex ler 198 0 b , 1983b ,
19 8 4 .
164 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W EST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S

Slavicisms in Y iddish an d the n eighboring Slavic languages is a function

of the expanding territo rial overlap betw een Y iddish an d the Slavic
languages w hich provided a p erp etu al Slavic m o d el,66 since G erm an
dialects enjoyed no less o f an overlap. U n fo rtu n ately , a com parison of the
Y iddish and G erm an Slavicisms is com plicated by chronological
disparallelism , i.e. G erm a n d a ta exist from the 13th century, while Y id­
dish exam ples have to be based on m uch m o re recent attestatio n —
usually not before the 16th-17th centuries. M oreover, shared Slavicisms
need not im ply that bo th Y iddish an d G e rm a n borrow ed the Slavicisms
on the sam e territory o r at the sam e tim e. O n e hypothesis th a t requires
testing is th a t G erm an Y iddish or R o m an i dialects w ere the carrier of
Slavicisms to G erm an dialects n o t in proxim ity w ith S lavic.67
6.21 S orbian and Czech com ponents in Y iddish.
6.211 W Y kowlec — EY kojlec. T h e Y iddish Slavicism denotes various
types of pastry, e.g. W Y (G ) kowlec ‘Shavuot cake’,68 E Y kojlec ‘tw isted
loaf o f w hite bread eaten on the S ab b ath o r (in some areas, e.g. U kraine)
on holidays’69 — U So kolac, C z kolac, Po kolacz, W U k kolac ‘type of b re a d
o r p a stry ’. In Polish and U k rain ia n , as in Y iddish, the cake could be ear­
m arked for special events, such as holidays or w eddings. N evertheless,
four facts support a W est Slavic source for th e Y iddish term : (a) Y «
~ oj < older Y 0 — a vowel found only in W est Slavic an d W est U krai-
m an (vs. Br kalac, st[E ]U k kalac)•, (b) the initial stress of the Y iddish
form s; (c) attestation o f the term in G erm an , D u tch an d Swiss dialects
of Y iddish; (d) the existence of qwj"lws (11th c, in R a sh i’s com m entary
to psaxim 4 8 b ).70 See also G (Silesian) Mok(n)kootsch ‘poppyseed p a stry ’,
Kolatsck ‘poor, not fully baked p a stry ’, (B ohem ian, M o rav ian ) Golatsch.
K - ‘ro u n d rye b re a d ’. 71 See also section 6.311 below.

66 B ellm a n n claim s this is w h y Y id d ish p resen tly has b in bajc vs. G Peitsche ‘w h ip ’ (see
S o , C r bic) (1 9 7 1 :2 5 6 , fn. 2 6 6 ). S ee also sectio n 6.2 2 1 b elow . S ee also re -lex ifica tio n in
Y id d ish , d iscu ssed in section 3 .1 3 ab ove.
67 F or ex a m p le , unless S lavicism s like Pinunse ‘m o n e y ’ and Kapuster ‘c a b b a g e ’ in the
scy th e-m a k ers’ jargon from W estfalia (see J iitte 1 9 7 8 :1 2 8 , 150; W o lf 19 5 6 , If 4 1 2 0 ) arc
d u e to d iffu sion from E astern G e rm a n d ialects, the p o ssib ility o f a “ S la v ic iz e d ” W estern
Y id d ish source sh ou ld b e en tertain ed . H o w e v e r , B ielfeld t claim s that Q penanse ‘m o n e y 1
is first attested o n ly in the 19th cen tu ry (1 9 6 5 :3 3 7 ), S ee also th e d iscu ssio n o f Y parx in
s ectio n 6 .1 4 ab ove. A p ossib le R o m a n i S lavicism m igh t b e D u slg oppoejen ‘drink up'
(M o o rm a n n 1 9 3 2 :113, 3 8 9 )— see R R o rn poisare ‘give to d rin k ’ < R p o it’.
68 B eem 1967; L o w en stein 1969:18; Z u ck erm an 1969:4-9.
69 In E astern Y id d ish d ialects, the term can d en o te a w id e v a riety o f food s, e .g . L iY
(R a se in ia i) ‘roll filled w ith ch op p ed m eat o r lu n gs and baked in ch icken fat or w ith cheese
a n d co o k ed in b utter, an d ea ten w ith b r o th ’ (F e in b e rg 194 7 :7 4 ) ~ B rY (D zja rzy n sk a )
‘u n b ra id ed w h eat roll w h ich J e w is h bakers sell to C h r istia n s’ (R e is e n 1 9 4 5 :7 ). In the
S lavic la n g u a g es, the term also d en o tes a variety o f baked p rod u cts, e .g . B g kolac
‘cerem o n ial rou n d l o a f ~ P o kolacz ‘w heat llatcak e’ (V jarxow 1 965 :8 0 ),
,0 S ee K o so v er 1958 :1 2 3 -1 2 6 .
7i S ee B ernd 1820; B ellm a n n 1971:142-144: an d m ap # 3 8 . For A u stria n G e rm a n sim -
p ie v ariants w ith k- (B en ed ik t et al. 1979) a n d f (Jak ob 1929: ‘sm all ca k e') are recorded.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S 165

6.212 Y krecme(r)(ke). Y krecme f ‘in n ’, krelmer ‘innkeeper’, kretmerkc ‘ib’

f have cognates in Eastern G erm an dialects (but not in the standard
language, and apparently not in A ustrian G erm an), e.g. Kretscham ---- em
m ‘village, second-class in n ’, Kretschmann ‘innkeeper’, Kretschmer fam.
T h e common etymon is Cz krctna f ‘inn’, krlmdr ‘innkeeper’, kremafka ‘ib’
f .72 W e note that Y krecme is closer than G Kretscham — -em to Czech in
form and gender assignment. A masculine gender assignment is known
in G erm an from the middle and late 14th century—from the area to the
west of H of (Bavaria), Cheb (Eger) and Olomouc (but see also curcthema
‘in n ’ f 13th c from a locale near Leipzig).71 Neither the Slavic nor native
G erm an feminine agentive suffix is encountered in G erm an dialects to
the best of my knowledge. M . W einreich’s suggestion that Y krecme ‘in n ’
w as received through G erm an and not directly from a Slavic donor
language on the strength of H om el’ Y krtcem is not convincing
(4:1973:269).
6.213 WY krejn — xr- ~ EY xrejn. While xrejn and krejn ‘horseraddish’
d ivide up Yiddish territory, G erm an dialects use only the variant with k,
e .g . G Kren.74 T he oldest attestation of the term in G erm an is from the
late 14th century.75 Since the change of pre-consonantal x > k in a
n u m b er of West Slavic languages probably did not take place before the
15th century (e.g. M odCz kfen < O C z chfen, LSo ks'en vs. USo chren, Svk
chrcn, Po chrzan < CSI V A 1), the Slavic etymon of G erm an Kren could
very likely still have had the original xr cluster at the time of the
borrow ing.76 The change of x > k is due to the fact that G erm an dialects,

77 So korfma o r Po karczma can be ruled oul on form al g ro u n d s. T h e root is attested

in all the Slavic languages, an d in m an y non-Slavic languages, in clu ding E stonian,
H u n g a ria n , A lb an ian , R u m a n ian an d R o m an i. P a re b a has suggested a n A rabic source
for th e Slavic term (e.g. A r xardi ‘e x p en d itu re, la n d -ta x ’). p o in tin g out that in the South
S la v ic dialects, the term has th e a d d itio n al m ean in g o f ‘e n te rta in m e n t, gift for good new s'
(1 9 7 9 ). T h e re is no trace o f this m ean in g in Y iddish. See also Bg krtfmja ,spend, w aste1.
A sso ciatio n betw een P o haracz an d karczma is rejected by Zajaczkow ski 1949b: 146■ 147,
T h e diffusion o f the te rm to so m an y non-Slavic la n g u ag es— th o u g h al) are coterritorial
to S la v ic — stren g th en s the suspicion th a t th e term m ay n o t be originally Slavic a n d that
it m a y not have (originally?) reached Y iddish directly from Slavic. See also R abccka-
B rykczyriska 1964; Stawski 1964. O n Po haracz ‘ta x ’ < A r xaradz *(land) ta x ’ (related to
A r xardl)y see K arfow icz 1885:421. See also JA ram hagd* *head ta x ’ (B erlin 1919:67,
fn. 3). *
73 B ellm ann 1971:171, m a p # 5 8 . G Kretschmer fam is attested since the 14th century,
see e .g . B reslau 1384 (B rech en m ach er 1:1957:63). See also Bielfeldt 1963:166.
74 See discussion in B ellm ann 1971:94-97.
75 See ibid. 96 for th e G e rm a n facts; for G e rm a n Y iddish, see b tn J a k a r 1544 (cited
a lso by G ru n b a u m 1882:313). Z unz also cites krein in G e rm a n Y iddish (post‫ ־‬l6 th cen­
tu ry ) , b u t gives no precise references
76 B ellm ann reg ard s So rb ian as the m ost likely source o f the G e rm a n Slavicism
(1 9 7 1 :9 4 ). T h e Mater verborumt a 13th cen tu ry C zech text, has chren (SedinovA 1981:86).
O n x > k t see section 3.341 above.
166 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

unlike Yiddish, normally do not tolerate ungram m atical x- in foreign

loans, e.g. G Charakter [k-] ‘character’, Chemie [?] ‘chemistry’ ( —[k] in
both words in A ustrian G erm an) vs. Y xarakter, xemje (via Slavic).
Presumably, WY krejn (W estern G erm any, Southwestern Slovakia)
shares the history of its coterritorial G erm an counterpart, unless an
original GY x- > k- under pressure from coterritorial Germ an.
However, there are two facts that suggest that Yiddish and G erm an may
have borrowed the Slavicism independendy: (a) G erm an Yiddish has k
a bit further to the west of the areas in which G Kren is found and (b)
Northeastern G erm an Yiddish has x, where the coterritorial German
dialects (and the standard language) have native Meerrettich. O nly the
Eastern Yiddish dialects in their totality and W estern Yiddish dialects as
far west as Eastern G erm any and Slovakia (except for the southwest cor­
ner which has k)11 preserve the original SI x-. Eastern Yiddish either in­
herited the early West Slavicism from W estern Yiddish or borrowed the
cognate independently from one or more coterritorial (non-Jewish)
Slavic languages.78 T he fact that SI x- is retained in Yiddish over such
a broad Eastern G erm an territory—pretty much in an area that was once
occupied by South Polabian and possibly Sorbian speakers—suggests a
possible (Judeo-) Slavic substratum , if not a higher incidence of
Germanic-Slavic bilingualism am ong G erm an Jews. Bellmann dates the
Yiddish borrowing to the period before the 13th-14th centuries, on the
grounds that Yiddish preserves the original WS1 r’, which subsequendy
became rz [z,§| in Polish by the 13th century, and f in Czech between the
12th-14th centuries.79 Such a claim is not entirely convincing, since later
Yiddish Slavicisms often have r where the source languages have ‫ ’ ז‬, ‫ ז‬or
rz (see further discussion in section 6.32 below); moreover, this argument
is altogether irrelevant if we assume that the source is U pper Sorbian—
where t has been retained in tact (e.g. chren). For discussion of the
W estern G erm an Yiddish tendency to reduce He x > 0 , see section 6.4,

” D etails w ere suggested by B eranek 1965, m ap # 9 6 ; A lthaus 1969:180 (w ith G er­

m an dialectal d a ta as well). See also D uY b ein (B eem 1967) a n d the discussion in M.
W einreich 4:1973:268-269. B tn J a k a r (cited in fn. 75 above) possibly gives evidence of
the form from Ich en h au sen , W estern B avaria. N evertheless, the prestige o f th e W estern
Y iddish literary lan g u ag e m ay account for th e app earan ce o f k in this w ord in 16th cen­
tu ry Polish Y iddish lite ra tu re ; for exam ple, th e term a p p ears w ith q in th e w ritings of
M oSt b tn Jisra e l [series (R a m o ) (b. c. 1520 K rak6w — d. 1572 K rak6w ) (see §ed in o v i
1981:82, 86) an d Slom o L u ria (active in L u b lin , 16th c).
’• W hile G e rm a n d ialects choose betw een Kren an d n ativ e M etrrtttuh, th e la tte r ii
u nknow n in Y iddish. B ellm ann 1971, m ap # 19 an d K onig 1981:226 give th e approx•
im ate d istrib u tio n o f the tw o G e rm a n term s. O n ly th e fo rm er te rm is n o rm a lly used in
A u strian G e rm a n (see Benedikt et al. 1979).
” B ellm ann 1971:95. F o r historical back g ro u n d on th e fate o f V in Polish a n d Czech,
see S tieb er 1973:49, 68-69 an d G e b au e r 1:1963:329 respectively and section 6 .3 2 below.
 JU D E O -S L A V IC A ND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 167

fn. 157 below; see also discussion of Y pameltx in section 6.55 below.
6.22 Putative Sorbian and Czech components in Yiddish. There are
a num ber of Slavicisms in Yiddish whose Sorbian and Czech origin can­
not be ascertained with certainty, since the roots are attested in all Slavic
languages and no early W estern Yiddish evidence is available. However,
the presence of surface cognates in Old G erm an texts allows us to regard
a pre-Polish West Slavic source for the Yiddish Slavicisms as possible. As
in the first set of common Slavicisms examined above, these Yiddish
Slavicisms also tend to be closer in form and/or meaning to the Slavic
etym a than the German loans.
6.221. Y bajc. Y bajc ‘w hip’ — So bic ‘club, m allet’, Cz ‘w hip’ vs.
G Peitsche ‘w hip’.*0 Yiddish, like standard G erm an, replaces the Slavic
m asculine gender assignment with feminine gender; the common
Y iddish-G erm an change o f « > aj points to an early borrowing, but it is
u n clear if the Yiddish Slavicism was received through G erm an or from
Slavic directly.
6.222 Y blince. Y blinee81 ‘pancake’ — USo blinc, LSo mliru*2 vs. G
Plinse, Plinze, Plintz.83 However, in Yiddish, and partly in G erm an, the
noun has been reclassified as a feminine noun, probably due to the
change of the morpheme boundary, e.g. Y blinc-es pi > blirue-s (by
analogy with feminine Slavicisms like jagdt-s pi ‘berry’?—see section 6.1
above).
6.223 Y grenec. Y grenec ‘border’ m now deviates from the Slavic
fem inine gender assignment (e.g. USo hranica), which is still retained in
G erm an , e.g. G Grtnze f ( ‫ »־‬O C zLat granicie ‘border sign’, 13th c).s.
O riginally, Yiddish must have had the form *grenece—before the intro­
duction of the rule dropping word-final shwa in the 14th century.85
6.224 Y jojx. T he original Slavic meaning o f ‘broth’ (e.g. So jucha, Uk

*° B ellm an n 1971:256-262 an d m a p # 6 1 . See also section 6 .2 , fn. 66. LSo prj'lia ‘w h ip ’

is a re b o rro w in g from G e rm a n . See also Bielfeldt 1963:165, M . W einreich 3:1973:103;
4:270.
■' S ee K osover 1958:136-139.
•* N ew er v arian ts w ith ml- a re also found in East Slavic (see V asm er 1:1953 u n d e r
blin), a n d in Y iddish (K osover 1958:136), b u t not in G e rm a n . See also U So plinc (a d ­
ju s te d to G e rm a n ?) (Jak u b aJ 1954). T h e root seem s to be un k n o w n in C zech an d Polish,
b u t is a tte ste d , in both form s, in U k ra in ia n , e.g . mlyn(ec') ~ (dial) blynec' , though
Shevelov e n te rta in s the possibility th at U k blytuc' is a loan from R u ssian (1979:741).
‫ ״‬B ellm ann 1971:150-151 a n d m ap # 3 9 . G Plintz ‘p a n ca k e ’ is given in Sw jela 1953.
See also Bielfeldt 1963:165; O p e l’b a u m 1971:47. T h e term is not know n in A u strian G e r­
m a n (B enedikt et at. 1979). T h e G e rm a n Slavicism has also b een b orrow ed by N orthw est
Polish Y iddish (see H erzog 1965:68). T ra k a i K a r Win can only be from East Slavic (see
also Li bljiuts).
*4 B ellm ann 1971:228, fn. 79. See also P rag u e Y grtnic (S ch n itzler 1966:25, 39).
" K ing 1980:403, 413.
168 JU D E O -S L A V IC A ND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

juska) is preserved in Y jojx vs. G Jaxuht *dung water, liquid m an u re’.**

6.225 WY smejte — EY smetene. T he Yiddish terms for ‘sourcream ’,
WY smejte — EY smetene are of Slavic origin (see Cz smetana, etc.) an d
there are surface cognates in G erm an dialects, e.g. Schmettem.87 T he in ­
itial stress in Yiddish suggests an early borrowing.

6.3 Non-coterritoriality oj Yiddish Slavicisms and their Slavic etyma

M any dialects of Yiddish have Slavic elements from non-coterritorial
dialects of Slavic (see also section 6 . 1 above). Examples include East
Slavicisms in Polish Yiddish (and vice versa) and Czechisms in Polish
and Eastern Yiddish dialects. The appearance of Slavicisms in Y iddish
dialects to the east of the Slavic donor language in most cases reflects the
eastward migration of Ashkenazic Jew s prior to the early 17th cen tu ry .4*
If the num ber of West Slavicisms of non-Polish origin that can now be
identified in contemporary Eastern Yiddish is quite small, this may be
because of re-lexification, i.e. adjustm ent to surface cognates in Polish
and East Slavic (see also discussion in section 6 .1 above).89 For exam ple,
OCzY *wrqjsl + urkes ‘cucum bers’90 ( ~ Svk uhorka) may have given way
in contemporary Eastern Yiddish to a surface cognate resembling Polish,
e.g. Y ugerke — Po ogorek (unless we are dealing with separate borrow ings
from Slovak and Polish respectively). Re-lexification of Polonisms to the
East Slavic surface cognates seems to be less widespread, to judge from
the large num ber of Polish terms in Eastern Yiddish dialects and the ex­
istence of Yiddish blends consisting of East and West Slavic cognates.
Examples of non-re-lexified Czechisms are Y hojl ‘bare, p u re’ < Cz holy
‘bald, bare, pure’, which in Polish and East Slavic dialects of Yiddish co­

*6 T h e negative m ean in g s a re a G e rm a n in n o v atio n o f the 16th■ 17th c en tu rie s

(B ellm ann 1971:201-204 an d m aps # #51-52). V on G ro lm an 1822 cites G vX^Jauche in
the m ean in g ,soup*—w hich could be (a) th e original m ean in g re ta in e d , (b) a b o rro w in g
from co territo rial Y iddish o r (c) a n in d ep en d en t sem antic in n ovation o f slan g .
17 See B eranek 1965, m ap # 107 an d the com parison o f Y iddish a n d G e rm a n d a ta in
A lthaus 1969:181. G Schmand *sourcream ' is u n related .
•* C e rta in paths of diffusion w ithin E astern Y iddish deserve a closer study in light o f
th eir possible significance for Ju d eo -S lav ic reco n stru ctio n . For exam ple, it w ould be im*
po rtan t to d eterm in e w h eth er U k rain ian ism s in Belorussian Y iddish can be a scrib ed to
the earliest chronological s tra tu m o f Y iddish Slavicism s, th us possibly of Ju d e o -E a st
Slavic origin. O n the reciprocal diffusion of Slavicism s betw een B elorussian a n d U k ra i­
nian Y iddish, see S u l'm a n 1939:75.
•* See also the T u r k ia z a tio n o f Ib erian A rabic co m p o n en ts in B alkan J u d e z m o (details
in W exler 1977b: 185). F o r a discussion o f re-lexification in Y iddish and K a ra ite , see
W exler 1980, 1983b. T h e conditions u n d e r which re-lexification takes place need careful
study
S h er 1978-1980:52.
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 169

exists with the Polish-derived cognate goln ‘to shave’ < Po golic91 and Y
krecme ,in n ’ < Cz krtma (vs. Po karczma, Br karcma, Uk korcma). Indirect
evidence of the re-lexification process is the existence of merged cognates,
such as Y padloge (widespread in Belorussia), which might be a blend of
Po podioga and Br padloha ‘floor’—vs. Y podleke ‘floor’—an unblended
Polonism borrowed at a time when Polish had a fixed stress on the first
syllable (?).9‫ נ‬A nother example of non-coterritoriality between Yiddish
Slavicisms and the Slavic donor languages is when the isogloss between
East and West Slavic elements in Yiddish runs to the west of the isogloss
separating Polish from East Slavic. For example, Y muien ‘to torm ent’
( < Uk muiyty, Br miuiyc') is widespread in Polish Yiddish, though there
is also a late layer of menlen ( < Po mcuyc) here; 93 both Y mniike ( < Po
mrtiszka) and monaike ( < Br manatka x [?] Uk monaxynja) ‘n u n ’ are attested
in Polish Yiddish (see A. M ark 1929). In attem pting to explain this
phenom enon, M . W einreich suggested that Belorussian and U krainian
m ust have once been spoken further to the west than they are presently.94
H erzog, however, reminds us that it was Jews from West Belorussian
and U krainian lands who first settled the Polish areas to the immediate
west, e.g. Jew s first settled Brest, Luc’k, Volodymyr Volyns’kyj, T rakai
an d H ro d na at least by 1388, but a documented Jew ish presence in
M azow ia to the west dates for the most part only from two centuries
la te r.95 T he possibility of a Yiddish carrier for East Slavicisms to Polish
should also be explored.9* Together, non-coterritoriality and cognate
m erging encourage the independence of Yiddish norms from Slavic,
which is tantam ount to creating a kind of “Judeo-Slavic” within Yiddish
(see type 2 of the classification of Jewish languages proposed in section
2 above). M oreover, the absence of uniform norms am ong contiguous
Slavic languages means that a Yiddish Slavicism might be innovative in
one are a but not in another.

” Y hojl could theoretically even have been acq u ired from J u d eo -W e st Slavic on Polish
te rrito ry . T h e lack o f re-lexification in Y iddish m ight be d u e to the sem antic distance be­
tw een th e tw o cognates.
” F o r discussion, see U . W einreich 1969:95-97. Y iddish often has blends o f East
Slavic o r Polish form an d C zech -O ld Polish stress, e.g. Y tkavrodt < Po skowtoda — Y
ikooertde < U k skooorodd (see section 6 .1 , fn. 15 above).
” S e e LC A A J. #152060.
« M . W ein reich 1965:83. See also G reen 1969:223.
*‫ י‬H e rz o g 1965:74fT, 240-242, 258, 273. F o r m aps o f Jew ish settlem ent in P oland and
a d jo in in g areas to th e east, see ibid 240-241, 243, 254; U . W einreich 1969:86-87. For
the U k ra in e , see H erzo g 1969:68-70
*• F o r exam p le, B ru ck n er reg ard s Po loksiyny pi ,v erm icelli' as a “ J e w is h ” term
(1915:1+ 4) (ic e section 6 .1 , (h. 14 above). K u rzo w a notes th a t in Lvov, P o pipek ‘stom ach
o f a do m e stica te d b ird ' is reg ard ed as a Y iddishism (1983:217). See P 0 Y pupik — pipik
'n a v e l', u ltim a te ly from an East Slavic source, e .g . B r pupok ‘n avel, gizzard of b ird s '.
170 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E S T SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

Instances of non-coterritoriality between Yiddish Slavicisms and their

Slavic etyma that cannot be satisfactorily explained by cognate merger,
by Yiddish strategies of integrating Slavicisms and by population move­
ment might be considered vestiges of a Judeo-Slavic substratum . But
even in such cases it is difficult to reach an unam biguous decision in favor
of a Judeo-Slavic substrata! element. For example, a Belorussian Hebrew
passage dated 1640 contains a Yiddish phrase with the Slavicism rn^dl
+ med ~ + m ’ed (contemporary EY med) ‘honey; m ead’.97 The author of
the text hailed from Mahilew—an area in which CS1 *e and fc u n d er stress
in the environm ent C ’—C became 0 , perhaps as early as the 11th cen­
tury, see e.g. stBr med [m ’o tj.98 W ithin Belorussian, the reflex m ’ed is
found now in scattered areas of the southeast, with med used in the
southwest (bordering U krainian territory). T he variants med ~ m ’ed have
severed possible explanations: (a) They might have first been acquired by
Yiddish speakers in the southwest area, say around Brest, after the late
14th century, and then carried eastward with subsequent Jewish migra­
tions (see the example of Y ozere ‘lake’ < SW Br ozera, Uk ozero vs. stBr
and non-SW dial vozera, etc. discussed in section 6.1, fn. 31 above), (b)
However, because examples of Southwest Belorussian dialectalisms in
general Belorussian Yiddish appear to be few in num ber, it might be
preferable to regard OBrY + mC)ed as a loan from Slavic-speaking Jews
in the Mahilew area—even though the Belorussian dialects now spoken
in this area have med. (c) M oreover, Eastern Yiddish dialects spoken to
the west of Belorussia also have the form, e.g. PoY med vs. Po miod
[m ’ut], with both meanings (A. M ark 1929).99 (d) Theoretically, the Old
Belorussian Yiddish spelling could reflect the pronunciation Im ’oil as well.
Hence, the Belorussian Yiddish Slavicism may have been first acquired
on Polish territory (say from Old Polish before the change o fe > 0 before
hard dentals in the 13th century) ,100 or even from Cz med. 101 A putative
Judeo-Belorussian origin for PoY med is also possible, in view of the diffu­
sion of East Slavicisms to Polish Yiddish after the 15th century. For fur­
ther examples of disparallelism between Belorussian and Belorussian
Yiddish, see the discussion of Y pral'nik in section 6.57 below.

‫ ״‬See M . K ac 1899:87-88 (also cited by D u b n o v 1909:14).

’• D A B M 1963, m ap # 3 0 ; W exler 19773:111-118.
” T h e status o f SI C '<C in Y iddish Slavicism s should be system atically checked as a
possible sequel to th e Y iddish use o f r for C z f, Po rz, ESI r(') (see section 6.32 below).
T h e term m V also ap p ears in G e rm a n Y iddish (Selig 1:1768:306, citing London
1722), b u t is a p p aren tly not attested in c o n te m p o ra ry W estern Y iddish dialects. See also
c o g n ate G Met ‘m e a d ’.
101 Stieber 1973:37. T h e p resen t-d ay u < 0 d ates from app roxim ately the 16th centurv
(ibid 95).
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 171

Slavicisms in Rom ani dialects also tend to be both of local and non­
coterritorial origin, while Slavicisms in Karaite and Colonial G erm an
tend to be almost exclusively local in character. A systematic comparison
of Slavicization processes in Yiddish and Rom ani would prove rewarding
for the student of Judeo-Slavic linguistics, since both languages share
sim ilar channels of diffusion and pre-Slavic contact experiences (e.g.
G reek) .102 Sporadically or perennially nomadic languages like Yiddish
and Rom ani, which become exposed to a large num ber of Slavic
languages, may apply strategies developed for integrating elements from
the original Slavic contact language to elements borrowed from later
Slavic languages (see Y -ak, r o t Rom -ica discussed in section 6.31, 6.312
and 6.32 below). This fact considerably complicates the identification of
Judeo-Slavic substratal elements in Yiddish.
6.31 Derivational suffixes. A particularly interesting case of non­
coterritoriality of Yiddish Slavicisms and the Slavic source morphemes
involves the use of Slavic nominal suffixes. Slavic nouns enter Yiddish
w ith only a small pan of their native derivational machinery. Hence, the
assignm ent of a Slavic suffix to the class of Slavic nouns used in Yiddish
very often differs from native Slavic distributional norms. In addition,
the possibility of extending the Slavic affix to non-Slavic nouns further
heightens the independence of the target language from the source
norm s. For example, while JS1 / kola ‘synagogue; school’ can only be
com bined in Yiddish with -nik m agent to form skol’nik fam (earlier used
in the literal meaning o f ‘sexton of a synagogue’?—Skola itself is unknown
in Yiddish), U krainian offers a choice between -nyk and -’ar, e.g. Uk Skola
‘school’ > Skol’nyk, Skil’nyk, Skoljar fam etc. (see also section 5.1411
above). T he relationship between Slavic and Slavicized Karaite and
R o m an i is similar. Consider the extension of SI -ica f agent to native and
non-native stems in Rom ani, e.g. ESIRomjud ‘Jew ’: judica f ( < G Jude);
biboldo ‘Je w ’: biboldica f; Cz, G Rom kerccmarica ‘innkeeper’ f ( < Slavic),
krai ‘king’: kralica ‘queen; princess’ ( < Slavic).101 In the Slavic
languages, -tea does not appear with most of these roots, see e.g. Bg
kralica ‘queen’ (non-South Slavic languages lack the form); Cz zid ‘Je w ’:
zidovka f, krlmai ‘innkeeper’: krlmarka f. T he novel distribution of highly
productive Slavic suffixes in Yiddish and Rom ani (e.g. -nik and -ica) may
at least be evidence of Yiddish and Rom ani “ ethnolects” of Slavic, if not
o f a Judeo-Slavic substratum in Yiddish.104 An unusual use of rare

107 See W exler !980, 1983b, 1984 for discussion o f the d ifferential Slavicization o f Yid*
d is h , R o m a n i a n d K araite.
103 F o r add itio n al exam ples, see Pott 1:1844:101.
O n the possibility o f recovering “ R o m an o -S lav ic1’ ethnolects from th e Slavic com ­
p o n e n t in R o m an i diaiects, see W exler 1984.
172 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

Slavic-derived suffixes in Yiddish might be more revealing of underlying

Judeo-Slavic norms. Examples follow below.
6.311 -ai. A Slavic suffix of extreme rarity in Yiddish is -al. O ften, the
Yiddish use of -at with a Slavic stem has an immediate parallel in a Slavic
language, e.g. Y piskae ‘large, broad m outh’ was probably borrowed
from Uk pyskat'person who shoots ofThis m outh’ (see also Y pisk ‘m outh,
snout’ which may be a back formation from piskal since the base form
in U krainian has a fugitive 0 , see Uk pysok). Lacking a Slavic parallel is
Y trejbac ‘person who removes the veins and tendons from the meat in ac­
cordance with Jewish ritual law’.105 Slavic agentive forms bear no
similarity in form and meaning, see e.g. Fo (arch) trzebiciel ‘destroyer;
person who castrates anim als’, Uk terebij ‘greedy eater’. The Yiddish use
of -aI with a verb stem stands in sharp contrast with most Belorussian
dialects, for example, where -at is productive mainly in deriving nouns
from nominal stems.106 See also the variant Y -ei, which tends to have
Slavic parallels, e.g. WY kowlec — EY kojlec (see section 6.211 above).
It is unclear whether contemporary R slg xoxmat ,wise guy’ has a Yiddish
antecedent, since the underlying root could be Y xoxem ‘wise guy’ < He
haxdm ‘smart (person)’; Y xoxme ‘clever idea (ironic); jo k e’ or non-
Ashkenazic He koxmah ‘wisdom’. See also U k pejsac in section 6.56 below.
6.312 -(’)ak. Most of the nouns taking -(’)ak in Eastern Yiddish are
either Slavic stems, or non-Slavic stems with translation equivalents in
the coterritorial Slavic languages which are combinable with the suffix.
Examples like Y xerl’ak ‘sickly person’, slovak ‘Slovak’ and pol'ak ‘Pole’
— Uk xyrljak, slovak, poljak and need not detain us further. However,
disparallelism with Polish and East Slavic is found in Y paskudn'ak ‘nasty
fellow’ ( < paskudne ‘nasty’) vs. Uk paskudnyk ( < paskudnyj)■,'07 Y litvak
‘Jew from the Northeast Yiddish territory (i.e. Belorussia, Lithuania and
Latvia)’ vs. Po litwyn ‘L ithuanian’, Uk lytvyn ‘Belorussian’ (18th c);1®• Y
xitrak ‘sly person’ ( < xitre ‘sly’) vs. Uk xytryk, xytrun, Br xitrec, xitrun.109
While we might regard litvak as a Yiddish extension of SI -ak with
ethnonyms, the choice of the rare -(’)ak with Y paskudne ‘rotten, nasty’
and xitre ‘cunning’ is puzzling, since the original source suffixes are also

101 H arkavy 1928 also cites trejbiier. See discussion o f the verb (rejb(a)n in section 6.1
above.
104 Scjacko 1977:95-96. T h is p a tte rn also exists in Y iddish, e .g . native jung 'y o u n g ':
jungat 'b r a t '. H ow ever, the suffix is ra re in the Palessian dialects (S m utkow a 1978:102).
See also Y paskudmk m as well as paskudnur f — U k paskudnyeja , slut; nasty w o m an ’.
*°* See H orbatsch 1966:162. Sec also Y litu n n , L ith u an ia n C h ris tia n '. P o litivaJt ,Jew
from L ith u an ia w ho settled in the Polish lands in (he 19th cen tu ry an d w ho speaks a poor
Polish’ (D oroszew ski 1958-1969) is a loan from Y iddish.
O B r xitrokl (S k ary n a, early 16th c) m ay be a C zechism (see B ulyka 1980:207). Sec
also H o m e!' B r xitrdi (A n ifen k a 1983:160).
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S 173

available in Yiddish, e.g. -nik, -ec (as in Y boxer ‘young m an’: boxerec
‘b ra t’, paskudnik ‘nasty fellow’). Y paskudnt can only be derived from ESI
o r Po paskudny(j) (in Polish the term is an East Slavicism);110 Y xitrak
seems to have a parallel only in Cz, Svk chytrdk ‘clever person’ (not
pej)—but sec the similar sounding Po chytrek ( ~ chytrzec). In Y mondrek
‘wise person’,111 the presence of the nasal points to a Polish source, but
from mqdry ‘clever’ (the adjective is not used in Yiddish); Polish only
derives mtdrek ‘clever person’, mfdrzec ‘sage, thinker’, mqdrata ‘clever per­
so n ’ (ironic).112 T he use of ■ak with this stem is, however, attested in
languages to the east and west of Polish, e.g. Uk mudrak ‘cunning, sly
person; wiseacre’ (vs. mudrec’ ‘sage, wise m an ’), Cz mudrak (rare, pej)
‘philosopher’, Svk mudrak ‘wiseguy’. There are also cases of - ( ’)ak in Yid­
dish with non-Slavic stems without translation equivalents in the Slavic
languages, e.g. Y cvu(j)ak ‘hypocrite’ < H e cMua* ‘hypocritical’;115 Y fric
‘novice’, (M tawa) Jricak ‘undependable young m an’114 vs. Po fryc
‘novice’ ( < G Fritz ma). In the Slavic languages, ‘hypocrite’ can be ex­
pressed by a compound involving -nik/ -nyk, -ec, -ar and -ek, but not -a ’k,
e.g . Po obiudnik, Uk obludnyk, Svk, Cz pokrytec, Svk svatuSkar, Cz svatoulek.
I cannot explain the Yiddish choice of -(’)ak over -nik on phonological
grounds.
It seems reasonable to attribute the innovative use of EY -(’)ak to an
earlier (Judeo-)W est Slavic norm. In fact, in contemporary Jewish-
C zech, -ak occasionally appears with a Yiddish Hebraism, e.g. dalesdk
‘penurious person’ < Y dales ‘poverty’ < H e dallut, koierak ‘Jewish ritual
slaughterer; supervisor of ritual slaughtering; (long) butcher’s knife’ <
Y koier ‘kosher’ < He kaSer.115 Jew -Po trefniak, Y trejfn’ak ‘Jew who eats

110 V a»m er 2:1955:320.

)‫ ״‬C ite d in a S lav ic'lan g u ag e folksong su n g by Jew s in Zelenec (P rilucki 1:191 1:114).
T h e reflex w ith on is not entirely expected in Y iddish. W h en Polish nou n stem s
h a v e th e alte rn a tio n q sg: <pi (usually (o, ej + nasal co n so n an t), Y iddish c h aracteristical­
ly b o rro w s the stem w ith the front vowel, e.g . Po dab ‘o a k ’: dfby pi > Y demb sg: dembes
pi; see also Soviet R om dJmbo ‘o a k ’; Po mqdry *clever1: mtdrek ‘sag e’ > R om mendro
‘c le v e r’. Y mondrtk m ay be based on the B elorussianized Polonism mudrak (19th c)
(M c M illin 1973). For fu rth er discussion, see W exler 1984. In the case o f Vopqpek, North*
w est Polish Y iddish has both pempik a n d pompik (H e rz o g 1965:80)— perhaps on the
an alo g y o f the East Slavic-Polish sou n d co rresp o n d en ce, e.g. Br muka: Po make *flour'::
(B r a n d st) Y pupik: pompik. T h e statu s o f Slavic m orp h o p h o n em ic a ltern ations in Y iddish
d e se rv e s a sep arate study. See also u netym ological n in R o m dlengo ( -‫י‬- dlugo) 4long’ vs.
P o diugit R dolgtj (H o rb a£ l9 7 la :1 4 0 T fn. 9).
1,, T h e H ebrew o rth o g rap h ic no rm s req u ired in the spelling o f H ebrew loans in Y id­
d ish lack j ; the v a ria n t with j follows Y iddish phonetic principles.
‫ * ״‬O patoSu 1941:119.
115 Pech 1948. G e b a u e r 1903-1916 glosses koierak as ‘kosher Je w ; kosher b u tc h e r’.
H ubA2ek also offers koier ‘Jew ish butcher* (1981:137). T h e m odel m ay be C z krtvak
*curved knife* < khcy *curved’. S c e a ls o G slg Schachter ‘slau g h terer; k nife' (P hilipp 1969)
< Y itxUr *slaughterer* (the second m ean in g is not cited by W olf 1956, # 4777). See also
C a r p a th ia n U k rizm kb discussed in section 5.1210 above.
174 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

non-kosher food’ has to be derived from Irejny ‘non-kosher’ < He tiref\

an immediate Yiddish source is not required, since in Polish Yiddish th e
Hebraism assumes the form Irajf(see section 3.341, fn. 403 above).116 O n
Hebrew-Slavic blends used in Slavic languages, sometimes with Y iddish
phonological features, see sections 7.32-7.322 below.
6.313 -ek. While there are instances of Y -ek following Slavic practice
(e.g. Podolian Y bojdek ‘thistle’ — Uk bodjak, bu-),"7 there is at least o n e
innovative use of -ek in Yiddish, i.e. EY mizinek ‘youngest son; sm allest
finger’.118 In the Slavic languages, the root usually appears with -(t)ec,
-nyk or -cyk, etc., e.g. Cz mezenec, Po miezin(n)y, (dial) miziniec, U k
myzynec’, mizynec’, ‘little finger’, mizyncyk, myz- — mizynnyk ‘smallest b o y ,
child’. 119 U krainian seems to be unique in having the variant mizynok
‘smallest finger’ (H rinfenko 1907-1909). Noting the disparallelism b e ­
tween the Yiddish Slavicism and Polish, A ltbauer reconstructed O P o
*mizinek on the strength of the Yiddish data (1928a). Such a reconstruc­
tion finds no support in any Slavic language. T he Yiddish preference fo r
-ek may have been influenced by Po beniaminek ‘youngest son’ < He bin-
jamin ma and Po -ek (discussed in section 7.13 below), by the fem inine
suffix -ke < SI -ka (see Y mizinke ‘youngest daughter’), or may co n tinue
an old Judeo-Slavic pattern, or be a restructuring of Uk -ok.
6.314 -nik. In Yiddish, Slavic stems may appear with -nik, in opposi­
tion to Slavic norms, e.g. LiY objezdnik ‘gendarme on horseback’
(PilviSkiai)120 vs. R ob'ezdlik;1J1 Y marudnik ‘daw dler’ vs. Po, Uk, B r
maruda; nudnik ‘pest, bore’ vs. Po nudziarz, no agentive derivatives in E ast
Slavic. In Yiddish, -nik is widely extended to non-Slavic, usually foreign,
roots, though often in imitation of Slavic patterns of discourse. Instances
of innovative use of -nik with non-Slavic loans are: (West European
loans) Y abortnik ‘abortionist’ vs. Uk nelehal'nyj aktiier (literally 'illegal
obstetrician’), Y minutnik ‘m inute han d ’ vs. Uk xvylynna strilka; (Baltic
loans) LiY degutnik ‘tar w orker’ ( < Li degutas ‘ta r’, degutininkas, degiuius
‘tar worker’) — R degljamik (with a double agentive suffix vs. Br dzjahc‫־‬

1,4 For Jew ish -P o lish , see B rzezina 1979:96. O n the d ev elopm ent o f PoY aj < p ro to -Y
*9 2 2 * »ce H erzog 1965:176-178, 191. W hile H erzog o rd ers the rule o f the low ering o f th e
d ip h th o n g relative to o th e r rules in Polish Y iddish, he gives no chronologies.
" ‫ י‬F rim er 1946:22.
n * For o th e r Potish Y iddish v arian ts, see A ltb au er 1928a.
1,9 N ote that the tw o m ean in g s o f finger a n d child are expressed by the sam e w ord in
Y iddish, bu t not necessarily in Slavic. See also discussion in V asm er 1953*1958.
H crsh 1944:52.
121 H arkavy 1928 gives Y objtidtxk. T h e geographic p a ra m e ters o f the v a ria n ts sh o u ld
be studied. In East Slavic, •ak an d -nik. etc. are nearly identical, see e .g . R
‘h o rse rid e r’, Uk ob ’jiznyk *border p atro l on h o rse b ac k ', O R natxxUthk — navodnik* ‘m etal
c ra ftsm a n ’ (1614) (B arx u d aro v et a l 1975ft).
 JU D EO “SLAVIC A ND EARLY W EST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 175

ja r);122 (H ebrew loans) Y znusnik 'a d u lte re r’ ( < H e ‘p ro stitu tio n ’) ~

Po porubnik; Y rexilesnik ( < H e n xilu t ‘gossip’), losn-haramk ( < H e Mon
hard‘' ‘evil ta lk ’) 'g o ssip ’ (anim ate) — R j bletnik\ Y ilienik ‘ex ecu tio n er’123
( < H e tlijah ‘execution’) ~ U k .hbenycnyk; C zY sikernik ‘d ru n k a rd ’ ( <
H e sikkor ‘ib’) vs. C z pijak, p y a n \l2i Y sltmezalnik ‘unlucky p erso n ’ ( < Y
slim ‘b a d ’ + H e mazzdl ‘lu c k ’) . 123 A ra re exam ple w ith a native stem is
vajbernik ‘w o m an izer’ < Y vajber ‘w o m en ’. A n innovative use of -nik w ith
Slavic stems (e.g. marudnik, nudnik) seems to be restricted to E astern Yid-
d is h ,16‫ ־‬while one exam ple w ith a H ebrew stem (e.g. sikernik) is attested
in C zech Y iddish. Inno v ativ e use of -nik w ith H eb rew stems is also
characteristic of R ussian slang, e.g. sm im ik ‘n ig h t-w atch m an ’, ultim ately
from H e smirdh ‘g u ard (in g )’;127 on Po chawrysmk, see section 7,321 below.
T h e fact th a t -nik enjoys a n innovative status th ro u g h o u t th e territo ry ex­
ten d in g from C zech to E astern Y iddish strongly suggests a tendency
am on g Jew s to develop a “ Je w is h ” v arian t of Slavic w ithin Y iddish.
W h eth er this tendency has its origins in Ju deo-S lavic cannot be stated
categorically.128 T h e use o f -nik in Jew ish fam ily nam es deserves a special
study; e.g. Y (D obru d za) sakadzinik fam < co territorial Bg sakadzi
‘w a ter-carrier’ (also in T u rk ish Ju d ez m o ) < T u saka ‘w ater c a rrie r’ (-dzi

122 L em chenas 1970. For O ld R u ssian , see B arx u d aro v et al. 1975ff.
123 See also synonym ous Y taljen. < H e ion.'in ‘e x ecu tio n er’.
124 T h e v a ria n t w ith -n ik is know n to m e only from 19th cen tu ry B ohem ian Y iddish
(K ra u s an d G old 1973:36, fn. 9). In E astern Y iddish, siker is b o th a n adjective and a nou n
(as in H ebrew ). O n the possible occurrence o f th e H e b ra ism in U k ra in ia n slang lexicons,
see H orb ac 1971a:145; W exler 1983a.
125 T h e b len d is also attested in Slavic, w hich m ean s the term could have originated
in either Jew ish o r Slavic circles, e.g. P o slam azam y ‘u n lu c k y ’, L vov U k sl'a m a zd m yk ‘stu ­
d e n t w ho w rites sloppily' (A ltb au er 1932a; H o rb a c 1966:35). O n thev w idespread use of
this H eb rew root in non-Jew ish languages, see S p itzer 1919; 1947; S u l’m a n 1926:216:
M . W einreich 2:1973:2 lOff; 4:277ff, 301ff. Evidence for th e p o p u larity o f -nik in Y iddish
is the re-analysis of m efunik 'c o n n o isse u r’ ( < H e rmjunnaq ‘spoiled p e rso n ’) as m tju + nik,
h ence the creation o f a fem inine agentive, e.g. Y mefumce ‘fastidious w o m a n ’— vs. H e
jnsftiuntqet.
' I am u n ab le to d eterm in e the precise w estern b o rd e r o f Y nudnik (also used in Polish
Y iddish). T h e root nud(s)- is pro d u ctiv e in Y iddish, following Slavic p a tte rn s, e.g. Y Tru:i-
note, nudnekejt ‘b o re d o m ’, n u d (’)en, nudzen 'to b o re ’, nudne ‘b o rin g ’ ~ U k n u d (’) o ta , nudyty,
nudnyj‫׳‬, P o nudnosc, nudzic, rmdny. T h e only n on-Jew ish use o f nudnik ‘p est’ 1 know of is
in the Polish w ritings o f J a n C zeczot. a Polish w riter from the W est B elorussian lands
(1796-1846), b u t this form is not cited in an y Polish d ic tio n ary (see K aw yn-K urzow a
1963:41). C o u ld the form be a Y iddishism in C zeczo t’s w ritings?
127 V .M . Popov 1912:96.
128 A p o ten tial Judeo-S lavic te rm m ay be Y sabasnik ‘S ab b ath la m p ’ . W hile the initial
c om ponent is ultim ately from H e sabbdt, it need n o t be taken directly from Y sabes. See
discussion in section 7.321 below . T h e existence of com pounds w ith -nik in G e rm a n Y id­
dish deserves a special study, see e.g . schlim Salneck ‘u n lucky fellow’ (Selig 1767:77 — EY
shm ezalnik). See also W nlI 1956. #4 9 4 0 an d #3595 (m istnick ‘d u m b fellow’ 1847ff.).
176 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N EN TS

agent < T u etc. is n ot used w ith this root in T u rk is h );129 see also
discussion of Y skol’nik in section 5.1411 ab o v e .130
In addition to the Jew s, w ho constitute a relatively m obile elem ent in
the population, an innovative use o f -nik is also characteristic o f Slavic
slang an d the Slavic speech of m in o rity groups. F o r exam ple, -nik is used
instead of stPo -ak, -arz, -ka in th e language o f th e itin eran t Polish v end­
ors of C h ristian holy im ages (called ochwesnicy) from the K alisz govern­
m en t, e.g. Po dial kapdm k ‘in n k eep er’, trusnik ‘m ille r’, synternik ‘villain’,
dulniki ‘m atches’ ~ stPol karczmarz , m lynarz , laydak, zapalka\lil see also
Lvov U k, Po slg pazornik ‘sh o em ak er’ an d U k slg (C helm ) porutnik ‘ac­
cu ser’ (vs. slPo szewc, slU k vbuynuvac ) . 12‫ ־‬T a ta r B elorussian Lexis also
provide exam ples o f original use o f B r -nik, e.g. pitalniki ‘q u estio n ers’ (vs.
stBr p y ta l’nik ‘question m a rk ’), radasmk, rado- ‘b earer o f jo y ’, posm k ‘fast’
(vs. stBr postnik ‘one who fasts’ [c. 1830], U k postnyk ‘strict observer of
fasting’) .133 See also the discussion o f T a tB r milosnik in section 4.4121
ab o v e.134
6.32 T h e integ ratio n o f Slavic sounds in Y iddish. T h e Polish an d East
Slavic loans in Y iddish occasionally assum e form s w hich do n o t represent
the shortest phonetic p ath betw een the source an d targ et phonological
systems. T h e treatm e n t of CS1 *r’ in Y iddish is an instructive exam ple
of disparallelism betw een the phonological com p o n en t o f Y iddish
Slavicism s and the Slavic source languages. CS1 *r’ has undergone
changes in the three W est Slavic languages w ith w hich Y iddish has had
prolonged contact, becom ing U S o r[s’] betw een p , k and a vowel, c’ ~

i 9 ‫ ־‬I am grateful to W olf M oskovich for th e D o b ru d z a d ata; on J u d sa ka d ii, see W exler

1981b:130, 134,
130 Y iddish fam ily n am es o f Slavic origin freq u en tly h av e an im poverished inventory
of deriv atio n al suffixes com pared to the Slavic languages them selves; see also Y 's’kljar
(literally ‘glassw orker’) — U k \S’k ljar , Skljarenko , Skljarcuk , Skijars’kyj , Skijarnyj ; Y krasec
(literally 'ta ilo r') ~ U k K m v e c \ Km vcenko, Krnucuk, K m vcyk, K rauciv , etc. (R e d ’ko
1966:49); Y sm ol’er (literally ‘ta r b u rn e r') ~ U k Smoljar, Smoljarcuk, Sm oijars’kyj {op. at.
44).
131 G o rk a 1901, glossary.
132 E streich er 1903; Ludw ikow ski am d W alczak 1922; H o rb ac 1983:314, 319.
153 T h e exam ples are taken from A k in er 1980:145, 171, 303. P italniki is tra n sla ted by
A ntonovic specifically as ‘the two angels o f darkness who test the deceased on his
know ledge of Islam ic L a w ’ (1968:394). T h e term is attested in the earliest T a ta r B elorus­
sian m an u scrip ts d a tin g from the 17th century {ibid. 165).
134 See T a tB r m tlasniku (17th c) (A ntonovic 1968:244). O th e r exam ples o f innovative
suffix use are T a tB r m ukar ‘to rtu re r’ ( -- stB r mucycel’)— b u t see also O R m u k a n ‘to rtu re r’
(13th-14th c) (B arx u d aro v et al. 1975ff; A k in er 1980:400). H ow ever, B ondaletov asserts
that v.'ord-forrnation processes m R u ssian professional slang follow those o f the coter­
ritorial colloquial dialects (19 74-:9). T h e possibility o f distinctive use o f derivational m o r­
phology am o n g itin e ra n t an d sed en tary groups should be explored (see also W exler
1984). ’ '
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 177

/ between t and a vowel, and r word-finally;135 Cz r and Po rz [i, SJ; in

the East Slavic languages, V has either been retained as such (Russian),
undergone total (Belorussian) or syllable-final dispalatalization (U krai­
n ian), e.g. CS1 *krislo > So kreslo, Cz kfeslo, Po krztslo — Br kresla [rj ~
R kreslo, Uk krislo [r’J ‘arm chair’; CS1 *dbxork > R txor' vs. Uk txir
*skunk‫ ׳‬. W est Slavicisms with V appear in Yiddish with three reflexes;
(a) r: Y txojr ,skunk’156 ~ USo ichor, Cz ichor, Po tchorz\ Y breg ‘bank,
shore; border’ — Cz breh, Po brzeg; Y cojzmer tp — Po Sandomierz\ (b) z:
Y cmentaz ‘Christian cemetery’ ~ Po cmenlarz; (c) (r)£: Y piedbo(r)z tp —
Po Przedhorz.157 T he Yiddish reflexes z and rz are less common than r and
ap p e ar to be of relatively recent origin. O n the surface, Yiddish West
Slavicisms with r could theoretically have been borrowed from a West
Slavic language before the loss of V . A problem with this analysis is that
CS1 V first became f in Czech in the 12th century and r* in Polish in
the 13th century—i.e. prior to the massive Ashkenazic settlement in
those lands. Moreover, the bulk of the Slavic com ponents in Yiddish
w ere probably acquired after the 16th century. A few Polish words with
r in Polish Yiddish could be ascribed to East Slavic phonological in­
terference, e.g. Y rejfe tp < Uk Rijaiiv vs. Po Rzeszow.138 But this ex­
planation would hardly account for the num erous examples of r in
W estern Polish dialects of Yiddish—far from East Slavic influences.
H ence, the only explanation for the Yiddish preference for integrating Po
rz (an d Cz f) as r rather than as a fricative (even though / is native to Yid­
dish) is that Yiddish speakers first accepted West Slavicisms with r'
before the 12th century, retaining r as a match for later loans with Cz r
and P o rz. T his is tantam ount to saying that in certain features the Slavic
com ponent in Yiddish can assume a more conservative form than the
Slavic source etym a themselves. It is significant that the intense contact
betw een Yiddish and post-12th century Czech and post-13th century
Polish had little impact on the Yiddish “ etymological” strategy for in­
tegrating Slavicisms (see also discussion of re-lexification in sections 6.1,
6.3 above). This may be because the Slavic com ponent in early Yiddish
was already quantitatively great and the extent of Slavic-Yiddish bi­
lingualism (partly through the medium of Judeo-Slavic speakers?) so per-

1‫ ״‬I n non-final positions, U p p e r S o rb ian retain s r' (o n h o g rap h ically rj), e .g . U So

pjtkar ‘b a k e r ' ( — R ptkar', P o piekarz) b u t pjekarja gen sg.
1M G u tm a n records the v a ria n t txojai in th e Y iddish o f Piaski (1924:384-385).
117 Y rz is ap p aren tly influenced by Polish o rth o g rap h y as well as p ro n u n c ia tio n (see
G u tm a n 1924:382-383). F o r a discussion o f th e Y iddish d a ta , see M . W einreich
4:1973:278fr.
1J* G u tm a n 1924:386. S ev en teen th -cen tu ry Polish stereotypes o f Je w s speaking Polish
also h a v e r for P o rz (B rzezina 1979:27, 39). O n J e w ‫־‬P o r(l) for stP o o rth o g rap h ic rz, see
A ltb a u e r 1929:110.
178 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S

vasive. M oreover, th e Y iddish r-strategy m ay ultim ately have

pre-Y iddish roots— i.e. in Ju d eo -W est Slavic, a language w ith equally
heterogeneous Slavic com ponents. A Ju d eo -W est Slavic origin for Y r
( ~ C z f, Po rz) is ta n ta m o u n t to saying th a t Ju d eo -W est Slavic, unlike
C zech and Polish, m ight never have elim inated r’ from its phonological
inventory. B ut this last hypothesis is difficult to confirm since th e Ju d eo -
W est Slavic glosses stop at the 13th cen tu ry , roughly the p eriod of the
change in C zech .139
W 'ords w ith CS1 V in the Ju d eo -W est Slavic glosses preserved in the
R abbinical com m entaries com posed in H ebrew betw een the early 10th
an d m id-13th centuries are consistently spelled w ith r\ in these texts, the
H ebrew letters s an d 2 ■(s) are used to tran scrib e SI s an d z ! i respectively
(H ebrew lacks a separate graphem e for i) , b ut nev er CS1 *r’. Ii0 E x ­
am ples from texts w ritten by Jud eo -S lav ic speakers are: (early 13th c)
JW S I c r jfil ‘earth en w are crock’ ( — U So crjop vs. O C z [s]tfep, O Po
irzop)\w (m id-13th c) JW rSl gm bostP (w ith vocalization of the text), cor­
rected to *grebjsa^l + grebisa ‘strive, struggle fo r’ ( ~ O P o grzes'c);143 JW S I
mresa ‫( כ‬w ith vocalization in th e text) ‘n e t’ ( ~ O C z mheze, M o d C z m riie ,
Po m rzezd).lii E xam ples from texts w ritten by non-n ativ e speakers of
Slavic include: (llth -e a rly 12th c) JW S I prebond (w ith vocalization
o f the text) ‘ritually tre a te d (m e a t)’ ( ~ O C z tnebono)\li!1 JW S I dwwr
‘m o u n tain ra n g e ’ ( ~ O C z debf, O P o debrz ‘valley’, M odP o debrz, debry
‘gorge; hill, te rra in covered w ith sh ru b s’, U k debra ‘gorge, dale
overgrow n w ith thick forest; god-forsaken p la c e ’) .14‫ ־‬T h e exam ple of
JW S I wwldjm jrI + vladimir ~ + vol(o)dimir tp from the 12th century
w ritings of £fraim ben J a ’akov of B onn (1133-1196) has been derived by

133 Jew ish languages often differ from th e co territo rial non-Jew ish cognate dialects by
differen t rule o rd erin g , see e.g. th e chronological gap betw een C astilian and Ju d e z m o in
the execution of th e rule J > 0 (W exler 1977b:175fE).
140 In m o d ern H eb rew , z w ith a n ap ostrophe den o tes i . G o ld ’s suggestion th a t the
(contem porary') Y iddish m a n n e r of spelling c. z , d z in Slavic w ords by ts, z s, dzs respect­
ively m ig h t “ be explained by reference to K n a an ic [Judeo-W est Slavic] o rth o g rap h y ” is
prepo stero u s (1977:336).
1‫ י י‬H eb rew lacks -j&; hence, n o n-native w ords w ith -p are often spelled in m edieval
H ebrew w ith - j (though in m o d e m H eb rew , n on-final p is used).
112 B ed M oss (in K u p fe r a n d Lew icki 1956:221, 252). T h e a u th o r, p robably a native
o f the C zech lands, sp en t several years o f his early life in M eissen and R egensburg,
143 B&n A zriel (in K u p fer a n d Lew icki 1956:187; see also 181). T h e root is not listed
w ith sie in dictio n aries of O ld Polish.
144 Ibid. (in K u p fer a n d Lewicki 1956:184, 191).
145 G . ben J a h u d a (in K u p fe r an d Lew icki 1956:26-28).
145 K a ra (in K u p fe r an d Lew icki 1956:111, 116). T h e Jtsdeo-W esc Slavic term
translates H e raxdsim. I f this m ea n in g was stan d ard in Ju d eo -W e st Slavic, then it w ould
ap p ea r to be u n iq u e w ith in Slavic. T h e a u th o r was a n ative o f N o rth e rn France. F o r con­
tem p o ra ry m eanings, see K u rzo w a 1983:151.
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 179

K upfer and Lewicki from Po Wlodzimierz Wolynski, but the etymon could
ju st as well have been Uk Volodymyr Volyn'skyj.H7 See also discussion of
JW SI merq in section 4.1142 above.
Integration based on etymological rather than phonetic considerations
is also quite common in the treatm ent of West Slavic loans by East Slavic
languages, e.g. Cz f, Po rz > Uk, Br r, as in Cz kehof ma > Uk Ryhir,
Po dworzec (kolejowy) ‘(railroad) station’ > Uk dvirec'\ Po pacierz ‘prayer’
> Br paeery pi t. T he same is true of the relations between a Polish or
East Slavic source and other non-Slavic target languages, e.g. Kar
vykormt (et-) ‘uproot’ < Po wykorzeniac (unless < Br vykaraniac'),1.8 C ar­
pathian Rom skridlos ‘wing’ < Po skrzydlo, RRom trivika ‘boot, shoe’ <
Po trzewik. 149 It is only in Colonial G erm an (in Poland) that Po rz tends
to be integrated consistently along the shortest phonetic path, e.g.
(Scpolno-Krajenskie) przekomich ‘conceited’ < Po przekomy. In colonial
dialects of G erm an coterritorial with Czech and Sorbian, we find r—
possibly a reflection of the Sorbian (or Old Czech) pattern of pronuncia*
tion, e.g. G Kren ‘horseraddish’ (see section 6.213 above) .150 Hence, the
Yiddish strategy for integrating Slavicisms may be a relatively recent
developm ent, acquired in the context of Eastern European language con­
tacts. T he relative productivity of etymological integration in Yiddish
an d non-Jewish languages needs to be studied carefully.
It follows from the above discussion that a Judeo-Slavicism like
Orebonol + trebond could in theory have been processed into Y lrejb(a)n
anyw here on West Slavic territory, even after the change of CS1 V >
C z r and Po rz in Cz Ifibit and Po trzebic. It is only the attestation of this
term in a dated Judeo-W est Slavic text from the m id -llth century and
the appearance of the Yiddish Slavicism in Eastern G erm an dialects of
Y iddish which favor an early Sorbian or Czech etymon. This is tanta­
m ount to saying that Judeo-W est Slavicisms cannot readily be utilized by

147 A ccord in g to K upfer an d Lew icki, this tow n h ad a Jew ish settlem ent a t least by the
s ec o n d half o f the 12th cen tu ry (1956:272). N ote th at M . W einreich derives the Y iddish
n a m e o f the tow n, lodmir, from “ O R " Vladimir (4:1973:285).
144 See discussion in W exler 1980b.
14, M ikJosich 1:1872:51 a n d 3:1873:34 respectively.
Besides krm t Bellm ann records only one o th e r G e rm a n Slavicism w ith C Sl V , e.g.
G d ia l Krtfwak ‘(b a d ) kn ife', deriv ed from the an teced en t o f M o d C z kfivak *curved knife,
penknife* (1971:179-180, fn. 24; see also section 6.3 1 2 , fn. 115 above). T h e term is now
a tte ste d in G e rm a n in only tw o po in ts in N o rth ern M o rav ia (east o fO lo m o u c ). Bellm ann
c o n je ctu res th a t the term is recent b u t th e presence of r m ight im ply a b o rrow ing o f con•
s id erab le a n tiq u ity . It is also possible that affectively ch arged v o cab u lary (like 'b a d
k n ife ’) was not alw ays in teg rated in G e rm a n d ialects according to the phonetically
sh o rte st p a th . In an y event, the G e rm a n spoken in th e C zech lands, unlike the G erm an
d ialects in th e Polish lands, seem s to have developed a n o n -phonetic strategy, like Yid*
d ish , for in te g ra tin g Slavic loans.
180 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

historians of the Slavic languages.151 O ther sets of correspondences which

are not based on the shortest phonetic paths are Y, JW SI and possibly
even JESI g for W, ESI h, g ( < CS1 *g),li2 Y I for Po I |w ], Br w, Uk
v [v, wj ( < CS1 */),153J u d ^ f o r T u g (j];154 see also Y e for ESI 0 discussed
in section 6.3, fn. 99 above, and Y t for Br c , Po c in section 4.31 above.

6.4 Recovering the Hebrew, Judeo-Aramaic and other non-native corpus ofJudeo-
Slavic
All Jewish languages are receptive in principle to an unlim ited degree
of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic enrichment in all periods of their history.
The geographical patterns of these components in a Jewish language can
often reveal much about the relative chronologies and paths of diffusion
of the Semitic corpus and about drift between Jewish languages. 155 A
num ber of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic loans in Yiddish are restricted to
the territory east of the Elbe River. The Hebrew onomasiological
isoglosses suggest that Yiddish dialects to the west of the Elbe River may
have inherited a Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic corpus from the Judeo-
Romance substratum first introduced into the Rhineland around the
9th- 10th centuries, while the Yiddish dialects that crystallized in the bi­
lingual German-Slavic territories accepted the Hebrew and Judeo-
Aramaic terminology in use am ong Jewish speakers of West Slavic.156
T he Judeo-W est Slavic corpus of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic loans
tended to prevail in the Yiddish dialects that were brought to Poland and
the East Slavic lands. Ultimately, the hypothesis of a Judeo-Slavic corpus
of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic can only be verified by a thorough com­
parative study of the monolingual Hebrew texts composed by Jews hail­

151 H ence, M a z o n 's arg u m e n t lhal Ju d eo -W e si Slavic glosses prove th a t CS1 'g was
still retain ed as such is noi alto g eth er convincing (1927). Sec also discussion in fn. 152
following.
m See JW S I cmgwv/ + cermgov tp (first h alf o f the 13th c) (ben Jic x a k in K upfer and
Lewicki 1956:173-175) — Uk Cemihiv. T h e change o f CSI *g > h in U k ra in ia n can only
be d a te d very roughly betw een the m id -1 1th an d 15th cen tu ries (Shevelov 1979:350). See
also discussion o fJ e w -B r bogomotitm in section 5.1511 above.
IM F o r exam ple, JE S I bj'U + byt ‘he w as' (1635 V ilnius) — M o d B r byw\ B rH e ajtwlt
(1669) - •d (1488) m a < Li VytauUis (B .-C . K ac 1899:32; W exler 19773:137, 166).’ For
a d d itio n al exam ples, sec D ub n o v 1909:15. See also discussion in section 4.32 above.
Like the in teg ratio n o f Y iddish Slavicism s, B alkan J u d e z m o also shows multiple
reflexes for T u g [jl: g as in T u eglenmek > T u J u d mglentane ‘be am u sed , am use oneself
a n d 0 as in T u bogaziamak > T u J u d boazladtar ‘cut the th ro at o f (S tu d em u n d 1975). The
Balkan J u d e z m o d a ta reflect d isp arate chronological stra ta a n d /o r geographical sources
o f th e T u rkishism s. For a discussion o f the strategies for in te g ra tin g loans in
Wandtrsprachen, such as Jew ish languages a n d R o m a n i, see W exler 1984.
I‫ ״‬F o r a m ore d etailed discussion o f the m ethodology, see W exler 1981c.
156 L ow enstein’s discussion of H ebrew -A ram aic isoglosscs in Y iddish m akes no men­
tion of this possibility (1969).
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N EN TS 181

ing from both sides o f the p u tativ e isogloss b o u n d ary an d by co m paring

the H ebrew and Ju d e o -A ra m a ic com ponent in all the E u ro p e a n and
peripheral Jew ish languages, i.e. Y iddish, Ju d e o -R o m an ce , Ju d eo -
G reek — an d even J u d e o -Ira n ia n an d Ju d e o -T u rk ic . T h e C e n tra l and
E ast E u ro p ean p ro n u n ciatio n o f H e hzt as ix i vs. O W G Y 0 m ay also
have a basis in the Jud eo -S lav ic su b stra tu m .157 See also th e w estw ard
spread o f lt A sian ’’ Jew ish an th ro p o n y m s discussed in sections
3.34-3.342 above. In the B alkan areal, it is striking th a t the p ro n u n c ia ­
tion of H ebrew by speakers o f B alkan Ju d e z m o differs in a n u m b e r o f
details from the norm s believed to have o btained in the Ib e ria n P en in su la
u p to 1492-1498; this fact has yet to b e ex p lain ed .138
6.41 ‘C ircum cisio n 5, GY (m ost dialects), Swiss Y brismile, D uY bevies
hamiele (w ith the H ebrew definite article ha-) overlaps in N o rth B avaria
w ith bris A ustrian, E G dial, C z, SW and C W P o, Svk, H g Y sude ~
EY (E P 0 j ESI, R u m ) bris ‘circum cision’ ( < H e brit ‘co v en an t’, brit [ha-]
mlidh 'co n v en an t of [the] circum cision’, s^u d a k ‘m eal*).9^‫ ג‬In oth er areas,
sude is used in the m ean in g o f festive m e a l.160 T h e sim plex mildh seems
to be preferred in T u rk ic and A sian Jew ish languages, e.g. K araite,

157 See M . W einreich 1959, w ho believes th e resto ratio n of /x / for hs-t in Y iddish was
due to B abylonian Jew ish influence ra th e r th an to a Ju d eo -S lav ic read in g tradition
(1959:90-91, 96). A Slavic im petus b eh in d the re sto ra tio n o f H e het as /x / is m ore plausi­
ble; after all. o th er features o f Ira q i H eb rew p ro n u n c ia tio n , such as the differentiation
o f het an d xdf, :ajin an d \ l e j , do n o t ap p ea r in Y iddish. F o r fu rth e r criticism of the alleged
B abylonian connection, see D . K atz 1979. Ju d eo -S lav ic a n th ro p o n y m s consistently have
x for H e het. In early G e rm a n Y iddish, we often find instances o f s- replaced by in
H eb rew loans, e-g. G H e cjm kV +■cima fa < H e sim hah (in a d o cu m ent referring to events
in L ow er F ran co n ia a n d B aden, d ated 1298) (Salfeld 1898:48, 51; see also discussion in
M . W ein reich 2:1973:37-38; 4:52). E arly G e rm a n Y iddish ap p aren tly followed coter­
ritorial G e rm a n , w here s- is u n g ram m atical. M ax W einreich observed th a t c- for j ‫־‬- is also
typical o f in d iv id u al w ords in th e Y iddish spoken in W estern Slovakia an d K alisz, Poland
(2:1973:38). It m ay be th a t th e re sto ratio n of etym ological s- in th e H e b re w com ponent
o f G e rm a n Y iddish was b ro u g h t a b o u t e ith e r by an increase of borrow ings from H ebrew
o r by contact w ith Slavic-speaking Jew s, w ho w ould have had no difficulty p ronouncing
s-. N ote sachern ‘to tra d e ’, recorded for G e rm a n Y iddish (p resu m ab ly w ith [s‫ )?]־‬in the
late 17th century (vs. G schackern 'h ag g le, cheat in tra d e ') (K luge 1960). T h e G erm an
Y iddish facts w ere observed by J u stu s G eorge Schottelius (1663: b, 1612, E inbeck, n e ar
H a n n o v e r—«d. 1676, W o lfenbiittel, B raunschw eig) a n d C asp a r von Stieler (1691:
b .l6 3 2 -d .l7 0 7 E rfurt). O n G schachemy U k saxruvaty, see section 5 above.
158 W ith in B alkan Ju d ez m o , there are a n u m b e r o f phonological isoglosses affecting
the H eb rew read in g n o rm s w hich cu t the te rrito ry in to a largely Slavic N orthw est
(Y ugoslavia, R u m a n ia , E astern B ulgaria, N orthw est G reece) an d a largely non-
Slavicized S outheast (T u rk e y , re st of G reece) (B unis 1980:12). T h is topic also aw aits a
researcher.
159 T h o u g h mille is cited for G e rm a n slang (Philoparcho 1768:505).
160 Low enstein 1969:23, 25, m a p # 5 . See also H aly c K a r seuda 'b a n q u e t, celeb ratio n '.
A 19th cen tu ry Yiddish in fo rm a n t from S o u th east B ohem ia gave (in addition to sude),
bris (colloquial) and bris-mile (literary ) (K ra u s an d G old 1973:35., fn. 7). T h e geographical
details are given in L C A A J , #162050.
182 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

Judeo-G eorgian and Judeo-C hinese,161 and regionally in Balkan Judez-

mo (Saloniki, Yugoslavia, alongside general Balkan J u d brit mita).
6.42 ‘Dowry’. S, NW G, Alsatian, Swiss Y nedunje ~ -inje ~ rest of
the WY area (i.e. D u, Bohemian) neddn ~ NEY (Li, N Po, Br) nadan ~
SEY (Po, Uk) nadn, nodn ‘dowry’ ( < He nadan, JA ram rudunja*); isolated
reflexes of the Hebrew term also appear in the Yiddish of Transylvania,
parts of N orthern Austria and H ungary (south of the Neusiedler Sea)
and in the R hineland.162 T he existence of the Hebrew form in Dutch
Yiddish might be due to later importation from Eastern Yiddish (or to
borrowing from the local M arrano Portuguese?); nedunje, by virtue of its
appearance in territory that is surrounded on both sides by variants of
H e nadan could be regarded as a secondary development in W estern Ger­
man Yiddish (see O G H e rudunjatah ‘her dow ry’—Koln 1286).165 The
Hebrew etymon is found in all the Slavic lands, and in Oberpfalz,
Brandenburg and Pom erania—former Slavic areas of G erm any. The
Judeo-A ram aic cognate is attested in other Jewish communities, e.g.
Balkan Judezm o (where it also means ‘trousseau’) and medieval Egyp­
tian Judeo-A rabic (as ‘dow ry’).164 If K ar (HaJyi) nedan was not influ‫־‬
enced at some point by Eastern Yiddish norms, then the corpus of
Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic in Slavicized Yiddish might form a common
isogloss with Judeo-Turkic. See also discussion of nadan in section 6 .6,
footnote 214 below.
6.43 ‘Food that is neither milk nor m eat’. WY mini( — EY par(e)ve
‘food that is neither milk nor m eat’. See the discussion in section 3.133
above. The origin of the Eastern Yiddish term is unknown; parwe is also
cited (as an “ Eastern Yiddishism” ) for Dutch Yiddish (by Beem 1967).
6.44 ‘Prayerbook’. WY (G, Bohemian) tfile — EY sider 'prayerbook'
(SCarpathian Y sidurl with the native diminutive suffix) ( < He tfillah
‘prayer’, siddiir ‘arrangem ent’) .163 T he W estern Yiddish use of He tfillah
may be of Judeo-R om ance or even Judeo-G reek origin, since the term
is also found in this m eaning in Judeo-Italian and Balkan Judezm o (see
discussion in section 3.14 above).

161 Baskakov et al. 1974; M oskovich a n d T u k a n 1982:22 an d W exler 1985a re­

spectively.
See B em anek 1965, m a p # 7 8 ; Low enstein 1969:20, 24, m ap # 4 ; K ra u s and Gold
1973:36. F o r nedunje-forms, see LC A A J, # 175030.
141 S te m and H o en ig er 1888.
164 See W exler 1981 b: 119.
165 U . W einreich 1965:20. Sidurl is also given by a 19th cen tu ry S outheast Bohemian
in fo rm an t (K ra u s an d G o ld 1973:34). T h e Slavic languages offer no preced en t for stddur
in this m ean in g , sec U k motytvennyk ‘p ra y e rb o o k ’ < molytva ‘p ra y e r’, also Po modtttewmk,
C z m odtui knitka ‘p ra y e rb o o k ’. For the d istrib u tio n of H e siddiir an d tfillah in G erm an
Y iddish, see Beranek 1965, m ap # 7 7 . O n th e d istrib u tio n o f ■I as the dim inutive suf-
(ix, see section 6.54 below.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 183

6.45 ‘R itual u n d e rg a rm e n t for m ales’. G Y , N EY (L i, Br) arbekanfes ~

A ustrian, B ohem ian, H g an d EY (SPo, LIk) ced'a’kl, la(j)bcedeiakl,
lajbcudekl (native, literally ‘[body] covering’) ~ N E G , N P 0 Y cicekanfes
‘m ale ritual u n d e rg a rm e n t1 ( < H e \ r b a c kanfot ‘four fringes’, c id t ‘tas-
sle’) .166 In the a rea betw een C zech Y iddish and E ast Slavic Y iddish we
also find reflexes of Po-ESl serdak (see section 6.54 b elo w ).167 T o ju d g e
from the geography of the v arian ts, we w ould suppose th a t arbekanfes,
found in the widely separated areas o f G erm an y and N o rth east Y iddish,
m ay be am ong the oldest form s, while the n ative G erm an ic form s in the
center are innovations;163 Y iddish blends w ith serdak found in the Slavic
lands m ay be old loans from Judeo-S lavic. T h e v arian t cicekanfes also oc­
cupies a uniquely Slavic area, e.g. covering C e and N G Y a n d N E PoY
(to a point ju st west of Bialystok), and extending as far south as the area
below W arsaw and one locale ju s t below M ukaceve in the C arp ath ia n
U k ra in e .169 O n the synonym ous Y lajbserdak, etc., see section 6.54 below.
6.46 ‘Search for leaven at Passover tim e ’- W Y xomec batln ~ EY bojdek
xomec zajn ‘search for leaven at Passover tim e ’ ( < H e hamec ‘leav e n ’,
bodeq ‘inspecting’, battel ‘canceling’, native zajn ‘b e ’). T h e isogloss for
these H ebraism s runs p re tty m u ch to the w‫׳‬est of K rakow and then goes
due north; E astern H u n g a ry goes to g eth er writh W estern Y iddish. T h e
periphrastic construction w7ith zajn appears twice in W estern Y iddish te r­
ritory, once as xomec bojdek zajn (N W G erm an y , and along the Baltic coast)
an d once as bojdek xomec zajn (south of the N eusiedler Sea, N A u stria and
H u n g a ry ).170
6.47 ‘Slav’, See discussion in sections 1, fn. 17; 4, fn. 19; 6.13, fn. 49.
6.48 ‘Sunflow er’. T h e L C A A J , # 099030 shows th a t isolated points in

166 L ow enstein 1969:23, 26, m ap # 6 . See also section 5.25 above. O n c1a t 7 sec section
7.14 below . Y arbekanfes is based on the H ebrew construct (expressing a genetival relation­
ship), ra th e r than the expected absolute *arba? knafot (see Beem 1967). B eranek derives
cedakl (his zidakt) from P o serdak on th e assu m p tio n th at c- replaces s- w hich is u n g ra m ­
m atical in G e rm a n (an d G e rm a n Y iddish?), b u t ce- is best derived from cu ’to 5 (1962:70).
167 T h e term is not cited on L o w en stein ’s m ap (1969. m ap # 6 ).
168 In th e case of doublets w hich consist o f n ative Y iddish and H ebrew (a n d /o r Slavic)
elem ents ‫ י‬an effort should be m ade £ 0 d eterm in e w hich v a ria n t is the oldest. See also the
exam ple o f ‘p o rg e ’ discussed in section 6.16 above, (native) ranign ("‫ ׳־‬stY rejnzkn 'clean,
p u rify ') ~ (JS1) trejb(er)n — (JF r) porsn ~ (H e) menakern . menaker zajn (the H e b re w term
is found now in E astern Y iddish; see also B eran ek 1965, m ap # 9 ). T h e first H ebrew ' term
is un u su al in that it is n o t co n ju g ated periphrastically; n e ith e r H e b ra ism is included in
U . W ein reich 1968. O n perip h rastic in teg ratio n of H ebrew verbal elem ents, see section
4.33 above. A p erip h rastic co n stru ctio n u sin g th e n ative Y iddish auxiliary zajn ‘b e ’ is
m ore typical o f E astern th a n o f W estern Y iddish dialects. F o r discussion in Y iddish and
o ther Jew ish languages, see W exler 1974b; 1980a; 1981b:121f fn. 38, 124.
1ee L ow enstein 1969:26, m ap # 6 .
170 See Low'enstem 1969:21, m ap # 2 , L C A A J , #196060 an d section 6.45, fn. 168
above.
184 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

East Galicia and Central and Northeast Belorussia (e.g. at Pidhajci,

Rohatyn; OrSa, Sklow, Vicebsk) agree in using Y levone ‘m oon’ < He
bvanah to designate ,sunflower’; in East Galicia the term appears in com­
pounds, e.g. levone-caike (Rohatyn), Uvone-blum (Pidhajci). There is no
smooth explanation for why these two widely separated Yiddish dialect
areas which do not influence each other should have such minute
parallels. Since both areas had Judeo-Slavic-speaking communities as
late as the early 17th century, it might not be unreasonable to see this
use of the Hebraism ‘m oon’ for ‘sunflower’ as a continuation of coter­
ritorial Judeo-East Slavic specch patterns. T his topic requires further
study.
For other pairs of terms of Semitic origin, for which precise mapping
is presently lacking, see U. W einreich 1965:19-20. See also the isogloss
for WY ‘o'm — EY dav(e)nen which cuts G erm any roughly into a western
and eastern block, approximately at a line running from H am burg due
south (see section 3.3111 above).

6.5 Yiddisk-Slavic and Hebrew-Slavic blends

There are a few expressions in Yiddish (one of which is shared by
Judeo-W est Slavic) and one expression in Slavic which consist of a Ger­
manic (i.e. Yiddish) or Hebrew component and a Slavic component, e.g.
JW SI bmwjlnV + bamvelna ~ -Una; Y bavl; cvu(j)ak; dobre-mazl\ lajbserdak,
pamelex; sejfer-pral’nik; Uk pejsai. These terms attest to the bilingual
character of the Jewish communities in the West Slavic and Belorussian
lands. An unexplored question is whether Judeo-Slavic or Yiddish
speakers were the originators of the blends. See also discussion in section
7.3 below.
6.51 JW SI bmwjln‫נ‬. See sections 6.1 and 4.1141 above.
6.52 EY cvu(j)ak. See discussion in section 6.312 above.
6.53 Y dobre-mazl. The compound is used in the m eaning of ‘luck’
(humorous) < SI (e.g. Po, Br, Uk dobry[j], etc. ‘good’) + H e mazzal
‘luck’. It is unclear if this term was ever used in any Slavic languages as
well, though compounds consisting of He mazzal and Y Slim ‘b ad ’ are (see
section 6.314, fn. 125 above).
6.54 Y lajbserdak, etc. I know of only one Yiddish-Slavic blend used
both in Yiddish and Slavic (Polish and East Slavic). T hat term is Br lap■
surduk ‘urchin; Jew (pej); torn clothing, rags’;17' Smolensk R lapsardak
‘Jewish dress’,172 Uk lapserdak ‘kind of long overgarment worn by male

171 N osovif 1870.

177 D obrovol'skij 1914. H istorically, this dialcci once shared in n o vations with the
B elorussian dialects to the west.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S 185

Jew s; ritu al shirt w ith four tassles’;173 P o lapserdak ‘Jew ish overgarm ent;
beggar, ragged fellow; riff-raff; rag; Jew ish la d ’. 174 T h e source is Y
lajbserdak ‘ritual u n d e rg a rm e n t w o rn by O rth o d o x Jew ish m ales’ < lajb
‘b o d y ’ + U k (?) sardak, serdak ‘sleeveless shirt w orn by C a rp a th ia n
m o u n ta in e e rs’ (first attested in Slavic in the 16th c e n tu ry ),175 T h e Y id ­
dish blend has a wholly n ative c o u n terp art in EY lajbcudekl, etc. (see sec‫־‬
tion 6.45 above), w hich could be construed as either the m odel for o r the
loan translation o f the Y iddish-Slavic b lend. See also O C zY s crdqjU
+ serdekl ‘w aistcoat; jack et w ith o u t a rm s’ (P rag u e 1619),176 w hich also
appears w ith the d im in u tiv e suffix; b u t if - / dim is atypical o f C zech Y id­
dish (see discussion in section 7.110, fn. 66 below), we w ould have fur­
th er support for the hypothesis th a t the term is ultim ately from a
U k rain ian Jew ish m ilieu. T h e adoption of a native Slavic clothing term
is rare in Y iddish an d raises the question of w hether P o-U k serdak m ight
n o t have been a borrow ing from a form o f Jud eo -S lav ic (on the use o f
T u rk ic clothing term s in Slavic an d Y iddish, see sections 5.4-5.413
above; see also Po kucza in section 5.163 above). T h e phonetic sim ilarity
of serdak an d cudek(l) m ay also have facilitated the creation o f th e blend.
It is a m a tte r of speculation w h eth er Slavic-speaking Jew s preferred the
varian t lajbserdak over lajbcud€k(l);177 in any event, Slavic languages show
no trace of the latter form . T h e hypothesis of the originally “ non-
Y iddish” origin o f lajbserdak m ay find su p p o rt in the fact th a t some
dialects of Y iddish also have the pejorative m eanings found in Slavic,
e.g. see Bialystok Y lajbserdak ‘tattere d g a rm e n t? rag am u ffin ’;178 ‘long
male coat, usually of cheap m a te ria l’.179 O n the H eb raism arbekanfes used
in E astern Y iddish an d in the non-Slavicized W estern Y iddish dialects o f
G erm an y an d H olland, see section 6.45 above.

173 H rin cen k o 1907-1909. Bilodid et al. 1970-1980 define the term as ‘old fashioned
long ov e rg a rm e n t w o rn by Polish an d G alician J e w s '.
174 O n th e use of th e te rm in Polish, see A ltb au er 1932:76. See also Je w -P o lapserdaczka
f (B rzezina 1979:87). See also Y serdak ‘corset, b o d ice’, cited by H ark av y 1928.
:7S O n th e diffusion o f th e U k ra in ia n te rm to Polish by the 16th cen tu ry at the latest,
see B ru ck n er 1957. T h e possible diffusion of a C a rp a th ia n U k ra in ia n term to B ohem ian
Y iddish has no p arallel in U k rain ian -P o lish linguistic relations. T h e term is not know n
in C zech to th e best o f m y know ledge; see also discussion o f O B rY med in section 6.3,
U k ra in ia n dialects (Bojkiw, L em k ian , S o u th ern S an) have isjbyk ‘sleeveless vest usually
w o rn in s u m m e r’ (J. R ie g er 3:19B2, m ap 137 an d p. 68).
),s See L a n d a u an d W ach stein 1911:26 (of th e text). Pech 1948 cites cidakl ‘am ulet,
ta lism a n ’ for (Jew ish-?) C zech.
1‫ ״‬D u rin g th e shift from a Jew ish language to a n on-Jew ish cognate, speakers o f the
obsolescent J ew ish language m ay p re fe r n on-Jew ish v a ria n ts closer to the form er Jew ish
n o rm s. See the G erm an exam ples cited in section 7.312, fn. 125 below . A ltb a u e r assum es
Polish accepted Y maxlojkes ‘q u a rre l’ (should be m axbjke ‘ib ’ > Po machlojka) because of
form al an d sem antic sim ilarity w ith machtowac ‘to sw indle’ (1950:127).
178 H arkav.y 1928 (wrho also gives synonym ous lajbcudak , lapserdak).
178 N evadovski 1946:33.
186 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EA RLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S

6.55 Y parmlex. Y iddish has two term s involving Slavic com ponents for
‘slow’— the Io an b len d pamelex ‘slow, ta rd y ’ and the loan pavol’e ‘slow(ly),
cautiously; take c are’.180 Pamelex consists o f a Slavic p reposition/ prefix
po- ‘by, alo n g ’ + native -melex ‘slow ’ (see G allmahlich ‘g ra d u a l’), com ­
bin ed on the m odel of C z pomalu, U So, Po pomalu ‘slowly, g rad u ally ’.
U . W einreich has suggested th a t Y pamelex results from the blending of
*-melex w ith Po pomalu ‘slowly, g rad u ally ’ (1955:604-605), b u t a Sorbian
o r C zech etym on cannot be excluded since both the Ioanblend a n d the
Slavic source m odel are attested in G erm an dialects spoken on C zech te r­
ritory, e.g. N C zG pumdlich ~ SC zG bum db.1s1 T h e ap p earan ce o f the
Ioanblend in both G erm a n dialects and in Y iddish (w here the w ord has
literary status) suggests an early form ation in C zech o r S orbian Y iddish
(see also section 6.2 ab o v e).*85
6.56 U kp ejsa c. T he Y iddish ( < H eb rew )-U k rain ian blen d pejsac ‘Jew
w ith ritu al sid eb u rn s’ is attested in G alician U k ra in ia n .183 It is unclear
if the term was used in Y iddish. See also section 6.311 above.
6.57 EY sejfer-pral(’) n 1k. A n interesting exam ple of a possible East
Slavicism fused w ith a H eb raism th a t denotes a concept intim ately b o und
u p w ith Jew ish life is EY sejfer-pral(’)n ik ‘thick book for b eatin g on the
read in g desk in the synagogue in o rd er to restore quiet before p ra y e r or
after the serm o n ’, sejfer pranik ‘book of the w ash-beetle’ (used jo cularly
for ‘book o f law s’) . 184 Both com ponents are used indepen d ently in Y id ­
dish, e.g. sejfer ‘religious b o o k ’ ( < H e sefzr ‘b o o k ’) a n d p ra l’nik ‘laundry-
b eetle’ ( < GS1 *pbrati ‘b eat, wash; la u n d e r’ + -nikb agent). T h e fo rm a­
tion of a derived n o u n w ith -nik from this root to denote laundry-beetle
seems to be lim ited to E ast and South Slavic languages an d to (East?)
dialects of Polish, e.g. U k dial p ra l’nyk, R p r a l’nik, Po dial pralnik, C hSl
pralm kh (see also Bg dial fjralnja);larj elsewhere in Slavic the n o u n appears
180 Y p a v o l’e could be from Po pow oli adv (vs. powoiny adj). b u t there a re also parallels
in the o th e r W est Slavic languages, e.g\ C z (M o ra v ia n ) povole ‘freedom ’, U So powclny
,slow ' (also ‘h a rd to raise; p lian t; q u iet, co m fo rtab le5). T h e change o f W Sl po- to Y par
m ay be a (later) low ering of unstressed 0 u n d e r the influence o f B elorussian akan'e. B ut
there are also Y iddish dialects w here H e 0 > a. e.g. p arts of.W est (G e rm a n ) and C en tra l
Y iddish (P oland) have gajes ‘n o n -Jew s’, sgajes ‘the p e asa n try ’ ( < Y dos ‘th e ’ -1- H e goj
‘n a tio n ’ + Y -es < H e -ut ab stract suffix) (H e r 2 0 g 1965:57-58, 179 a n d m ap # 3 ,1 5 ; U,
W einreich 1965:26). O n H e gdjim > see also section 7.110, fn. 72 below .
Idl R ip e c ’ka 1963:156. T h e Slavic loan is also attested in the G erm an dialects of
P ru ssia, P o zn an , Schlesw ig-H olstein, Silesia, B av aria an d A ustria. A ccording to
Bielfeldt, G bum ah ( < Polish) is first attested in th e 18th cen tu ry (1965:337). See also
M . Wreinreich 2:1973:301.
182 C uriously, H u n g a ria n R o m a n i seem s to h av e a n analogous Ioanblend in poloko ,
polofa 'slow ly' < iokoi ‘slow ’ (M iklosich 2:1872:49).
183 Frank□ 1907:110.
184 A ltb au er 1977 [ 1973a] :12, fn. 37 fo r th e first v arian t; H ark av y 1928 for the second.
185 B ilodid et al. 1970-1980 define p r a l’nyk as person w ho w orks in a la u n d ry ’ vs.
pranyk, prac ‘la u n d ry -b e e tle '.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC A ND EARLY W EST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 187

w ith the -c suffix, e.g. U So, B r, U k prac, Cz prac, pracka, Po pracz. Stut-
chkoff also cites Y prac in the Jew ish m eaning ‘book for beating in the
synagogue’,186 b u t the w ord is also know n in the m ean in g of ‘laundry-
b eetle'. C learly, Y p ra l’nik can n o t be derived from a W est Slavic source;
b u t the identification of an E ast Slavic source presents some difficulty.
In B elorussian Y iddish (the dialect for w hich we have the best
geographical detail), p ra l(’) n ik co-exists w ith the Slavicisms p ra n (’)n ik ( <
B r [ajprdnik, pran[n]ik < p ra i’nik) a n d prac and w ith n ative klaper ( < klapn
‘knock on, ra p ’) . 187 In B elorussian Y iddish, the m ajority form is
p ra n (’) ik , w ith p ra l(’) n ik reco rd ed sporadically in L ith u a n ia and L atvia
(adjacent to B elorussian dialects w ith prajnik w ith j < I 1) an d in isolated
p a rts of east-central B elorussia (i.e. to the n o rth an d east of M ahilew ).
In B elorussian, p ra l’nik itself is rare , now found only in a few locales in
the eastern fringe of th e southw est corner of the speech te rrito ry — in
o ther w ords, far from the presen t-d ay location o f BrY p ra l(’)n ik it1s— and
in the Sejny dialects o f B elorussian in P o la n d .189 In U k ra in ia n , pral'nyk
is recorded only at occasional points in the C ernihiv, K iev, K iro v o h rad ,
S um y, V o ly n ’ an d Z ytom yr d istricts— i.e ., rarely adjoining th e present-
day B elorussian frontier. T h e m ajority forms in U k ra in ia n are varian ts
o f prac and pranyk. 190 T h e a re a o f South B elorussia and th e N o rth U k rain e
in w hich p ra l’nik ~ p ra l’nyk sporadically ap p ear historically form ed the
K iev-Palessian dialect area, p rio r to its split, by the 15th c en tu ry , into
“ South B elorussian” an d “ N o rth U k ra in ia n ” dialects. T h e distrib u tio n
o f the Y iddish, B elorussian a n d U k rain ian d ata suggests th at p ra l(’)n ik,
etc. in all three languages, is a n old form . I w ould suggest two possible
sources for EY p ra l(’)nik. (1) Y iddish speakers m ight have picked u p the
term w hen they first en tered the southw est corner o f the K iev-Palessian
lands in the late 14th cen tu ry (see also discussion o f Y med an d general
E Y ozere discussed in sections 6.1, fn, 31 an d 6.3 above). B ut a problem
w ith this view is th at the southw est corner o f southw estern Belorussia, a
U k rainian-speaking area in the m ain , now has prac p re d o m in a n tly .191 At
first glance, NWTU k prac m ight ap p ear to be a relatively recent in tro d u c­

186 19 5 0, # 620a (u n d e r gebethojz): n ativ e Y suiklaper is also cited in this m eaning. B ut

see Y prac ‘b eater; b e etle ’ in H a rk a v y 1928.
1(37 U . W ein reich 1969:98, m a p # 9 .
186 B elorussian a n d N orthw est U k ra in ia n d a ta are ta k e n from the D A B M 1963, m ap
# 252. T h o u g h th e D A B M gives no p r a l’n ik from th e H o m e l’ district (S outheast
Belorussia)., th e form is reco rd ed th ere in the m ean in g ‘la u n d ry -b e e tle ’ (A nicenka et al.
1978:211-212). '
189 Zdancew icz 1964:1231. B ut in East B ialystok B elorussian, pranik an d prac a re both
attested (G linka et ai. 1980:89),
9°‫ נ‬D etails are given in M atv ijas 1984‫־‬, m ap #171.
191 In O ld B elorussian, -ac was m ore productively used w ith verb stem s than at present
(see V jarxow 1965:76, 83).
188 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

tion from neighboring Polish, but a Polish origin is not altogether convin­
cing since the term also appears at points in the Minsk and Homel’
oblasts where a Polish impact is not very likely. Hence, prac might have
been the variant in Southwest Belorussia at the time of Jewish settlement.
T his would leave us with the possibility of assuming (2) that Y pral(’)nik
was acquired very early during the Ashkenazic settlement from Jewish
speakers of East Slavic in Northwest or C entral Belorussia since the form
is attested in Belorussian Yiddish around Mahilew and V ilnius—two
areas in which monolingual Slavic-speaking Jews could still be observed
as late as the first half of the 17th century (see sections 4.3-4.33 above).1”
T he fact that pran(n)ik appears throughout Northeast Belorussia (i.e. in
an area which, together with the contem porary Russian dialects to the
north and east of Belorussia, originally formed the Polack-RjazaiT
dialect grouping of East Slavic that existed up to about the 15th
century—to the north of the Kiev-Palessian dialect area) ,193 suggests that
the form might have predated the settlement of Jew s in Northeast
Belorussia. T hus, at the time that JESI pral'nik was being acquired by
Yiddish speakers in Northwest and C entral Belorussia, the coterritorial
Belorussian speakers were probably already using the variant pran(n)ik.
Moreover, it is striking that the geographical distribution of the suffixes
-/a n d -nik in the term for ‘laundry-beetle’ has a replique in other words,
e.g. forms with -nik like cape!’nik, padxvatnik, uxvatmk ‘prongs (reinforced
hook on a handle for grasping hot pans)’ appear in C entral Western
Belorussia in the extreme northeast (north of Vicebsk), the Mahilew area
and in the Brest-Pinsk-Hrodna areas.194 Ju st as with pral’nik, etc. these
roots are combined far more rarely with -nik than with the other suffixes,
e.g. -c, 0 . W hether EY pral(’)nik was taken from the Kiev-Palessian
dialect or from Judeo-East Slavic spoken in the Kiev-Palessian or Polack-
R jazan’ lands, its antiquity is vouched for by the fact that Yiddish seems
to be the only language in the East Slavic lands where the derived noun
retains the original m eaning ‘beat’.195 See also discussion of Smolensk R
iabus in section 3.3112 above.

6.6 Bilingual Slavic-Yiddish and monolingual Slavic folklore of the Ashkenazic

Jews
Bilingual Slavic-Yiddish and monolingual Slavic proverbs, exorcisms
and folk-songs of the Ashkenazic Jews are attested from the Belorussian,
JS2‫ ״‬T h e app earance o f pTQl(')nik in the Y iddish o f contiguous L ith u an ia and Latvia
could also be d u e to la te r R u ssian influence (see R pral'nik).
198 For details on early B elorussian dialect fo rm atio n , see W exler 1977a:55ff.
194 See the D A B M 1963, m ap #251 an d A vanesaw et a i 1968:257 an d fn. 2. There
a re additional dou b lets not m apped by the D A B M , e.g . kamik ~ karai ‘chastiser* (s «
V jarxow 1965:76).
195 See d a ta in V a sm e r 2:1955:426.
 JU D EO -SLA V IC A ND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 189

U k rain ian and Polish lands. Some of the motifs (e.g. enforced conscrip­
tio n ) and the presence of Russian words point to a 19th century origin
for most of the m aterial.1,4 However, Slavic songs with Jewish religious
m otifs, which were usually found only in scattered rural areas of the
U k ra in e and Belorussia, could in theory pre-date the 19th century. 197 It
m a y be significant that many Slavic folk-songs, proverbs and exorcisms
a re now unknown to the coterritorial Christian population;19' while these
m aterials could very well be archaic Christian materials that happen to
be preserved now only am ong Jew s, I would not rule out the possibility
o f a Jew ish authorship199—though it would be prem ature to claim, as
B jadulja does, that these materials prove the existence of an “ old Judeo-
Belorussian dialect” .200
U ntil detailed descriptions of Jewish-Slavic speech are produced for all
th e Slavic lands (see the definition of type 4 in section 2 above),201 it is
safest to attribute grammatical errors in the Slavic component of these
folklore materials to Yiddish substratal influence; an example would be
th e loss of case in the Slavic component (there is almost no case marking
in Yiddish), sis in Jew-Uk til’ko pravda skazaty ‘only speak the tru th ’ (for
stU k pravdu acc sg), do Jerulolaim ‘to Jerusalem ’ ( < Y jmiiolaem < He
pruidlajim — colloquial Uk Jerusalymu gen);502 Jew-R(?) mi tarn box xvalili
‘we praised God there’ (recorded in Warsaw) (for stR boga acc sg).203

'** U . W einreich 1950. Exam ples m ay be found in G in z b u rg an d M arek 1901

(n u m b e rs # # 6 , 15, 17, 19, 41, 89, 93, 118, 216, 351-353, 371-372, 374); M aggid 1910;
P rilucki 1:1911 (n u m b ers # # 5 - 6 , 34. 37-40, 53-54, 67, 71-72. 95-96); A nilovii 1912;
H o ro v ic 1912; Boroxov 1913:65 ( # 454a); B jadulja 1921 (section rep rin ted in K arskij
1925:22); G o ld b erg 1928; B erehovs’kyj 1930; S tankevif 1933b; B rutzkus 1945.
1,7 E xam ples are from the K a u n as an d M ahilew g o v ern m en ts, V ilnius, M insk, Ljady,
P o d il’ja , Bila C erk v a, U m a n ', K re m ja n e c ', etc.
‫ •יי‬E xam ples are the Belorussian proverbs listed by H orovic 1912:123 (e d ito r's note),
ihe m ixed Slavic-Y iddish song from B arysaw , Belorussia, published by G oldberg
1928:596, an d c h ild re n 's co u n tin g songs from th e S am ogitia district o f L ith u an ia
discussed by B rutzkus 1945. M acaro n ic bilingual poetry is also fo u n d in the neighboring
Slavic c o m m u n ities, see e .g . 19th cen tu ry B elorussian-Polish poetry.
A co m p arativ e study o f folklore am o n g Slavs an d Slavicized Jew s in all areas w ould
be m ost w elcom e. Skudnicki theorizes th a t <111 Slavic-Y iddish folksongs w ere firs( sung
by J e w s in a m onolingual Slavic form (1935:115).
1921:35.
201 A t present we have only th e b rief observations o f A ltb au er 1929; 1934; R ozcnlal
1954:213-214; G reen 1969:224, 239; M . W einrcich 1:1973:89; 3:78, 85-87; 4:254. T h e re
are p e jorativ e ep ith ets for Jew ish-Slavic speech in a n u m b e r of languages, see e .g . Uk
izyndzykaty ‘talk (U k ra in ia n ) in a Jew ish m a n n e r' (H rin Je n k o 1907-1909), Po iydtacztnie
‘Jew ish m a n n e r o f talking Polish' (G reen 1969:224, 239). It is u n clear if U So iidowac,
tid itc ‘speak like a J e w ’ (Pfuhl 1866) show d isd ain for the proficiency of the Jew s in U p ­
per S o rb ian o r G e rm a n (see also iidowlcina ,Jew ish la n g u a g e' [w hich?]— ibid.).
707 B ereho v s'k y j 1930:44 an d p. 2 (sep pg).
I<‫ ״‬P rilucki 1:1911, # 4 0 . H ebrew w ords in th e 15th-16th cen tu ry East Slavic text of
Fedor th e J e w a re also not declined, e.g . m tiu xeruvtmi ‘am o n g c h eru b s' (P salm 36)
190 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S

M orphological peculiarities th at c an n o t b e ascribed to Slavic m ay be the

result of internal leveling, e.g. a “ B elorussian” text contains the form
nohami ‘by feet’204 vs. stBr nahami. T h e Jew ish-B elorussian form could be
overgeneralization from nohi n o m pi, or tak en from a B elorussian dialect
other th an the standard; I am ig n o ran t o f th e Jew ish-B elorussian stress
position. T h e re is a stro n g er likelihood th a t som e lexical deviations have
their origin in a Judeo-S lav ic su b stratu m . C o n sid er the m ixed Slavic-
Y iddish song collected in th e B arysaw area (n e a r M insk) in 1928 by
G oldberg, w hich contains th e following “ R u ssia n ” - “ B elorussian” stan-
2 a: Idjotjankel s bogomoliem, pejsami trjasjot... “A skazite, dobri ljudze, do u
vas za klapot?” ‘Ja n k l goes w ith phylacteries and shakes w ith his
sidelocks..,’ “ O h say, kind folk, w hat is all this com m otion with
y o u ? ” .205 T he stanza contains a Ju deo-S lavic item , bogomoliem inst sg
‘phylacteries’, also en co u n te red in Slavic non-Jew ish sources (see discus­
sion in section 5.1511 above). It is in terestin g th a t this Judeo-S lavicism
appears in a text alongside Y iddishism s such as ja n k l m a ( < Y ja n k l <
H e j a ’-aqov) and pejsami 1ritu a l sidecurls of observ an t m ale J e w s ’ ( < Y pe-
jes < H e p P o i). T h e Slavic com ponent has b o th B elom ssian an d R ussian
features, probably a reflection o f th e secondary R ussification of an
original “ B elorussian” te x t.206 E xam ples are “ B r” ljudze ‘folk’ — Br
ljudzi vs. R ljudi ; klapot ‘co m m o tio n ’ ~ N W B r klapota 207 vs. stB r klopat,
R xlopoty pi t; “ R ” bogomoliem ~ R bog- vs. B r bah-. N ote also th e sibilant
confusion in skazite vs. stR skazite, colloquial (b u t n o t stSoviet) B r skazace
‘say ’ pi im p er, do vs. stR cto [sto], stB r sto ‘w h a t’ (see also discussion in
section 6.7 below). T h e confusion o f s, z, c, dz an d s, z , c, dz is
characteristic of B elorussian and B elorussian Y iddish dialects (b u t n o t of
the two languages as a w hole)2'JS an d th e stereotyped B elorussian speech

(S peranskij 1907). F o r a possible Jew ish -C zech exam ple, see sedeti sive, n o ted in section
5.124, fn. 34 above— if sive is fem inine - Y five; it resem bles n e u te r nouns of the type
kafe ‘chick en ’. T h e use of the n o m in ativ e sin g u lar o f a-stem s after transitive infinitives
is also attested in N o rth R u ssia n dialects (e.g. posel zemlja. paxat’ ' he w ent to plough the
la n d ’}, b u t this p ro b ab ly has n o th in g to do w ith the Jew ish -U k ra in ia n feature (for details,
see T im b erlak e 1974).
2"■' A nilovic 1912:153.
sos G o ld b erg 1928:596. W e have tra n slite ra te d th e term from G o ld b e rg ’s Y iddish
spelling. T h e use of the le tte r g m ig h t reflect e ith e r R g o r B r g T h e sang is said to be
rarely sung by C h ristian s (w here, p resu m ab ly , it lacks th e Y iddish com ponent).
206 See also Stankevic 1933b:186. A ccording to th e 1970 census figures, the B arysaw
a re a (to th e east of M insk) now boasts a relatively low percentage of R ussian-B elorussian
bilingualism (see Itogi 1973). O n the preference o f Soviet B elorussian a n d U k ra in ia n Jew s
for R u ssian over the local Slavic lan g u ag e, see W exler 1981b:131-132, fn. 59.
207 M ackevic el at., 2:1980.
sns O n th e relative chronology o f the dev elo p m en t, see U . W ein reich 1952; W exler
1977a:109-l 11. In early 20th cen tu ry stereotyped Jew ish -P o lish speech from the Lvov
a re a, sib ilan t confusion appears to be restricted to individual lexical item s— w hich is also
tru e of c o territo rial Polish (B rzezina 1979:39).
 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC CO M PO N E N T S 191

o f Jew ish characters in 18th cen tu ry B elorussian interm edies, e.g. Jew -B r
az ‘ev en ’ (1787 ~ stBr az ).w9 F or B elorussian Y iddish, the p henom enon
covers roughly the area o f Polack and V icebsk up to the territo ry west
o f Sm olensk, and south o f M insk, Svislac a n d B ab ru jsk .210 In B elorus­
sian dialects, sibilant confusion characterizes the M insk, M ahilew ,
B abrujsk and Svislac areas an d the Bielsk region (n ear Bialystok) in
P o la n d .211 In both B elorussian an d B elorussian Y iddish the feature is
currently in recession. T h e ph en o m en o n is also characteristic of Polish
(e.g. in the M azow ia area, w here it is know n as mazurzenie), N o rth R u s­
sian (Pskov dialect) an d in p a rt L ettish. M erg e r o f W est an d E ast Slavic
features characterizes a Slavic pro v erb used by Jew s in Bialystok: me do
boga, nie do ljudi ‘good for n o th in g ’ (literally ‘n ot for G od, n o r for peo-
p ie’)212— w here the stem o f ljudi gen pi ‘people’ resem bles R ussian and
the case ending resem bles Polish, i.e. R ljudej vs. Po ludzi — unless the R
ljudi nom pi has been generalized to the prepositional case (see also nokami
above). T h e m ixing of Slavic languages also characterizes the stereotyped
Jew ish dialogues in the 17th-18th cen tu ry B elorussian an d U k ra in ia n in-
term edies (see section 6.7 below ).213 T h e m ixing o f Slavic com ponents of
diverse origin is rem iniscent o f the Slavic com ponent in Y iddish itself—
though there is little overlap betw een the Slavic com ponent of Y iddish
a n d that of the bilingual Y iddish-Slavic folklore m aterials.
B ilingual folksongs also contain H ebrew w ords and an th ro p o n y m s in
a non-Y iddish form ; these m aterials deserve to be system atically
classified by period and locale. C onsider, for exam ple, Jew -U k avraham
m a ( < H e ‫נ‬avra[hd]m) — avrum ( < Y avrem vs. U k Avram ), raxili fa ( ~
U k RaxiV vs. Y roxl < H e rdhel), nadan ‘do w ry ’ ( < H e nadan vs. EY
nadn).2u A n exam ple of a m ixed Slavic-Y iddish expression w hich lacks
a precedent in either source language is the use o f U k nadivaty ‘w e a r’ with
H e talit ‘p ray er shaw l’ an d tfillin ‘p h y lacteries’ (Bila C erk v a)21s ~ U k
nakladaty ‘la y ’ w hich is a caique of EY legn tfiln, literally ‘lay the

209 See W exler 1977a:46, 109 (citing M arasew ski 1787).

210 1952:363, m ap # 1; 1963; th o u g h la te r, W einreich claim ed th a t sibilant confusion
in B elorussian Y iddish extended dow n to the U k ra in ia n b o rd e r (1969:92-93). T h e exact
m a n n e r o f re n d itio n of th e single set in Y iddish varies locally, b u t now here in the area
do we find the opposition of the tw o series. In stereotyped speech, the postdentals m erge
w ith the d entals.
m U . W ein reich 1952:363, 371, fn, 52 citing V olk-L evonovic 1930-1931:511ff.
312 N evadovski 1946:33.
213 Polonism s ap p ea r in the U k ra in ia n speech and U k rain ian ism s in the Polish speech
of Jew s in th e U k ra in ia n interm edies (H udzij 1960; L a n g e r 1972:104).
214 B erehovs’kyj 1930:41 an d separate p a g in atio n . 35 (tran slite ra tio n o f songs with
m usic). O n H e nadan, see also section 6.42 above.
215 P rilucki 1:1911, # 54.
192 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S

phylacteries’ (K rem janec’).216 In the Jewish religious song in Belorussian

published by StankeviC, H e hablujdh ‘halleluah’ (literally ‘praise God’)
appears in the form haleluie.217 T his transcription differs both from stY
halelujo and Br, Uk aliluja, Uk alyluja, M U k allyluia (Berynda 1627), ChSl
alleluia, Po aleluja < Gk alleluia, Lat alleluia. However, the same song con­
tains other Hebrew expressions which reflect more the Ashkenazic pro•
nunciation norm , e.g. H e s'trdh haddiah ‘new song’ > Jew-Br
fyroxodaso.JI8 Mixed Yiddish-Slavic and monolingual Slavic songs from
the West Slavic lands also need to be collected and studied.219
T he significance of monolingual Slavic and mixed Slavic-Yiddish
folklore is reduced by the fact that the Slavic com ponent may be a con­
scious imitation of non-Jewish stereotypes of Jewish-Slavic, the validity
of which has to be questioned (see below).250

6.7 Stereotyped Slavic speech of the Ashkenazic Jews, 17th-18th centuries

Stereotyped language in literature must be viewed with extreme cau­
tion, especially when the authors have a clear anti-Semitic orientation;
still, it would not do to dismiss this source out of hand. Examples of
stereotyped Slavic speech of Jews first appear in the Belorussian and
U krainian intermedies of the 17th-18th centuries.221 Jewish characters in
17th century Polish dram atical literature appear not to speak a
stereotyped Jewish-Polish dialect.222 T he presence of Yiddish terms and
expressions suggests that the subjects of stereotyping were Yiddish­
speaking Ashkenazic Jews. Examples are Jew -U k Aj vej! Ne mov ze my tak
‘O h my! D on’t talk to me like th a t’ (Aj vej < Y oj vej ‘oh woe’, ze my
< Y cu mir ‘to m e’).223 Yiddish elements also appear in innovative com­
binations, e.g. Jew -U k Avraamly ma (1745) < Uk Aoram ma < He

216 Ibid. # 5 3 . See also H e hiniah ifillin, literally May p h ylacteries'. See also Po tutktyc
stt tatesem, ktasc tfybn (A ltb a u e r 1932b: 186).
" 1933 ‫׳‬b: 186.
Jl* T h e A shkenazic p ro n u n ciatio n w ould be xadoso
2,9 A ntscherl 1904 records a Jew ish c h ild re n ’s song in Slovak, know n to her grand•
fath er (b o rn in B rno in 1789), that co n tain s th e term (za) obrecu ‘(as) the circumcision'
(?)— a term un k n o w n in C zech o r Slovak (sec C z obfrzaru ‘circum cized p e n o n ; Jew ’,
cited in section 5.5222 above).
220 O n the Jew ish use o f stylized stereotyped Jew ish -P o lish, see B rzezina 1979. For
fragm ents of C ro a tia n in the m ixed Ju d e z m o -Ita lia n speech o f a Jew ish character in a
C ro a tia n play from 1683, sec K o v afec 1972-1973:505.
221 For U k ra in ia n , see H u d zij 1960; M ark o v s’kyj 1962; H orb atsch 1966.
272 See Baryka 1637 (cited by B rzezina 1979:26-27). T h e Polish phrases a ttributed to
Jew s from 1425 also show no distinctive features (see section 4.2 above). F o r late 19th-
early 20th cen tu ry stereotyped Jew ish -P o lish speech, see B rzezina 1979.
s‫ ״‬Intrrmidiji z drrmvs'koho zbimyka (end 17th-early 18th c en tu ry ) (in H u d z ij 1960:81).
 JU D E O -S L A V IC AND EARLY W E S T SLAVIC C O M P O N E N T S 193

’>
avrd(hd)m ‘A braham ’ and Y -It dim (vs. Y avremele dim );224 gojas ‘G en­
tiles’ < Y gojim < He gojim ‘nations’ + Y(?) -s pi. 225 T he merger of
Polish and East Slavic elements in the stereotyped East Slavic speech of
Jew s also points to an Ashkenazic origin of the subjects, see e.g. Jew -U k
vudky gen sg ‘vodka’ < Po wodka nom sg (vs. Uk horilka); zdrooe ‘health’
< Po zdiowit vs. Uk zdorovja;226 dam vam penendzy viele i viystek meho iaty
‘I ’ll give you a lot of money and all my clothes’ (Po mojtj szaty,
pieni(dzy)221‫־‬
At the same time, the stereotyped Jewish-Slavic speech also contains
features not readily attributable to a Yiddish substratum , such as sibilant
confusion. T his phenom enon affects both the Slavic and Yiddish
(H ebrew ) components, e.g. Jew -U k boze zyvyj ‘oh, living G od’ ( — Uk
boze iyvyj),221 sukaes ‘you seek’ ( — Uk iukaef)229—but also ju z ‘already’
an d znaei ‘you know’ ( — Po juz, Uk znaef) without confusion;250 rosxevdys
‘the New M oon’ ( < ? NEY rosxejdi! — stY roixojdil < H e roi hodtf),™1
sabas ‘S abbath’ ( < Y Sabes < He Sabbat).232 Sibilant confusion is expected
in Belorussian and Belorussian Yiddish dialects (see section 6.6 above),
b ut not in U krainian or U krainian Yiddish—though occasional lexical
item s could have spread to the U krainian area from Belorussian.233
T h e existence of sibilant confusion in stereotyped Jew ish-U krainian
speech could be explained in four ways: the feature (or individual lexical
item s with the feature) (a) spread from Polish and/or Belorussian
dram atic literature to the Ukraine and is not a reflection of indigenous
U krainian (Yiddish) speech patterns, (b) spread from contiguous South
Belorussian Yiddish to N orth U krainian Yiddish dialects (there are a

‫ * ״‬Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:163).

*‫ ״‬Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:74). T h e -s plural m a rk e r in Y iddish is co m m only used w ith
Slavic com p o n en ts, w ith H eb rew fem inine su b stan tiv es a n d occasionally w ith Ju d e o -
R o m a n c e elem ents. See also section 4.1122 an d fn. 39 above.
Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:63).
**’ Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:75). O n th e Y iddish tre a tm e n t o f the Polish m o rphophonem ic
a lte rn a tio n 0 — i, see section 6.3 1 2 , fn. 112 above. T h is ex am p le ap p ea rs in C yrillic
c h a ra c te rs , bu t th ere are also Polish phrases spelled in L atin ch aracters.
” • Ibid. (in H u d z ij 1960:191).
« » Ibid (in H u d zij 1960:63).
2.0 Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:64 an d 116 respectively).
1‫ ״‬Ibid (in H u d z ij 1960:80).
2 .1 Ibid. (in H u d z ij 1960:190). In N o rth east Y iddish d ialects w ith sibilant confusion,
stY iabts typically assum es th e form sabes, b u t lobe! is also attested . Jew ish fam ily nam es
in th e U k ra in e an d M oldavia p ro v id e exam ples o f sibilant confusion, e.g. moskovii fam
< moSko m a (see section 5.5215 above) < H e moSth ‘M o ses’, b u t this m ight be a t­
trib u ta b le to th e m ig ratio n o f th e n a m e b e arrrs.
F o r South B elorussian exam ples o f sibilant collapse, see W exler 1977a: 109-110.
M e y e r W o lf inform s m e th a t sibilant confusion ch aracterizes the U k ra in ia n Y iddish
speech o f adu lts a d d ressin g ch ild ren .
194 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

num ber of North U krainian features in the U krainian interm edies),2”

(c) was not reflective of real Jewish speech but was attributed to Jewish
characters in the intermedies since it had low social status, (d) did indeed
reflect the U krainian speech of Jews in the 17th century. T he last ex­
planation could imply a Jewish substrata! influence. Looking to the east
of the U krainian speech territory, to the Caucasus, we note that sibilant
confusion characterizes Ossete (Iranian), U pper Balkar and Cuman
(Turkic).235 Abaev attributes the Balkar phenomenon to an Ossete
substratum .236 Jews speaking an Iranian or Turkic language with a
reduced sibilant inventory might have been unable to distinguish dentals
from postdentals in speaking U krainian. A non-Yiddish origin for the
stereotyped Jewish-U krainian sibilant confusion in the U krainian in-
termedies finds additional support in Hebraisms which show a non-
Yiddish form, as well as holiday terms of possibly Judeo-Slavic origin,
e.g. rav ‘rabbi’ ( < He rav vs. Y rov; stUk rabyn, ravvi);13’’ adonaj ‘G od’ (<
He 3,adonaj vs. Y adenoj);2>>pesax ‘Passover’ ( < He ptsah vs. Y pg'sex);259
kucky ‘Sukkot’ (with sibilant confusion);240 (holosnie) Irubky ‘Jewish New
Y ear’,241 bosyny ‘Yom K ippur’,242 haman ‘P urim ’.243 A problem with this
hypothesis is that any Judeo-Iranian or Judeo-T urkic influence on the
stereotyped U krainian speech of the Jews would have to postdate the
T atar invasions in the mid-13th century which probably destroyed the
local Jewish populations; unfortunately, I lack information on Jewish
migrations to the Ukraine from Iranian- and Turkic-speaking areas after
the 13th century, while in Christian circles, it is hardly likely that there
could have been an Iranian influence on U krainian at this late date.244

” ♦ M ark o v s’kyj I962:99fT.

1.5 See A baev I964a:116, 121 (see aUo section 7.321 below ). Sibilant confusion—of
a different type— m ay also ap p ea r in W estern Y iddish lands, if C z slg so/ ‘g old1 is
ultim ately from H e zikdv (O bcrpfaJcer 1934-1935:210). Such a form is not cited by W olf
1956. O n sibilant confusion in HalyC a n d L u c'k K a ra ite , see Kow alski 1929;X LV I-
X L V II, w ho derives th e p h en o m en o n from th e T u rk ic h o m eland o f the speakers. See also
section 3 .3 , fn. 303 above.
2.6 1964a: 116, 119. N ote also A b aev ’s belief in an Iran ia n influence on East Slavic
phonology an d g ra m m a r (ibid. 116ff; 1964b). In th e H aly f dialect o f K a ra ite , a language
closely related to B alkar, th e postdentals also m erge w ith the dentals.
7.7 InUrmtdijt z dtrmvs'koho zbimyka (in H u d zij 1960:129). Ravvt is cited in An*
d ru sy sh en and K rett 1957; rav in a U k ra in ia n p ro v erb cited by H rin fe n k o 1907-1909.
3,1 InUrmtdijt z demies ,koko zbimyka (in H udzij 1960:191). See also discussion in section
7.11 below.
‫ * ״‬Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:80). See section 3.341 above.
2.0 Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:80). See also section 5.163 above.
741 Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:80, 190). Sec also section 5.164 above.
2*7 Ibid (in H u d zij 1960:80). See also section 5.124 above.
‫ב‬4‫ נ‬Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:80). See also section 7.16 below.
aM As late as the 15th cen tu ry . K ievan K araites w ere designating K iev in Hebrew
d o cu m en ts as mn krmn (1481) — mnqrm^nl + mankermdn (M a n n 2:1935:1162, 1170,
 J U D E O -S L A V IC AM D E A R L Y W E S T S L A V IC C O M P O N E N T S 195

A n interesting u se o f a H eb raism with a non-Y iddish form in a

I7th-18th century U k rain ian in term ed y is Jew -U k kapara in the phrase:
A j vej mer, lyxij hod prijsol na mene, kapara ‘oh woe, a b ad year has come
up o n m e, kapara'’ . H u d zij in terp reted the last w ord as kapara, the ac­
cusative singular of U k kdpar ‘p oor p erso n ’.245 I suspect th at kapara (and
u ltim ately kapar) is derived from H e-JA ram kapparah ‘expiation;
forgiveness; sacrifice, sacrifical fowl (slaughtered on the eve o f Y om K ip-
p u r)’; also used as an exclam ation in Y iddish. T h e m ean in g ‘ex p iatio n ’
is certainly m ore ap p ro p riate in th e phrase kapara na rnoju hoiovu stalo ‘ex­
piation upon m y h e a d ’,246 i.e. ‘I got the p u n ish m en t in ten d ed for som e­
one else’. N o form of the root ap p ears in the dialogues of non-Jew ish
characters in the interm edies. Reflexes of H e-JA ram kapparah (also with
a non-Y iddish form ) are widely used in Polish an d E ast Slavic, e.g. Po
kaperowac, kapyr- ‘be in need; suffer lo n g ’, kaparzyc ‘p rep are p o o rly ’; U k
kaparyty ‘live in poverty; botch u p , do a p o o r jo b ; soil’, kaparnyj ‘b u n g l­
ing, m iserable, w retch ed ’, kapamyk ‘bungler; m iserable, lazy p erso n ’
(also attested in the in term ed ies),247 kaparnycja ‘slut, slovenly w o m an ’,
kaparstvo, kaparnja ‘bungling; w retched life’;248 R (N D vinsk) kapara ‘sick­
ly p erso n ’ m , f (1928) a n d (V ologda region) kaparuci ‘dirty, unusually
large, sickly h a n d s’.249 If the R ussian form s prove to be surface cognates
of the U k rain ian an d Polish form s, th en H e -JA ra m kapparah w ould have
a geographical spread in Slavic sim ilar to th a t o f H e q tv tr ' grav e’—w hich
I also sought to derive from non-A shkenazic Jew ish sources; q iv tr encom ­
passes an area extending from G erm an to the R u ssian dialects spoken in
the R ja z a n ’, O rel and T am b o v areas southeast of M oscow, and the
Ja ro sla v l’ area n o rth of M oscow (see section 7.113 below). T h e Sem itism
is w idely used in Jew ish languages in m eanings w hich resem ble both
H ebrew and Slavic, e.g. Y kapore, pi kapores, as in tojgn ajkapores ‘be good
for n o th in g ’, kapores gen/ maxn! zajn ‘go to p o t’; kaporenik ‘G e n tile’.250 T h e
Y iddish form of the Sem itism is also found in G erm an and Slavic

1173-1175; see also H ark av i 1899, p art 1, book 1, 10-11); H ark av i notes th a t the nam e
w as used by Iran ia n s a n d G reeks {ibid. 11); P ritsak gives exam ples o f this A ltaic nam e
from texts sp an n in g the m id 13 th to late 16th centuries (the la tte r in a T u rk ish cext),
w ithout m e n tio n in g th e K a ra ite m aterials (1 9 5 5 ), It w ould be in te re stin g to know if the
U k ra in ia n K araites preserved the A ltaic n a m e for K iev (and o th er cities?) longer th a n
o ther indigenous non-Slavic groups. See also section 2 above,
245 Interm ediji z dsrmvs 'ksho zbim yka (in H u d zij 1960:75),
246 Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:116).
147 Ibid. (in H u d zij 1960:115, glossed as ‘evil person; c rim in a l’).
48^‫ ־‬K arlow icz 1894-1905; H rin cen k o 1907-1909; A ndrusyshen and K re tt 1957.
248 F ilin et al. 13:1977.
850 U n b e g a u n derives Y kapurenih < fam kapore (1972:344).
196 JU D EO -SLA V IC AND EARLY W E ST SLAVIC C O M PO N E N T S

languages, e.g. G slg kapores (attested since the 1 7 2 0 s ) , B r kapfrus

‘downfall, wreck, end’ (Vicebsk district);157 the Slavicized form is also at­
tested in Yiddish, e.g. kapamik ‘rogue, crafty person’.2”

G u n th e r 1912:146.
K as’p jarovif 1927. Sec also Palessian U k htpora ‘som ething o f no importance'
(co m m u n icatio n from W olf M oskovich).
‫ * ״‬H arkavy 1928.
 7. H EBREW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S OF
POSSIBLY N O N -A SH K EN A ZIC O R IG IN IN SLAVIC AND
LANGUAGES O F T H E CA U CA SUS
7.1 H e b re w an d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in Slavic languages w ith Y iddish an d Ju d e z m o
cognates
7.11 H e *adonaj•, jkw h
7.12 H e , J A ra m bdhur
7.13 H e binjdmin
7.14 H e cicil
7.15 H e, J A ra m d-b-r
7.16 H e kaman
7.17 H e fuvrah; J A ra m fuvruta‫ג‬
7.18 H e , J A ra m kapparah
7.19 H e, J A ra m mtxts
7 .110 H e (?) n tjtl
7.111 H e , J A ra m ptsah
7.112 H e qabcdn
7.113 H e, J A ra m ‫ף‬-‫ע‬-‫ז‬
7.114 H e idm tx, somex
7.2 J u d eo -A ram aic loans in Slavic languages w ithout Y iddish an d J u d e z m o cognates
7.21 J A ra m lajtor, Irtor
7.22 J A ra m pinxa*, etc.
7.3 H ebrew -Slavic blends
7.31 H e c-g-t an d SI kolo
7 .3 11 C z kolr/ko
7.312 B r vakol
7.32 H ebrew nou n s w ith a Slavic suffix
7.321 ESI $dbas\ Po 1 zabasntk%sabatmk, etc.; chawryinik, etc.
7.322 Br, U k baxuriyk
7.4 R ecovering the Judeo-S lavic p ro n u n c ia tio n n o rm s o f H ebrew
7.5 H eb rew a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans o f non-A shkenazic origin com m on to Slavic
a n d languages o f the C au casu s
7.51 H e, J A r a m *dxal (U k ra in ia n slang; Iran ia n languages)
7 52 J A ra m kum(d)rd 3 (C ast an d South Slavic; A rm en ian ; O ssete)
7.53 H e, J A ra m qdhdl (Slavic; K um yk)
7.54 H e !abbot (Slavic; A rm e n ia n ; CuvaS; G eo rg ian ; O ssete; U byx; U di)
7.55 H e tdmdr (Slavic; G eo rg ian )
7.6 H ebrew a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in languages of th e C au casu s w ith no Slavic
(non-A shkenazic) cogates
7.61 H e cavon (K a b a rd ia n ; O ssete)
7.62 H e gdlutt hanut; htibdn\ 5uq\ largtmdn (A rm en ian )
7.63 H e kditr\ qddol (O ssete)
7.64 H e tdrdh (G eo rg ian )
7.7 H ebrew a n d Judeo-A ram aic loans in Slavic an d Finno-U gric lanifuaees
7.71 H e galldh '
7.72 H e m txts
7.8 T he geog rap h y of H ebrew a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic loans in th e Slavic languages
7.9 R ecovering the H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic corpus o f Ju d eo -W est Slavic
198 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

7. IN T R O D U C T IO N

The Slavic languages have a small corpus of Hebrew and Judeo-

Aramaic terms which can be attributed to four sources: (a) European
Jewish languages, e.g. Judeo-Slavic, Yiddish or Judezm o, (b) Asian
Jewish colloquial languages, e.g. (colloquial?) Judeo-A ram aic, Judeo-
Iranian, Judeo-T urkic, (c) G erm an slang, and (d) written Hebrew and
Judeo-A ram aic. In channels (a), (b) and (d), the Hebrew and Judeo-
Aramaic components could have reached the non-Jewish target
languages either directly from the source or through an intermediary.
T he majority of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic loans in Slavic were re­
ceived through channels (a) and (c); only channels (b) and (d) need de­
tain us here. The study of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic elements in the
Slavic languages that are not attributable to a Yiddish, Judezm o or Ger­
m an intermediary is in its infancy. Most of the existing studies are inade­
quate in either their coverage or analysis; useful discussions are found in
Karlowicz 1885, 1894-1905; A ltbauer 1932, 1934, 1950, I960, 1965;
Ulaszyn 1951; Wolf 1956; Jofe 1965. For a comprehensive description of
!he methodological problems together with an analysis of some fifty
Semitisms in Slavic, see Wexler 1983a.
A Yiddish, Judezm o or G erm an source for a Hebrew or Judeo-
Aramaic element in Slavic can often be identified by the form and/or
m eaning of the loan in the target language (see discussion in section 5
above). In addition, Hebraisms and Judeo-A ram aism s diffused from
G erm an slang to Slavic may also be identified by earlier attestation in
G erm an than in Slavic and earlier attestation in West than in East
Slavic—in addition to formal and/or semantic features. Phonetic or
semantic features are usually not sufficient, however, to distinguish be­
tween a direct borrowing from written Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic and
a colloquial Jewish language other than Yiddish. T his is so because (a)
the paucity of examples and reliance on secondary Christian sources
make it difficult to reconstruct the non-Ashkenazic and non-Sephardic
pronunciation norms of Hebrew in the Slavic lands, and (b) the tradi­
tional pronunciation of Hebrew among Christians in the Slavic lands, as
in W estern Europe, resembled that of the Balkan Sephardic or Italian
Jew s. 1 Even in Jewish ethnolects of Slavic, there are serious problems in
identifying the channel of diffusion of Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic com­
ponents. For example, Jew -R (i)esiba, pi (i)esibot ‘Jewish religious

1 For a useful discussion of C h ristian read in g n o rm s of H ebrew in W estern Europe,

see S. A. B irn b au m 1935:240*241.
 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C . 199

se m in a ry ’, found in early 20th century texts,2 differs from Y jeswe(s) as

w ell as from Ashkenazic He pstvo, pi j>sivos. T he b suggests that the
C lassical Hebrew morphophonemic alternation between stop and
fricativ e (e.g. He bajit ‘house’: bivajit ‘in a house’) has been neutralized.
H ow ever, in Hebrew there is no alternation of b — v in this w ord.1 A
p ro b lem is to distinguish between cases of hypercorrection and
phonological interference from the native vernacular in Semitic elements
th a t have non-Ashkenazic form.
A n im portant clue to the source of a Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic com­
p o n e n t can sometimes be found in its geographical diffusion. For exam-
p ie, Semitic loans in non-Yiddish form which are found primarily in the
E ast Slavic languages (especially in Belorussian and Ukrainian), and on­
ly occasionally in Polish, might be attributed to a pre-Ashkenazic
so u rce—though a learned borrowing from written Hebrew cannot always
be excluded easily. Learned borrowings can sometimes be identified by
th e ir relatively late date, since knowledge of Hebrew am ong Slavic
scholars was rare in Poland before the early 16th century, and in the
U k ra in e before the 18th century.4 Yet, even when a non-Ashkenazic
o rig in for a Slavic Hebraism is preferred, the problem remains of defin­
in g the specific source language. There are a num ber of Hebrew
elem ents limited to East Slavic and Polish (and occasionally also to
L ith u an ian and Rum anian) which differ from the pronunciation of the
surface cognates in the contiguous Yiddish dialects; some of these
H ebraism s have identical cognates in Judeo-A ram aic. In addition, one
H ebraism in the South Slavic languages differs in meaning from the sur­
face cognate in Balkan Judezm o. There are a handful of Aramaisms in
E uropean languages not found at all in Jewish languages. The examples
discussed below constitute a partial listing.5

1 G in z b u rg an d M arek 1901 :X IX . A sim ilar form ap p ears in o th e r E uropean

la n g u a g e s, e .g . Po jeszybol (A ltb au er 1934:13), ja ztb o t (S ch o rr 1915:427) and G Jesckika
(E J -B 9, 1932). See a ls o J e w -C z golts ‘exile’ ( < Y golts < H e gdlul) — golrt ‘exiled land,
exile from P alestin e‘ (Pech 1948). T h e form w ith I m ight be a n attem p t to reconstruct
the p o rm a tiv e H ebrew p ro n u n ciatio n .
5 S e e also C hSl evrijbskj> — cb- 'Je w ish ' vs. H e St‫׳‬n" ‘H e b re w ' an d discussion in H an-
dke 1983. T h e a lte rn a tio n o f b an d v is also found in G e rm a n Y iddish a n d G e rm a n slang
(b o th in H eb rew an d o th er no n -n ativ e com ponents), e.g. G slg Rtbtuh ~ Rew- ‘gain; u se ’
(J a k o b 1929). See also B eranek 1965, m aps # # 3 3 , 97 for the alte rn a tio n b — 1‫ ׳‬in G e r­
m an Y iddish.
‫ י‬S e e S ch o rr 1915:430; Baranow ski 1950:48, 51; Bilodid 1979:61. 67, 83-84.
J A n im p o rtan t d esid eratu m o f Jew ish linguistics is the p re p a ra tio n of a co m p re h e n ­
sive d ic tio n a ry o f H ebrew a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic elem ents in all Jew ish and non-Jew ish
lan g u ag es. At p resen t, only B alkan J u d e z m o has been studied rigorously (by Bunis
1980— w hich could serve as a m odel for o th e r Jew ish languages). A co m parative study
of H e b re w a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic elem ents is needed before ph en o m en a o f drift am ong
Jew ish a n d no n -Jew ish languages can be conclusively identified. Especially relevant to
200 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

M any of the Jewish communities in the Caucasus date back to the ear­
ly Christian era. In section 3 above we raised the possibility of contact
between Caucasian and East Slavic Jewish communities. Linguistic
evidence which might establish this connection is the handful o f Hebrew
and Judeo-A ram aic loans in a non-Ashkenazic pronunciation which are
common to Slavic (East and West) and to languages of the Caucasus. In
addition, there are a few Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic loans found ex­
clusively in languages of the Caucasus, three Hebrew terms with a non-
Ashkenazic form shared by Slavic and a num ber of Caucasian languages
(and sometimes by other Indo-European languages such as G erm an and
Baltic) and one Hebraism shared by Slavic and Iranian languages. The
extent to which Caucasian Jews ever had intercourse with East Slavic
Jewries cannot be fully determined until the study of the Hebrew and
Judeo-A ram aic elements in the Caucasian languages (both Jewish and
non-Jewish) is undertaken (see discussion in Abaev 1949; 1958-1979;
Moskovich and Ben-Oren 1982). Languages in the Caucasus known to
have Hebrew or Judeo-A ram aic components include members of three
language families: Indo-European (e.g. Arm enian, Ossete), Turkic
(CuvaS, Kumyk), Ibero-Caucasian (Georgian, K abardian, U byx, U di).4

7.1 Hebrew andJudeo-Aramaic loans in Slavic languages with Yiddish andJude2 ■

mo cognates
7.11 He ?adonaj; jhwh. He ’adonaj ‘G od’, which becomes in Y adenoj,
assumes a distinctly non-Yiddish form in Slavic target languages, e.g. Uk
Adana (Zizanij 1596),7 Adonai (17th-18th cc),8 Po (H)adonaj (1637).9 In
O ld Russian Judaizing literature, the word is attested in a compound,

Ju d eo -S lav ic studies is (he H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic co rp us in the Iran ia n language?

(see O ran sk ij 1971; Y a rsh a te r 1977). Besides the lexical co rpus, o ther qu estio n s o f in­
terest include (a) th e relative p roductivity o f affixes (e.g . J A r a m -Id 3 f gender sufTix is at­
tested in parts o f J u d c o -R o m a n te an d Y iddish but a p p aren tly not in K araite), (b) the
type 01 H ebrew d eriv atio n al an d inflectional m achinery borrow ed (e.g. Y iddish accept!
H e m titx -kin g ' m sg to g eth er w ith the in pi, f sg an d pi e n d ings, while K a ra ite accepts
only the first form ); (c) th e existence o f a com m on corpus o f borrow ed H e b re w and
J u d eo -A ram aic elem ents (e g H e hatax ‘he w e n t’ seem s to be in use in J u d e o -Ita lia n and
Yiddish as well as in G e rm a n an d A rabic slang). A p relim in ary analysis o f H e b re w and
Ju d eo -A ram aic com p o n en ts in the Slavic languages is given in W exler 1983a. See also
discussion of H e mahioqU in A ltb au er 1950:126 an d fn. 5, an d section 6.54, fn. 177 above
‘ U byx is no longer spoken in th e C au casu s an d is virtually extinct in T u rk e y where
the U byx people m ig rated after the R ussian subju g atio n o f the N orthw estern C aucasus
in 1864 (C om rie 1981:196).
1 N im fu k 1964:23. See also ibid 177. For C h u rc h Slavic citations, see K u rz 195911
* B ervnda 1627; Intermediji z dtmws'koho zbimyka (in H udzij 1960:191).
’ O ccu rs in the speech o f a Jew in a play by B aryka 1637 (rep rin te d by KJem ensiew icz
2:1965:303-304). Sec also B rzezina 1979:26.
 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 201

e.g. Adonaj!Adanaj gospodh (late 15th c).10 T he H eb rew w ord for ‘G o d ? is

spelled by Jew s non-phonetically (w ith o ptional vowel diacritics) as
j(9)k(0)v(a)h or j ( 2)j(a). A n u m b e r of scholars have p roposed th a t H c jh w h
is the basis o f (j)axues used in B elorussian and R u ssian professional slangs
in the m eanings ‘G od; C h rist; church; iconJ (the la tter m ean in g is also
expressed by axvesnik); see also R sigjaxvesu cinaVsja. axvesat’sja. 'p ra y 7. 11
If (j)axves is derived from jh w h , it m ust be a ttrib u ted to C h ristian s who
read jh tv h as IjahwahJ ‘J e h o v a h ’; since there is no Jew ish co m m unity
w here the tetrag ram m a to n w ould be read in such a m a n n e r.12
7.12 H e, JA ra m bahur. H e, JA ra m bakur £y o u th ? > Po bachur ‘young
m an , b r a t V 3 O B r, U k baxura gen sg (Brest 1577),14 B r (W B rjansk) bdxur
‘lo v er’, (N W ) baxur , baxor, bexur ‘child b o rn out o f w edlock; small
p illo w '15‫( י‬E M ahilew , H ro d n o ) baxiircyk. 'y o u n g m a n ’ (ironic) (w ith Br
-cyk d im );16 in N osovic’s B elorussian d ictionary we find a n u m b e r o f cita­
tions for baxur : ‘fat-bellied; u n castrated pig; y o ung m a rrie d Je w occupied
in the study of the T a lm u d ’, bdxurok 1Jew ish schoolboy; ra th e r fat youth";
bdxurstvo ‘d e b au ch ery ’;17 see also (O )U k bdxur > ‫־‬or (1616) ‘Jew ish child,
b rat, child b o rn out of wedlock, stu b b o rn child; lover; faw ning p erso n ?; 18
R bdxur *young Jew ; fat m a n ’;19 Li backuras 4y o u th ’. Y boxer is th e im ­
m ediate source of the te rm in languages spoken to the west of Polish, e.g.

‫נ‬° K azak o v a an d L u r’e 1955:297.

“ A rapov 1965:124-126; M arty n aw 1:1978. See also th e v arian ts R oxvis, oxves’ , axves',
xves’ f fes. A rap o v derives the form ofenja 'v e n d o r o f cult o b jects’ from axves (ibid. 125-126).
H o rb a c derives the U k ra in ia n cognates from G k Qeos "G od’ (1971a:143; 1983:318).
12 T h e re is no basis to A rapov*s claim th a t Jew s in tro d u ced (j)axves into E ast Slavic
languag es (1965:125).
13 R asto rg u ev 1973:50. See also P o d ial (unspecified) back, beck (K ariow icz
1894-1905).
L* K le jm a n 1 9 2 4 :3 1 5 .
15 M ackevic et al. 1:1979:175. T h e m ean in g ‘small pillow ’ originally had n o th in g to
do w ith th e H e b ra ism , b u t derives from a sim ilar sou n d in g n ativ e term , e.g. C z bdchor
“w urst; fat m a n ’ . See discussion in W exler 1983a, fn. 75.
16 A b a b u rk a 1979:13.
17 N osovic 1870:17. T h e exam ples are given in N osovic’s o rth o g rap h y . T h e m eaning
o f ‘Jew ish sem in ary s tu d e n t’ is n o t fo u n d in Y iddish, except in the com pound jesive-boxer
( < jesiue ‘s e m in a ry ’). In Ju d e z m o , th e m e a n in g of baxur is usually ‘young m a n , young
bachelor, a d o lescen t’ b u t in B u lg arian J u d e z m o there is th e ad d itional m eaning of ,rab-
binical s tu d e n t’ (could this be d u e to Y iddish influence?). T h e H e b ra ism is n o t attested
in B ulg arian itself. M o st B elorussian form s te n d to have final stress— w hich points to in ­
depend en ce from Polish; see also H ro d n a , M in sk -M alad zecn a, T u ra w baxor, - u7
(ScjaSkovic 1972; Z ydovic 1974; K ryvicki et al. 1982 respectively), NWT dial t e a r (K an-
dra c ju k 1975:55) vs. V icebsk bdxar ’s u ito r’ (K a s’pjarovic. 1927). V in e rJs proposal th a t R
baxur m ight be a b ack fo rm atio n from E Y baxunm pi (1895:59) is conceivable.
18 R u d n y c ’kyj 1:1962:89-90; O h ijen k o 1979ff (w ith a citation from K iev 1669).
19 V a sm e r 1:1953:64. F o r Sm olensk R u ssia n d a ta w ith n on-Jew ish associations (e.g.
'm a s te r o f cerem onies a t C h ristm a s g am es’), see D o b ro v o lsk y 191.4■ an d Ivanova 1974ff.
O n the te n d e n cy of Slavic H eb raism s of non-Y iddish origin n o t to have specific Jew ish
connotatio n s, see section 5 above.
202 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S ET C .

C z bochr,2° Svk bocher,2' Hg bo(c)heT32 ‘student in a Jewish religious

sem inary1, G Bocher ‘student’.25 In Belorussian and U krainian, the
H ebraism also appears with the diminutive suffix, e.g. Br, Uk baxurcyk
‘child’.24 In Lvov Jewish-Polish, the Yiddish pronunciation bucket
prevails (see PoY buxer), but when a Slavic suffix is added, the root ap­
pears in a non-Yiddish form, e.g. bachurek.2> The recent proposal to
derive Uk baxur from O T urkic bagir ,liver; heart; breast; stomach; side;
relative’, etc. has no m erit.26
7.13 He binjamin. He binjamin ma, literally ‘son of the right (hand)’ ap­
pears in Polish as beniaminek ‘youngest m em ber of the family, favorite
child’; Cz slg benjamin ‘policeman’, beniamtn(ek), Svk beniamin ‘youngest
male member of a group; youngest sibling’.27 T he term is apparendy not
attested in other Slavic languages, except as a proper nam e (e.g. Br
Ven’jamin). See also the discussion of Y mizinek ‘youngest child’ in section
6.313 above. In the Judeo-East Slavic caique translation (late 15th-early
16th century). He ‫י‬ii jim ini, literally ‘man of the right (hand)’ (Esther
2:5) appears as JESlcq binhjamina gen (see section 4.4113 above).
7.14 He cicit. In Hebrew, the term cicit denotes ‘one of the four tassels
on the undergarm ent worn by O rthodox male Jews; the garment itself.
This is also the meaning of Y cices. However, in some West Slavic
languages, the term has acquired the meaning ‘phylactery’, e.g. Cz cicit
( < Hebrew directly),28 Po cyces ( < Yiddish)29 vs. Br cycel’ ‘male Jewish
20 C ile d in G o ttlieb 1965. H ow ever, note C z bath(t)uT ‘young m an w ho studies ihe
T a lm u d ’ (Pech 1948). Both backur an d bocher ap p ea r in a 19th cen tu ry C zech G erm an text
(alongside o th er d oublets of H eb rew orig in ) (T ro st 1965:88).
a1 M endresz6va an d O rb a n 1933. See also buther, bo- in Pridavok 1939.
” H u tte re r 1968:657.
‫ ״‬Philoparcho 1768; W olf 1956, ft 584. See also G Y boxer , y o uth. Jew ish sem inary stu­
d e n t’ (B eranek 1965, m a p # 6 1 ). For an o th e r exam ple o f H e qomae > Y a \ see discus­
sion o f H e qahdl in section 7.53 below.
34 A b ab u rk a 1979:13, citin g the usage o f th e w riter J a .K o la s ; R u d n y c'k y j 1:1962:90,
T h e term baxur/tk is used in Israeli H eb rew , w hich suggests (hat Y iddish speakers might
have been fam iliar w ith the Slavic term . A lternatively, H e boxurttk m ay be an indepen*
d e n t d erivation o f H e baxur 'b o y ,' since ‫־‬iik enjoys lim ited use in colloquial H ebrew (but
no( usually w ith n ative roots). Finally, we should not rule ou t the possibility o f an Israeli
H ebrew borrow ing of th e d im in u (iv e form d irecd y from Belorussian a n d U krainian. See
also T ra k a i K ar baxurfox, d im o f baxur *young m a n , b a ch e lo r', w hich m ay be the source
o f the East Slavic H eb raism .
‫ ״‬B rzezina 1979:86.
26 Sem enova 1983:164*165, w ho fails to recognize th e convergence o f Slavic and non*
Slavic roots (see fn. 15 above).
i7 For C zech, see T re im e r, w here th e term is reg ard ed as a deform ation o f R om beng*
‘m o u n ted policeman* (1937:75). All E u ro p ean targ et languages have replaced H e bin-
'so n o f by ben- ( < H e b€n ‘son o f ) . T h e m ean in g o f the term is derived from the Biblical
figure B enjam in, the youngest son o f Jac o b .
« Pech 1948.
29 M ickiew icz 1834 (an d not 1832 as D u k er 1974:336 claim s). See also G orski and
H rab ec 1:1962.
 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 203

ritual u n d e rg a rm e n t’.30 T h is confusion betw een ‘p h y lactery ’ and

‘u n d e rg a rm e n t’ also exists in E nglish, w here phylactery is often used in the
m ean in g o f H e cicit.31 (O n the term ‘p h y lactery ’, see sections 3.123,
5.115 an d 5.123 above.)
7.15 H e, J A ra m d-b-r. H e. J A ra m dibber ‘he spoke’ and madabber
‘speaking’ m sg both a p p e a r in Y iddish an d E u ro p ean non-Jew ish
languages, e.g. G Y dibbern ~ da- ~ medibbern ‘to ta lk ’ ~ EY, PoY
thieves’ slgss dabern ‘babble, ta lk ’; G slg tdffret ‘b ab b le d ’ (1490), dabern —
dib(b)ern ~ medibbern ‘talk, speak’;33 F r slg daberer ‘ch atter, te ll’.3* In
Slavic, I Find the term in C zech an d East Slavic only, e.g. C z slg bataben
‘talk ’,35 B r dabaryc’ ‘b a b b le ’, (raz)dabara 1b a b b le r’, razdabary ‘long ch atter
over trivialities’, mzdabaryvac’ ‘ch atter at length about triv ialities’, raz-
dabarycca ‘have a lo n g talk ’,36 tary-bary ‘em pty conversation, c h a tte r’, U k
rozdobarjuvaty ‘c h atter’ (First attested in K otljarevskij 1819), tarabars’kyj
‘incom prehensible’, SR. dabarit’, razdabaryvat’ ‘ch a tte r’, R rastabary
(hum orous) 'co n v ersatio n ’, (ras)tabaryvat’, razdobarivat’ ‘c h a tte r', razdabar
‘garrulousness’, tarabar ‘ch a tte re r’, tarybary-razdabary ‘em pty c h a tte r’,
tary-bary, tary da bary, tary-bajy-rastabary ‘sloppily’, tarabarskae narecie ‘secret
language o f Jew ish m e rc h a n ts’ (G o g o l) e tc .37 G erm an form s w ith (me')di-
could be derived from Y iddish, b u t G erm an and Slavic form s w ith da-
present a problem , since th ere is no basis for such a form in H eb rew ( da -
appears only in the participial, im perative an d future tense form s, e.g.
‫כ‬adabber ‘I will speak’). H ence, G e rm a n and Slavic form s w ith da- could
either be non-Jew ish innovations (w hich even spread back to G erm an
Y iddish, E astern Y iddish and Polish Y iddish thieves’ slang) o r a Y iddish
innov ation created on the analogy of H ebrew finite verbs o f the type EY
badkenen ‘inspect m eat ritu a lly ’, ultim ately from H e badaq ‘he inspected’.
In an earlier discussion o f this term (1983a), I supported th e hypothesis
o f eastw ard diffusion from G erm an slang to the Slavic languages o n the
stren gth of the G erm an attestatio n from the late 15th century. N ow, it
seem s to m e th at the ap p a re n t absence of the term in Polish (b u t not in

30 Bahusevic 1894:25,
31 W eb ster 1971:1705, w ith th e suggestion th a t the confusion steins from tw o passages
in the Bible (M atth ew 23:5 a n d N u m b ers 15:38-39).
32 K u rk a 1907:13. T h e g eographical details are given in the L C A A J , #224001.
.33 J . M . W ag n e r 1863:236; Seiler 1925:375; W olf 1956, # 1007.
S ainean 1907:161.
35 T re im e r 1937:27, 61, 64■, 78. N ote the G e rm a n infinitive ending.
36 Jo fe 1965:435, 437; A traxovic 1977-1984.
‫ ־נ‬T h ese an d o th e r form s a re cited in W exler 1983a. See also R dial tdry-bdry ‘em pty
w ords’ (N iznij N ovgorod; N ovgorod), tarabdry ‘c o n v ersatio n s’ (T o b o l’sk), tardbdnt’
(V ologda), tarabdrit’ ‘talk, jo k e in cessan tly ’ (K u rsk ) (cited in Sreznevskij a n d V ostokov
1852) an d (arabarskaja (gramota ) below , T ru b ac e v proposed a n ative R ussian derivation
(notes to V asm er 1964-1973).
204 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O ‫ ־‬A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

Polish Y iddish slang!) strongly suggests th a t th e C zech an d E ast Slavic

borrow ings m ay be in d ep en d en t. H ence, I w ould ra th e r propose th at in
W estern E urope G dabern could be the basis of the C zech H eb raism ,
while in the E ast Slavic languages the source of the H eb raism m ight be
a Jew ish language other th a n Y iddish. M oreover, th ere m ay be evidence
th at the H ebrew terra was know n in R ussian as early as the 15th century,
see e.g. Tarabora (Bezeck 1533) a n d Tarabrin (M oscow 1590) fa m ,38 and
tarabarskaja (gramota) ‘secret speech (of Jew ish m erch an ts)’ (15th-16th c,
so-called tajnopis’ or ‘secret w ritin g ’) .39 Possibly also derived from H ebrew
are S eC r davdri ‘ah, oh; stop!’, davonti ‘sing (m ilitary m u sic)’, davorija
‘song’ (attested since the 17th c). Skok has rejected a n u m b e r of com ­
p o u n d derivations that have been proposed for these term s, preferrin g to
identify davorija as consisting of a root o f unknow n origin w ith L a t -ia
(1:1971). T his analysis (w ith the addition th at davor- m ight be from
H ebrew ) is attractive since it is r e m in isc e n t o f fused Sem itic and
R om an ce com pounds in Ju d e o -R o m a n ce languages, see e.g. M oroccan
J u d hakitia ~ x-, the native glottonym < A r hkaja ‘w itty say in g ’ + R m n
-ia.*a Finally, an onom atopoeic origin, such as has b een proposed for
sim ilar-sounding E ng jabber (attested since 1499) a n d dial javer (since
1440), is n o t altogether unattractive.
7.16 H e, JA ra m hdman. Ham an w as an anti-S em itic figure, whose a t­
tem pts to destroy the Jew s in Ira n in the 5th cen tu ry BC are related in
the Scroll of E sther, w hich Jew s recite in the synagogue on the holiday
know n as P u rim . In U k rain ian , th e H ebrew w ord is used w ith a distin ct­
ly non-A shkenazic vocalism and m eaning, e.g. U k hdman 'Jew ish holiday
o f P u rim (first attested in 1627); J e w ’ (pej), zy d ivs’kyj haman ‘dum b w itted
person w ho lets him self be in su lted 1— though the initial stress resem bles
both Po haman ‘large, heavy c re a tu re ’ an d Y homen ‘H a m a n ; evildoer;
anti-S em ite’.41 T h e correct H ebrew holiday term , purim ( > Y purim ), is
also attested in Slavic.ts In addition, Y iddish m eanings are also know n
in Polish an d B elorussian, e.g. Po haman ‘H a m a n ; evildoer’ (attested in

38 V eselovskij 1974:312. W eissenberg suggests C rim e a n K a r Dibor fam < H e davor

‘th in g ’ (1914:106).
39 A rxipov 1982b:15. Bilodid et ai. 1970-1980 gloss taraban’ka hramota as ‘O ld South
Slavic an d O ld R u ssia n secret w ritin g in C y rillic’.
40 B enoliel 1926:209-210. T h e H e b re w ro o t also ap p ears w ith a fricative, e.g. H e ddsar
‘th in g ’.
41 F ran k o 1907:116; A n d ru sy sh en an d K re tt 1957; R u d n y c ’kyj 6:1967; 10:1971:918.
See also R o m a n iv U k hamana (H o rb a c 1965:19).
42 Purim is attested in B elorussian since the 17th cen tu ry (B ulyka 1980:184). See jjvjyrn
in Jidis-vajsrusiser tasn-verterbux 1932. A curious co m p o u n d is B r Purim'b-Aman'b (N ikiforov-
skij 1897:22, fn. 345, sep pg). O n Purim as a Jew ish fam ily n am e, see section 3.341, fn.
391 above. See also G Hamansfest literally ‘holiday o f H a m a n ’ (R . 1850-.322). H om on ~
H am an w ere m ale nam es (cynically?) a p p ro v ed by the A u stro -H u n g a ria n authorities in
 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 205

a Polish folksong from th e Siedlce region);43 B r haman ‘i b — see also the

B elorussian pro v erb recorded in the Lahojsk district, napali ja k zydy na
Ham ana ‘they feU u p o n (him ), as the Jew s do H a m a n ’, said w hen a
defenseless person is attacked by a m o b .45 C h ristian fam iliarity w ith the
figure Ham an m ay be due to the custom of hav in g C h ristian s p lay the role
o f H a m a n in Jew ish P u rim p lays.46 A n interesting use o f H e haman is Po
kamanowe ucko, U k hamanove vuxo ‘trian g u lar p astry w ith a filling m ad e on
P u rim ’ (literally ‘H a m a n ’s e a r’).47 T his expression lacks a parallel in
co ntem porary E astern Y iddish, w here th e p astry is called komentas
(literally , H a in a n ’s pocketbook, p o u c h ’). T h e disparallelism betw een
co ntem porary E astern Y iddish an d U k ra in ia n suggests th a t the latter
m ay preserve the original E astern Y iddish designation, widely attested
still in W estern Y iddish, see e.g. O N ItY hmn ‫־‬k ‫?׳‬cra/ + hamano(j)ren ~
komen- (beginning 15th c),48 M o d D u Y hamansoren.‘19 W hile EY komentas
could be a native innovation in spired by the form of the p astry , I w onder
w hether E Y las ‘pocketbook, p u rs e ’ m ight n o t owe its position in the
culinary term to sim ilar-sounding U k haman ‘(leather) purse; m oney
b a g ’— an association facilitated by the fact th a t H a m a n was one of the
richest m en in the la n d .50 Such associations could only have been m ade
by U krain ian -sp eak in g Jew s. T h is fact, and th e non-A shkenazic form of
the Slavic H eb raism , to g eth er give support to the hypothesis o f (a) con­
tact betw een A shkenazic Jew s in the U k rain e and a Slavic-speaking
Jew ish com m unity (see discussion o f H e qahal in section 7.53 below ), and
(b) Slavic borrow in g from an autochthonous non-A shkenazic Jew ish
com m unity. T h o u g h , alternatively, SI H am an m ight also be a learned

1788 though they w ere n ev er b o rn e by Jew s (M uneles 1 9 6 6 a :ll-1 2 ). If the holiday were
to be n am ed after a p ro tag o n ist in the n arrativ e, th en E sth er, the Je w ish queen who
helped to foil H a m a n ’s plot to d estroy the Jew s w ould b e the choice (for a G reek Jew ish
exam ple, see M ouse 1973:16).
13 P rilu ck i 1:1911:116. O n Jew ish -P o lish , see B rzezina 1979:89.
44 D ru ck i-P ad b jareck i 1929. In S k a ry n a ’s tra n slatio n of Esther the w ord appears as
A m a m , (1519). F orm s w ith h- or g- are n o t found in E ast Slavic Bible texts.
45 V a rly h a 1964:179. A related expression js given in Federow ski 4-: 1935, #9704. See
also U k hamanuvatj! 'b e a t m ercilessly’ (Z elexivs’kyj a n d N e d ilV k y j 1882-1886).
See S h m eru k 1979:21-25, 53, 78.
47 A n d ru sy sh en an d K re tt 1957, O h ijen k o 1979ff describes the term as w idespread in
the U k rain e. H o rb a c derives U k xamony ‘small p a strie s’ (cited in M aksym ovyc
1718-1724) from H e h dm m (1966:11), U k (H ucul) H a m a n (’u k) fam m ay be related to
ha7nan (de V in cen z 1970:533).
46 K o so v er 1964:367.
49 B eem 1967, T h e use of ‘c a r’ is a n ailusion to the chopping off of a c rim in a l’s ears,
related in the M id rash . See also p astry term s such as Israeli H e ozsn ham an , J i t orrechio
d i A m a n , literally ‘H a m a n ’s e a r’.
50 V a sm e r reg ard s R gaman as a n ativ e Slavic term (1:1953) b u t R u d n y c ’kyj opts for
a T u rk ic etym ology for the U k ra in ia n cognate (6:1967:553).
206 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

C h ristian sem inary bo rro w in g from w ritten H ebrew , or an early Slavic

borrow ing from an older Y iddish p ro n u n ciatio n p a tte rn .51
7.17 H e kiordh, JA ra m hevrutd ‫נ‬. T h e H ebrew o r Ju d e o -A ra m a ic term
for ‘society, org an izatio n ’ is found in m a n y Slavic languages, b u t often
as a borrow ing from the co territorial Y iddish dialects, e.g. B r xewra
‘gang, g ro u p ’ (w ith no Jew ish connotations) < Y xevre < H e hsvrdh; Cz
slg chabrus ‘g an g ’, Po slg chawres, chawrysnik (should be - t u -?'),32 Br
xavrus’nik ‘associate (in crim e)’ < Y xemuse ‘com pany, bu n ch , g an g ’ <
JA ra m h e v r u t a B alkan Ju d e z m o has two form s o f the H eb rew term , xevra
1society, association’ an d xavra ‘Jew ish religious elem entary school for
m ales’.53 T h e doublets w ould m ean eith er th at Ju d e z m o borrow ed the
H eb raism at two different historical periods, or, w hich is m ore likely,
preserves the H ebraism in two p ro n u n ciatio n s— a ‘‘w hole” H ebrew xevra
(used in reading m onolingual H ebrew texts) and a “ m erg ed ” H ebrew
xavra (the form of the w ord in colloquial Ju d e zm o ). O n ly the v arian t xavra
appears in the Balkan targ et languages— in the unexpected m ean in g of
synagogue: see e.g. Bg xavra, S eC r (hjavra, T u havra, Alb avre, R u m havra
(know n since the 18th c).54 In Ib e ria n Ju d e z m o the H eb ra ism apparently
m ean t exclusively ‘Jew ish c o m m u n ity ’, w hereas ‘synagogue’ was
denoted by reflexes o f J R m n synagoga (see sections 3.3111, fns. 320, 327
above). T h e sem antic disparallelism betw een Ju d e z m o ‘society; associa­
tion; Jew ish religious school for m a le s’ an d non-Jew ish Balkan
‘synagogue’ requires com m ent. I w ould advance two hypotheses:
(a) H e hevrdh m ight once have d en o ted ‘synagogue’ in Ju d ezm o .
T h o u g h I have no confirm ation for this, the extension o f ‘c o m m u n ity ’
> ‘synagogue’ does have a p recedent in H e qdhal ‘(Jewish) c o m m u n ity ’
> J u d kal ‘synagogue’.
(b) H e hevrdh in Balkan languages an d H e qdhal in Ju d ezm o are both
sem antic innovations m odeled on a th ird Jew ish language, perhaps
Ju d eo -G reek or an “ A sian ” Je w ish lan g u ag e— see H e qdhal in K um yk

51 In view of the po p u larity o f the E sth er story in plays p erform ed in G e rm a n non-

Jew ish circles in W estern E u ro p e in th e early 17th cen tu ry , in w hich the form H am an is
attested , we m ight w an t to posit a n on-Jew ish W est E u ro p ean source for SI H am an; the
earliest attestatio n in G e rm a n appears to be from the early 16th century. W e should also
not rule o u t ecclesiastical channels, since G e rm a n L u th e ra n Bible translations beginning
w ith the m id ‫ ־‬l7 th cen tu ry also have H am an. T h e p ro p e r nam e is first attested in R ussian
in the Artakserksovo dejstvo of 1672 (see K u d rjav cev 1957:34 an d fn. 1 0 9 3 0 3 ‫ ;־‬Shm eruk
1979:25, fn. 18, 53. fn. 29, 78, fn. 12). T h e R u ssian play w as in troduced to M oscow by
a G e rm a n th eatrical group, b u t the R u ssian form o f th e H eb rew a n throponym s need not
be deriv ed from G erm an ; see e.g. R Sadok m a vs. G Zadok < H e cadoq. O n this nam e
in Slavic texts, see section 3.342 above.
52 Ludwikowrski an d W alczak 1922; M ach ek 1971.
53 B unis does not attem p t to characterize the tw‫׳‬o varian ts (1980, #1085).
54 S ain ean 1902:565; Skok 1 9 7 M 9 7 4 ; W exler 1983a.
 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C . 207

discussed in section 7.53 below.55 But a problem with assuming a non-

Ju d e zm o origin for the Balkan Hebraism is the fact that the lowering of
the pretonic high and mid front and back vowels to a, especially in the
environm ent of x and r, is also characteristic of the Hebrew component
in Ju d e z m o .56 T he chronology of this rule in Balkan Judezm o is unclear,
but there is some evidence that it characterized the pronunciation of
H ebraism s in pre-1492 Iberian Judezm o too—though not necessarily in
this w ord.57 See also N African JA r habra ( “ colloquial” ) vs. hebra (“ learn-
e d ” )58—though the former could be due to the influence of Judeo-A rabic
phonology. The possibility of Balkan phonological interference on Judez-
mo should also be explored, since neutralization of unstressed 0 is typical
of Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian dialects—but here 0 > u. 59 Otherwise,
in view of the Turkish impact on Balkan languages, I assume that the
H ebraism was diffused from Turkish to the Balkan languages.
7.18 H e, JA ram kapparah. See sections 6.7 above and 7.112 below.
7.19 He mtxts. The Hebrew term for ‘tax, customs’ appears in G er­
m an, Czech and Polish as meches (with additional variants in Germ an).
In G erm an, the term, first attested in 1768, is non-literary and retains
the original Hebrew m eaning.60 Czech has the word in the meaning ‘tax
paid by a Jew for crossing a bridge in Prague’,61 However, in Polish the
term (with numerous derivatives) means ‘Jewish convert to Christiani-
ty’.62 M asing identifies an Aramaic cognate in a num ber of Uralic
languages, e.g. in Balto-Finnic (Lud, a dialect of Karelian, and possibly
in older forms of Liv and Estonian as well), Lapp and in Baltic (Lettish),
and raises the possibility of an Aramaic (non-Jewish) etymon for the
Baltic and Uralic languages (sec e.g. JA ram mtxes ‘customs, d u ty ’). His
examples include Lapp makso ‘paym ent, revenge, value1, Erzya-M ordva
maksrums ‘give, distribute’.65 Even if M asing's etymology is correct, the

‫ יי‬M lad e n o v alone derives the B ulgarian term from “ A ra b ic -H e b re w ” (Judeo*

A rabic?) via T u rk ish (1941:664).
56 B unis 1980:70.
Ibid 222.
sa Leslau 1945:72.
59 G eorgiev I9 68b:27; Stojkov 1968:93-116. T h e feature is restricted to ihe south
R h o d o p ian dialects o f B ulgarian, spoken on the b o rd er w ith G reece.
60 Philoparch o 1768:505; W olf 1956, # # 3 4 9 3 , 3506 (citing 1822 as the earliest a t­
testation); see also mauchess (1840) 'ta x official, b o rd e rg u a rd ’ ( < H e maxes 'ta x ‫־‬official’).
81 B randi 1876:149; K ariow icz 1885:417-418.
42 K arlow icz et al. 1900-1927.
M asing derives the A ram aic term from A kkadian miksu ‘h arvest tithe* (1976:522).
It is w orth citing here P ritsak ’s con ten tio n that in the 10th c en tu ry , in tern ational traders
in the N o rth e rn D vina basin used fiu d ia n (O ld E stonian) an d M iddle Persian (1981:28).
T he p a rticipatio n of Jew s on this trad e ro u te is suggested by term s like m txts and galidh
(sec scction 7.71 below).
208 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

differences in m eaning and form between G erm an and West Slavic on

the one hand and Baltic and Uralic (if the latter are in fact of Semitic
origin) on the other suggest independent acts of borrowing rather than
a common isogloss. Further, a specifically Jewish dialect of Aramaic is
not required for the Baltic and Uralic terms. T he term is rare in Yiddish
(in the meaning ‘tax’).
7.110 He, JA ram (?) ntftl. A Hebraism (or Judeo-A ram aism ?) a p ­
parently found only on Czech territory is Jew ‫־‬C z Nefele ‘elevated section
in the old Jewish cemetery of Prague reserved for children who died
under the age of one m onth’.64 T he oldest dated tombstone in the P rague
Jewish cemetery is from the first half of the 15th century; the area o f the
Nefele has been used for infant burial since the early 18th century, b u t the
adjacent area has graves dating from the late 15th century. So far, I have
not encountered the term in other European Jewish communities. T h ere
are four conceivable analyses for the term Nefele:
(a) T he etymon is JA ram mftlah5 ~ nifla3 ‘stillbirth’. A problem w ith
this analysis is the -e- in the second syllable of Nefele instead of the ex­
pected -«-; also it would be surprising if such a section in the cem etery
were designated by a singular noun.
(b) If we regard the etymon as He or JA ram ntftl, the cognate o f the
Judeo-A ram aic forms cited above, then the -t would require explanation.
O ne possibility might be to analyze it as the G erm an (or Old Yiddish)
plural marker (as in G Pftrdsg: Pferde pi ‘horse’), the Czech plural m arker
used with native toponyms (e.g. Lobkovice)6i or the Y dim -le, resulting
in the loss of the stem -I (see CzY s^rdqjl J619, discussed in section 6.54
above).66
W hatever the etymology, a Yiddish interm ediary for the root seems
doubtful, though the term is listed in a late 18th century Czech Yiddish
glossary, e.g. nephelo, alongside mappelo ( < He mappalah ‘bringing
dow n’?) ‘stillborn child’ and mapp'd (zajn) ‘abort’ (17 73),67 aderived form
of the same Hebrew root; see also EY mapl-kind (literally ‘aborting’ +

M D a a lit jiidiicke Fnedhof in Prag 1960:17.

‫ ״‬G e b au e r 3:1960:113.
66 Beranek gives -el(e) as che d im in u tiv e in B avarian an d C zech Y iddish (1965, m a p
# 4 4 ); sec also K onig 1981:157. G e rm a n dialects from L u satia and Silesia have •/ a s th e
dim inucive (2 irm u n sk ij 1956:443). H ow ever, in A lsatian Y iddish, base stem s e n d in g in
•/ rake a dim inucive in *>6. although oecasonally w ith th e loss o f the stem I (Z u c k c rm a n
1969:56). F u rth er, L an d au notes th at in the Y iddish o f G e rm a n y , B ohem ia a n d
M o ra v ia, the preferred d im in u tiv e suffix was •xt (1937:157*159). In E astern Y iddish, th e
use of a t is restricted to a single locale in N orthw estern P o land, b u t was p robably once
m ore w idespread (H e rz o g 1965:140-141, m ap # 4 .6 3 ). F u rth er d a ta from Polish Y iddish
are given in M W einreich 1959:100, fn. 25.
61 T irsch 1773:100. N o Ne/eU is recorded in P frim m e r 1959; Beem 1967; lo w e n s te in
1969; W einberg 1969; G u g g e n h eim -G ru n b e rg 1976.
 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 209

‘child’). H e, JA ra m n tftl is also found in G erm an slang lists b eginning

w ith the m id-19th century, e.g. Nefel ‘stillborn child’, N ewel ‘sm all child’;
see Nefelche dim 1862s8— and in a G e rm an Y iddish glossary p rep a re d by
a Jew ish convert to C h ristian ity , G. Selig (1792:219 ) .M B ut nepkelo ( =
* nefele) as a singular n o u n seems to be an unlikely source for a term
d en o tin g a section of graves. M o reo v er, Y iddish term s for ‘cem etery’
often involve the p lu ral form o f ‘grav e’, e.g. Y bejsakvures, kvurim < H e
bet haqvdrot, qvdrim.
I f a Y iddish in term ed iary is ruled out, th en the in terp re ta tio n o f Nefele
as H e, JA ra m nsful 4 C z -e pi becom es appealing (see above), though
it is not w ithout problem s. In Y iddish an d , to a lesser extent, Ju d e z m o ,
it is com m on to com bine a H ebrew or Ju d eo -A ram aic n o u n w ith a
H ebrew plural m ark er, th o u g h the d istrib u tio n of th e two H ebrew plural
m arkers -im and -ot in Y iddish o r Ju d ezm o does n o t always follow that
of norm ative H ebrew , e,g. H e sabbdtdt ‘S a b b a th s’ w ith -ot > Y sabosim
w ith -im < H e -im. Slavic plural m ark ers are n ot ad m itted in Y iddish
at all. T h e utilization o f a “ su b -g ra m m a r” for H ebrew a n d Ju d eo -
A ram aic com ponents is typical of Jew ish languages w hich have been
created on an earlier Jew ish su b stratu m (see type 1 described in section
2 ab o v e).70 A H ebrew su b -g ram m ar usually requires th at H ebrew and
Ju d eo -A ram aic n o u n s be com bined w ith a H eb rew plural m ark e r and
th a t H eb rew verbal elem ents generally be conjugated periphrastically
w ith a n o n -H eb rew auxiliary (see discussion o f verbal periphrasis in sec­
tion 4.33 above). H ow ever, in so-called tran sitio n al, i.e. obsolescent or
adolescent Jew ish languages (type 4: see section 2 above), we rarely e n ­
c o u n ter elem ents of a H eb rew su b -g ram m ar. T h u s, H e bdhur, pi -im
‘young m a n ’ > Y boxer: -im pi vs. 20th cen tu ry Jew -C z bochr ‘Jew ish
sem inary stu d e n t’, pi bochri w ith the C zech plu ral m ark e r (see section 2
ab o v e).71 W hile the com bination o f a H ebrew n o u n w ith a H ebrew plural
m a rk er (used as such) is characteristic of a “J u d e o ‫־‬X lan g u ag e ” , the
assignm ent of a n o n -H eb rew plural m a rk e r to a H ebrew n o u n is not ex-
elusive to a “ Je w ish -X ” lan g u ag e ” . T h u s H ebrew verbal nouns w ith the
encircling derivational p a tte rn hit-... -ut nev er take a H ebrew p lu ral in
Y iddish, probably since this w ould involve accepting an aw kw ard m or-
phophonem ic altern a tio n in the stem , e.g. H e hithajvut ‘d u ty ’ (- vujot pi)

58 W o lf 1956, # 3 8 3 6 . See also neffild (P hiloparcho 1768:506).

e9 C u rio u sly , G e rm a n dialects preserve a n o th e r H e b ra ism w ith stem -I and -e vs. Y
0 , e.g. B av arian G (Schopfloch) egde vs. Y egel ‘c a l f — unless th e fo rm er is from H e csglah
1h eifer’ ra th e r th a n from H e c£gel (P hilipp 1969:35). W o lf 1956, #114-7 also gives egel
(1822).
70 See details in W exler 1974b; 1980a; 1 9 8 1 b :l22, fn. 42.
71 C o m p are also J u d malsin *inform er5: m alsinim pi ( < H e malsin: -im pi) vs. S p (arch)
malsin: -es pi, an d exam ples from P o rtu g u ese in W exler 1982a:85-86, 98.
210 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

> Y hisxajves, with the native plural -n; also a few Hebrew verb steins
can be integrated non-periphrastically. Even the extension of a Hebrew
plural marker to non-Hebrew components, though rare, is encountered
in Jewish languages of type 1, e.g. native Ju d ladron ‘th ie f : ladronim pi
(vs. Sp ladron\ladrones), Y pojer ‘peasant’: -im pi (vs. G Baiter-, ■n pl).‫״‬
Hence, it is impossible to decide whether Nefele reflects a “Judeo-C zech”
or “Jcwish-Czech” grammatical pattern; not that one example would of­
fer a firm basis for a decision. In theory, a form like Nefele could also have
been a creation of Christian speakers, who rarely borrow Hebrew nouns
togeiher with their native plural markers, e.g. He pe3ot pi ‘side curls of
an observant male Jew ’ > Y pejes (with back formation peje sg) > (Jew-)
C z pejz sg > (tautologous) pi pejzy\ other Hebrew plurals turned singular
in Slavic are R begemot ‘hippopolom as’ ( < He fohemah ‘cattle, animal’,
pi -ol)\ R serafim ‘seraph’ ( < H e serif, pi strdfim)\ Bavarian G slg
(Schopfloch) Kasseeremm ‘pig’ < He hazirfm pi.73 An analogous construc­
tion may be O PoLat ( < OPo) Kawyary, Kawyory (14th c) < H e qtvtr sg
or qvar- pi stem + Po -y pi (discussed in section 7.113 below). There are
no parallel examples of Hebrew stem and a non-Hebrew plural marker
in the Judeo-W est Slavic glosses, and there is only one known example
of a Hebrew plural m arker appearing with a Slavic singular stem, e.g.
JW SI qrwqjm ‘caterpillars’ (from the Hebrew writings of the French
scholar, Rashi, c. 1028-1105: see section 4.1122 above).
7.111 He, JA ram ptsah. See section 3.341 above.
7.112 He qabcan. The Hebrew term for ‘beggar’ may be the source of
Po kapcan ‘old devil; poor person; muddler, good for nothing; fool’, kap-
caniec ‘go to ru in ’;74 Br kapcany ‘disheveled clothing’;75 Uk kapcan ‘street
urchin, especially Jew ish’ (pej), kapcanily ‘fall into poverty’;76 R
(Novorossisk 1908; also W and S dial) kapcan ‘poorly dressed fellow,
ragam uffin’.77 Y. M ark notes that qben is first encountered in a Hebrew
text from the Lithuanian-Belorussian area written in 1622/1623.78 This
would suggest the “ H ebraism ” was a creation of Yiddish speakers. In

‫ ״‬O n rare occasions, a Jew ish language m ay p refer a non-H ebrew plural with a
H ebrew n oun while a non-Jew ish language prefers a H ebrew plural m a rk e r, e.g. Jew -Pt
(o f th e con tem p o rary crypto-Jew s in N o rth ern P o rtu g al) goios vs. stPt goim ,C hristians.
g entiles’ ( < H e goj ‘n a tio n ’ + -im pi) (W exler 1982b:85). See also J ew -U k gojas in section
6.7 above.
” P hilipp 1969:29. See also W olf 1956, #2 5 0 4 (w ith one plural exam ple).
‫ • י‬D oroszewski 3:1964. H g kapca, kapcabttyar ‘ro tten fellow’ could be directly from Yid­
d ish , but a Polish in term ed iary should not be ruled o u t.
71 N osovif 1870; A b ab u rk a 1979:50.
75 A ndrusyshen an d K re tt 1957; Jo fe 1965:435. O h ijen k o 1979fTadds the gloss "clum■
sv, d u m b w ittcd p e rso n '.
' ‫ ״‬Filin et al 13:1977.
’• Y. M ark 1958a:136. QUn is the H ebrew spelling w hich is req u ired in Yiddish.
 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 211

stan d ard Y iddish the form of the “ H e b ra ism ” is kapcn ‘b e g g a r’, b ut in

the Y iddish spoken in th e U k rain e, th e form kapcan is also atte ste d .79
T h ere is no verb derived from this root in Y iddish. T h e form o f the East
Slavic and Polish H eb ra ism m ight rule o ut a direct b o rrow ing from Y id­
dish, though the m ean in g in U k ra in ia n retains an association w ith Jew s.
M . W einreich theorized th a t U kY kapcan was a reb o rro w in g from
U k ra in ia n ,80 b u t I w ould also en tertain the possibility th at eith er the
U k rain ian an d /o r U k ra in ia n Y iddish form w ere received from an earlier
non-A shkenazic Jew ish su b stratu m (Judeo-E ast Slavic?), w hich p rev en t­
ed the subsequent superim position of PoY kapcn on U k ra in ia n Y iddish,
even after the source language had becom e obsolete. If this hypothesis
could be established, it w ould m ean th at a Ju d eo -E a st Slavic H ebraism
survived in Y iddish at least in form , though its m ean in g was adjusted to
th a t o f the Y iddish surface cognate (assum ing it h a d un d erg o n e the
sem antic changes attested in the Slavic targ et languages). It is interesting
to speculate w hether the pejorative m eanings associated w ith H e kapparah
in Slavic languages are due to resem blance w ith the identical initial
syllable in H e qabcan.
7.113 H e, JA ra m q-v-r. Reflexes of the H eb rew -Ju d eo-A ram aic q-v-r
‘grave; b u ry ’ are attested in (a) G erm an (by the m iddle 16th century)
a n d D u tch slang, (b) O ld Polish L atin and in (c) m o d ern R u ssian and
Polish dialects. H ow ever, the form al and sem antic facts suggest two in­
dependent acts of borrow ing: a Y iddish source certainly accounts for G
slg Chejure ‘grave; hid in g place’ (1735),81 Po dial kferes ‘Jew ish cem etery ’
(attested in two tow ns n ear B ielsk);82 see A lsatian Y gfure ‘b u ria l’,83 EY
kvure\ kvures pi ‘cem e tery ’ < H e qvurdh ‘b u ria l’.84 W e have to posit a
Jew ish language oth er th a n Y iddish as the im m ediate source of the
H eb raism in all other languages: see e.g. O P o L at Kawyary (n e a r San-
dom ierz 1387), Kawyory (n e ar K rakow , late 14th c) Je w ish cem etery’:85

75 M . W ein reich 4:1973:328. Jew ish -P o lish also has kapcan (B rzezina 1979:90—with
p enu ltim ate stress?). T avjov cites kapcan, kab- fam (1923d:342),
9(1 M . W einreich 4:1973:328. S ainean suggested th a t Y kapcn m ight be a Slavicism
(G inig er 1954:177, fn. 113). T h is is unlikely since the plural m a rk e r is H e -im. M oreover,
w hat w ould die Slavic stem be?
SJ W olf 1956, #2589. Ph ilo p arch o lists chejure ‘hole; secret tre a su re ', chejure machen
'b u ry stolen goods w hen an escape is n o t possible’ (1768:49 6). See also discussion of G e r­
m an d a ta in fn. 100 below.
s! N itsch 1954:205; A ltb au er 1977[1961b]:48-49. T h e change of Y u > Po f is
puzzling.
S. A. B irn b au m 1981:26,
84 T h e opposition of ‘g ra v e ’ (sg): ‘c em etery ’ (pi) is also fo u n d in Li kapas: kapaT and
Br m ahila: mokilki.
" B aiaban 1930:11; N itsch 1954:206. T h e claim by A ltb au er th a t K aw iory reflects a
Y iddish p ro n u n ciatio n of the H eb rew ro o t needs m otivation (1977[1961b]:48). T he
K h a z a r etym on proposed by S ip er 1926b an d others has been ju stly rejected by B rutzkus
212 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O ‫ ־‬A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

Po Kawiory tp (in the O lkusz district and a village 3 km outside of

K rakow ), Kawiary tp (G niezno d istrict).36 T h e reflexes of H e-JA ram q-v-r
in R ussian and Polish (often from the slang register) lack the m ean in g
'Jew ish cemetery*: R xibara (R ja z a n ’, O rel, T a m b o v ); (e)xibarka
(M oscow , Jaro slav ]’), xiburka (Sm olensk) ‘shanty, hovel, earth en h u t7;87
(slg) kaber, kabor 'b reak , gap in the floor’, xavira, xavera ‘den of thieves’,88
xavira , xovira ‘a p a rtm e n t’,89 xovyra ‘h iding place’,90 (S dial) kaburka ‘cell
for sobering up at a police statio n ’,91 xavyrka ‘fem ale sexual o rg a n ’,92
,
kabur 'th eft through a tu n n e l’ kaburscik ‘h o u seb reak er’,93 kaburif
‘dism antle a wall or ro o f5.9* U k slg (Lvov, T e rn o p il’) xavira ‘h u t,
lodgings’,95 Po sIghaw ir(ka) ‘h o u se’, chamira ‘house; secret hid in g place;
large p ocket1,96 xavor £(court)yard; enclosure a ro u n d the h o u se’ (K oniri
district; C zestochow a).97 T h e earliest attestation is “ 3 R ,J xibar(k)a (late
17th c,. PutivF in the U k rain e, N ovosiF in R u ssia — bo th tow ns first cited
in the 12th ce n tu ry ).98 Form s like O G Judenkiewer (M ag d eb u rg , before

1929; M ieses 1934; A ltb a u e r 197/ [I9 6 lc ]:4 3 ; [1961b]:48-49 (see also section 3.32, fn.
370 above) B afabaivs deriv atio n from G K irchhof is u n accep tab le (1930:1 1). T he village
K aw iory n e ar K rakow is cited in a L atin d o cu m en t d ated 1318 in the form K auor — w ithout
the plural suffix (Sulim ierski et al. 15,2:1902). O n the possible existence o f Slavic fam ily
n am es from the K h azar e th n o n y m , see section 3.323 above.
66 Sulim ierski et al. 3:1882. N itsch also cites K aw iory as the n am e o f a street in K rakow
a nd of an old village n e a r C z a rn a W ies (1954:206). T w o sim ilar-so unding toponym s in
Belorussia. K auaryki (H ro d n a district) an d Kavarljany (M insk district) b e a r checking (see
R apano v ic 1981; 1982). T h e Jew ish settlem ents in S an d o m ierz an d K rakow date from
the early 13th and early 14th cen tu ry respectively; th at o f G n iezn o from th e 12th century
(and possibly earlier). Jew ish m in ters w ere active in G n iezn o , K alisz an d Inow roctaw in
the 1 2 t h 1 3 ‫־‬th centuries (see G um ow ski 1975:110-111 and section 4.2 above).
87 V a sm e r 3:1958:239— allu d in g to G slg Kabora ‘place w here stolen goods are
h id d e n ’, of H ebrew origin. Skacinskij cites R thieves’ slg hdbu7 ‘tra p d o o r; tu n n e l connect­
ing buildings in a cam p for purposes o f escap e5 (1982), T h e A rabic cognate (com ing via
T u rk ic languages) can n o t be ru le d o u t as th e etym on, e.g. A r gabar ‘g ra v e 5: q u b u r p l‫׳‬, T a t
kaber ‘g ra v e ’: kaberhk ‘c em ete ry 5 (Russko-tatarskij slovar' 1941); note, in a ddition, reflexes
of T u kubur ‘quiver; h o lste r’, e.g. R koburd, U k kobur(d) ‘h o lste r’, S e C r kubur , kiibum
‘pistol; h o lster' w hich m ay offer ari alternative etym on.
a£) L a rin 1931; M.oier1aly\ .. J J IT L K 1952; Z&rgan prestupnikov 1952.
S traten 1931; Materiaiy,. J J I T L K 1952.
30 F ab n cn y j 1923. T h e 0 in the first syllable here an d in the p receding exam ple m ay
b e due to convergence w ith SoR x o i a f. U k xovaty ‘c onceal5.
91 V . M . Popov 1912:38; Potapov 1923; Slovar1. .,zargona 1964.
92 Zargon prestupnikov 1952.
93 Slovar\>. zargona 1964. See also B r xavira ‘m u d h u t' (Z ytkavicy) (L ucvc-F edarec
1976:234). '
V o riv o d a 1971.
95 H o rb a c 1966:40.
3e E streich er 1903:43, 53, 120; K u rk a 1907:20 (w ho also cites PoY slg hauire in the
m ea n in g ‘h o u se ’ an d havire slogen 'h id e o n e se lf); Ludw ikow ski an d W alczak 1922:29.
U laszyn distinguishes betw een Po si? (c)hawira ‘h o u se ’ an d ckawira *hidine‫ ־‬place; large
p o c k et’ (1915:463). L
97 B udziszew ska 1955:136.
K otkov 1970:142-143.
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C . 213

th e m iddle 16th c) ‘Jewish cemeteries’, " G slg Kewer (1862), Du slg keiwer
‘g ra v e ’, keware ‘bury’100 < He, JA ram qtvtr ‘grave’ are possibly also not
o f direct Yiddish origin, since the use of the plural form, e.g. H e qvartm,
is found very rarely in contemporary W estern Yiddish (the only instance
reco rd ed by the LCAAJ, # 181080 is at Assen, Holland). In Slavic and
Slavic-derivative dialects of Yiddish, e.g. Slovak, Galician, Silesian,
Belorussian and Bessarabian Yiddish, we only find sporadic use of He
qvartm (see LCAAJ for details). Otherwise, contemporary Eastern Yid­
d ish uses H e, JA ram qtvtr only in the compounds kejver-oves ‘parental
g ra v e s’ ( < H e, JA ram qtvtr ‫נ‬avot), bejsakvures ‘cem etery’ ( < He bet
haqvarol, literally ‘house of the graves’) .101 T he situation in Old W estern
a n d Eastern Yiddish is unclear.
It is tantalizing to posit a common (Judeo-Slavic) Hebraism as the
ety m o n for the G erm an and Slavic data. After all, the Jewish com­
m u n ities of M agdeburg, 102 Regensburg and Erfurt were Slavic-speaking
probably as late as the 14th century; in fact, the Jewish scholar Iserlin,
w hose work Trumat hadtstn contains many Judeo-Slavic glosses, was born
in R egensburg in 1390; see also the numerous Slavicisms in the Or zartta,
w ritte n by Jicxak ben MoSt who was born in the first half of the 13 th cen­
tu ry in the Czech lands but grew up in Meissen. It would be interesting
to d eterm ine whether the Jewish residents of these German-Slavic towns
reta in ed Slavic longer then their Christian neighbors, but the dates of ex­
tin ctio n of Slavic in these areas cannot be determined. It is difficult to
evalu ate the significance of the variant Polish Latin spellings in a — 0 .
W e are reminded of the changes of O Po e > a > a and e > a > 0
believed to have been completed by the N th century;103 if He qtvtr
> * q ( ’)ev’er > * qdv’ar>*qav’or, then the Polish Latin variant with -ya-
(Sandom ierz 1387) might be regarded as the more archaic of the two
v arian ts and the Hebraism could have been in the Polish lexicon perhaps

99 H eise 1931:361; M . W einreich 1:1973:211; 3:214-215— who also gives variant

fo rm s q u o tin g G u d e m a n n 1865:244-245; 1:1880:94-95, including G Judtnkafer (19th c)
from B e m b u rg (n e a r M ag d e b u rg )— a n are a w here Sorbian Jew s w ere noted in the 10th
c e n tu ry (see section 4 above). T h e p lu ral m eaning seem s to be d u e to an identification
o f '€‫ ז‬as the G e rm a n p lu ral m arker.
100 V a n B olhuis n .d .: 79 for D u tch ; W olf 1956, #2 5 8 9 for G e rm a n . See also G slg
ccrkaptm , vetkawwtm ,cover w ith e arth ; hide in the ground* (von G ro lm an 1822).
m T h e im p o rtan ce of bejs is seen in the Yiddish*Slavic blen d used dialectally in Yid•
d is h . btjs-smtnUii (M . W einreich 4:1973:328). T h e re is no fo u ndation to M . W ein re ich ’s
scepticism th a t Y iddish speakers w ould have called a cem etery by a plural form of H e
9 c0 f r alone (3:1973:24).
102 A cco rd in g to T ykocinski, M ag d e b u rg had the oldest Jew ish settlem ent in Eastern
G e rm a n y , d a tin g from the second h a lf o f the 10th cen tu ry ( 1934d: 163-164). See also M .
W ein re ich 1:1973:50, 85*86; 4:146. See also discussion o f N ie n b u rg in section 4 above.
‫י‬°‫ י‬See S tieb er 1973:24-25, 36-37, 60.
214 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

two or three centuries earlier than the oldest Polish attestation. A lter­
natively, it may be more expedient to derive the Russian forms from
JA ram qabrP ‘grave’, via Iranian languages, see e.g. M Pers^a^r — gaur
‘hole, depression’, M odPers gur ‘grave’, gur kardan ‘bury’, gurestan
‘cem etery’, CzRom govr ‘grave’.104 See also Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic
elements in languages spoken in the Caucasus discussed in sections
7.5-7.64 below.
7.114. He samtx, somex. R thieves’ slg samax, somax ‘inspector, in ­
vestigator’ would appear to be either from H e samtx ‘nam e of the letter
s’ (i.e. somax might be an abbreviation for R sledovatel’ ‘inspector’)105 or
from He somex ‘he supports; supporter (of the com munity?)’. In neither
case can we point with certainty to Yiddish as the intermediary since
there the two words would be pronounced as samtx and sojmex respectively
(the latter used with the auxiliary zajn ‘be’ in the meaning ‘rely on ’) .10*
A possible cognate, if not source, of the Russian term might be JESl(B r)
Samaxa ma gen (Trakai Jew ; Vilnius 1501 )107 — Samaku dat (L uc’k Jew ;
Krakow 1506-1507)108—if / is a function of sibilant confusion; see also
&omak (Petrykaw 1510).109 Samaka, Semjaka, Semakovh nom (sic!) (Jew
from Smolensk 1489-1490).110 He somex is a current Jewish family nam e
in Iraq.

7.2 Judeo-Aramaic loans in Slavic languages without Yiddish and Judezmo

cognates
T here are two J udeo-Aramaic elements in Slavic and contiguous non-
Slavic languages which have not been encountered in any coterritorial
W estern or Eastern Yiddish dialect, and hence may be either direct
Slavic borrowings from a colloquial Jewish source other than Yiddish, or
(via Christian clergymen and seminary students) from written Judeo-
Aramaic.

104 A n A ram aic etym ology for Pers gur was proposed by N oldeke 1892:41. ( am
grateful to Shaul Shaked for calling m y atten tio n to th e Iran ia n -A ram a ic a lte rn a tiv e (see
also Shaked 1979:272, 282, note 2). T h e R o m an i term is cited in W olf 1960. See also
C z slg govrak ‘g ra v e ’, which T re im e r derives from R o m govr (1937:76).
,0!v T h is is the suggestion o f F rid m an 1931. T h e v arian t samax is given by Lebedev
1909.
106 But T avjov cites somax fam ( 1923d:344). In W estern Y iddish an d G e rm a n slang,
sammich has the m ean in g ,six ty ’ (R a p p 1952:251).
107 Bersadskij 1:1882, #38.
,0B Ibid. 1:1882, # # 44, 46-47. O n th e change o f final x > k. see section 3.341 above.
109 BA 3:1930, # 1 4 .
1 ,0 Sbomik russkogo istortfeskogo obsccstva 1892:24, 31-32, 43-45. O R Scmjaka (1 6 th -l7 th
cc) was a nam e not associated with the sain ts' c alen d a r (Balov 1901:111).
 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 215

7.21 J A ra m lajtor, letor. See section 3.124 above.

7.22 J A r a m pinxa?, etc. G k pinaks ‘b oard , plank, w ritin g tablet, platter,
engraved plate1, pinakas ‘b oard , in d ex ’, pinakion ‘plate, d ish ’ ap p ear in
Judeo -A ram aic as pinxa^ o r pitiax ‘container, p la te ’; literary H ebrew has
borrow ed both Ju d eo -A ram aic G recism s. T h e first Ju d e o -A ram aic term
appears in G erm an as Pinke and in D u tch ping-pong, ping-pm g ‘m o n ey ’,
b u t in C zech, Slovak a n d H u n g a ria n a s pinka ‘con tain er for m oney, paid
by cardplayers to the in n k eep e r’. 111 T h e term is unknow n in Y id d ish .112
C u riously, Gk pinaks is also the basis for H e, JA ra m pinqds ‘register,
n o tebook’, w hich continues as Y pinkes ‘ib’;113 see also C hSl pinakida
‘b o a rd ’.111 An in trig u in g question is w hether the acceptance o f JA ra m
p in x d ‫ נ‬in G erm an an d D u tc h dialects was facilitated by the presence of
a second G recism w ith sim ilar form an d m ean ing , e.g. G k pougga
‘pocket’ (M o d G k poungz 1p u rse ’) > L at punga ‘p u rs e ’ (R a v e n n a 564) >
M L G punge ‘purse, pocket’.115

7.3 Hebrew-Slavic blends

Jew ish languages seem to be u n iq u e in productively constructing
frozen com pounds o ut o f synonym s of diverse origin, e.g. Y f i s nohe ‘chill­
ed calves feet (food)’ < native f is + Br w h y ‘feet’; C rim ea n K a r kurban
ola ,offering’ (1734) < A r qurbdn + H e ‘offering’ (based on Biblical

111 W a if 1956, #4120; Kiss 1957:405; M ach ek 1971; E n d t 1982; van B olhuis n.d.
H ub acek glosses G z pinka as ‘personal cash b o x ’ (1981:51), See also ru ra l A u strian G
pinkepinke ‘m o n ey ’ (B enedikt et al. 1979). T h e reduplicated form s m ay be a n original
onom atopoeic creation w hich la te r u n d e rw e n t sh o rten in g in som e languages. C 2 ech a t­
testatio n dates from 1880, H u n g a ria n from 1888, G e rm a n only from 1906. W olf, follow­
ing S. A. B irn b au m 1955:249, rejects a Ju d eo -A ram aic origin, b u t gives no cross
reference to #4197 w here G slg Pinca ‘cellar’ (1922) js derived from So pinca (sic!), T he
m ean in g an d etym ology of the S orbian term are n o t given. See also Svk slg p in k a , pica,
C z pice an d H g slg pina ‘v a g in a ’ (v u lg ar) (w ith 2 >£‫ ־‬in terp reted as the d im inutive suffix
and rem oved). T h e association o f th e fem ale sexual org an and m oney-box is not unusual,
see e.g. R slg kopilka, w ith both m eanings (G aller 1977)-
u2 S, A. B im b a u m was the first to n o te th a t G Pinke can n o t be derived from Y iddish,
b u t it is u n clear if he also ruled o u t a n A ram aic etym on (1955:249).
113 T h e G e rm a n professional slang spoken in Schopfloch, B avaria has p in k l ‘record
boo k ' (w ith -I dim ?) (P h ilip p 1969:35), w hich provides a link betw een the two Judeo-
A ram aic an d H ebrew G recism s. See also G slg pintes in this m e a n in g recorded by
Philo p arch o 1768:507. J u d pinak ‘pro to co l’, pinakes pi ( ~ pinkos, pinkes), still attested in
D a lm a tia an d Bosnia, appears to be the only exam ple of the original G reek etym on in
a E u ro p ean Jew ish lan g u ag e (o th er th a n Ju d eo -G ree k ). C u rio u sly, pin a x w ith the Jew ish
m ea n in g ‘protocol5 also appears m the G erm an w ritings o f Jew s in this cen tu ry (see
G elb er 1920).
114 S ad n ik and A itzetm u ller 1955. T h e w ord ap p ears in the C odex Suprasliensis
(B ulgarian, 11th century).
115 See K iparsky 1934:54.
216 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC CO M PO N E N T S E T C .

H e qorban c0 iah)."6 In addition to frozen compounds, synonyms of

diverse etymological origins may become fused if they are phonetically
similar, e.g. BrY hltjm ‘clay’ < Y lejm + Br hlina;1' 7 T rakai K ar kanpor
‘cam phor’: see T u kajur + Po kamfora. 118 There are two examples of a
possible blending of a synonymous Hebrew and a Slavic root due to
phonetic similarity. Curiously, both cases involve the Hebrew-Judeo-
Aramaic root c-g-l (as in ciggul ‘circle’, cagalah ‘wagon’) + CS1 *kolo ‘cir•
cle’. The examples are by no means certain, since alternative derivations
can be provided. I am unable to determine whether the forms were
created by Jews or non-Jews, and if the former, Slavic- or Yiddish­
speaking. O n Hebrew-Slavic blends used only in Yiddish, see the discus­
sion in sections 6.5-6.57 above.
7.31 He t-g-l + CS1 *kolo.
7.311 Cz kolrtko. He cagalah ‘wagon’ is found in both W estern and
Eastern Yiddish dialects, e.g. Swiss Y agil, agbr ‘driver’ vs. EY agult
(Vilnius, Warsaw) ‘(Jewish) hearse’. ” 9 From W estern Yiddish, the term
has spread to G erm an and Czech slang, e.g. G Go(h)U (1814), egoln
(1806), egele (1821), Cz ( < G?) egele.120 A curious form coterritorial with
the Western Yiddish-German-Czech isoglass is Cz-Svk kolecko ‘single­
wheeled wagon, wheelbarrow; small wheel’ (Slovak has only the last
meaning), which Machek (1971) derived from G slg Go(h)U, with in­
terference from Cz kolo ‘wheel, circle’. Smilauer doubted this deriva-
tion;121 but if Machek is correct, then the blend could have originated
either among Jewish speakers of Czech or Czech speakers of slang (where
the Hebraism might have been known, with or without a German in­
termediary). U nfortunately, the age of Cz kolecko cannot be ascertained;
if it should prove to be older than the earliest G erm an attestations, then
it might be an innovative Judeo-Czech blending. Some indirect evidence
that cagdlah may have been known to Slavic speakers is that the Hebrew
root (-g-l retains a specific Jewish connotation in Polish and the East
Slavic languages where the Yiddish compound balagole (unattested in

W exler 1983b. For exam ples from A shkenazic G e rm a n (i.e. Jew ish -G e rm a n wm-
ten in Yiddish ch aractcrs, 1760 1 0 approxim ately the end o f the 19th century), involving
G e rm a n Yiddish a n d stan d ard G e rm a n cognates, see W exler 198la:!2 3 -1 2 4 . F or a com­
prehensive study o f frozen co m pounds (freezes), see C o o p er and Ross 1975— though
w ithout m ention of the u n iq u e Jew ish exam ples.
!‫ זי‬W exler 19Hlb: 133-134. S«x also the exam ple of K a r xydi in section 3.312 above
"* T h e K araite term is cited by Kowalski 1929, glossary; the analysis is m ine.
"* T h e E astern Yiddish geographical facts follow U . W einreich 1965:26.
110 Sec T reim cr 1937:27. 61, 65 an d W exler 1983a. For G e rm a n slang exam ples, first
cited in 1807, see W olf 1956, # 1865.
I‫־‬l Sec the en try in M achek 1971. T h e R ussian surface cognate koUiko has the meaning
‘rin g let’.
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 217

W estern Yiddish) is used in the m eaning ,(Jewish) wagon driver’—

though in Yiddish itself the m eaning is simply ‘wagondriver’ (see also
discussion in section 5 above).
7.312 Br vakol. Br vokal(a), vakol adv, prep ‘around, all ab o u t’ has
cognates in all the Slavic languages, e.g. R, Cz, SeCr okolo, Mac okotu
< CS1 *o- ‘around’ + *kolo ‘circle’ (see Br kola ‘circle, wheel’).122
Sul’m an stands alone in proposing that the Belorussian variant vakol is
derived from He (iggul ‘circle’ (via Y igf) on the grounds that initial
unstressed Br a ordinarily does not receive a prothetic v. 125 But there is
no prothetic v before i- in Belorussian either, and reconstructing an initial
rounded vowel in Hebrew, say He *coggul, would only make sense in an
Arabic-speaking milieu, where c would be pronounced as a voiced
pharyngealized glide, which could result in the rounding of the following
vowel. In the Slavic lands, H e c was apparently always pronounced as
0 . I am unable to determine the geography of the three variants in the
Belorussian dialects.
Resorting to Hebrew is probably unnecessary to account for Br vakol.
In most Belorussian dialects, initial 0 acquired a prothetic v (e.g. vozera
‘lake’ — Uk ozero)■, v before a in vakol could be simply due to analogy with
vokal. Mixed declensions involving prothetic v are found in Belorussian,
e.g. akno ‘window’ ( ~ Uk okno): vokny nom pi: akon, voknaw gen pi.124
However, for Belorussian-speaking Jew s who might have been receptive
to H ebrew loans, the crossing of two Slavic and Hebrew roots of similar
form and function cannot be entirely ruled out. But an association of the
two roots is based on the assumption that Belorussian-speaking Jews
preferred the variant vakol—and there is no way to prove this. 125 T he two
examples of Slavic-Hebrew blends discussed here are problematic and it
would not be wise at this stage to insist on a common origin for the Czech
and Belorussian forms—let alone a Hebrew origin.

113 See also JW S I 3wqwl ,circle’ (in the w ritings o f b tn A zriel, m iddle 13th c) (in
K upfer an d Lewicki 1956:183, 193).
■« 1926:216.
IM T h e D A B M does not m a p this w ord specifically, b u t sim ilar roots a re presented.
M ap H 189 shows th a t forms w ith p ro th etic 1‫׳‬- before an u n stressed vow el, e .g . vuhol or
vuhlo (vs. stB r ctifial) ‘c o m e r’, a re clustered m ain ly in th e N o rth w est, N o rth east and
Southw est o f th e co u n try ; in m ap # 190, the v a ria n ts vtihal', 011/101' ( - stB r vuhal' ‘co al’)
are show n scattered in the N orthw est an d N o rth east, an d sporadically in the Southw est
and East C e n tra l area.
115 O ccasionally, we find th at Jew ish speakers o f a non-Jew ish lan guage p refer the
non-Jew ish v a ria n t closest to th e obsolescent Jew ish n o rm , e.g . som e A shkenazic G e rm a n
texts have J rt/ + tit ‘n o w ’ (F im h 1816), as in c o n te m p o ra ry Y iddish, co rresp o n d in g to
G dial ilzt (w hile o th e r texts use the v a ria n t j'c t/ + j u t — stG jttz t) (W ex ler 1981a: 128,
6 1 . 28). See also ibid , 27 an d section 6.54 an d fn. 177 above.
218 H EB R EW AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

7.32 Hebrew nouns with a Slavic suffix.

7.321 ESI sabas; Po s(z)abasnik, sabatnik, etc.; chawrysnik, etc. Y sabes
‘Sabbath’ is attested in all the Slavic languages, e.g. Po szabts ‘Sabbath’,
szabasowka ‘Jewish tallow candle; kind of whiskey’; Br sabasovki ‘Jewish
candles’,126 Br, Uk sabas ‘Sabbath’. In the East Slavic languages we find
an additional reflex, Iabai.nl The age of this variant is difficult to ascer­
tain, but OBr sabas ‘Sabbath’ (stress?) is attested in a source from
1616.128 Four hypotheses can be advanced to explain the variant Iabai:
(a) Assuming that ESI sabas is from Y labes, the replacement of -s by
-I requires explanation. O ne possibility would be to speak of assimilation
of -s > - / either in East Slavic or in Yiddish. A weakness in this explana­
tion is the absence of other examples—in either language. T he change
of s > s is attested in native U krainian words in only two environments,
before adjacent postdentals (e.g. O U k bes iadb ‘without children’ [12th
c] < bes ‘w ithout’) and before n (e.g. Uk velnjak ‘water mill that
operates at the time of the spring flood’ < vesna ‘spring’).129 The latter
case is irrelevant for Uk !abas since it is brought about by assimilation to
palatalization, but might apply to Po dial s(z)abasnik, sabatnik, szabatnik
‘(Sabbath) lamp; baking oven’. But we have not resolved the question
of whether Po szabas'nik comes from *szabasnik or *szabasznik.130 Y labalnik
‘Sabbath lantern’ might either be a borrowing from standard Polish or
from a Polish dialect with sibilant confusion. 151 U krainian also has
assimilation of postdentals to dentals before a dental consonant (e.g.
O U k ou Lucbsku ‘in Luc’k’ [1386] < Ltu'bsk-).132 Moreover, Ukrainian
also has the variant sabas ‘Sabbath; dancing on a holiday’, sabalivka ‘fur

1 ,6 Nikiforovskij 18 9 5 :L X X , fn. 676 (sep. pg) w ho also cites the synonym smyrkaikymt
(inst pi) from the V icebsk region.
I‫ ״‬In th e speech of th e U k rain ian iimyky ( ‘o rg a n g rin d e rs’), *Saturday’ is called idc•
vaton (a recent loan from G reek) an d sdbatka (Horbafc !957:27). HorbaC a ttrib u te d the b
to U kY sabai, idbaS(sic!). See also R savvaia ‘S a b b a th 1 which V asm er inexplicably derives
from “ literary Greek** (1909:96). O n th e fem inine g en d er assignm ent, see section 3.125
above. See also Br (ad)sabasavac' *celebrate the Sabbath* (N osovif 1870), adsabyiyc'
*celebrate (o f J e w s )’; (M ahilew dial) ‘flog, cut to pieces, rip o u t, b e a t’ (B jal’kevif 1970;
M arty n aw 1:1978). U k (coll) fabdJnyk *one who engages in p a n tim e side jo b s ’ (Bilodid
et a i 1970-1980) m ay be derived from Uk Sabas *end’. O n Br subotnik, see section 3.341
an d fn. 388 above.
128 See Bulyka 1972b:358. V eselovskij cites O R Sabas fam (late 15th c) (1974:359),
129 Exam ples w ith discussion are from Shevelov 1979:180, 338-339.
110 W ozny describes these form s as typical of south, central a n d west Little Poland
(1975:51-53).
111 I see no basis for M . W ein re ich ’s b elief th at the co m p o und developed first in Yid*
dish (1:1973:205). In fact, A. M a rk ’s Polish-Y iddish dictio n ary glosses Po siabasntk by
o th e r Yiddish o r Y iddish-H ebrew term s (1929). C on v ersely , EY sobointkts 'c a n d c lab ra'
is taken from Po (o r J P o ? ) sobotmki (E streich er 1903:78; K u rk a 1907:90; Ludwikov.sk)
an d W alczak 1922:65).
Shevelov 1979:339-340.
 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O ‫ ״‬A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 219

h a t w orn by Jew s on S abbath; S ab b a th tallow candle; S ab b ath w hiskey’

( ~ sabaUvka ‘S abbath tallow can d le’) ,133
(b) ESI sabas m ight be from a dialect of Y iddish w ith sibilant confusion.
See also discussion in section 6.7 above.
(c) ESI sabas m ight be a h ypercorrect im itation of Jew ish speech— since
in Y iddish dialects w ith sibilant confusion ‘S a b b a th ’ is usually realized
as sabes.
(d) ESI sabas m ight reflect a m erg er o f Y sabes 1S a b b a th ’ w ith the East
Slavic Iranianism sabas (see discussion in section 3.3112 above). T his
hypothesis is suggested by the p artial sem antic overlap th at exists b e ­
tw een Y sabes an d ESI sabas. F or exam ple, th e innovative East Slavic
m eanings for sabas, i.e. ‘enough; stop w o rk ’ are rem iniscent o f Y sabes
in th at this is a day on w hich all w ork is proscribed by th e Jew ish religion.
T h e Slavic languages also have form s w ith t, reflecting non-A shkenazic
p ronunciations of H e sabbat ‘S a b b a th ’, e.g. in the U k ra in ia n dialect of
the V olhynian tailors, U k sabatura denotes ‘S a b b a th ’.134 T h e dental stop
also appears in Po sabatnik ‘S ab b ath la n te rn ’ w ith sibilant confusion (see
also szabasnik ‘S abbath lan tern ; baking o v en ’ discussed above).
O n P o chawrysnik , B r xavrus’nik, see sections 6,314 and 7.17 above.
H ebrew blends w ith Slavic suffixes used in Y iddish are tak en u p in sec­
tions 6.31-6.314 above.
7.322 Br, U k baxurcyk. See section 7.12 above.

7.4 Recovering the Judeo-Slavic pronunciation norms of Hebrew

T h e recovery of the p ro n u n ciatio n norm s of H ebrew from the Ju d e o -

W est Slavic glosses is com plicated because of the use of an etym ological
spelling for H ebrew ; the Ju deo-B elorussian caique language is of lim ited
value to us because o f its small corpus of H ebrew term s (see section
4.4114 above); the n u m b e r o f non-A shkenazic H ebrew com ponents in
the Slavic languages is too small and, in addition, is subject to distortion
by Slavic phonological systems. H ence, the H ebrew an throponym s
recorded in non-Jew ish docum ents assum e a special im portance for
Judeo-S lavic linguistics.135 H ebrew anth ro p o ny m s ap p e a r in the C h ris­
tian Slavic sources in a Y iddish, Slavic, H eb rew an d Slavicized (non-
Y iddish) H ebrew form . It is the last two varian ts w hich are potentially

135 Zelexivs’kyj an d N e d ilV k y j 1882-1886. Bilodid et a i a d d the m eanings ‘Sabbath

food; side jo b done in o n e ’s free tim e, jo b done on S a tu rd a y ’ (1970-1980).
134 D zendzelivs’kyj 1977:323. See also U k sabatura 'p a p e r bag, c a rto n ’ discussed in
s ectio n 3 . 3112, In. 345 above.
135 O n the im p o rtan ce o f a n th ro p o n y m ic d a ta for Y iddish h istorical linguistics, see
S iper 1924; 1926b:283-287.
220 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

of interest to use, though we must reckon with the possibility that C h ris­
tians may have distorted Hebrew names borne by Slavic Jew s, either
under the impact of the Slavic forms of the Biblical Hebrew names, or
because of unfamiliarity with Hebrew names not found in C hristian
sources. These problems notwithstanding, the systematic study of Jew ish
names in Slavic Christian sources should yield im portant inform ation
about Judeo-Slavic pronunciation norm s of Hebrew. In the materials at
our disposal, we note that Hebrew names often appear in more than one
form, even from the same area. For example, He / a t / ‘S aul’ appears
both in a Hebrew form, e.g. JESl(B r.U k) Saulju Judiiu dat (Br6st 1589)136
and in a Belorussified Hebrew form, e.g. Saoulja Ahronovicu dat (T rakai?
1489)'37 (vs. Y Saul, Sojl, Suel, R-ChSl Saul); He mosth ‘Moses’ appears in
a Hebrew form, e.g. JESl(U k) Molejja (a Pesaxa Abramovicov) gen (L u c’k
1530),1JS JESl(B r) Ic’ko Moseevii (M insk 1579)139 and in a Polonized
form, e.g. Mojzeia Tamxanoviia gen (Vilnius 1587)140 (vs. EY mojse, W Y
mawse); H e kajim ‘H aim ’ is unknown in the Slavic languages since it is
not of Biblical origin, yet in Christian sources, it may appear either in
a (hypercorrect) Belorussified form, e.g. JESl(Br) Faim E s’kovii(K obryn
1563),141 or in a Yiddish-Hebrew form, e.g. JESl(Br) Xaim Icxakovic
(Pinsk 1583);m the feminine derivative that we find in JESl(Br) Xaimova-
ja Jakubovii (H rodna 1541) is an innovation (see He hajjah fa, literally
‘animal; living’ > Y xaje fa).143 He jichaq ‘Isaac’ appears in Slavic form s,
e.g. JESI(Br) Izak Xackelevii (H rodna 1532),144 Izaak FajSevil (H ro d n a
1503),145 Ajzak — Ajzik Ezofovic (Vilnius 1522),146 Hebrew, e.g. JE S l(B r)
Icxaku dat (H rodna 148 7) ,147 and (Slavicized) Yiddish form, e.g. Ic’ko
Moseevic (M insk, late 16th c)148 (vs. Y jicxok, ajzik, dim icik). A rare exam -

,,,‫ י‬Akty, otnosjaSlitsja k istorii Juznoj 1 Zapadnoj Rossii 1863. U scinovif incorrectly re la te s
O B r South 1 0 L ith u an ian and T a ta r c ty m a (1975:149). See also epenthetic v in seq u en ces
o f the type -ova- in H ebrew n am es discussed in section 3.342 above.
B eriadskij 2:1882, # 19.
Ibid., 2:1882, # 137.
BA 3:1930.
1 ,0 ^ 5 1867:289, 291. T h e B elorussian v arian t Mosej is e ith e r from Mojsej (O rth o d o x
n am e vs. C ath o lic M ojztf) o r from H e molch w ith sibilant confusion (B iry la
1:1966:124-125).
141 B eriadskij 2:1882, #185. See also JE S I(B r) lesku Ptsafovilu dat < H e ptsah
(T ykoein 1528) (idem, 1:1882, # 1 2 2 ).
“ * .4S 1867.
I‫ ״‬B eriadskij 1:1882, # 3 20. See a lso JE S I(U k ) Xam (')ko m a dim (L u c ’k 1553) ( ibid
3:1903. # 2 7 ).
' ‫ ״‬Ibid., 2:1882, # 144,
“ * Ibid.. 2:1882, # #39-40.
'•» Ibid , 2:1882, # #71-72 respectively.
Ibid., 2:1882, # 1 2 .
BA 3:1930. See also discussion above.
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 221

pie of a Judeo-Slavic anthroponym recorded in a Jewish source (in

H ebrew characters) is (EngH e) jcV + (j)ica (13th c), borne by a rabbi
from Cem ihiv; the etymon appears to be He jichaq. 14,
T h e phonological features found in non-Jewish sources are not found
in Jew ish sources (e.g. interchange of m and n, x > k, voicing assimila­
tion in medial consonant clusters), and may thus not have been
characteristic of Judeo-Slavic pronunciation norms. However, the non-
Jew ish features cited above are not attested after the late 16th century.
It is tem pting to regard this cut-off point as a reflection of a change in
Jew ish pronunciation norms of Hebrew brought about by the
Ashkenazicization of the Slavic-speaking Jews. In this case, the features
preserved in non-Jewish sources might indeed be of Judeo-Slavic origin.

7.5 Hebrew and Judeo-Aramaic loans of non-Ashkenazic origin common 10 Slavic

and languages of the Caucasus
7.51 H e, JA ram \axal, *axflah (U krainian slang; Iranian languages).
T h e Hebrew-Judeo-Aramaic verb 1axal ‘he ate’ is found in a num ber of
widely separated Iranian languages, e.g. the £istoni, an Afghani people
resident in Tadjikistan and Uzbekistan, have oxel- ‘eat’ in their new Ira­
nian secret language;110 the Shirazi Judeo-Persian secret language has
oxel- to o .lsl T he term is found in EY axlen ‘eat’, but as a humorous term,
and rarely without the initial vowel. 152 Uk (Volhynian tailors’ slg) xylyly
‘eat (dinner)’ appears to be derived from He 3axildh ‘eating’.155 Vowel
loss is also found in Jewish languages not contiguous with U krainian,
e.g. Saloniki J u d xallear — axalear ‘eat (gluttonously)’154 and GY (a)chielen
‘e a t’.155 The apparent absence of the term in West Slavic sources and the
relatively recent attestation of the term in G erm an slang (1726) suggest
that U krainian either borrowed the term directly from Eastern Yiddish,
or from Iranian languages to the east. T he possibility of Rom ani in­
terference in U krainian is also plausible, see native U kRom xalem ‘I ate’

,4* B»n Jicx a k (in K upfer an d Lewicki 1956:173-175). T h is passage contains the
etym ology o f H e j-b-m cited in section 4, fn. 23 above. O n the identity o f the rabbi, see
K u p fe r a n d Lewicki 1956:174.
IM O ra n sk ij 1971:92-93.
151 Y a rsh a te r 1977:4.
I‫ ״‬D zendzelivs’kyj 1977:321. It is u n clear if th e U k rain ian term is related to Po (arch)
chylu, M o d P o wyckylai 'toss dow n o n e ’s glass, gulp dow n, d rin k ' (D oroszew ski
1958-1969).
I‫ ״‬For G e rm a n slang cognates, see W olf 1956. A single in stan ce in G e rm a n Yiddish
w ithout the in itial vowel has been recorded at N o rth eim by th e LC A A J, M104050.
154 N eham a 1977 derives jalltat (his spelling) from H e haltah ‘S ab b ath , festive b re a d '.
■m W einberg 1969.
222 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

(S lavjansk);156 the possibility o f confusion w ith xyV ‘J e w ’, xyVka ‘Jew ess'

in the sam e dialect of U k rain ian should n ot be dism issed (see details in
section 5.5211 above).
7.52 JA ra m kum (d)rd:>(S outh, E ast Slavic; A rm en ian ; O ssete). ChSl
kumirh ‘id o l’ (and derivatives) is the source of R , B r kumir, U k kumyr
‘id o l’; see also Bg kumir, S eC r kumir ‘ib'. T he etym ology is u n certain , but
J A ra m kum(d)rd? ‘(idolatrous) p rie st’ has b een proposed as the source of
the Slavic term s as well as for A rm khurm ‘id o l’ and O s gum ir ‘g ia n t’. 157
T h e H ebrew cognate kom tr 1C h ristian p rie st’ is attested in Y iddish as
kojrrwr ‘ib'\
7.53 H e, J A ra m qdhal (Slavic; G erm an ; K um yk; L ith u an ian ). T he on­
ly H ebrew -Judeo-A ram aic term sh ared by Slavic languages an d at least
one C aucasian languag e— K um yk, a T u rk ic language spoken in the
D aghestan A utonom ous S S R — is H e, JA ra m qdhal ‘(Jewish) com m unity;
g ath erin g ’. T he term (w ith the identical non-A shkenazic vocalism ) is
found in an unbrok en chain of languages extending from the three E ast
Slavic languages to Polish, Slovak, C zech a n d possibly even O ld G erm an
slang, see K u m qagal ‘m atzah ; Passover (in th e second m ean in g optio n al­
ly followed by bayram ‘religious festival, h o lid ay ’); n o ise’;158 R kagal
‘noisy crow d; Jew ish com m unal o rg an iz a tio n ’, (K rasn o d ar) kagald ‘fam i­
ly w ith m any ch ild ren ’, (D on area) kagal, kagald ‘crow d, th ro n g ’, 159 U k
kahdl ‘Jew ish com m unal organization; disorderly, noisy crow d, m e e tin g ’ ,
kahalytysja ‘assem ble in noisy crow ds’,160 Br kahalam ‘all to g e th e r’,161 kakal
‘Jew ish co m m u n ity ’, (V ilnius, C e rv e n ’ district, V icebsk) ‘crow d, (noisy)
g a th e rin g ’, 163 (Zytkavicy district) ‘relativ es’;163 Po kakallbi a n d L i kahalas

156 Sergievskij an d B aran n ik o v 1933.

157 See discussion in V a sm e r 1953-1958; S adnik a n d A itzetm u ller 1955, # 418. Abaev
(1:1958:530) derives O s g ^ m ir y , etc. (w hich he regards as the surface cognate of SI kumir,
etc.) from Biblical H e gormr identified as th e C im m erian s (Ezekiel 38:6). T h e C im ­
m erian s, from th eir h o m elan d east of the Black Sea in vaded M ed ia, S yria and Palestine
in the 8th cen tu ry BC. It is u n c le ar w hy O ssete should have a H eb rew nam e o f a C a u c a ­
sian tribe.
158 B arom atov 1969.
159 O vcin n ik o v a et al. 1975-1976; Filin 1965ff.
lsa Z elexivs’kyj and N e d il’s’kyj 1882-1886.
161 M ackevic et al. 2:1980:355.
162 Bajkow an d X ekrasevic 1925; K a s ’pjarovic 1927; D ru ck i-P adbjarecki 1929;
S aternik 1929. T h e B elorussian term is first found in 1663 (B ulyka 1980:42). Possibly
related are Br (Lahojsk) hakalic’ ,w et, soil, p o u r o n ’ , kahdla ‘one w ho spills som ething on
the floor’ (V arly h a 1970).
163 Saskevic 1979:97. A ccording to A kuJaw. B r kahal in 19th-early 20th century
literatu re was connected specifically w ith Jew s (1980:86-87).
164 T h e Polish te rm dates from th e 17th cen tu ry (B ulyka 1980:12). It is in teresting that
A. M a rk 1929 does n o t tran slate Po kahal by the Y iddish surface cognate. O n Jew -P o
kahal, see B rzezina 1979:90.
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C . 223

have only the m eaning of Jewish communal organization. In contem ­

porary Eastern Yiddish, the term is pronounced as kol, kul and means on­
ly ‘Jew ish com munal organization’.161 The Ashkenazic pronunciation is
found only in 19th-20th century G erm an slang. Ashkenazic Jews in East
Slavic lands have also borrowed back the Slavic pronunciation of the
term in the family name kagal’nik. 166 An Old G erm an slang list also con­
tains a term which might be derived from H e qthalim, pi of qdhal, e.g.
kitlam ‘city’ (1510), but after this date, qdhal appears in G erm an wordlists
only in an Ashkenazic form (and after the mid-19th century, without the
final nasal which may have become interpreted as the G erm an plural
marker), e.g. G slg Kohl (1916).167
O n formal grounds, the Slavic forms cannot be derived from a coter­
ritorial dialect of Yiddish (Preobrazenskij’ 1:1959:280 seems to be the first
to have stated this), but could be analyzed
(a) as a learned borrowing made by Christian Hebraists, since it
resembles the West European Christian reading norms of Hebrew,
essentially based on Judeo-R om ance reading traditions;
(b) as a borrowing from an earlier Ashkenazic pronunciation norm,
say *kahal, which is attested in some W estern Yiddish dialects, e.g. DuY
kdl, Alsatian Y khdl ‘Jewish com munity; com munal assembly’. 168 In
such a case, the West Slavic languages might have received the Hebraism
from O ld W estern Yiddish and then spread the term in this form to the
East Slavic languages, since by the time of direct contact between Yid­
dish and the East Slavic languages, the Semitism would have already
achieved the form it now has in Eastern Y iddish;169
(c) as a borrowing from a Jew ish language other than Yiddish. T he ex­
istence of a Caucasian link makes such a path of diffusion attractive; see

'•* See details in W exler 1983a. T h e d istrib u tio n o f G e rm a n Y iddish form s is given
by B eranek 1965, m a p # 6 5 . See also M . W einreich 1955:92.
1W P rib lu d a 1968:149. T avjov also cites kogel fam am o n g R ussian Jew s (1923d:343).
‫ ן*נ‬W 'olf 1956. # 2 6 1 2 . A lternatively, the sourcc o f the G e rm a n slang form s m ight be
H e qfhitahy pi qtkildi ‘(Jewish) com m unity*, a d erivative o f H e qdhal; see G Y kille, pi •‫מ‬
(W einberg 1969:71). T h e H e b ra ism m ay also be the basis for ItR o m kilma *market*
(W olf 1960).
16# W estern Y iddish form s w ere given by Beem 1967; Z u ck erm an 1969:46. See also
Sand 1965:42 (fo r 1596). For geographical d etails, see the L C A A J , # # 229014, 229016.
M o rag d a te s th e ch an g e of a > 0 (in Slavicized dialects o f Y iddish) to the 13th cen tu ry
(1971:1128). U . W einreich (1965:39 a n d fn. 82) regards th e Polish H eb raism as a loan
from O ld Y id d ish — b u t the presence o f the term in East Slavic an d K um yk w eakens this
claim . D . K a tz has developed the th eo ry th a t the read in g o f th e qamdc d iacritic as a ra th e r
than 0 reflects a colloquial Judeo-A ram aic. p ro n u n ciatio n no rm (1979:46*47, 50; 1985)
but ih e existen ce o f Ju d eo -A ram aic speakers in G erm an y in the 9 th ‫ ־‬l0 th cen tu ries has
yet to be e stab lish ed . See fu rth e r discussion in sections 3.33-3.331 above.
,*‫ י‬See U . W ein reich 1965:39 an d fn. 82 for discussion o f this a n d o th e r Sem itism s.
224 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M PO N E N T S E T C .

also Trakai K ar kagal,'70 C rim ean K ar kahal, qagal ,Karaite com-

m unity’;171
(d) as a borrowing from a non-Jewish Caucasian language. T he drift
of the Semitism from Kumyk to Russian is reasonable on phonetic
grounds, but the possibility of reciprocal substitution of g for h makes a
definitive answer impossible. Furtherm ore, except for contemporary
localisms, I cannot cite other Kumyk loans in Russian. A direct Hebrew
source for Kumyk poses no problem, since K um g could replace He h
which is absent in Kumyk; the choice of a velar over a palatal stop for
He q may reflect a pronunciation of Hebrew which distinguished be­
tween H e kaf, say Ikl and qof Iql, e.g. Georgian, Aramaic-speaking K ur­
dish Jews, some Iranian Jewish communities (e.g. T at), perhaps
K hazar.171 A Russian origin for Kum qagal is not attractive since R g,
at least in Soviet imports, tends to be integrated in Kumyk as g rather
than g (e.g. R glagol ,verb’ > Kum glagot) and the Russian impact on
Kumyk tends to be relatively recent. Approaching the problem from the
vantage of East Slavic, we could in principle derive R kagal from Hebrew
(Judeo-Aramaic), Belorussian or U krainian (since foreign k regularly
becomes g in Russian, e.g. G Hitler fam > R GitUr) or from Kumyk
(K um g could also have yielded R g). In Cz, Svk kagal g may be a hyper-
correct replacement of k\ in these two languages, foreign g was typically
accepted as such roughly from the 18th to mi d 2 0 ‫־‬th century.17’ Russian
theoretically might be a source for Czech and Slovak forms with g, but
the geographical separation of the two groups of languages poses a
problem.
It is difficult to evaluate the significance of the fact that Kumyk and
a num ber of Slavic languages share the non-native m eaning of ,noise’.
O f course, this could be a coincidence, since terms denoting the Jewish
religion or community frequently acquire the secondary m eaning of
noise, tumult in a num ber of non-contiguous non-Jewish languages, e.g.
G Judenschule ‘synagogue; noise;1M name of a card game involving

1 ,0 Kowalski 1929 (note the sam e tre a tm e n t o f H e A > g as in K um yk).

171 A ltb au er 1979-1980:59; M oskovich an d T u k a n 1980:92. T h e te rm is noc listed in
Baskakov etal. 1974, bu t then this d ictionary has an incom plete coverage o f H ebrew c o m ­
po nents. It is u nclear if C u m a n kahal ‘slow; foul' (13th c) is related (G ren b ech 19*2:134).
172 D etails o f Jew ish read in g p ro n u n ciatio n s a re given in M orag 1971:1133. O n
K h a za r, see G olb a n d Pritsak 1982:54-55, 143.
1 ,5 Pridavok 1939; Pech 1948. A G erm an slang form possibly w ith g for H e A (o r x)
is mogtln ‘to sw indle’ (see S. A. B im b au m 1935:238; 1955:225; W olf 1956, #3 6 5 1 ).
IM See also the p h rase Es gekt hier her w it in eirur Judenschule 'w h a t a row; all hell broke
loose’, cited by J . L. K . an d W . G rim m 4,2:1877:2356. J a k o b glosses Judenschule as
‘synagogue; noisy g a th e rin g ' (1929). Synagoge rrp laccd the trad itio n al o rthodox
Judenschule in 19th cen tu ry G e rm a n Jew ish R eform circles in p art because o f the negative
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 225

shouting; place of m errim ent’175 ( < Y Sul ,synagogue’); Du slg kabanes,

cabanes ‘noise; row; tavern’ < (?) D uJPt cabanas ‘Sukkot, i.e. Feast of
Tabernacles; tents in which meals are taken during the holiday’;176 Uk
(Lvov) xajder, EUk xaj ‘noise’177 < PoY xajder ,Jewish religious school’
( < H e htdtr; see Uk, stY xgder); Br (Vicebsk) talmudka ‘chatter’, lalmud-
zu ' ‘talk nonsense’ (Salihorsk district, Palesse, inform ant), ‘deceive, trick’
(E M ahilew);178 R (Smolensk) talmata ‘noise, com m otion’179 < (?) He
lalmud ‘T alm ud’ (the Belorussian terms may represent a cross of the
H ebraism with a native East Slavic root). See also expressions of the type
!MWBr haiasujuc, jak u zydouskoj szkoli ‘they make noise, as in a Jewish
synagogue’;180 Svk hluk ako v zidooskej Skole ‘noise like in a Jewish
synagogue/ school’. A similar phenomenon exists in M editerranean and
Balkan languages, see e.g. M alt hawwad ‘confuse’ < l&di ‘(the) Je w ’;181
M odGk xavra, xaura ,synagogue; noisy mob (usually said of Jew s)’ and
Bg xavra ,synagogue; confused, deafening chatter’;182 Rum havra
,synagogue, hullabaloo’185 < (?) T u havra ,synagogue’ < (? )J u d xavra
,society’ < H e htvrah ,ib' (see also discussion in section 7.17 above). See
also discussion of Geo fora in section 7.64 below and the change of ,Sab-
bath’ > ‘witches’ in Cz sab(b)at (see section 3.3112, fn. 346 above). Kum
qagal m ay have acquired the meaning ,noise’ independently by associa­
tion with the native terms qaogal — qalmagai ,noise’ (see also T u kavga
‘fight, quarrel’) but on the basis of the Greek, Bulgarian and Turkish
data, we might derive qagal from some coterritorial Jewish language
where He, JA ram qahal denoted ‘synagogue’. A Jewish origin for Kum
qagal is likely since the term denotes a Jewish holiday, see e.g. ‘Passover;
m atzah’. Note that K rym iak uses He htvrah ‘com munity, society’ in the

connotations o f the la tte r (see Jellin ek 1:1881:29-30). A sim ilar opposition obtains in
A m erican English shui *O rthodox sy n ag o g u e’: tempU ‘reform sy n ag o g u e': synagogue ‘c o n ­
servative synag o g u e’.
'« R . 1850:322.
■‫ ״‬V a n B olhuis n .d .; W exler 1982a:82.
H o rb a f I963 b :2 7 2 ; 1966:13, 37.
” • B jal'k ev if 1970. See also Br kabala ,fuss, co m m o tio n ' < H e qabbdlah ‘k a b b a la ’
(N osovif 1874).
,,‫ י‬D o b rov o l’skij 1914.
Federow ski 4 :1935, # 9 7 1 9 (also in Polish). See also B r kry(zai,jak iydy u stkoU {ib. ,
#9730; w ith sim ilar expressions in R u ssian a n d Polish). A U k rain ian exam ple, iydics'ka
Ihla a p p ea rs in K otljarevskij 1808 (see H o rb a t 1966:13).
I a m grateful to A lex an d er Borg for the M altese exam ples. In P o rtu guese dialects,
smagoga ‘sy n ag o g u e ’ d enotes, in a d d itio n , an expression o f m ockery (M a d eira) (R ibeiro
1920:136), ‘u n in tellig ib le sig n ' (A rcos de V aldevez) (Alves P ereira 1927:289) a n d ‘group
of persons involved in m ischiefm aking, m alicious gossip, in trig u es' (A lentejo) (G om es
Fradinho 1933:125).
1M A n d re jiin ei ai. 1955.
IM H . and R . K a h an e 1962:291-292.
226 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C

m ean in g of ‘synagogue’.184 T h e original Jew ish do n o r language m ight

have been Ju d eo -G reek ; for exam ple, the extension of H e, JA ra m qahal
J e w is h co m m u n ity ’ > ‘synagogue’ is attested in J R m n , e.g. JP ro v ,
B alkan J u d kal . 185 Since this use a i qdhal is u n k n o w n in Ib e ria n J u d e o ‫־‬
R om ance languages, we m ig h t w ant to regard the Ju d eo -P ro v en g al and
B alkan Ju d e z m o innov atio n as com m on borrow ings from Ju d e o -
G re e k .186 F or an o th er p u tativ e exam ple o f a (Ju d eo -)T u rk ic or -G reek
substrata! elem ent in B alkan Ju d e z m o , see discussion o f H e darom and
cafon in section 3.321 above.
7.54 H e, J A ra m sabbdt (Slavic; A rm en ian ; C uvas; G eo rg ian ; O ssete;
U byx; U di). See discussion in section 3.125 above.
7.55 H e, JA ra m tamdr (Slavic; G eorgian). H e, JA ra m tamar ‘palm
tre e ’; fa has becom e a fem inine an th ro p o n y m in G eo rg ian and bo th a
fem inine and fam ily nam e in R u ssian , e.g. R Tamarin, Tamara . T h e
R u ssian n am e m ay be tak en directly from G eo rg ian , since in C h u rch
Slavic, H e, JA ra m tamdr w ould n orm ally ap p ea r as Famarb ~ In
C odex # 262, the Ju d eo -E a st Slavic caique tran slatio n o f th e Bible, w rit­
ten in the late 15th-early 16th century (see discussion in sections
4.4-4.4125 above), the n am e appears as tamarb (R u th 4:12). A m ong East
Slavic Jew s, the fam ily n am e has assum ed the non-A shkenazic form
Tamarkin (versus attested A shkenazic Tum arkin, following the Y iddish
p ron u n ciatio n of J A ra m -H e tamar) .188 In Y iddish, the root is also used
as a fem inine an th ro p o n y m , e.g. tamare.

7.6 Hebrew and Judeo-Aramaic loans in languages o f the Caucasus w ith no Slavic
(non-Ashkenazic) cognates

7.61 He cavon (Kabardian; Ossete). Musaev has advanced the view that Kab
asan , Os ajvan Jeering, mockery’ may be from He cavon ‘sin’ (1964:19). The
Hebraism (in the original meaning) also appears in Karaite—and in a form

184 M oskovich and T u k a n 1982:21, 25. K ry m cak is a C rim e a n T u rk ic language dose-

ly related to K u m y k , K araite, K aracaj-B alk ar an d C rim e a n T a ta r.
m See G ross for a Ju d eo -P ro v en g al exam ple (1897:473); W ex ler 1981c for Ju d eo -
Ib e ria n d a ta . Ib e ria n J u d m l (in C h ristia n texts) denoted ‘co m m u n ity; Jew ish q u a rte r'.
T h e Ju d eo -P ro v en g al m ean in g , w hich seem s to lack a p arallel in Ju d eo -C a ta la n , could
be in d e p e n d en t o f the B alkan Ju d e z m o surface cognate, b u t Provence was once the hom e
of G reek-speaking Je w s in th e early M iddle Ages.
186 Y / e are rem in d ed of th e fact th a t in th e early p o st-C h ristian period, J G k synagoge

‘Jew ish c o m m u n ity ’ also acquired the m e a n in g o f ‘sy n ag o g u e’—b u t prim arily a m o n g
non-Jew s (see section 3.3111, fns. 320, 327 above).
JS7 See U n b e g a u n 1972:107, 343 for the R u ssian and R u ssian Jew ish data. Tam ar is
used as a fem in in e p erso n al n a m e in G reek a n d T u rk ish J u d e z m o an d T ra k a i K a ra ite ,
an d as a su rn am e in B u lg arian Ju d ez m o .
186 See also G Tkam ar fam (W ien er-N eu stad t 1478) (S ch w einburg-E ibenschutz
1894:281) an d discussion in section 3.161 above.
 H E B R E W AND JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 227

sim ilar to that o f Ossete and K abardian, i.e. avan ‘sin, evil’; the term is attested
in Balkan Ju d e z m o and Jud eo -Italian (R om an dialect), but not generally as a
simplex in Y iddish.189 T he three Jew ish languages as well as the two languages
of the C aucasus were all historically coterritorial with G reek. T he sem antic
discrepancy betw een O ssete-K abardian and H ebrew -Jewish languages requires
explanation.
7.62 H e galut, hanut, htfbon, lug, targtman (?) (A rm enian). Arm gagut* ‘col­
o n y ’, haiiv ‘bill’, iuka(j) ‘m arket’, fiargman ‘tran slato r’ and xanuO ‘shop’ m ay be
from H e galut ‘exile’, htibon, Suq, targtman and hanut ‘ib’ respectively, though an
A ram aic (Syriac) source should not be excluded, e.g. gdldtdhdnu&d}, husband3),
lut^a3), targtmanfd3), since this language exercised an impact on early A rm enian
Bible tran sla tio n s.190 Except for htibon and galut, the other H ebraism s are not
a ttested in Yiddish.
7.63 H e kaier, qadoi (O ssete). H e kaier ‘kosher, ritually pure (food)’ m ay be
the source of O s kusart (D igor), kd- (Iron) ‘anim al slaughtered for the table’.
A baev suggests, without evidence, that the H ebraism was introduced into
O ssete by T urkic-speaking K hazars,191 but any Jew ish language spoken on the
N o rth e rn Black Sea littoral could have been the source. A H ebrew etymology
w as rejected categorically by Bcnveniste (1956:36-37), but neither Abaev nor
B enveniste has noted that Persian Jew s pronounce the H ebrew vowel diacritic
qamdc as 101, which makes an Iranian Jew ish source quite plausible. If the
H e b re w etym ology of O s kusart — kd- is correct, then O ssete would appear to
be the only East European language to borrow the H ebraism from a source
o t h e r than Yiddish (see Uk koiemyj, C z k'o’ier, etc. ‘kosher’ < Y kaier), though
in som e W est European languages (in contact with indigenous or Iberian Jew s?)
a n on-Y iddish pronunciation is also attested, e.g. Fr cacher m , cachere f, cachir m,
f. A baev also believes that H e qdddl ‘holy’ is the source o f O s kaedzos (D igor),
kadzus (Iron) ‘clean, holy’ (1:1958:603), but he leaves unexplained the different
tre a tm e n ts of H e qamdc—this tim e as x — a. Both Sem itism s could have been
d e riv e d from (Judeo-) A ram aic surface cognates rather than H ebrew .
7 .6 4 H e, JA ra m tordh (Slavic; G eorgian). G eo tora ‘synagogue; noise’ < H e,
J A r a m torah ‘Law, T o ra h ’ (vs. JG e o ‘prayerbook; Jew ish religious school;

, *‫ י‬See J u d avon ‘sin, m isd e m ea n o r'. J i t nauon (M assariello M erza g o ra ) vs. Y

bavojntsejnu-horabim ‘in view o f ou r m an y sin s’ < H e bj^auonotenu-haribim T h e re a p p ears
to b e n o A ram aic cognate o f H e cav6n C o m p a re also the g eo graphy o f H e tfillah ‘p ray er-
b o o k ', discussed in section 3.14 above.
190 T h e term s (w ith the exception o f t^argman) a rc cited by M a n a n d ia n 1965:65. In
J u d e o - A r a m a ic , th e cognates are ga lit(a >
), htibon, iuq ( ‘s tre e t'), lurgmdn(a*), hdnut(a>
).
1,1 See A baev 1:1958:575. N adel assum es th at som e o f the A lans, the ancestors o f the
p re s e n t- d a y O ssetes, converted to J u d a is m (1960:69. 101). O n the alleged K h a z a r infiu-
c n e e o n O ssete songs, see K aloev 1967:24. O n the possibility of K h a za r influence on R u s­
s ia n lite ra tu re , see Barac 1908; 1924; M eifersk ij 1958:118-119; G olden 1980:17-18;
A ltb a u e r 1977[ 1960] :94. O n K h a za r influence on early U k ra in ia n c u ltu re , see B rutzkus
1 9 3 0 :3 4 3 ; 1944; C h u b a ty 1963:582; G olb an d Pritsak 1982. A baev does not consider the
p o s sib ility of a d irect Ju d eo -G ree k source for the O ssete H e b ra ism . See also section 1,
fn . 14 above.
228 H E B R E W A N D J U D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C .

T orah’).152 See discussion of the semantic shift of ‘Law’ > ‘noise’ in section
7.53 above. In Slavic, the word was received via Yiddish (e.g. Po dintojra
‘kangaroo court’ < Y ‘Rabbinical court’) or directly from literary Hebrew (e.g.
Br torn ,T orah’).

7.7 Hebrew and Judeo-Aramaic loans in Slavic and Finno-Ugric languages

7.71 H e galldh. A possible reflex of the H ebrew root g-l-h ‘shave’ m ay
be found in R slg, E rzy a-M o rd v a galax ‘barefooted person; v ag ab o n d ’,
M o k sa -M o rd v a galax ‘poverty-striken p erso n ’.193 A. I. Popov, review ing
the fact th a t G erm an slang since the 15th cen tu ry has a surface cognate
(galle 1510)194 in the m ean in g ‘vagabonds m asq u erad in g as C atholic
priests’, added th at the earliest R u ssian attestatio n m ight be O R Brityj-
Byckov-Galax fam (16th c) ( < R brityj ‘shaven’); he th en concluded th a t
the H eb raism could have been diffused either from R ussian to M o rd v a
o r vice versa (1957:56-57). T h e H ebraism is also found in Y galex , B alkan
J u d galax and K a r (H alyc) ganlax ‘C atholic p rie st’. T h e sem antic dif­
ferences betw een G erm an , Y iddish and K ara ite on the one h an d an d
M o rd v a and R ussian on the oth er h a n d m ight suggest ind ep en d en t acts
of borrow ing. T he sem antic inno v atio n of ‘C atholic p riest’ (as well as the
form in H ebrew ?) m ust have originated in a W est E u ro p ea n m ilieu.
7.72 H e m txts. See section 7.19 above.

7.8 The geography o f Hebrew and Judeo-Aramaic loans in the Slavic languages

T h e Slavic H ebrew a n d Ju d eo -A ram aic elem ents discussed above

show a lack o f correlation betw een Y iddish form and Y iddish m ean in g
in the Slavic target languages. F or exam ple, in the case o f H e qdhal,
C zech and Slovak have th e H eb raism in a non-Y iddish form b u t w ith a
Y iddish m eaning; E ast Slavic languages have the H eb raism in a non-
Y iddish form b u t in b o th a Y iddish and a non-Y iddish m ean in g . See
table 3 below.
T h e distribution of th e m ean in g ;n o ise’ in non-Jew ish languages, i.e.
only in languages east o f Polish, also serves as th e dividing line for m uch
of the H ebrew and Ju d eo -A ra m a ic corpus of the Slavic languages. For
exam ple, E ast Slavic H eb raism s often lack attestatio n in C zech and
Slovak, and are rarely know n in Sorbian; occasionally, Polish jo in s the

192 M oskovich and B en -O ren 1982:22. U se o f H e tordh ‘T o rah , L aw ' in the m eaning
‘synagog u e’ is d istinctly non-Jew ish. It is also found in Ira q i M u slim A rabic, e.g. torn,
torat 'synagogue: T o ra h ’ (discussed in W ex ler 1981b: 130).
193 A. I. Popov 1957:56-58; J u h a s z 1961.
W olf 1956, #1626.
 H E B R E W A N D JU D E O -A R A M A IC C O M P O N E N T S E T C . 229

T a b le 3.
D istrib u tio n of H eb rew -Ju d eo -A ram aic qdhal in E u ro p ea n languages

C zech, Slovak Polish B elorussian, U k ra in ia n R u ssian K um yk

kagal kahai kahal kagal qagal
n o n-Y id d ish >------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1
form
non-Y iddish
m ean in g ---------------------‘n o ise ’ (etc.) ---------------------- 1
1

Y iddish
m ea n in g 1------------------ ,Jew ish c o m m u n ity o rg a n iz a tio n ’ --------------------- 1
c oterrito rial
Y iddish form —W estern Y iddish E astern Y iddish -----------------------------------:■
1

! ( f t‫ ׳‬a l , kol , ku l kol , ku l

E ast Slavic languages. C onversely, H ebrew an d Ju d eo -A ram aic

elem ents w hich are found only in C zech a n d Slovak consistently have
surface cognates in G erm an , D u tch and H u n g a ria n (e.g. m exts, p m x d y);
these com ponents ten d to be restricted to th e slang register in all the
targ et languages.

7.9 Recovering the Hebrew and Judeo-Aramaic corpus o f Judeo-W esl Slavic

See sections 6.4-6.5 above.

 8 . SU M M A R Y A N D T O P IC S FOR T H E F U T U R E

T h e goal of this study has been to learn as much as possible o f the

Judeo-Slavic languages created in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe
during the last thousand or so years by Greek‫־‬, Iranian- and possibly
Aramaic- and Turkic-speaking Jew s. These Judeo-Slavic languages were
subsequently replaced by Yiddish in Central and Eastern Europe b egin ­
ning with the 14th century and probably by Judezm o in the South Slavic
lands after the 16th century, though the process o f obsolescence was
gradual, with the last evidence o f monolingual Slavic-speaking Jew s in
the Ukraine dating from the early 19th century. In the Balkans, where
the direction of language shift was reversible, Judeo-South Slavic might
also have been superseded in certain locales by Judeo-Greek.
Because of the paucity o f textual attestation in Judeo-Slavic, we had
to extend our attention to a number o f coterritorial non-Slavic languages
as well, especially to Yiddish, Judezm o, Judeo-R om ance, Hebrew and
Judeo-Aramaic. What have the non-Slavic materials taught us? Yiddish
proved to be of paramount importance in the recovery o f Judeo-Slavic
for two reasons: (a) First, this language retains Slavic components that
might have been acquired as early as the 10th century in Eastern G er­
many. Judeo-Slavicism s in German and Dutch slang dialects also attest
to an early Slavicization o f Western Yiddish dialects before the migration
of German Jews into Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia and suggest that
Jew s were more receptive than non-Jews to influence from the Slavic
substratum in Central and Eastern Germ any, (b) Second, Yiddish
retains Greek and Asian linguistic influences which could only have
reached the German lands through the intermediary o f Slavic Jewry. For
example, we have found that not all Greek components in German Y id ­
dish and in the fragmentary Old Polish inscriptions on coins written in
Hebrew characters can be ascribed to a Judeo-R om ance substratum;
hence, we must postulate direct contact between Greek and Slavic J ew s,
and possibly even between Greek Jew s and their coreligionists in the G er­
man lands. The presence o f Judeo-Greek patterns o f discourse in G er­
man, Hungarian and Czech also corroborates the theory o f a Greek
connection in Central Europe. Some o f these Yiddish Grecisms, together
with Yiddish and Slavic elem ents, found their way into Judeo-French.
Similarly, the presence o f a few Iranian terms in Medieval German Y id ­
dish and of Hebrew naming habits which are shared with Turkic and Ira­
nian Jewish com m unities (and first attested am ong the U krainian
Khazar Jews o f the 10th century) unmistakably point to a S lavic­
 SUM M ARY AND T O P IC S FOR T H E FU TU RE 231

speaking Jewry (itself Iranianized and H ellenized), which served as the

intermediary link between German Jewry on the one hand and the
M editerranean and Caspian Jew ries on the other hand. We have no
reason to believe that these Asian linguistic elem ents in German Yiddish
are due to the migration o f Iranian and Turkic speakers to Western
Europe.
T h e Slavic languages themselves are also important to the reconstruc­
tion o f Judeo-Slavic. (a) First, they often retain Hebrew and Judeo-
Aramaic loans in a non-Yiddish phonetic shape. This evidence could be
of paramount interest in establishing the presence o f non-Ashkenazic
Jews in the Slavic lands, but caution must be exercised. Alternatively,
Slavic Hebraisms in non-Yiddish form could also have been borrowed
directly from Hebrew literature by Slavs or through a German Christian
intermediary, (b) Second, Slavic languages have a variety o f native terms
which have Jewish associations either exclusively or alongside non-
Jewish meanings. Some of these terms appear to be loan translations o f
Hebrew or Judeo-Greek patterns o f discourse and hence could be innova­
tions o f Judeo-Slavic speakers. A certain number o f terms may also prove
to be innovations em anating from Christian or Judaizing comm unities,
(c) In addition, some non-native terms in Slavic languages with Jewish
associations provide indications o f how the Jews may have reached the
Slavic lands.
T h e examination of Judeo-Slavic, Jewish-Slavic and diverse non-
Jewish data has uncovered a common cyclical process o f component fu­
sion in all the languages spoken by the Jew s in the Slavic lands. The
Judeo-Slavic glosses and occasional phrases recorded in Hebrew
characters in the West and East Slavic lands show unmistakably that
Judeo-Slavic differed from the speech o f the coterritorial Christians by
the use o f Hebraisms, Jewish substrata! elements (especially Judeo-
Grecisms), and by the unique utilization o f coterritorial as well as non­
coterritorial Slavic material. The impact o f Hebrew patterns of discourse
was particularly striking in the case o f the Judeo-Slavic caique language
that crystallized in the East Slavic lands by the 15th-16th centuries; in
this language, the Slavic com ponent also revealed varied origins as well
as unique elem ents. While no Judeo-South Slavic texts are known, the
Judeo-W est Slavic glosses and Yiddish provide evidence that the Jews
who settled in the Czech and Sorbian lands in the 9th-10th centuries
must have included speakers o f South Slavic in addition to Judeo-Greek.
Explorations in Judeo-Slavic linguistics have demonstrated forcefully
that the study o f a Jewish language must be carried out in a comparative
Jewish linguistic framework— because o f the shared processes o f com po­
nent fusion, comm on utilization o f Hebrew (and usually Judeo-Aramaic)
232 SUM M ARY AND T O P IC S FOR T H E F U T U R E

components, and frequently com m on descent from spoken Palestinian

Hebrew through an unbroken chain o f language shift. In many ways, the
history of Judeo-Slavic is inextricably bound up with that o f Yiddish—its
neighbor and ultimate successor. The reciprocal influences between
Judeo-Slavic and Yiddish became so penetrating that we may be entitled
to speak of a Judeo-Slavic-G erm anic Sprachbund between the Elbe and
the Dniepr Rivers. O ne immediately thinks o f the historical contacts be­
tween the non-Jewish cognate languages, but the parallel is misleading;
many of the features shared by German and the Slavic languages have
their origin in Germ an, while in Jew ish circles Slavic played a dominant
role in shaping the developm ent o f Yiddish. Judeo-Slavic and Yiddish,
both independently and in tandem, experienced a com m on process o f
fusing diverse Asian linguistic elem ents (Aramaic, Hebrew, Iranian,
Turkic) with European base components (Germanic, Greek, R om ance,
Slavic). The first fusion experience took place in Greek-Slavic circles in
Bohemia, the Balkans and the Black Sea region as early as the 6th and
no later than the 10th century, as growing urbanization brought Slavs
and Jew s into close contact; this fusion resulted in the rise o f Judeo-Slavic
dialects. The second process o f fusion took place further to the west
during the 9th-12th centuries— between the Rhine R iver and the m ixed
Germanic-Slavic borderlands along the Elbe R iver— this time resulting
in the birth of Yiddish. The last major act o f Jewish language creativity
in Slavic Europe unfolded in the hom ogeneous Slavic lands between th e
Elbe and the Dniepr Rivers now occupied by Germanic- and S lavic­
speaking Jew s— roughly in the 13th-17th centuries—culm inating in th e
intensified Slavicization o f the Yiddish dialects and the eventual o b ­
solescence of Judeo-Slavic everywhere.
Jew ish language creativity in Slavic Europe thus offers an id ea l
laboratory in which to survey the ebb and flow in the confrontations b e ­
tween European and non-European cultures and languages— a reflection
in microcosm o f the very factors that were shaping the coterritorial n o n -
Jewish civilizations.
T he near total absence o f connected texts in any spoken dialect o f
Judeo-Slavic has obliged me to concentrate on historical lexicology a n d
etym ology. Q uite likely, some o f the etym ologies proposed here will h a v e
to be abandoned as new materials are discovered, but I believe that t h e
position of Judeo-Slavic on the chain o f Jewish language shift in E u ro p e
can no longer be doubted. Yet, many questions stM await fuller an sw ers,
which only the joint efforts of linguists and historians can provide: W a s
Judeo-Greek spoken in Kievan R u s’? Did Judeo-W est Slavic sp eak ers
settle in Poland along with the Ashkenazic Jews? Did the Tatar in v a sio n
o f Russia and the Ukraine in the 13th century result in the total o b liter a ­
 SUM M ARY AND T O P IC S FOR T H E FU T U R E 233

tion o f the indigenous Slavic-speaking Jewish comm unities or did a part

o f this population succeed in joining coreligionists in safer regions, say
in V olhynia, Galicia and Belorussia? In other words, who exactly were
the Slavic-speaking Jews the Ashkenazic settlers encountered in West
and Central Belorussia in the 16th-17th centuries? The chronology o f the
Judeo-Slavic and non-Ashkenazic Hebrew com ponents in the Slavic
languages depends in part on the answers we can provide to the
preceding questions. Further, what is the origin o f the possible Judeo-
Turkic substratum in Balkan Judezm o? D o the Iranian elem ents and
Irano-Turkic(?) corpus o f Hebrew anthroponyms that appear in Western
Yiddish as early as the 13th century owe their presence to direct contact
with speakers o f these Asian languages or rather to diffusion through a
Judeo-Slavic intermediary? What is the extent o f the Yiddish impact on
Judeo-French?
T h e linguist can explore a number o f immediate research tasks which
may elucidate some of these questions, (a) East Slavic texts translated by
Jews directly from Hebrew need to be systematically explored; (b) Judeo-
Slavic names in the Slavic Christian texts need to be collected and ana­
lyzed to determine whether Slavic names borne by Jew s in the Slavic
lands in the 15th-16th centuries, in addition to being caiques o f Yiddish
names, might also have been translations o f Judeo-Greek names from the
pre-Ashkenazic period, (c) A continuing search o f Old Yiddish texts un­
doubtedly will lead to a better understanding o f Yiddish— (Judeo-)Slavic
bilingualism and Judeo-Slavic creativity; (d) however, the most exciting
breakthrough in the future should come from the on-going publication
of linguistic atlases and historical-etymological dictionaries for Yiddish
and the Slavic languages which will permit us to reconstruct more and
more aspects o f historical Yiddish-Slavic bilingual dialectology. But even
before these topics are explored, we must call upon historians to evaluate
the implications o f the linguistic apparatus assembled here for our under­
standing o f Jew ish setdement in “ C anaan” — Slavdom and the impact o f
the Slavic and Slavicized Jewries on the Jewish com m unities o f Germany
and Northern France.
 BIBLIO G RA PH Y

Abbreviations of cities frequently d ied in the bibliography:

A — Amsterdam, AA — Alma-Ata, Alg — Algiers, As — Assen, Ath — Athens, B —
Berlin, Ba — Basle, Bar — Barcelona, Bau — Bautzen, BudySin, Bo — Bonn, Br —
Bratislava, Bm — Braunschweig, Bud — Budapest, C — Cambridge, C h — C hicago,
Cin — Cincinnati, Co — Copenhagen, E — Erevan, FI — Florence, Fr — F rankfurt
am M ain, G — Giessen, Gd — Gdansk, Go — Gottingen, Goz — Gozlo, Jevpatorija,
G r — G raz, H — T he Hague, Ha — HaJle, Ham b — H am burg, Hei — H eidelberg,
Hi — Hildesheim, J — Jerusalem , K — Kiev, Ka — Kaunas, Kowno, Kaz — K aza n 1,
Ko — Cologne, K r — Krak 6 w, L — StPetersburg, Petrograd, Leningrad, L — L6 d z ,
Ldn — Leiden, Lo — London, Lpz — Leipzig, Lu — Lublin, Lv — Lemberg, L ’viv,
Lvov, Lw6 w, M — Moscow, M a — M adrid, Mass — Massachusetts, Mk — M insk,
M n — M annheim , M rb — M arburg, M u — M unich, NB — New Brunswick, Nc —
Nendeln, Nu — N um berg, NY — New York, O — Oxford, O t — O ttaw a, P — P aris,
Ph — Philadelphia, Po — Posen, Poznan, Pr — Prague, R — Rome, S — Sofia, S a r
— Sarajevo, Sm — Smolensk, St — Stuttgart, T — Toronto, TA — Tel-Aviv, T u —
T ubingen, U — U ihorod, V — Vilne, Vilnius, Wilno, Ve — Venice, Vi — V ienna,
Vic — Vitebsk, W — Warsaw, Wi — W iesbaden, Win — W innipeg, W;it —
W ittenberg, W r — Breslau. Wroclaw, X — Kharkov, Z — Zagreb, I — *ytom yr

Abbreviations of frequendy cited journals, collective works and linguistic adases

AA JRP American Academy ofJewish Research. Proceedings. NY 1930ff.

A C IC S - 4,5 American contributions to the Fourth, Fifth International Congress ofSlavists
H 1958; 1963.
AEW K Allgemeine Encykhpddie der WusenschafUn und KuruU, ed. J . S. Ersch
a n d j . G. G ruber, section 2, part 27. Lpz 1850.
A IV K Akty, izdavaemye Vtlenskoj Komissiej dlja razbora drevnix aktov 1-39. V
1865-1915.
AO Acta orientalia. Bud I950IT.
/!.S’ Arxeografifeskij sbomik dokumentov otnosjatfixsja k istorii Sevao-Zapadno)
Rust, izdavaemyx pri Upr. Vilen. ufeb. okruga 1-14. V 1867.
Afn spraxfront 2nd-3rd series. K 1934-1939.
ASN SL Archiv j u t das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen. Elberfeld an d
Iserlohn, B—Brn 1846ff.
ASPh Archiv fu r slavische Philologte 142‫־‬. B 1876*1929.
AUAAS Annals o f the Ukrainian Academy o f Arts and Sciences tn the U.S. NY
195 Iff.
BA Belaruskt arxiw 1-3. Mk 1927-1930.
BG Bleter far geitxte I-I3. W 1948-1960.
BM Belaruskaja mot>a Mk 1977ff.
BN Beitrdge zur Namenforschung. Hei 1949ff.
BZ Byzanttnische Zeitschnft. Lpz, M u 1892fT.
B '/IH Btuletyn Zydowskiego Instytutu Historycznego. W 195Iff.
DABM Oyjalektalahyinyj atlas belaruskaj movy, ed. R. Avanesaw, K. Krapiva
and J u . M ackevif. Mk 1963. Maps and commentary published
separately.
E J ’B Encyclopaedia Judaic a 1-10. B 1928-1934.
EJ^J Encyclopaedia Judaica 1-J6. J 1971.
EP Encyklopedya polska 1-22. W 1912-1939.
 B IB LIO G R A PH Y 235

ES Evrejskaja starina 1*13, L 1909-1930.

FS Filologiie iriftn 1-3. V 1926-1929.
FY The Field o f Yiddish. Vol. 1, ed. U. Weinreich. NY 1954; vol. 2. ed.
U. Weinreich. H 1965; vol. 3, ed. M. I. Herzog, et al. H. 1969; vol.
4, ed. M. I. Herzog, et al. Ph 1980.
Hutoria Judaua 1-23. NY 1938-1961.
% H istoric iriftn 1-3. W 1929-1939.
HUS Harvard Ukrainian studies C, Mass. 19771T.
IJSL International journal of the sociology o f language. H , A I974ff.
>RJ Institut russkogo jazyka A N SSSR. Problemnaja gruppa po eksperimental'noj
1 pnkiadnoj lingvistike PredvanteCnye publikacii. M.
JAO S Journal o f the American Oriental Society. New Haven 1834fT.
JB Judaua Bohemiae. Pr I965IT.
JB S The Journal o f Byelorussian studies. Lo 1965ff.
JG G JC R Jahrbuch der Gesellschaft fu r Geschichte d a Juden in der Cechoslovakischen
Repubhk 1-9. Pr 1929-1938.
JG LS Journal o f the Gypsy Lore Society. Edinburgh, Liverpool 1888ff.
JH SET Jewish Historical Society of England. Transactions. Lo 1895ff.
J JS Journal of Jewish studies Lo, O 1948FT.
JL Jazyk 1 literatuia 1 8 ‫־‬. L 1926-1932.
JP J tty k polskt. K r 1913IT.
m The Jewish quarterly review. Lo, Ph 1889fT.
JS JafetUeskij sbomik 1-7. L-M 1922-1932.
JSJ Journalfo r the study offudatsm in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman period.
Ldn I970ff,
LCAAJ Language and Culture Allas o f Ashkenazic Jewry. Unpublished files,
Departm ent of Linguistics, Columbia University, New York.
Numbers cited refer to the questionnaire of the Atlas.
L ti Ljionenu. TA 1928ff.
LV Ltbn un visniaft 1*2. V 1909-1912.
MAJ Mitteilungen aus dan Arbeitskreis fu r Jiddistik 1*20. Butzbach, G
1955-1964.
M tdL R Mediterranean language review. Wi 1983JT.
MGWJ Monatsschnft fur die Geschichte und Wissenschaft des fudentums 1*83. W'r
1851*1939.
M JV Mitteilungen zur judtschen Volkskunde 1*32. B, Vi 1898-1929.
MZ Mtesictznik zydowski 1-5. W 1931*1936.
N ZU TH 1 Naukovi zapysky Ukrajins'koho Texniino-Hospodan ,koho Instytutu
Regensburg, Mii 1948JT.
NZUVV Naukovt zapysky Ukrajins'koho V il’noho Universytetu. Mii 1957ff.
ORJaS I Otdelenie russkogo jazyka 1 slovesnosti Izvestija 1*32. L 1896-1927.
ORJaS-Sb Otdelenie russkogo jazyka i slovesnosti. Sbomik 1-101. L 1867-1928.
PS Palestinskij sbomik. M 19540*.
PW CJS-6, 7. 8 Proceedings o f the Sixth, Seventh, Eighth World Congress o f Jewish Studies.
J 1977. 1980, 1982.
RABM Homel’skt dzjarfawny universitet. Rehijanal’nyja asablwasci betaruskaj
movy, htaratury 1faVkloru. Homel* 1973.
RE J Revue des etudes juives. P 1880IT.
RE S Revue des etudes slaves. P 1922ff.
RL Revista lusttana 1*38. O porto 1887-1943.
RO Rocznik onentalistyczny W 1914ff.
RS Ruerche slav is tiche. R 1952(f.
RT Rocznik tatarski 1*3. V, Zamosc, W 1932-1938.
SBB Studies in bibliography and booklore. C in 1953ff.
SEER The Slavonic and East European review. Lo I922ff.
SF Sbomik filologicky 1*12. Pr 1910-1946.
236 BIB LIO G R A PH Y

SFPS Stiuiia z filologiej polskiej i slowianskiej, W 1955ff.

SH Slavica Hierosolymitana. J 19770".
SN U N Sbomik za narodm umotvorentja, nauka i kniinina. S 1889fT. Later Sbomik
za narodm umotvorentja i narodopis.
ss Studta slavica. Bud I955IT.
1Vor Worter und Sachen 1-23. Hei 1909-1944.
ws Welt der Slaven. W j, Mu 1956fT
YB YlV'Obleter. V, NY 1931fT.
YF Yidiie filologye. W 1924.
YIVO YIVO Annual o f Jewish social sciences. NY 194611.
Y$ Yidiie iprax. NY 194Iff.
ZB Zeitschrift fo r Balkanologie. Mu 1962IT.
ZD L Zeitschrift fu r Dialektologie und Linguisltk. M rb 1969ff.
ZD M G Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft. Lpz, Wi 184741.
ZDPh Zeitschrift fo r deutsche Philologie. B 1869ff.
ZDS Zeitschrift fo r deutscht Sprache B I887ff.
ZD W Zeitschrift fo r deutsche Wortforschung 1-14. Slrassburg 1901-1914.
ZRPh Zeitschrift fo r romanische Philologie Lpz, T u 1877fT.
ZSI Zeitschrift fo r Slawistik B 1956fT.
ZSPh Zeitschrift fo r slavische Philologie Lpz, Hei 1924(T.

Prim ary and secondary sources of Judeo-Slavic words and passages in H ebrew
charactcrs, and Slavic texts translated from Hebrew or containing Hebraisms ap p ear
with + ; works relevant to Judeo-Slavic linguistic contacts (except Slavic dictionaries a n d
word lists) appear with *, while works containing data from other Jewish languages a p ­
pear with *‫״‬. Al! other topics are uncoded.

A baburka, M .V . (1973). Ab padryxtowcy ablasnoha sloumika MahilewMyny. R A B M , 3-5.

* (1979). Dyjalektyzmy w tvorax belarusktx saveckix pis 'mennikaw. Karotki sloumik — daved-
nik. Mk. '
**Abaev, V I. (1949). Drevneevrejskie elementy v osetinskom. In his O setinsktjjazyk i
f o l ’klor, 331-332. M-L.
------(1950). Russko-osetinskij slooar*. M.
• • ------(1958-1979). Istoriko-etimologifeskij slovar ‫ ״‬osetinskogo jazyka 1-3. M-L.
------(1964a). O proisxoidenii fonemy y (A) v slavjanskom. ProbUmy indoevropejskogo
jazykoznanija , 115-121. M.
------(1964b). O b odnoj skifo-slavjanskoj izoglosse. Ibid. 90-99.
Abdrazakov, K .S ., et al (1966). Tatarsko-russkij slovar'. M.
A faryan, Hr. (1971). Hayeren armatakan barraran 1. E.
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*Akty, otnosj&Jdiesja k istorii Juznoj 1 Zapadnoj Rossti (1863). L; H 1970*.
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— (1966). O technice przekladowej Szymona Budnego. Studia jtzykoznawcze poswitcone
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‫״‬-------------- 1968) a). Jeszcze o rzekomych **chazarskich” nazwach miejscowych na ziemiach
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I tl hatanax [l965b:62-64]; Jasodot HI ivrit alkana 2 it bata'atik kirili mehamaxacit
h a n io n a id ham e'a ha-16 11977:115-125]; Ktav-jad slavi kadum Sinitgala mcxadaS
b am in zar al-iem santa katanna [ 1973a:3-13]; M txkaro id jicxak Siper al hajasod
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)agon hadibur Sd jahude mizrax eropa bam c'a ha-16 [parts in Polish, 1961c:39-43];
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 INDEX O F W O R D S, PHRASES AND SOUNDS

Only Judeo-Slavic data recorded in Hebrew characters in Hebrew- and Yiddish-

language lexis and Judeo-East Slavic caique data are listed separately. Suspected Judeo-
Slavic data found in Slavic and Slavic Latin texts as well as Jewish Slavic examples are
classified under the Slavic cognate language; Jewish data from languages other than
Slavic which are written in non-Hebrew characters are listed together with the cognate
non-Jewish language (e.g. Judeo-C atalan is listed with Catalan). T erm s shared by both
Hebrew and Judeo-A ram aic, by U pper and Lower Sorbian, by Czech and Slovak or by
Belorussian and U krainian are listed once under Hebrew, U pper Sorbian, Czech and
Belorussian respectively. Croatian examples are listed under Serbo-Croatian; Slovincian
appears with Kashubian. T he letters j c, & and b arc disregarded in the alphabetical
listings, and as separate entries appear at the end of the alphabet; 1 is listed together with
e\ h with A; $ with th; i with d.

T able of languages cited

L Afro-Asian
1.1 Semitic
1.11 East Semitic
1.111 Akkadian
1 11 Northwest Semitic
1 121 Hebrew
1.122 Judeo-Aram aic (and Syriac)
1.13 Southwest Semitic
1.131 Amharic
1 132 Arabic
1.133 G e'ez
1.134 Judeo-Arabic
1 135 Maltese

L Altaic
2 J C uvai
2.2 Oguz
2 21 A zerbajdiani
2.22 Turkish
2*3 Kipiak
2.31 Cum an
2 32 K arafaj
2 33 Karaite
2 34 Kumyk
2.35 T atar
2 ^ Northern Turkic
2.41 Kirghiz

3. Finno-Ugric
U Finno-Permic
3 11 Komi
3.2 Finno-Volgaic
3.21 Erzya-M ordva
3 22 MokSa-Mordva
1_3 Lapp
3*1 Balto-Finnic
3.41 Estonian
 IN DEX O F W O R D S , PH RA SES AND SOUNDS 271

1-5 Ugric
3 SI H ungarian

4. Ibcro-Caucasian
4 1 Northeast Caucasian
4 1 1 Lezgian
4 111 Udi
4 2 North Central Caucasian
4.21 Cefen
4 22 Ingui
4_3 Northwest Caucasian
4.31 Adyge
4.32 Kabardian
4-33 Ubyx
4_i South Caucasian
4-41 Georgian

3. Indo-European
5.1 Albanian
Armenian
Baltic
5.31 Lettish
5.32 Lithuanian
LA Germanic
5.41 Dutch
5.42 English
5 43 G erm an
5.44 Gothic
5.45 Yiddish
S_5 Greek
5.6 Indie
5.61 Romani
5.62 U rdu
5.7 Iranian
5 71 £istoni
5.72 Judeo-T at
5.73 Kurdish
5.74 Ossete
5 75 Pashtu
5.76 Persian
5.8 Romance and Romance Creole
5.81 Catalan (and Aragonese)
5.82 French
5.83 Italian
5.84 Judeo-French
5.85 Judeo-Rom ance
5.86 Judezm o (and Ladino)
5.87 Latin
5.88 Papiam entu
5.89 Portuguese
5.81Q Provencal
5.811 Rum anian (and Meglanite)
5. B12 Spanish
5.9 Slavic (Common and unspecified)
5.91 Judeo-Slavic
5 92 Kareo-Slavic
272 IN DEX O F W O R D S , PH R A S E S AND SOUNDS

5 93 West Slavic
5.931 Czech
5.932 Judeo-W est Slavic
5 933 Kashubian and Slovinctan
5.934 Lower Sorbian
5.935 Polabian
5.936 Polish
5.937 Slovak
5.938 U pper Sorbian
5.94 East Slavic
5.941 Belorussian
5.942 Judeo-East Slavic
5 943 ludeo-East Slavic caique language
5.944 Russian
5.945 Ukrainian
5.95 South Slavic
5.951 Bulgarian
5.952 Church Slavic
5.953 Judeo-South Slavic
5.954 Macedonian
5.955 Serbo-Croatian
5.956 Slovenian
6 . Sino-Tibetan
fLl Judeo-Chinese
L Afro-Asian
1.1 Semitic
11 1 East Semitic
1.111 Akkadian: miksu 207
1.12 Northwest Semitic
1121 Hebrew: a 108; *adabber 203; 5adar Sen! 23; ,adonaj 111, 118, 149, 194 . 200;
5afarseq 37j ‘agalah 216; ’aharon (btn josef) 108, 112: ’ahaiveroS 108; *akadon IZ;
5aleksandrus 52, -an 52, 144: ’apitropos, ’apotropos 30! ’arba< kanfot/knafot 183;
,aSkanaz 3, 160: *5aver, ’avir 29, 40; cavon 226; ’avra(ha)m 191, 193: Avraham X aim
bar Smuel Cvi Sabad 112 : ,axal, , axilah 145. 2 2 1 ; b 199; ba'al 'agalah 117: badaq 203;
badhan 5Jj baha! 106; bahur 8 , 201, 209; bajit 199; barux (’atahj’adonaj |)/(habaJ) 78,
118; barxijahu 78; batiel 183; bavtl 107: baxur(£ik) 202; ba'avonotenu harabTm 227:
bahemah 2 1 0 ; bahemot 106, 2 1 0 ; btliSa’car 111 ; ben(-) 2 0 2 ; btn rabbi zalman kalonimds
51: beni uvcnex 104: bet ’el/’tloha/’tlohim 123-124. 128: bet hahajim 131: bet (ha)kntstt
28. 124. 134; bet (ha)qvarot 131. 209. 213; bet jhwh 123: bet midraS 120. 124: bet mir-
qahat 102: bet ‘olamim 131: bet tfillah 63, 123; betlthtm 108; bavajit 199; bin- 202; bin-
jam in 106, 174. 202; b l 'r 162; blwm’ 54; bmdjnt 74; bocaz 107: bodeq 183; braxiah 78;
brit ([ha-] milah) 181; btulah 111; bwndj’h 74; cadoq 78, 206; calon 7I_, 226; cavua' 173:
ctm ah 55-56: cicit 183, 202-203; -iik 202; cjmh’ 181; cwbwjf 64. 6 8 : daltt 73; dallut
173: darom 71. 226; davar 204; dtlti 73; dibber 203; divre hajamim 47; dodi 110; draSah
121: d'ukas, dukus, dux 31j 35; dvorah 59; t 76; s i l l ; ’efah 106; ’tfod 121; 'tg tl,
*tglah 209; ’elihu btn barax’el 111; ’tm tt 39; ‘trtv 71_; ‫־‬trtv Sabbat 19; ’tr ’txa 77; ga’al
104: gadlan 144: gadol 105. 144: gallah 148, 207, 228; galut 199, 227: gavar 105: gavri’el
110 ; g-d-f 33; ger ZOj, ga’ulati 104^ giddel 105; g-M 104! ^ 216; goj(im) 186, 193, 2 1 0 ;
goltm 17; gom tr 222; gvalim 5; gwld’ 56; h 77, 108, 144, 224; h 59, 76-77. 108; ha-
111, 181; hadassah 96; hag 69, 74; hag hamacot 134; haggaj 74; hago’el 104: hahareS
tahariSi, hajtltd 103: hajim, hajjah 79, 145. 220; halax 200; halalujah 192; hallah 221;
ham an 145. 150. 204-205; bamtc 183; hana'arah 103: hannukah 74-75; hanut 227;
harafa’im 111; haruc 109; h alm frn i 104: havaqquq 26; haxam 172: bazirim 210; htcron
47; hedtr 225: hem ar Saddaj li tna’od 103-104: htSbon 107. 227: hit 108; Ijt(’ h a|a’ 105;
 IN DEX O F W O R D S , PH RA SES AND SOUNDS 273

h tv r a h 206, 225; hicltab 104: higdil ( 5ojcv) 105: hillcl 144: hinlah tfillin 192; hirkivu 104:
hiti^ajvui 209; hkjm 79; hol‫־‬hamdced 73; hoxmah 172: h*n‫־‬prwt 153; hjv 33; hugged hug-
gad 103; hur 108; 3icfadion 37; ciggul 216-217; -Tm 92* 139, 209-211; 3f5 jam ini 106,
202; *15lo 3 105: civri 199; ja'aqov 107-108. 160. 190; *jah 56, 58; jahw ah 201; jaqar 78;
j a r e 3 dajjan 148; javan 44; j-b-m 89j 221; jigabber 105: p h i3cl 144: j 3ho?ai 79: jah03uac
51; j ( 3)h( 0 )v(a)h 201; jshudah 108; jahudi 143. 145-146. 148; jahudit 146; j( 3)j(a) 201;
ja n jla Ja jim 106, 189; jaiivo 199; j?vanit 1; jhwh 111, 149, 200; jichaq 89, 144, 220-221;
jiS 'a ja h u 99: jisraVi 145: jo’as, jd cas 79; jom kippur 19, 132; jom tov 73-75: jom vav 22;
jo n a ti 110; k 145. 224; kad 37-38: 4 kalcnd 60; kallah 145: kapparah 195, 207, 211; kaSer
173. 227; k*d-v 33; kafaz, ktttm (pa 2 ) 109; kijov 3; knacan(i) 5j 88 ^ 160; kntstt 123, 134;
k o m tr 222; krzn 3 161; k ‫־‬t‫־‬v 33; 11 dvr 160: lahav 105; lapidot 50; b io n harac 175;
U vanah 184: l*h‫־‬v 105: lig*dl 104; limud 68 ; 3Iksndr(ws) 52; ma<arav 7J_, mah jafita 74*
78: mahaq 39; mahloqtt 200; mahzor 42; malSln 209; mappaJah 208; maqom 73;
m a ra 5 106; m algtax, malgijah 80; mazzai 175, 184: m adabbcr203; madinah 74; mafun*
n a q , m dfunntqtt 175; maholal 110; m e^r 50; mtltx 200; m anahtm 46, 75; meqabber 131:
maqaddeS 99; m irqahah 102: m atuki 56; mavorax 78; m axapper 26; mcxis 207, 228-229;
m icraim 106; m idbar 119: milah 181; miiaVI 107: mizb(e)ab 58; mizraJ? 7_lj mjjmwn(3)
79: m n krm n, m nqrm 3n 194: m o'cd 73; m ordjxaj 75* 77, 148; m olth 147, 193, 220;
m oxcs 207; -n 52; nadan 182, 191; nahSon 108; natan 25; natronaj 78; nddunjatah 182;
n tf d 208-209; nahamah 46-47: ntm tc 160: n»tan 3d , natanjah(u) 48; nisan 47, 74* 77;
nm c 160: nm hjr 5Jj noal? 79; no<ami 107: novax 79; n!rwn3j 78; o 186, 227; ‫<״‬oggul
217; colah 215-216; -on 38; -ot 209-210; cdved 107: oztn haman 205; -p 178; panim 68 ;
p az 109; pe 36 t 190, 210; p»rah(jah) 55-56, 77; ptrtc 107: ptrtq 77; p( 3 )rigoras 1JL
46. 49; ptsah 52, 74-77, 194. 210, 220; pinhas 77; pinqas 215; pjnkw 'S 31, 33*34;
plw m 3, pp3, ppws 54; prjgwrj 46; purim 75j 204; pwp 3 54; q 224; qabbalah 225; qabcan
52, 210-211; qadoS 227; qah*l 73* 205-206, 222-223, 225-226, 228-229; qara3im 145-146;
qafovasija 3 33; qavar 132; qben 210; qshalim , q^hilah 223; q tv tr 132, 195, 210, 213;
q tv tr 3avot 213; qim ron 37; qjjwv 3 3* 72; q ln 'd 34, 60; qlwnjmws 5 jj qorban 216; q ‫־}־‬f,
q ‫־‬l ‫־‬v 33; qvar(im) 209-210, 213; q-v-r 211-212; qvurah 131. 211; qwj ‫״‬IwJ 164; rabbi 26;
rahcl 108, 145, 191; rav 112, 194; 3rc nmc 160: r‫־‬c*f 105: rcSeqa 153; ra3uven 110;
rexasim 178; rcxilut 175; rivqah 145: rol haianah 23, 135; ro? bodtS 193; r-q-h 1112;
r*5jgj, r^ijtq^ 153; rusia, rusiah 88 ^ 97; rwsj3 88 ; s- 181; sa'adjah 78; Sabbat 24, 26-27, 65­
6 6 . 75. 106, 145* 175, 193. 209. 219. 226: Sabos 25: Sabtat 26. 107: Saddai 106; s a f a r i 18;
Safrar(ut), labor, Salat, iali! 104: Salhtvttha, Salhtvttjah 100: Salmah 111; samtx 214;
iammaS 27, 126: sandaq 30; 5a36l $a3al 103; 5a3ul 220; seftr 38j 186; 5cm (ov 51_, 53; 5tqtc
117; scraf 210; sacudah 181; itv tt 68 ; 5‫־‬b‫־‬r 104; iibboltt 65; SibbuS 68 ; siddur 182:
Sifhatcxa, Siffeotexa 105: sifron 38j Sikkor 175; Silton 104: iimljah 59^ 77. 181; Sirah
badaiah 192; 5ivcah 121: J*l*m*h, Slomoh 79* 111; Jmirah 175; Smu’cl 145; sndjqn(j)s,
sndqnjs 30-31; sndrj 3 52; 5nc 46; Jnljn 161; iofar 136; I6 f(im 47; sohertt 106, 108; somex
214; Jqwlfftr(3) 124; ’ itw q 38; sukkot 135; suq 227; 5v3nkj 33; iwljmn 79; swljqws 125;
^w lm n 126; SxnJ 99; tahat vaSti 105; (alit 191; taljan 175; talmud 225; tam ar 25, 49.
108, 112. 226; tanhum (^3) 46-47: tannur 27; faref 174; targam an 227; !acut 79; taxrix
141; •t 3cadrix, u cazrix 48; tfUlah 27, 42, H 8 * 182; tfUlm 138* 191; tfillot 138; tiicah
b 9 3av 7 ^ 78; ypj( 31, 34, 40; tj3wdwrws 47; tlljah 175; tod( 6 Xr)os 47; torah 227-228;
(6 v 22; 5ur(i), 3u rirag a 3 46; -ut 33, 186; v 110, 199; -v- 220; vajaSltftnnu 104: vajhi
108; vajjaku...m akkat lurtv 105: vajjamlixtha 104: vajjijav libo 105: vantit 3; vattiliaq
lahtn 105; v 9dato 122; v^xarkas, vaxilon 107; 3wfmj3h 49; ‫ ׳‬wn 37; *wnntjt, wwntjt 3;
x 76* 108, 145. 166. 181, 224; xadoio 192; xcvra 206; z3, i 178; zahav 58, 194; zarah
58-59, 7Jj u h a v a , zahavit, z^rah(jah) 58; znut 175; zoreah 58; zoxth 98; zqenah 46; ‫ג‬
181; c 181, 217

U 2 2 Judeo-Aram aic (and Syriac): *a3, 3afarsqin 37; 3altksandrus 52; 3aqlida 3 37;
1aruvta 3 19; bc(t) kniita 3 28, 64, 134; dukas. dukus 35; ctrtv 19; galuja3, hanuj(a3),
htibon 227; b^vruta 3 206; h u 5ban(a3) 227; *jan 49; j^Suac 5l_; •jn 37; jom a 3 rabba 3 19;
kraga 3 165; kum (a)ra 3 222; lajtor, Icjor, l3jtw r 24, 215; margaljan, margli(o)t,
marg(6 )11ta, margdljan 49; m aiknta 3 36; m^dinah 73*74: m txts 207; n^dunja 182:
rufi3a5, nifla 3 208; pinax, pinxa 3 215, 229; pifqa3, pitqi(o)n 37: qabra 3 214; qsm aron 37;
274 IN DEX O F W O R D S, PH R A SES AND SOUNDS

SabaS( ej) 67; Sabbaka’, £abbaka} 25; Sappir 160: sava* 46; sindik(n)os 30; iraga 5 5 0 :
$uq(a5) 227: *ta* 35* 200: 1arg 3 m an(a>) 227: p pf(a2, ppifan 4 jj turgm an(a3) 227: xulw id
sippurta 44

1.13 Southwest Semitic

1131 Amharic: Sanbat 22
1.132 Arabic: 5al* 39; alfsahi 77; ’almaqabir 118: 3andalusijja 3* ,arrafianijja 3, 6 1 :
*a^aqlabijja 3; bimadfnat 74; br*gh 67j danu, dunu 92; duwa 62; flohr 71^ d ia m a
(elihud) 118; cddahra 7J; elfsahi, fa?h 77j frandiijja 3; *fr5gh, fz>c> 87; habib (allah) 1 1 0 ;
b a d id i 69; hakim 78; hkaja 204; *ikram 40; jahudi 143. 146; knis 64^ 139; knisa 118;
*kHkw 40* krum(e), kurum 40; laban *asafir/'usfur 43; madlna 74; majmun(a) 78-79:
m asdiid, mawla 11_7; *m ^j frg 87_, 92; *mldJwh, mlw^wh 87; mu?allan 64; m5zn frg 8 7 .
92: nimsa 161; nwb gr*d 86 * 92; qabar 212; qadus(e), qattuse 39; qubur 212; q u rb an
215; ram a^an 75; rowda, pj^a 130; rum 3; rus 88 * sactd 78* $ala, $alla 63; $ira( (alm usta-
qim) 122: sulajman 79; tora, torat 228; ’ummah 132: wantit 3; xar(a)di 165: xilca 140:
zahra 55

1133 Ge*ez: Sanbat 22

1.134 Judco*Arabic: habra 207; h ad i 69; l>ebra 207; $|a 63; Snuga 29; fajamon 29-30.12

1.135 Maltese: -a, bieb(a) 38; hawwad 225: katusa 38; ludi 225: X and(m ) 53; Xema

2. Altaic: baglr 202; V iiak 72; Sabat 26

2 A CuvaS: fcu^a 67; Semat, ibmat-kon, Sumat 27; xoza 62

2*2 Oguz
2.21 AzerbajdSani: SabaS 62
2.22 Turkish: altin 57; bay ram 74; bogazlamak 180: boncuk 116: caba 66 ; teribafi 146;
*ci 176; ^i^ck 56; Qifit, Cifut, Cifut 145: Qingene 146; ^oba 66 ; £ufut 145: cuma(rtesi)
23; du(v)a 62; d iab a, diaba(h) 66 ; D 2ifut 145; eglenmek, g 180: gun(ey) 7 |; hane 146;
havra 206, 225: hil’at 140: kaftan 141; kafur 216; kaptan 141: karaba$ 149; kavga 225;
kubur 212; ku$ sutii 43; nem^e 161; ode 145; pa^a 64; ramazan 74; Saba 66-67: saka 175;
yagmurluk 140

2*3 Kip£ak
2.31 Cum an: kahal 224; Sabat kun 21

2.32 Karafaj: SabSt-kun 26

2.33 Karaite: adzy 69; ajn^kin 20; avan 227: aver 3l_* 40; baraski 20* 31^ 42; baxur(£ox)
202; biin 167; bol- 98; Dibor 204; £jn£kin 20; g 224: gantax 228; javan 44; (j3ru)xad£i
69: kagal, kahal 224: kanpor 216: kar(a)vaS 149; kicejnekin 20; kiti(baraski) 20* 23; kur­
ban ola 215; mizbccha, mizb( 6j)ax 58: moed 73; Mordkowicz 77; Moskovit 147: n£dan
182; Nowachowicz 79; qagal 224; rabban 112; Sabat 66 ; Sam(b)aS 27; sluda 181; Simxa
77; tam ar 226; tan(d)ur, tefile, te11(l)a, tefiniJa, tyfilja 27; vykorent et• 179: xaxam 112:
xoron 37; xyd?. (£t216 ^69 (‫ ;־‬Zarachowicz, Zarax 58; zox£ bol*

2.34 Kumyk: bajram 222; g, glagol 224: qagal 72, 206. 222, 224*225. 229; qalm agal,
qavgal 225

2.35 T atar: kaber(lek) 212; ke£e atna kon 20; SabaS xodia 62

2.4 Northern Turkic

2.41 Kirghiz: iabas 62
 INDEX O P W O R D S , PH RA SES AND SOUNDS 275

3_ Finno-U gric
3 .1 Finno-Pcrmic
3 11 Komi: SabaS

3.2 Finno-Volgaic
3.21 Erzya-M ordva: galax 228; maksnems 202

3 22 M okia-M ordva: galax 228

3.3 Lapp: makso 2Q7

3 4 Balto-Finnic
3.41 Estonian: poljpuhapaew 23

3.5 Ugric
3,51 H ungarian: Alexander 53; andris 147; Aranka, arany 58; bo(c)her 202: Duna 92j
fd(i5kola), f5-oskola 125; hosszunap 19; iskola 125; *ka 215; kad 39; kaftan 141: Kalman,
K alo 50; kapca(bety&r) 210; m adirtej 43; \lik l 6 s 47; pin(k)a 215; piinkosd 25^ 33-34;
S and o r 53; sip 65; Szabadka 25; szombat 2 ^ 34; temeto 118: Virag 56; zsid 6 142

i . Ibero-Caucasian: Ghyssar 146

1^1 Northeast Caucasian

4.11 Lezgian
4-111 Udi: p 'arask ’i 20; Samat 2fi

4 .2 North Central Caucasian

4.21 £e£en: p ’erisk'in 2D

4 '27 InguS: p'arask'oe 20

4 .3 Northwest Caucasian
4.31 Adyge: bereskeii 21_! 23

4.32 Kabardian: avan 226; berazew 2J_; SabaS 66 ; Sabat 26; iu i 146

4.33 Ubyx: berask’a 21

4.4 South Caucasian

4.41 Georgian: p ’arask'evi 20; Sabati 26; salocavi 63; Sandro 53; ;ora 225, 227

i Indo-European
5^1 Albanian: avre 206; java e madhe 19; kule 33

5.2 Armenian: dukhs 35; gaguth, haSiv 227; khurm 222; Sabat*1 23-26: .^ambals 26;
$uka(j), thargman 227; town agathich 63; xanuS 227; zogovaran 64.

5*3 Baltic
5.31 Lettish: Sandra 54; iidavs 146; ziHs 142

5.32 Lithuanian: bachuras 201; ba£ny£ia 130; blynas 167; degufius, degutas,
degutininkas 174; kahalas 222; kapaf, kapas 211; Saba, Sabasfas), Sabatas 66 ; Vytautas
97. 180; iydas 142

5.4 Germanic
41 ‫ י‬Dutch: ach, aggcnebbisj 159; cabanes 225: (happen 155; jom woof £2; kabanes
225: keiwer, keware 213: nebbis(ch). oggenebbisj 159; oppoeyen 164; parrag 161; ping
ping/pong 215; put J_3Z
276 IN DEX O F W O R D S , P H R A SES AND SOUNDS

5 42 English: hen’s tooth 42; jabber, javer 204; nightingale's tongue 42; phylactery 24*
203; Sandra, Sandy 34; shul, synagogue, temple 225

5 43 G erm an: Abend(land) Zl; aj 167; Alexander 52; allmahlich 186; bachur 202: bam-
wol 93; Bauer 210: Baumwolle 93; Bautzen 86 ; betahus, betehus 63* biboldo, Blat-
tenkinn 146; Blumche 55; Bocher 202: Bock 159: boumwolle 93* 157; Brame 138;
Budessin 8 6 ; bum alj 186; ^ 166; Cal(e)man 50; Chaim 146; C harakter 166: Charcas 107;
Chefure (machen) 211; Chemie 166: curcthema 165: dabern 203-204; dallet, delles 23;
denkzedel, Dcnkzettel 138; der lange Tag 19; dib(b)ern 203; docnen 62; Donau 22;
duckeste 35; e 208: egel(e) 209, 216; egoln 216; Eimelroder 149; Elbe 92; (Elie)ser 52;
•er 213; Erlag 2l_; Faischel 49, 146; Feierabend 22; Feiertag 75; Feit(e)l 145; Foss 31;
Friedhof 139; Fritz 173: g 224: Galle 228; Gauner(sprache) 44; gimme 109: Go(h)Ie 216;
Golatsch 164; Gott 159; G recht-Tag 22;G rcnze 167: Hakim , Hakym 79; Haman(sfest)
204, 206; Han(a)f, H anef 94; Heilman 52; Hitler 224: Homon 204; L 167; ioddenker-
chove 138: Itzig 144: iizt 217; laich 146; Jauche 168; launer 44; j cct, 5jet 217; jenisch
44: Jeschiba 199: jetzt 217; Jo n er 44; jordan 148; joum rofTin/roof 22; Ju d e 144. 146,
171; juden rodel 137-138; Judenfreythof 139; Judenkafer 213: Judenkiew er 130. 212;
Judcn-kirchow f 138; Judenm eister, (Ju^cn)putz 137: (Juden)schulc 126-127. 130. 224;
Ju d le 144; k 166; kabora 212; Kaftan 141. Kaim(chen) 146; Kalende M i kalle 145;
Kalman 50* kapores 196; kapuster 164; kasseeremm 210: kauli, keim 145: kera^hof, kerf*
m 139; kewer 213: kielam 223: Kirchhof 131. 138-139. 212; Kloster 124: Kohl 223:
Kolatsch 164; Kolman(in) 50; Kren 165-166. 179: Kretscham, Kretschem,
Kretschm ann, Kretschm er 165, Kriewak 179: •1 215; ‫׳‬lein, Lieb(cr)mann 52; Lothringen
160: mackum 73; -man 52; mauchess 207: Mauschel 146; meches 207; medibbern 203;
M eerrettich 166: Meissen 87* M eister 136-137; Merk 94; M esner 126; Met 170; mid-
borus 119; Milchstern 43; mille 181; Missnick 175; mo(c)kum 73; mogeln 224:
Moh(n)kootsch 164; mokum -m atina 74; Moldau 87; M orgen(land) 7_1; munich 31; -n
210. 223; Nacht 93; nebbich 159; nefei(che), newel 209; Nienburg 86 ; Off(e)mia 49; Par-
rath 161; Peitsche 164, 167: *pare-, parein- 22; penunse 164; Petsak 77; Pferd 34j 208:
Pferintag 20-22; Pfingsten 21* 33-34; Pfinztag 21_; phutze 137; Pinax, Pinca 215; pin-
coston 33; Pinke(pinke) 215; pinkest 33-34; pinkl, pintes 215; pinunse 164; Plinse,
Plintz, Plinze 167; Plueml(eXi)n, Plum M ; Poppelman 49* 54; przckomich 179:
pumalich 186; punge 215; Piitz 137: Rachejoiner 149; Rebach 199; resch, resche Semmel
153-154; Rewach 199: Rodal(c) 137: rosch 154: Rusttag 22; Salman(nus) 52; sambuke
25; sammich 214; Samstag 26-27. 80: schab 65* 69; Schabset 145: schachem 118. 181;
Schachter 173: Schamserler 146; schapolis, schappoll 65; schibbusch 68 ; schickse(l) 117:
schieb(cs), schi(e)wes (gehen) 68 ; Schigerl, Schlaier, Schlaume 146; Schmand, Schmet-
tern 168: Schmuhl 145-146; Schnitzer 146; Schule(r), Schul(l)er, Schulmeister 124. 126.
136; Sendir, Send(r)(lein) 52; senta 53* simt 26; Sindik 3]j Slatte 56; Slommentrost,
Solomon 47; S onnatend 23* 26-27; Speyer 160; Stelze 92* 157; Susskind, Sussmann 52;
Synagoge 124, 224; -t 33; taffret 203; Teppich, teppid, teppith 40-41; T ham ar 226;
Theatrich, Theoderich, Thialrich 48; Trost(lin) 47! Tschindo 146; verbramen 138:
verkapern, verkawwern 213: Vogelmilch 43; Voss 34; Wandilgelde 139; W eihnacht(en)
93; Weirach 78; W orms 40; wunschen 29; x 166; Xandl 53; yoden kerchof 138; Zadok
206; zidakl 183; zofon 21

5 44 Gothic: (fruma) sabbato 23; gudhus 128: paintekuste 33; paraskaiwe 20* 22

5-4.5 Yiddish: a 186, 202. 223: abortnik 174: -ai 172; (a)chiclen 221; adenoj 194. 200:
agal, ag b r, agule 216; aj 167. 174; ajzik 220; ‫)’ (־‬ak 171. 173: alter 46; apetropes,
apitropos 30; arbekanfes 183, 185; aver 40; avrem(ele) 191, 193: axlen 221: badane(s)
13. 48. 54. 59; badkenen 203; bagrobn, ba'is aulem 131: bajC 164, 167; balagole 117. 216:
barsak 5Jj, bal 65; batxn 5U baveln 93* 157; bav^n 152: bavl 93* 184: bavojnesejnu-
horabim 227: baxer 202; beis tefillo 63; bejs 213: bejsakneses 124: bejsakvures 131. 209,
213; bejs-sm entai 213; belme 157; beries hamiele 181; besalmen 131; bes-medrei 124.
130: besojlem, betn got 131; bilz^l 152: blime 54-55; blince 167; blum(e) 54-55. 57;
 INDEX O F W O R D S , PH R A S E S AND SOUNDS 277

b ’nwwjlh 93; bojdek 174; bojdek xomec zajn 183; bok 159; borex 118, 144; borux(er)
144; boxer(ec) 8 , 173. 201, 209; breg 177; brengn cu kvure 131; bris(mile) 181; broxe
78; buxer 202; c 68 , 181, 193; i 68 , 178, 181; ta p 65; -( c 208; cedakl 183; cejmex 54;
chodsche 155; cicekanfes 183; cices 202; cimes 44; cm entai 177; cm inter 131; cojzmer
177; joint 152; cu (mir) 183, 192; cudek(l) 185; cvim er 131: cvu(j)ak 173. 184: dab(b)em
203; dales 73, 173; dale! 73; daven-Sul 6 L 63, 124; dav(e)nen 61-64. 80. 124. 131. 184:
d ’egexc 156; degutnik 174; deide 163; dell 131; dcm b 173: der lange Tag 19; dibbem
203; dobre 90; dobre-mazl 184: dobrui 90, dojnen 62, dorman 153; dos 186; dos mejdl
nebex, dos umgliklixes mejdl 159; dukes, duksah, dukse, dukus 35; dunaj 92; dvojre
54, 59; dwkws 31. 35; di(5) 178; e 133. 180; -e 208; -ec !73; -e l 172; egel 209;
ej 76; *ej, •ek 174; elb 92; •el(e), -208 ‫ ג‬1‫ ; ג‬ernes 39; erev Sabes 19; -es 186; fajge 144-145:
fajrtog 75; fajtl 145: fajvii 49; fargrobn 131: fejbui 49; feld 131; ferd 34; fin die szkoles
124. 130: fis (nohe) 215; *fjnkwf 34; fojglmilx 42-43; frejde 54, 59; fric(ak) 173;
frim u li( 152; g 133. 180; gadlen 144: gajes 186; galex 148, 228; (gejn af) vikup 32, 123;
gfure 211; gjm 109; godl 144: gojim 193: gold(e) 54, 56-58; goles 199; goln 169: grenec,
*grenece, grenic 167: grin-xoge 33; grixnland 44; gudle 144: gut(e)ort 131; halelujo 192;
ham ansoren 205; hanef, hanf 5 94; harle 163; havire (Slogen) 212; hejlikort 131: he51 149;
Kisxajves 210; Ifikjm 79; hlejm 216; hmn ’w j'm 205; hof 131: hojl 168-169: hom en(tai)
204-205; bt*h 155; i 167: icik 144. 220; igl 217; -im 209; -in 49; iSjamini 106; jades 157;
jag d e 157, 167; jankl 190; jarm (u)lke 140: ieruiolaem 189; jeSive(-boxer) 199, 201; jexiel
144: jicxok 144. 220; jojx 167-168; jom tef, jomtof, jontef 22, 73-74: jovn 44; jq r 78; judl
144: jung(a£) 172: kacef 23; kafc(a)n 141: kagal'nik, *kahal, kal 223; kale 145: kalmen
49-52; kalonymos 49; kanop(l)’e 157; kapam ik 196: kapc(a)n 52, 141. 211; kap 3 U 140;
kaporenik, kapore(s) (gen)/(maxn)/(zajn), kapurenik 195; kaitn 29; katavasnik,
katavusnik, katewnik, katoves(dik)/(nik) 31-32, 39; -kc 174; kejver-oves 213; k 'ep d s,
kepi 140; kest 29; ketowes 32; khal 73, 223, 229; kile 31, 33; kille 223; klajzl 124: klaper,
klapn 187; klojz 124: kogel 223; kojlef 164, 172: kojmer 222; kol 73, 223, 229; konop'e
94. 157; konopl'es 157; koier 173. 227; kowlef 164, 172; kravec 176; krefem 165:
kre<me(r)(ke) 165. 169: krcin, krejn 165-166: k|fwt, ktvwt 32; kul 73, 223, 229;
kvur(es)/(im ) 209, 211; L 180; -I 182. 185, 208; laaj(en)en 152; lajb 185; la(j)bcedakl,
la(j)bcedeld 183; lajbcudak, lajbcudek(l), lajbserdak 183-185; lapidos, lapidus 50,
lapserdak 185; -le 193. 208; legn tfiln 191; lejenen 152; lejm 216; levone
(-blum )/(-£afke) 184; limed 68 ; litvak, litviner 172; lixtman 50; Mksndrws 52; lodmir 179;
lokin 155; lopete 157; loSn-haranik 175; loter 160: ,Itr 4$; mahilnik 131: m ajmone 79;
m aj(n)ster 137; majofis 78; -man 52; mapl-kind, mappelo, mappil (zajn) 208; margolin,
m argulies 49; m arudnik 174-175; matike 157; mawie 220; maxlojke(s) 185; m 'd 170;
m ( ’ycd 158. 170. 185, 187; m edibbern 203; medienc 74; mefunice, mefunik 175; mejir
50: m ekaber zajn L21; mekadeS zajn 99; mekn 39; *-melex 186; m enaker zajn, m enakem
183; m enien 169: m ini(, minnesch 31, 182; m inutnik 174; mispalel zajn 131: mizinek
174, 202; mizinke 174; mijmwn(?) 79: mniike 169: m 0 (t10)lkes 131: mojJe 220; moljen
zix 62, 131: m onalke 169: mondrek 173: moiko, moskovif 147, 193: Jmt 39; m uien 169:
m u n x 31; -n 52, 210, 223; nad(a)n 182. 191; nebex(dik)/(!), nebi( 148, 159; nedan,
nedin je, nedunje 182; *nefele, Neflild 209; nephelo 208-209; newich 159; -nik 32, 171.
1 73-175. 186; nisn 47; nill, njtl 34; nodn 182: JnpJ 94; nud(’)en, nudne(kejt), nudnik,
n u d n o te, nud ien 174-175; o 164, 223; objezdttk, objezdnik 174; oj 127. 164; oj vej 192;
o m 62, 184: ow 164; ozere 158. 170. 187; pa- 186; padloge 154. 169: pajet 42; pajsex
76; pamelex 167. 184. 186; par<e)ve, parwe 31, 155, 182; parx 161, 164; paskudn'ak,
p asku d n e, paskudnice, paskudnik 172-173: pavol’e 186; peia(j), pece 64; peje(s) 76, 190,
2 10; pejrex 54; pejsex(uvke) 54, 76, 194: pempik 173: pen em er 68 ; peri 49; piet 42; pilcl
153; pinkes 215; pipik 169: pisk(a£) 172: pjavke 157; |ijng¥!n 33; pjnkw ‘‫ '׳‬i ' 21, 31,
33-34. 41; planje/sne/an, planxe/ane/sn 152-153; plejce 156; podleke 154. 169: pojer
210; pol'ak 172: pompik 173: ponem 68 ; poiin 162, 183; praajen 152; p rai 187;
p r a l( ’)nik 95, 170. 186-188; p ran (’)nik 187; praven 32, 116: prjdjg 161; pSedbo(r)i 177;
p u p ik 169. 173: purim 204; pwp 5 49; qlmn 52; q ln 'd 34; r 133, 156, 161, 170. 179; r{’)
166; 1(1) 176-178; rajsiJ 88 ; rajsn 88 , 97; ranign 162, 183; rejnikn 183; rejie 177; rex-
ilein ik 175; roSxejdil, roSxojdii 193; rov 194; roxJ 145, 191; f 45, 68 , 181, 123, 218; -s
278 IN D EX O F W O R D S , PH R A SES AND SOUNDS

193: Sab 65; fabaS 64-65. 67-69. '218: SabaSnik 175, 2!8; *abcs 25, 27* 67, 145, 175,
193. 218-219: (*)SabeS 193: Sabosim 209; sachem 181; Jaj 99; sakadiinik 175;
Salet 153: Sames 126; samex 214: sammich 214: sandek 30-31. 42: Sap 65; Sapira, sapiro
160: sarge/ 3 ne/3s 152-153: Saul 220: saxem 118: Saxnovi£ 99; schlim Salncck 175:
schpouscring 152: sejfer(-pral[,)nik)/('pranik) 184. 186; Sejndl 161; sender, sendir49, 52;
serdak 183, 185; Sexier 173; sgajes 186; Jibes 64* 68 ; Siboles 65; sidcr, sidurl 182:
$iker(nik) 175; sikes 135: Sikse 117: Sil 124: sirae 54, 59; sinagogc 124: Jive 190; SjbwS
6 8 ; Skil’nik 127, 171; Skljar 176; Skol'nik 127, 171. 176; skoverede, skovrodc 157, 169:
Slim(ezalnik) 175, 184: Slojme 127: slovak 172: smejte, smeiene 168: sm ol'cr 176, Smuc)
144: sndrj 5 52; Sneur 45-46: sobotnikes 218: Sojl 220: sojmex (zajn) 214: Solet 153: somax
214: spiro 160: Srage 50; scrdqjl 185, 208; Stok 38^ Stoic 92* 157; subotnik 70, 75; sude
181; Suel 220: sukes 135: Sul(r) 63* 124-125, 130. 225: Sulklaper 187; Sulman 126;
SS^nkj 33; 1 180: talcs 122: taljcn 175; tam are 226; taS 205; tcpex 40; tfile (tun) 111,
182: tifle(-hof), tifio-hof 63, 131: tiktin tiSebov 78; tlienik 175; todres(en), todros 11,
47-48. 51: toes 7£; lojgn ojf kapores 195; trajf 76, 174: trejba? 162, 172: crejb(er)n L16,
156, 162-163, 1_Z2* 179* 183; trejbtfer 172; trejf 76; trejfn’ak 173; trejst 47; trop 37, 52,
80: tS 178; tum arkin 226; tuves 79; (wlmJ 30, 35; txoja2, txojr 177: u 211; uftolmen IQ;
ugcrkc 168: vajbcr(nik) 175; veliave 87; vintS(eve)n 29; ,wrqjs 168: xaim 144-145: xajder
225: xaje 144-145. 220; xalat 140: xalemojed 73; xapn 155: xarakier 166; ■xe 208;
xcjder 225; xcmje 166: xerl'ak 172: xevrc, xevruse 206; xitrak, xitre 172-173: xo£(e) 155;
xomec (batln)/(bojdek zajn) 183; xoxem, xoxme 172: xrejn 165-166: i 177-178: zajn
98. 131. 183, 214: zalmen 5J_; zejde 163; zidakl 183; zise 56; zlate 54, 57-58: zlmn 52;
zlotc 54, 57-58; znusnik 175; zojxe zajn 98; zorcx 54; z5 178

!L5 Greek: Abbakoum 26; i c r 40; Aleksand(e)r 53; Aleksandra 49, 53; Aleksandros
52-53: Aleksis 53; alleluia 192; Ambakoum 26; An£0ema 29; Anatole 52* 58; andras
140. 147: An0e 56; arxisynagoge 125: dco 62; doukas, douks 35; dova 62; Edessa 88 !
elinika 1_I apitropos 30; <fpomfs 121; Euphemia 49; EC16ymia, Eu 6ymides 59; euxeion 63;
fagion 119: foiniks 112: Gavriel 110: gerontios 46‫ ״‬gouna 36; he megale heb*
domas/hemera IS; he pentakoste hem era 31; he tyrine (hebdomas) 19; hebraios 143:
hemera ion azymon 134: ’Iason 51j -ika 1_; -ion 37; javanitika lj kadion, kados 37-39:
kalandai, kalendai 34; kalo 16, 50; kalomiti 50; Kalonymos 49* 51-2: Kalyke, Kalykion
56; kamarion 37; katavision 3 jj katergon 112: kefaletion, kcfaJitidn 139; kele 33; kleidi
37: koile 33; koimetcrion 131: kdttavos 33; kyriakon 128: m argarites 49; mb 25-27:
megalobdomadon 19; Melis*a(n0e) 59; mikros, mkro 38; monasteri(o)n 37; monaxos 31_;
Moyses 147: mytc 50; Nemitzoi 160-161: Nikeias, Niketcs, Nikolaos 47; odas 145: oikos
proseuxes 63; oksos, -on 37; 6mi06n gala 44; -os 37, 51-52; 6 vreos 143; papo 16;
paregoria, Paregoros 46; parasfevg’f, paraSf*, paraSegv(, paraSevgwi, Paraskevas,
paraskeve, Paraskeve, paraskevge, paraSSefk'i 19-24. 27: pepos 54; persika 37; Phoibos
49: phylakteria, phylaktcrion 24; pinak(a)s, pinakion 215; pittakion 37; poieton 42: politi
16: pougga, poungf 215; presbyteros 46; prosabbaton 20* 22-23: proseukterion, proseuxe
63* 130: prote sabbatou 27; retnbi 26; rhetor 24; roditi 16; romejika 1_; Rumeka 16; sab*
bata 25; sabbaton 23; salpigks 136; sam ba(ta) 2£, 26, 80; Sam batis 25* sambaBa, *sam-
ba0on 25-26: sambyke 25; Sandra, sindrou 53; satanas 22; sombotou 25; stadion 37;
sxolastikos 124: sxole 27, 63, 125. 127: synagoge 28* 63-64. 124. 130. 226; syndikos,
synteknos 30; tapes, tapeton 40; te aorta ton salpiggon 136; Oalamos 30, 37; 0amar 2^;
0(e)od6ros 47; Oeos 201; Oddoros, 0odos 47; 0oloma 30; todros 48, 5 J ; tou poulidu to gala
42: tovA 62; tro p an , (ropan(o)n, tropos 41j tsifoutes 146; Tsitseka 56; tzampa 6 6 ;
tzitzakion 72; Vodena, Vodina 89; xanokas 75; xaura, xavra 225: xoros 37; xrysion
(kefaz) 52- 109: zakonon 4; Zeppos 54

Indie
5.61 Romani: benga 202; biboldica, biboldo 149, 171; dembo, dlengo, dlugo 173: d iu t
146; govr 214: -ica, jud(ica) 171: judos, jut 146; kerfemarica 171; kilma 223: kral(ica)
171: lokoi 186; mendro 173; parascicvin, paraSt’ovin (jekto), paraStuji 20, 23; poisare
164; pol6 ke, poloko 186; sik^rmask^ri, sik^rpask^ri, Skola 125: skridlos, trivika 179:
xalem 221: xalo, xalo 148: fcydano, iydos 142
 INDEX O F W O R D S, PH RA SES AND SOUNDS 279

5 .6 2 U rdu: SabaS &Z

5 7 Iranian
5 71 Cistoni: oxel- 221

5 .7 2 Judeo-T at: SoboS 65

5.73 Kurdish: §aba$(ej) 65; xanuki Z5

5 .7 4 Ossete: «r 227; ajvan 226; b a rz s k 'x , barys’ki 21; dziwitt, dzutt 146; g.ymiry,
g u m ir 222; kxdzos, kocdzus, kosart, kusart, ar 227; sabat 26; Sandyr 53

5 .7 5 Pashtu: iab ai 62

5.7 6 Persian: faharSanbe 27; doa 62; gabr 214; -gah 64; gaur, gur(estan), gur kardan
214; had£(di) 69; kanis( 3), ken£3t, kon&t 64; madine 74; namaz(gah), nam azxanl 64;
oxel- 22J; iab ai 65, 67-69; San be 27; Siri morg 44, 69; xane 64; xanc(*)xoda 129

5 .8 Romance and Romance Creole

5 81 Catalan (and Aragonese): aladm a, alaJma 29; Floreta 55; parasceve 22; scola 63;
S enior 46; sindic 31; talam, t&lem 30

5.82 French: brouhaha 118; cacher, cacherc, cachir 227; cadus 39; Calot 50; challandes
34; + Solent 160; dab^rer 203; deuil 131; (drache) de huitaine 121: ecolc 38; escole 63;
jo u r de paraceuve 22; Kalman 50; M estre 136; midi 71_^ Noel 74; o(u)rer 62; parasceve
21; pentecote 33; phylactfcre 24; puits 137; 5am(b)edi 25, 80j -s 92^ Sand(r)e, Sandro 53;
syndic 31; trope, tropier 41, 52; vermicelles 152

5.83 Italian: bavella 93; Bononc 51j Brutaxi 18; t 34; Calim ani, Calim ano, Calo,
C alonym os 50; capo d 'anno 23; catu(su) 39; chile, chilla 33; ‫״‬dfidco, giudeo 142; Greghi
16: kaputanni 23; kenapura 19, 23; NataJe 74; nav 6 n 227; orare 62; orrechio di Aman
205; parasceve 21-22; purile, purilondzu 23; q 34; f 127: Sandro 53; scuola 63; sin-
daco, sindico 31; talamo 30; tappeto 40; tropo 41

5_M Judeo-French: ((3)rwpJ 31, 41; tolme 30; trwf 31, 41

5.85 Judeo-R om ance: -1a 204; synagoga 206

5 86 Judezm o (and Ladino): .A. 111; apatropos, apotropos 30; aver 31, 40; avon 227;
axalear 221; baxur 201; bed tefila 63; (ben) major 45; berdugo 56; boazladear 180, brit
m ila 182; cal 226; cemax 54; dwq*s 35; dfcidj6 , d2udezmo, dZudia, d2udjo 143; cl dia
grande 19; em qabar 131: englenearse 180; -ente, enteram ente 147; f 178; f\h! 147; flor
55; g 180; galax 228; bak’tia 204; indiferente 147; jallear 221; jomtov 73; kal 206, 226;
kalmi 50; kalo 49-50: kapo de anjo 23; kenaani 5; Kolonomos 49; kreskas 56; ladron 210;
malsin 209; meaara 131: mexa(m)pcr 26; mizbf&x 58; moed 73; naxmia.s 47; nemci 161;
pafa 64; papel 23; peragi'a, peraxja 54, 56; pesax 77; pinak(es), pinkas, pinkes 215;
Sa(a)di, Saadya 78;5abata, $a(ba)tula, Sabatulika 75; sakadii 175-176; samba(d) 26, 31,
42; sandak 30-31; sand 6 49, 53; senior 45; simenterio 131: talamo 30; tam ar 226; tapet(e)
31, 41; !rwnp5. jrwnpw 41; twdrws, jwrdws 47; uda 145: ventana, vente 147; xakitfa 204;
xallear 221; xanuk£ 75^ xavra 206, 225; xevra 206; xoro 37; zeragja, zeraxja 54, 58
5 87 Latin: alleluia 192; anathema 29; aurea, Aurelia 57_, balneatoriam , balneum
(Judaeorum ) 137; bede 139; Bondia, Bongoron 75; Bono-Nomine 51j cadus 39; calendae
34; caJeniem 160; Caim an, Calonymos 5Jj Carcaso 107; cena (pura) 23, 1[9; cenofaija,
chlodnicza 119: Choler 50; cimitcrium 131: claustrum 124; coemcterium 131; Coloman-
nus 50; comite(m), commater 38; conventiculum 64; cunccia 134; Danubius 92; dies
azymdrum 134; dies bonus 75; dies clangori 136; dies magnus 19; (dies) natalis 34, 74;
280 INDEX O F W O R D S , PH R A SES AND SOUNDS

divinare 62; dux 35; fcstum clangoris !36; Feyrtag 75; Fleur de Lys 55; Fiona. Florya
54*55. 60; gardinum 130; gemma 109; G)ow(i)na, Glownya 50; Golda 56; granicie 167;
hortus Judaeorum 130; i 143; -ia 204; iudaeus 142; kalcndac 34; K auor 212; Kawyary,
Kawyory 210*211; Kolcr 55, M aazor 42; magister 136-137; maior 45; M am mona 79;
Moses 147; Moyse Iordan 148; Nameguit 5 lj Nemeta, Nemete, Nemetensis civitas,
Nemetis, Nemetum, Nemidonc 160; Nomcbonum 5Jj orare, orario 62, 133; Paragore,
Pareiorios 46; Phoebus, Phyebe 50; phyla(c)terium 24; Popclina 54; praecincta orario
133; precaria 139; proseucha 63: publicanus 136; p u n g a2 l5 ; puteus (Judaeorum ), rabi,
rationale, rodale 137; Roesia 55; rotula, rotulo, rotulum, rotulus 137-138; s 45; sabbaia
27: sabbatizare 136; sabbatum 25, 27; Sadya 78; *sambata, sambuca 25; sc(h)ola 38*
125-127; scholasticum, scholasticus 124: Scholnyk 126: senex, senior 45; septimana
maior JjJ; Sigericus 2; Sloma Swyathly 50, 54, 127; Slottha 57j synagoga 63-64; syndicus
31: tapetum 40; Tauros, Theodorus. Theodotus 47; Thiderich, Tidericus 48; Tor(r)os
47: tropus 41j u 143; vandel. wandel 139; Zcakana 46j Zerach Sfl

5.88 Papiam entu: snoha LID

5.89 Portuguese: almacave, almocabar, almocave(r) 118, 130: cabanas 225; esnoga 63.
130, Flores 55j gcnesim 139; goim, goios 210; sinagoga 130. 225

5.810 Provencal: kal 226; Todrosi £2

5.811 Rum anian (and Meglaniie): Alexander 53; Bogdan 48; bordei 116: c4tun(a) 116:
ciufut 146; evreu 143; havra 206, 225; iidan. iidov 142; lapte de pasare 43; Neam{ 161;
odaie 145: ovrei 143: pijea 64; s£mb4ta 25; §andu 53; sipt&m&na branzei 19; (Sfeta)
Para 5ki(e)va 21

5.812 Spanish: alcaduz 39; anatem a 29; arcaduz, cadozo 39; ladron 210; malsin 209;
parasceve 21j Pascua del cuerno 136; Sancho 54; semana mayor 19; tdlamo 30, tapete 41

1L2 Slavic (Common and unspecified): -'4k, *4r 173: -i 187: «£yk 174; dunaj 92;
‫״‬d 1»xon» 177; e !70; ‫״‬ea 92; -ec, ■ek 173; *g61, 8 8 . 94t 100, 133. 180; H am an 205; -ica
171; ‫(־‬i)ec 174; -in 49; lodisin 146; ‫״‬jebati 89^ *ka 174; *kadb 37; -ko 147; *kolo
216-217; *kos• 95; *krfslo 177; kumin» 222; !J 180; ljudi 191; -nica 161; (*)•nik(*), *nyk
173-174, 186; 0- 217‫ ;״‬q 38; po- 186; ‫ ״‬pbrati 186; V 166, 176-179; rabin H 2; t I2 L
178; Skola 60, M9, 125, 127-128: stolec 92; V 97; ‫ ״‬vblna 93, 157; x 108, 166; -xno99:
‫״‬xr£n* 165; I 178; zakon 4, 46, ( ‫) ״‬zid(^) 60, 127, 142; •*ud* 142; t 38, b LZfl

5.91 Judeo-Slavic: *kd- 38; Skola 126-127. 171; *wnntjt, wwntjt 3

5 92 Kareo-Slavic: Arona syna loscfa, komentar, rabina LL2

5.93 West Slavic: h 180; Jahna 87; k 165: *nik 110; po- 186; r ’ 166; x 1£‫צ‬

5.931 Czech: -ak 173: bichor 201; bach(t)ur 202; *bamvlna 93; barm a 149; bataben
203; bavlna 93, 157; bflm o 157; beniamm(ek), benjamin 202; bi£ 167: Bluma 55; bochr
8 , 202, 209; boh 159; boinica, boinic£ 128-129; bfeh 177; bfitov 139; buh 159; C e m i
90; chabrus 206; eh fen 165: chytrik 173: cicit 202; cidakl 185; Crn4 2IL dalesak 173:
deb? 178; d id 163; dehet 156; dlouhy den 1_9, 3X! !2 , 119, 132; Dobru$(2) 90; Dunaj 92;
-e 209, ER 106; egele 216; g 224; Gabriel 110; gem(m)a 109; goles, golet 199; govr4k
214; haSile 149; holubicc 110; holy 168; houn£ 35; hfbitov. hrob 139; *jagoda, jahoda
157; jiin i 71^ jordan, jordeska 148; k 77^ 165: k id ’ 39; kaftan 141: kagal 224. 229; kaim
145: kakrle 149; kalendy 34; kde 38; keim 145; kmet, kmoira 38; kola? 164; kole£ko, kolo
216; konopi 157; k6 ‫־‬Ser [73! 227; koSerAk [73; kotel 144, kr4sn4 161; krehov 0 8 ;
kr£ma, kr£m4?(ka) 165. 169. 171; kfen 77, 165; kfeslo 177; kfivAk 173. 179; kfivy LZ3;
k fti 143: ku£a 135; kudel 144; kufe 190; Kvii(a), kv£t(na)/(ny), Kwicla 54-57; kyla 33;
 INDEX O F W O R D S , PH R A SES AND SOUNDS 281

L a b e , led 92; Lobkovice 208: loket 91_; lopata 157; m&jstr 137: M £ra 106: meches 207;
m e d 170: mezenec 174: Mikul43 47; milostnik 110: mifik 94; mistr 136; modla L12,
133-134: modlicf knfika 182: modlitebnic£, modlitevnic£ 120. 133: motyka 157;
m ram aro w l 106: m fieJe, m tfie 178; mle 95j m udrik 173; nebohy, nebo££k 159-160;
N efele 208. 210: obfezanc, obfezat 149, 192: odrich 147: okolo 217; oktfn 36-37. 95: pata
91: pejz 210: pefina 92; Pesachuv 76; pi£e 215; pijik, pijan 175; pijavice, pijavka 157;
pin k a 118. 215; Pinkas 77; piece 156; pokrytec 173; poledne 7Jj pomalu 186; potemn&la
35: povole 186; prfi£, pra£ka 187; *praga 87: pfednice 161; pfesnice 134: prym(ek) 138:
pta£f ml£ko 43; pulnoc 71_; *r' 166: f 133. 156, 161, 166, 170. 176-179; rachla 115;
RadeS, R&na 90; rebeka, Rebeka 145: Rehof 179: Reiniger 162; 54b 65; sab(b)at 66 ,
225: Sazava 90; sedtti live 121. 190; Sephyn 47; Ikola 119. 124-126: SkolnOc 126;
ik rav ad a, skrovada 38* 157; Sladki 90; sladki, Slatka 56; SUva 90; smetana 168; sobota
25. 119; sobot£1es 119; Jof 194: soudny den 132: § t’astny 54, 59; stolec 92; (s)tHp 178;
svatoduin( sv£tky 33; svatouiek 173; svaty duch 33; tchof 177: Todros 47; ttfbit, triebiti,
triebono 156, 162, 178-179; u b o iik 160: vinoc(e) 93; vefem f 7J^ Veseli 59; v(la LL1;
vlad af 104; V ltava 87^ x 77* 165; z pokolenj Beniamin 106: zikon 122: iid(ovka) 142,
171: ZIat(k)a, ZlatoA 57; znamenati 25

5.932 Judeo-W est Slavic: bjjlmw 157; bmwjln>93Jl 157, 184; bwljsljj, bwlj€ljw 96; c 119;
cxjf 178; cmgwv 180; djgt 156; dwkws 3l_, 35* 93* 96; (*)dwnJ(j)(j) 91-92: dwwr 178; g
180; garibosa* 178; gnd 96; *grebjsa> 178; gwn* 3 L 35* 92-93: jgwdj 157; knzdn 96;
k rz n 5 161; k*zj blwt 95* 119: Ibw, Iby, ljd 92; Iwd 91-92; lwpj* 157; Iwqj( 9 lj mcd 170;
m erq 34_, 94* 179; m rela? 178; m lqVmiqw (qrl pwISqj) 96; m w yqJ 157; 5np 5 24;
’dbznam enanisa 3 95; p(j)rjnws 92; pjwcj 157; plc> 156; pdjemnel3 35; prjdjg 161*162;
*prjm w i, prjmw; 87; pt* 9l_; ,qdwn 36-37: qlS 96. qnwpj 94* 157; qrwqjm 92_, 210:
q w j‫ ר‬wS 164; qwnqrj 36; rw n> 9 lj rwsqw/rwtqw 94-95: ^ r w v d J 38_, 95* 157;
5‫ ״‬sqvwrd 3 157; Sfwlcj 92* 95* 157; 5xn3 99; t(3 )rebono 93. 156, 162, 178-179; -wn 37;
5w nqijn, 3(w)qdwn, 3wqrj(n) 3J_, 36-37. 39-40. 93; 5wqwl 217; V qw rjn 36; wwldjmjr
178; zl(h 56-57

5.933 Kashubian (and Slovincian): bvoirtica 128: konopie 157; k«u?(k)a 148: suchan-
drys 147

5 934 Lower Sorbian: bog 159; hok 8in 37; koloda 34; k$£n 165; tok$ 9l_; mlihc 167: parch
161; pejtSa 167: pjeta 91; p$£dliea 161; swttki 33; 163; iyd 142

5.935 Polabian: Lib(, L4bu 92; p ’ota 21

5.936 Polish: a 213; a 133. 173: Adassina, Adassy 96; -ak 176; aleluja 192; andrus,
a n d m t, andrys, Angrez 147; -arz 176; bach(ur) 201; bachurek 202; baJabuch 120: ba-
tagula 1 j_7; bafracz 150; *bamwelna 93; ba! 65; bawetna 93^ 157; bech 201; beniaminek
174. 202: bes(z)emedre 5(z) 130; bielmo 157; bliskos£ 104; bocio 150; Boleslaw,
Bolezla(u)i, Bolezlawi 96; Boruchowie 144: boumwol 93; b'6 znica 128-129: bram a 21,
138; brzeg 177: bucher 202: burtczuk 116: bu£nico zydosko 129: c 97* 180: cebularz 148;
ccrkiew 129: chaja 145: chalat 140: C hanaan 5; chapal 155: (c)hawira 212; chawres,
chawryinik 175, 206, 218-219: chlodnica 119, 135: cho£ 155: chrzan 165; chyli£ 221:
chytrek, chytrzec 173; ciebie 97; cm entarz, cmyntarz 131-132. 177: cyces 202: cymes 41;
dab 173: debry, debrz 178; dcby 173; dintojra 228; d)ugi 173: dobry 184; dulniki 176;
Dunaj 92; dworzec (kolejowy) 179; dziad 163; e 170. 211, 213; e 213; e, e 173. 193; *ek
174; fajga 145; Fojbos 50; fryc 173: gamaik, gamaj 109; Glouna, Glowin(a), Glowisch.
Glown(i)a, Glownya 50, 54* 59, 127; G nezdna, Gniezno 96; goli£ 169; grzesc 178; gud•
iaj, G udyai, gudyaiek 144; gunia 35; h 96; (H )adonaj 200; hadzy 69: ham an, hamanowe
ucho 204-205; haracz 165; hawir(ka) 212; Ichudzicz 108; Isaak Glownia 127: (J)antek
144; ja(r)mulka 140; Jcdrus 147: lerzv 99: iesz!b6 t. jcszvbot 199; jczioro 158; jordes 148:
Juchno 99; juz 193; k 76; -ka 176; kabtaj 150. k^cza 134: kaftan 141: kahal 222, 229;
kaimie 145: Kalisz 96; kamaik, kameik 109; kamfora 216; kaparzyc 195; kapcan(iec)
282 IN DEX O F W O R D S , P H R A SES AND SOUNDS

210*211: kapelnik 176; kaperowac, kapyrowac 195; karaim 146; karczma(rz) 165. 169.
176; kasztan 29, 148: Kawiary, Kawiory 212; ka 2 ub 119: kferes 211; kierchof 139;
ki(e)rch 6 w 129. 139; kierkot, kicrkut 139; kila 33; kirkuc 129-130. 132, 139; kladowisko
132; klamczuch, k(l)apciuch 148; kla&c tfyfon 192, kolacz 164; koleda 34; komcntarz 1 12;
konopie 157; kopa£ 130: k o k i 6 i 129: kozub(alec), kozubalec, kozubalcs 95* 119. 139;
Krak 6 w 40; kropla 157; krzcslo 177: kucki 135: kucz(k)a, kuczki 134-135: kudlaj, kud-
Jeez 144: 1 98; 198* 180: Laksandr 53^ lapserdaczka, lapserdak 185; Latossek Scholnyk
127: laydak 176; leb 150: Leksa, Lcksand(c)r 53; litwak, litwyn 172: I6 d 92: lokszyny
155. 169: lopata 157; lubic 98; ludzi 191; tupic 98; machlojka, machlowac 185; m ^drala,
m^dry 173: majofis, majufes, majufis 78; m 4 ka 173: m aruda 174: marzyk 94; meches
207: mechidrys 147: mcczyf 169: mcdrck, mcdrzec 173; Mesco 96; mes(z)emedres(z)
130: Mieszko krol polski 96; miezin(n)y 174: mitoinik 110: mi6 d 170: mirzyk 94; mistrz
137; *mizinek, miziniec 174; mlynarz 176; mniszka 169; modlitewnik 182; mojej szaty
193: moralnoW mie£ — to ja mam 103; Moyses Fischel 127: mrzeza 178; Mykota 42;
nakryl sic talesem 192: niedowiarek 149; -nik 176; nudnik, n u dnoil, nudny, nudziarz,
nudzic 174-175: o 170. 213: o 173. 193: obtudnik 173: ochwcSnicy 176; odkup(i£) 104:
odpraviac kufki 117. 135: odprawiai boruchy 117: (O)femija 49; og 6 rek 168: okop(isko),
okopowisko 130. 132: Olecha, Olechno 53; pacierz 179: papek 173: parch 148. 161;
parszywiec 148: paskudny 173; pazornik 176; pejs(ach) 6 wka 76; perku 77; Pesachowicz,
Pessac 76; piccdziesi4 tnica 33. 134; piekarz 177; pienicdzy 193; Piesakowicz 76; pijawka
157; pipek 169: piece 156; podloga 169: pogan(in) 149; p 6 inoc, potudnie 7J_; pomahi 186;
porubnik 175; powinowity 104: powoli, powolny 186; pracz, pralnik 186*187; prawic
mszc 32; Prochownik 4; Przedb 6 rz 177: przednica 161; przekomy 179: Przemyil 82;
przodek 161; Pszcz6 tka 59; ptasie mleko 43; Pyeszakowicz 76; r 177; *r' 166: rabin 112:
rachla 145: racyjona), rodaly 137: rz 133. 156, 161, 166. 170. 177-179: r(i), Rzesz 6 w
177; s 95; sabat 66 ; sabatnik 75^ 218-219; s^dny dzien 132; Salomon Scholnyk 126-127;
Sandomiens 177: Schabdey de Rwssia 107: Sc(hk)olnik 126: senjor 45; serdak 183, 185;
skowroda 157, 169: skrzydlo 179: slamazam y 175; sobota 25; Sobota 75; sobotniki 218;
stolcy 92; SwUtki 33; swicto trabek 135-136: synagoga 28. syntemik 176; szabas 22;
s(z)abainik, szabas 6 wka 75, 218-219: szabasz 6 6 ; *szabas(z)nik 75, 218: szabatnik 218;
szabatura 6 6 ; szabes 218: szewc 176; szkota 124. 126. 130; szkolniki 126; szul 124: tch 6 rz
177: tr^bki 136; t re fn iak, trefny 173-174: trusnik 176; trzebif, trzebiciel 172■ 179;
trzewik 179; trzop 178; trzoslo 162; Tykocin 97; u 170: wandil 139; wiJa 110: wilowac
111; winszowac 29; wladarz. wtodarz 104; Wlodzimierz Wolynski 179; wodka 193: Wolf
Deutsch 127: wychrzcii, wychrzta, W ychrzta 149; wychylad 221; wykorzeniac 179:
wykup 123: x 76; xajder 225: xavor 212; ■y 210: zapalka 176; zb 6 r 134: zdrowie 193:
zwyciezyc 104: zyd 142; zydlaczenie 189: zydoskie pacierze 24. 120. 138

5 93‫ ־‬Slovak: bcniamfn, bocher, bucher 202: chren 165; kufka 135: Kveta 56; obrecu
192: okrin 37; omSa 95; pata 91; pifa 215; ptaic m llko 43; sv atu ik ir 173; uhorka 168:
iidovskej Skole 225: Zlatko S2

5.938 U pper Sorbian: bawtna 93; bii 164, 167; blinc 167: bohowy, boil 129: BudySin
8 6 : c’, I 176-177; ch rin 165: £rjop 178; frj 6 slo 162; Dunaj 92; dzfd 163; hranica, jucha
167; kola? 164; konopej 157; korfm a 165: krasna 161; kfeato 177; Lobjo 92; 16d 91-92;
lokd 9 !; lopata, motyka 157; N fm c, nim y 160: njeboh 159: pinca 215; pjata 91;
pjekar(ja) 177: plinc 167, pom alu, pow61ny 186; pra£ 187; r, f 176-177; r \ rj 177: S' 176;
Smul(o) 144: sobota 25; Sula 125: swjatki 33; tch 6 r 177: trjebi£ 162; iid 142; lidow ai,
iidowSfina 189: zidowska schula 125; iidzec 189

94 ‫ ר‬East Slavic: blcski 105: blin 167: -iik 174: g, h 180. 205; h3b 111: (j)axves 201;
katavasija 32; m ciu xeruvim i )89; mlin 167: nasovbeb 121; -nik 174: o 170. 180;
paskudny(j) 173; r(') 170; iabas 218: S ib il 67. 218-219; serdak 183, 185; Tam arkin 226

5.941 Belorussian: a- 217; abrazaniec 149; -ai 187; ad darohi iidovikaj 122;
(ad)Sabasavac’, adSabysyc' 218: Ajzak, Ajzik 220: akno, akon 217: aliluja 192: alubok
 INDEX O F W O R D S , PH R A SES AND SOUNDS 283

150; Anaiolij 59; andrus 147: (a)pranik 95* 187; a i 191; bah- 190; bahamaJcnne,
baham olje, bahamol(le), baham ol’nja 133: Bahdan(a), Bahdanovif 48; Bajramsuba, Baj*
ramsuw(owicz) 74; balabuSa, balabuxa 120; balagula, balahol, balahula 117; bavolna 93;
b ax ar, bax 6 r, b£xur{a)/(£yk)/(ok)/(stvo) 20I 219 ,202‫ ;־‬bainica 125. 128; bebaxi, b^bexi,
bebuxi 120: W xur 201; blistati 105: bljask 105: Bogdanowicz 48; bogomoliem 24* 133,
180. 190; boha 111: Bohdan(oviC) 48; bohomolennerm. 122. 133: bohomolje 133; borex,
borox 144: boroxi (otpravljac’) 117*118: (boroxoto)duna(i)c’ 118; b 6 rux 144: boruxi vad-
zic’ 117-118: bosiny 120; Broxa Jakubovi£ 78; budki 121, 135: bunfuk 116; byw 98* 180:
( 1 9 0 .188 £( ‫ ;־‬c’ 97* 180: fapcl’nik 188: carb 111; cebja, cjabe 97-98: cto 190; cybul(’)nik
148; cycel’ 142, 202: -£yk 145-146, 201; cymus 44; dabaryc’ 203; daroha 122; dibre
haiom in 47; dobry 184: dwuszapnik 148‫־‬. d i 190; dzjahejar 174-175; cfy 106; -el* 142;
*cstim, estyj 98*99; f 141: Faim 220; francuski akop 130: g 88 ; g 133. 190; gud(laj) 144;
h 88 ^ 100. 108. 133: halapiaty 150: halcluie 192: ham an 205; Hanus Bljum 55; hebraj,
hebr^j 143; hlina 216; HovaSa 79; I c ^ k o MoSeevi?, Icxaku 220; Iuda 146; Ixudo 108;
Iza(a)k 220: izraalfik, izrarlczyk, Izrail* 145; i 187; jankl 190; jaw r 6j 143; (j)axves 201;
jehudczyk 146; ju d ( 0 v)ka 144. 146; k 214. 221: kabal£ 225: kaftan 141; kahal(aXtn)/(ic’)
222, 229; kalaf 164; kapcany 210; kapcrus 196; kaptan 141: karaf, karnik 188; karfm a
169; karoSliwik 148; katarhi 112; katavasija 31_; k aiorht 112; Kavarljany, Kavaryki 212;
kJadaviska, kladbi§£a, klady 131-132; klapot(a), klopat 190; kola 217: kopac', kopiSfa,
kopiSie 130: kresla 177: ku£ki 135: kudlej 144; kumir 222; kuplju 104; L 1^ 98* 187; lap-
surduk 184; ljubic’ 98; ljudze, ljudzi 190; lokSyna 155; lupic’ 98; m 47j 78^ 221; mahila
211; m ahil’nyk 131; maJla 117; manaSka 169: M ara 106: M arduxovif 77; M aroju 106:
m aruda 174: matyka 157; me£ic* 67* 117: mefit 117: m ’ed, med 170; Merovaxu 78;
M ikita 47; mitasnik, mllaSniku, milosnik, milostnikb 110-111. 176; M isan(ovif) 47* 78;
mj a i i c 117 *67 ‫׳‬: mohilki, mohlicy 131.211: Mo(j)scj, MojzeS(a), MojzeSu 47j 220; molla
117; M ordux 77; mordva 148: MoSko MisanoviC 47; mu£yc’ 169: mu^yccl’ 176; muka
173: m ukar 176; mul(l)a 67* 117; munla 117; musulmanskij um m ci’ 132: n 47* 78* 221 ‫־‬.
naboroxotodun£(i)cca 118: naham i 190; N avaxt 79; navuka 80; nexryst’ 149; nibahac-
zak 148; nidawiarak 149; •nik 110. 176, 188: Nisana 47. 77: nohami, nohi, nohy
190-191, 215; Novaxa 79; o- 217: O l’xim 49; oreko 77; ozcra 158. 170: pacery 179:
padloha 169: padxvatnik 188 ; paludnie 71_; parszyuka 148: parx 148. 161; Piolka 54* 59;
pejsami 190; Pejsax, pejsaxi, pejsy Z1L peradok 161; Perku 77; Pesach 76; Pesafovifu
220; Pesax(ovi£u) 76; Pinkasovi£ 77; pitalniki 176; pjarednik 161; plejtux, pleszywy 148;
pljajtux 149; poSnik, postnik 176; pownaf 2Xi pra£, prajnik, pral’nik, pran(n)ik 187*188;
ptaSeCaho/ptaSetfa moloka. ptulynac malako 43-44: pulub’ic' 98; pupok 169: purim,
Purinn>-Amam», purym 204; Pysach 76; pytajuiy, raspytavaw 103: pytal’nik 176; r 177.
179: radasnik, radosnik 176; Ramazan 74; (raz)dabara, razdabary(cca)/(vac') 203; rizu
122: roxlja 145: Ruvim , Ruvinom ... Rubinovi£em 110: ryza 122; S 190; Sabas,
Saba§(ka) 66 j 218: SabaSovki 218: Sabat 66 ; Sabdaem 107: Sadk(o)/(u) 78; Salamon 111:
§amak{a)/(uK §am axa 77^ 214: Samuil, Sanja, SaSa 53; Saulb, Saulju, Savulja 220:
§a(x)nu 99; $£asnyj 54^ 59; sedzec‘ u bosinax 121: $emakov‫־‬b, Semjaka 214; senior* 45;
skaiace, skazite 190; Skola, Skol’nik 124-127. 225; Sloma 127; smyrka£kymi 218: Softim,
§oftimb 47; Somak 214: Sto 190; subon’a 75; subota 24; subotn(’)ik 75* 218: Sura 53;
svajaku 104: syn 111: SyroxodaSo 192: talmudka, talmudzic* 225: Talxamovi£, Tamx*
amovi£. Tam xanovida, Tamxonovi£, T anxam ovtfu, Tanxomovi£ 1.3* 47* 54, 59* 220:
tary-bary 203; tora 228; tres’ (trjasti) blox u vodu 122: u 100: uxvatnik 188: v 100: v*
217; -v- 79-80. 220: vakol 217: V en'jam in 202: Venjaminec 106; Vicebsk 97; vilic* 110:
Vitawt 97; vokal(a), voknaw, vokny 217: vozera 158, 170, 217; vuhal, vuhal’, vuhl6 ,
vuh61, vuhol1 217: vykaraniac' 179: vykrescic1, vykrest, vykscic', vykst(k)a 132. 149;
vykupc, vykupic* 104: w 180: x 108. 214. 221: xadiain, xadz’ain 62; Xaim(ovaja) 220:
xavira 212; xavrus’nik 206. 219; xewra 206; xitraf, xitr£c, xitroki, xitrun 172; i ’ 190;
zakon 122. 149; zakonnik 123: Zarax(ovif) 58; iidelb J42; iidka 146; iidovskaho
bohom olennja 133; (iidovskie) stojany/styjany 122; fidovskij narod, zirec 132: zyd 142;
zydouskoj szkoli 225: zydowski m ahil'nik L32

5.942 Judeo-East Slavic: b j‫״‬l 98* 180: bogomoliem 24; g 180: icJ 89. 221; lwbjS, lwbq3,
284 INDEX O F W O R D S, PH R A SES AND SOUNDS

lwpjS, Iwpq5 97; mcd 170: m qdi bj U 98-99: Sq^njq 126: ( 3)s(j*m 98-99: Sxn* 99;
Icb iy> 97-98: (itrsl 5 161; wjjwld, wj^wl! 97* 180: wwj!cpsq *£2

5.943 Judeo-East Slavic calquc language: ad*, ad(ov)nik* 111: apttku 102: ba 111;
bahata 106: bavelbskij 107: beltvcrb, behyiacrb 111; betlehema 108: bili...bitbem 1
m etovynn 105; bin 1>jamina 106, 202; blisk 105; boaz* 107; fem osik, fem yj, dai mi us-
lySati, dali emu £zditi, dastb emu m od 104; ehipetskaja 106: elihou s n t baraxbei
111-112; eru$alaimb 106; farect 107: funik* 112: habriel‫־‬b, havrili. 110; hdb 111;
holubice 109*110: horbkoju 106: hr£x‫־‬b zhr£5il 105; i xan»kas£, i xilben 107; ijuda 108:
jakova 107-108; jarusolim a 106-107: kaftan 141; katerhi 112: khim* 109: m£sto vaStii
105: m eii mnoju 1 m eii toboju 104: micraim 106; milostnikb 109*111; miSaelt, misaila
107: m oltati zmoltilb 103: naami 107; naxSon* 108: •nik* 111: nixto 106; nofb, no$(b
102; ogorfilb Sadai mn£ velmi, okupenbe, okupitelb, okupi(ti) 104; onoe ditc 103: ot
binbjamina 106; oulinil e£ crceju 104: oudobrtlo 105: oved*, perecovy 107: pocelovala
ix 105; polomja boiic 100; pov£da povtdano 103: pofive 108; raby 105; rahelb 108;
rob*, rozvclifilsja 105: Sabat, Sadai 106: Saltmona 111: saxareta 106. 108; skoti, sm£rou
106: solomonovy 111; ta$ molodica 103: tam arb 108. 226; veliioval 105: vila 109-110;
vladarb 104. 109. I l l : vlodfrevb, volod£lb, voloditelb 104: vrjad* 122: v*sxorobr$tb 105;
xe£bon£ 107: xuru 108: zlato, zoloto 102; zvitjaiit 104

5.944 Russian: A. X. Sabad, Abram Samuilovif Sabad 112: Adanaj/Adonaj gospodb

201, Agasferus, Agron 108; Alek(o), Aleksan(dr), Alik, Alja 53; andrus* 147: Arona
OsipoviCa I l_2j axves(’), axvesat’sja, axvesnik 149, 201; bagram t, bajram(b) 75; ba$ 65;
b£xur 201; bebuxi 120; begemoi 106, 210: betula 111; blisku 105; bog(a) 189-190;
bogomol’e, bogomoliem 133. 190; boinica, Boinifyj dozor 129; brie 150: brityj, Brityj•
Byfkov-Galax 228; btula 111: £abus (iidovskij) 67-68. 188; cerkov’ 129: Cto 190; dabarit*
203; degtjarnik 174: dolgij 173: Dolgonos 148: efusi*, ‫״‬efurw 121-122: efy 106; epomidb
121: ermolka 140; evrej 142*143; evrejskaja molel’nja 134: (e)xibarka 212; Febus 50; fes
201; finik, funik 1 12, g 108, 190, 224: galman 150: gaman 205; Gavril(o) 1 10; ghery
70: Gitlcr, glagol 224; gun(j)a 36^ (i)05iba 198: iz kol£na Veniaminova 106: (j)axves, jax-
vesu fin a l’sja 201; (j)efud‫־‬b, (j)epomida 121: kaber, kabor, kabur(it,)/(ka)/(5?ik) 212;
Kacarev 72; kad', kadka 39; kagal(a) 222, 229; kapara, kaparufi 195; kapcan 210;
karabfa, karaW un 149; Katavasbcvv, katavasija, Katavasbiny, katavasnik 31-33:
Kazarin(ov) 72; kladbiSfe 132; kvmctb 38; kobura 212; kolefko 216: kommentarij 112:
kopilka 215; kopiS£c 130: kostel 129: kreslo 177; krestcy 123: kufki 135: kumir 222;
ku&epotfenic, kuSCi 135: lac 150: ladanki 138: lapsardak 184: litera, litoreja 24] ljudej,
ljudi J90* 191; M aroju 106: mi tarn box xvalili 189: milostnik 1 10: mogil'nik 132: Mojsej
147: molel’nja 120: molenna 133: molitvennaja Skola. molitvennyj dom 120: m onastyr’
37: M orda 148: m ram om yj 106; mukarb 176; na SibaSix 66 ; najezdnik 174; naple£nica,
naplcfnikt, naramnica, naram nikv nasovbtb. nasovecb 121 : nauka 80; navodfrk*,
navodnikb 174: nefet*. nefed’ 149; Nikita 47: o b ‫״׳‬ezdfik 174: ofenja 201; ofenskij ja 2 yk
61: okolo 217: okop 130: Oleko 53; oxves’, oxvis 201; ParaSa, ParaSin, Paraskcva(‫־‬
Pnjanica) 20, 22., 74; pejsaxovka 76: pekar’ 177; perednik 161; Perka 77; pit1, piterik,
pjat* 22; pjatidcsjatnica 33; pletnik 175; poii’ 164; poSel zemlja paxat* 190; pral’nik 186,
188: Praskoveja, Praskov’ja 20; predok 161; Proskov'ja 22; p tif’e moloko 43; r ’ 177;
(ras)tabary(vat’) 203; raw in 112; razdabar(yXva t’), razdobarivat’ 203; ritor 24; Rossija
8 8 . roxlja, ryxlyj 145: SabaS £7; SabaS, SabaSevat‘, SabaSit’, SabaSka, SabaSnik, Saba&ovat*
66-67, 218: Sadko 78; Sadok 206; samax 214; Samuil 53. 1 12; samvikb 25; Sandyrb,
Sanja, Sa5a 53; satan£ 22; saw ata 27^ 218; Saxny 53; Semjaka 214; scrafim 210:
sinagoga 28; skaiite 190; skcs 149; Skola (*idovskaja) 125: sledovatel’ 214: Smirnik 175;
Smu)1 144: somax 214: stojan’e 122: sub(b)ota 24; Subbotnik(i) 70; sudnyj den’ 132:
Sura 53; Svjatki, syjatok 33; syrnaja (nedelja) 19: tajnopis* 204; talm ata 225: Tam ara,
Tam arin 226; tarabar(!(’), larabarskaja graniota, tarabarskoc nare^ie, tarabary,
I’arabora, taraborit’, T arabrin 203*204; tartar 150; ta ry b ary , tarv(*)bary*
(rastabar\‫)׳‬/(razdabary), tar> da bary 203; tcrebiti 163; troicyn den’ 33; txor* 177: uksus
37; (v)andrus 147; vclikden' 19; vila 110: Vjatify 3; Vladimir 179; vtoroj zakon 122;
vykrest 149; xalat 140: Xarxas 107: xavera, xavira, xavyrka, x!bar(k)a, xiburka 212;
 IN D E X O F W O R D S , PH R ASES A N D SOUNDS 285

x! 6 poty 190; xovat*, xovira, xovyra 212; xoxma^ 172; xozjain 67j xves’ 201; zakon(‫)*־‬
(M oiseev*) 122; iid(ovin), Zidovin 142-143; Zidovskie krestcy 32j 123; Zlata 57;
iy d a v 'm (k t), iyt 142

5 .9 4 5 Ukrainian: Adana, Adonai 200: adonaj 194; aj vej 192. 195; allyluia, alyluja 192;
- ,a r 171: Avraamly 192; avraham 191; Avram 191-192; avrum 191; balabux(a) 120:
b alag u la 117: b ixor, bdxur 201-202; bebexy 120; bes, bcS £ad* 218; biber 149; blynee‫׳‬
167: blysk 105; bobj 6 r 149; bodjak 174; Bohdan 48; bohomilje 133: bohomillja 24, 120.
133: bohornil'nycja 133: bohomol*ja 128; boroxy spravljaty/vidmovljaty/vidpravljaty
117. 132: bosini, bosyny (spravljaiy) 120-121, 132, 194; bofc zyvvj 193; boinye’i,
b oin y eja, boinye’y 128-129: budjak 174; burdcj. burdij 116; £eres!o 162; Cernihiv 180:
djufutka 146; cvyntar 131; cybuch, cybul'ai 148: -£yk 174: darna nedilja, dam yj, dam yk
121: debra 178; did 163; dojeru iolaim 189; dobryj 184: dom bofcij 128; dovhonosyk 148:
dvircc* 179: dzyndzykaty 189: -cc 5 174; Fenna 49; filakterija 24^ 138: finik* 112; gojas
193. 210: gudlaj, gud(z) 144; h 180; h£m&n(a) 194, 204-205; hamanove vaxo 205;
H am an ('u k ), hamanuvaty 205; hebreos 143: (holosnie) (rubky 135, 194: horilka 193;
hreb aty , hrib, hrobky. hrobovylfe, hrobu 131; i 127: icik, icyk 144: Isaj(a) 99; iudej 143;
!van 44; (j)andrus 147; iantek 144; iarmulka. !armurka 140; Jem saJym u 189; ievrej 141;
juSka 168: iu i 193: kad* 39; kahil(ytysja) 222; kalaf 164; kapar(a), kapam ja, kapamyc•
ja , kapam yj, kapam vk, kaparstvo, kaparyty 195; kapcan(ity) 210: kapora 196: karajim
146; kladovy§£e, kladovys’ko, klasty 131; k6 bur(a) 212; kola£ 164; komcntar(ij) 112:
kon 6 pli 157; kopaty 130; kortm a 169; koicmyj 227; kozar(ljuha) 142; K ravfenko, Krav-
civ, K ravluk, K ravlyk, Kravec* 176; krislo 177; (K)sander, (K)sandra 53; kufki,
ku'fky 135. 194; kudlaj 144; kumyr 222; kureni 121. 135; kurij, kurin’ 121; kyla 33;
ladanky 138: lapserdak 184: fejbyk 185; ljubyty 98j Lu?'bsk(u) 218: lupyty 98; lytvyn
172: m arfyk 23; Maxno 99; meho Saty 193; mizynfyk, mizynec* 174: mizynnyj d e n20 ‫;״‬
m izynnyk, mizynok 174: mlyn(ec') 167: mohyla, mohylky 131: molytva, molytvennyk
182; molytysja 131-132; monaxynja 169; MoSejja 220; Moiko 147. 193; mu£y!y 169;
m udrak, mudrec* 173: Musij 147: Mykyta 47j mylostynnyk 110; myzyn£yk, myzynec'
174: nadan, nadivaty 191; nahrudnyk 121: nakladaty 191; neboh(a) 159: nelehal’nyj
ak u ier 174; nexryst 149; nudnyj, nud(')ota, nudyty 175; -nyk 171-174; o 127; ob’jiznyk
174; obludnyk 173; obvynuva£ 176; -ok 174; okip 130: okno 217: okopy&e, okopys'ko
130-132: O lel’ko, (O)les', O les’ko 53; ozero 138 . 170. 217; Paranja, Paraska,
Paraskev(i)a 20; parx 148, 161; paskudnyeja, paskudnyj, paskudnyk 172: pazornik 176;
pejsaf 172, 184, 186; penendzy 193; pcredok 161; Pcsak 76; pesax(a) 194, 220: pivni?
71: plamy eja 100; poljak 172: poruinik, postnyk 176; powden’ 7Jj pra£, pral’nyk,
pranyk 186-187; pravdu 189; pravyty 32; ptaSa£e/pta5yne/pty£e moloko 43; pyska£,
pysok 172; 179 ( ’ ) ‫ ;־ו‬rabyn 112, 194; rachla 145; rav(vj) 194; raxili, Raxil’ 191; r£znik*
122. 173; RijaSiv 177; riznyk 122: rosxevdys 193: rozdobarjuvaty 203; ruchla 145: Ryhir
179: sabas 193; sib a5 67, 2!8; 3‫־‬abaS(ivka) 218-219; SabaSka) 66 , 218; SabaSnyk 218;
Sab££yty 67; Sabat 6 6 ; sibatka 218; Sabatura 66 j 219; Saj(a) 99; Salamejka, Salamok
122. 140:~§andor. Sandro 53; sardak 185; sayvaton 218; iaxruvaty 118. 181; Scnderuk
53; serdak 140, 185; 5ibeny£nyk 175; Skljar, Skljarfuk, Skljarenko, Skliamyj,
Sidjars’kyj 176; Skil’nyj, ikil’nyk, Skil'nyk, ikola, Skoljar, Skol’nyj, Skol’nyk, Skolyk
124. 127. 171: skovoroda 157, 169; sl’am azamyk 175; 51’omcj 127: slovak 172: Smoljar,
Sm oljarfuk, Smoljars’kyj 176; subota 24; sukaes, SukaeS’ 193; syndyr 52; tarabars’ka
hram ota, tarabars’kyj 203-204; terebij 172; terebyty 163; teymeVt’iv, te^m en'uv 118:
til’ko pravda skazaty 189; traf(nyj), tref 76; trijeja 33; txir 177; uslySi mi 104; v 180:
Veksuk 149; Velyk d en ’ 20; vesna, veSnjak 218: vidna nedilja 121; vira, Virsta 149;
vladan* 104; vokopysko 130: Volodymyr Volyns’kyj 179: vudky 193; vyxryst(ka) 149; x
144; xaj(der) 225: xalat 140; xam (’)ko 220; xamony 205; xapaty 155: xavira 212; xejla
144; xo£(a), xotja(j) 155; xovaty 212; xvylcnna strilka 174; xyl’(ka), xyl’uvs’kyj, xylyty
144. 221; xyrljak, xytrun, xytryk 172: -y5£e, -ysC)ko 132; zdorov'ja, zdrove 193; ze my
192: zeJeni svjata 33; Zlata 57; znacJ(’) 193: iyd 142*143; iydivs'ka Skola 126, 134, 225;
iydfvs’ke bohomillja 133; iydivs'ki boruxy 117; iydivs’kyj ham an 204; £ydjuha, iydjuk,
iydok, iydyk 143
286 IN D E X O F W O R D S , P H R ASES A N D SOUNDS

5.95 South Slavic: Skola 125

5-931 Bulgarian: andre 147; cari(-)baSijat £engene, £eri-ba$ija, Cifutin, £ingene 146;
cvet, Cveta 56; dalboka d^brava 113: •dii 175; dfidavec, elini 142; cvrein 143: cvrcjfce
149; gun(j)a 36; guSt 149; iaxo, iaxu 146; karabaiaf 149; kdSta 135: kola? 164; kralica
171; kradmja 165; kr3 vaf 148; kum ir 222; nuii£ka 148; o 207; papePaSka, pepel’aSka 23;
petak, Petka 21*22; pralnja 186; pti£e mleko 43; remen 148; sakadii 175; Sand£,
San(dX') 6 , S indre, Sane, Sin(k)o 53; sabota 24; sim a nedelja 19; u 207; Voden 89;
voz(a), *vozar' 113; xavra 206, 225; iid(ovec) 142; Zlat(an), Zlata(na), Zlatil, Ztatin 57;
iu t 146

5.952 Church Slavic (includes all recensions): adovbn* 111 ; alleluia 192; Aman* 205;
Ambakum* 26; behelmoth* 106; bliinem u 104; bogomolije 128: Celovek* nikii 106;
dom* boiii 128: donvb molitvbnyi 120; duks*, dux* 35; ebrSjbsk* 199; Esbonfc 107;
Esrom 47; cvr£jbsk* 199; Famarb 226; filaktirija 24; Gavriil 110; het* 108; hospodb 111;
hrexom* sohreSil 105: hsdb 111; i byl* vesel* 105: ijudejbsk* 146; istr£biti 163; jakovy
ehda masti kipctb 102: (j)evr£i 143: k1»motra 38; k^Sti 135: kreposti 104: ku£epor*ienie
135: kumir* 222; kuplju 104; kuS£i, ku5£noc porbWnie, kuiinyj prazdnik* 135: mene
rozJufitb oi tebe 104; m isto Vastii 105: milyi moi 110; Misail* 107: miadosti, moci 104;
mramorovym* 106; napolni me hs3b velbmi horkostemi 104; Napraznik kulinyj 135:
Napraznik trub* 136; Natan*, NaOan* 25; Noema 107: o povySenii 105: otplcmenc
Emijna 106; paraskev’gi, paraskevgii, paraskevgija 20; pctbdesctnice 134; pinakida 215;
pjatikostii 33; pocalovala jest € 105: povedeli sutb mn£ 103: pralnik* 186; prazdnik
ku&nogo pot*££nija, prazdnik* trub*, Praznik* kuifnyi 135: (prazbnik*) opr£sn*k*,
praznik opresno£nyi 134; privoznesesc 105, racional* 137; Saul 220; s(*)bor*, s*boriS(e,
s1»nbm*, s*nbmiSte, sobor 134; sobota, sobota 25; sobranic, so(n)(*)mi3£e 134; sotona
22; svjato opresnofnoe 134; Oamar* 226; tr£ba, tr£biS(e, tr£biti, tr€bbmk* 163; tri mcry
106; ty ... budeS mol^ati 103: Vavilon* 107: vladeetb, vladetelb, vlad£ti 104; Xarxas,
Xelion 107; xram gospodenb 128; z velikoju praceju vyostreno budetb 105; zakonbnik*
123: zbor*k* 24, 134; 2id(ov)(in) 142; zlato (kefaz*) 109; zobranje 134

5.953 Judeo*South Slavic: gwbwg3 djbrwv5, wwz’r 113; zl(h 56-57

5.954 M acedonian: A ltan a, A ltanov 57; an d re(a) 147; cikus 149; d fu t 146; •ec 147; elini
142; evrein 143; fid iu 147; ju d a 146; k a tu n 116; o daja 145; okolu 217; sabota, sam ba,
s^m buta 24*25; ventevec 147; visok 142, 148; vo zar 113; Zlatka 52

5.955 Serbo-Croatian: btf 164; bogomolja, bogdmolje 129. 133; Cifut, £ifut(h)«ma,
Cifutin, Civa, fivutariti. £ivut(h)ana, Civutin 134, 142, 146; davorija, davdri(ti) 204;
ddva 62; diifut(in) 142; guboka 113: gflnj 36; (h)adii(ja) 69; hane 146; (h)Svra 206;
Jtv rejin 142-143; jevrejska bogomolja 134; kada 39; k&tun 116: krfi 143; kubur, kubura
212; ku&i 135; kQmlr 222; Leko 53; Nemci 161; o 207; odaja 145; okolo 217, Paracevija,
paraskavija, Paraskeva, Paraskev(ij)a 20-21; pti£(i)je ml(ij)eko 43; sSjmiSte (jfcvrejsko)
134; 5im a nedelja 19; Skevija 21; skupSiina 134; StiUa 92; subota, Subotica 2 4 2 5 ‫ ;־‬u 207;
velika nedelja 19; vdzar 113; zb 6 rnica 134; 2Td, fclov(in) 142; zlata, Zlata 52

5.956 Slovenian: binkoSli 34; ko£a 135; kr5k 92; rah^t, rahla 145; sobota 25; ild 142

fL Sino-Tibetan
6.1 Judeo-Chinese: If-b^i-si 63
ISBN 90 0♦ 07656 5