yiddish

  1. Anne Frank

    Yiddish: bubbala

    Hi there! It not that the forum is perfect for the question, but I didn't know where else one could ask about it. The thing is that when you google it, you get to know that the Yiddish word bubbala is used by Yiddish-speaking grandmothers to address their granddaughters. But in the book The...
  2. H

    All is not butter that comes from the cow.

    I watch the film "The Offering" (2022) It's about the Jewish community, in one scene two guys talk about one of their son who returns home after leaving for an ages. A: Don't you think it's quite strange that he shows up after all this time? B: My son want to start again A: I know he's your...
  3. H

    Yiddish: machor [macher]

    I watch the film "The Offering" (2022) It's about Jewish family who encounters a spirit. In one scene the family sits together. The father said to his son that "Such a home. My son, the real estate machor" What is machor means? the subtitles editor adds that it means "giant" I guess it's...
  4. MonsieurGonzalito

    Yiddish: גײ אַװעק [Geweg / Gey avek]

    Friends, In a 1997 USA movie called "The Beautician and the Beast", a NYC woman of Jewish background (interpreted by Fran Drescher) is hired as a teacher to a very small and remote Eastern European country. At some point, she is dismissing from her room the son of her employer (who just had...
  5. zzjing

    Yiddish: grubba

    The following is from Joseph Heller's Good as Gold: "How is Lieberman these days?” “Still a grubba, still a zshlub.” What is a "grubba" exactly?
  6. סייבר־שד

    Yiddish: "What are you doing?"

    As in "What are you (sing.) doing this week?". Would it be correct to say " װאָס טוסטו די װאָך?"?
  7. C

    Yiddish: Thank you for having faith in me and helping me

    Does anyone know how to say "Thank you for having faith in me and helping me" in Yiddish? Toda
  8. סייבר־שד

    Yiddish: Gender discrepancies

    Hi, I recently noticed that some Yiddish words appear to have a different gender depending on which dictionary I look them up in. I'm currently using two dictionaries, Weinreich's and Shapiro's. Two examples of what I mentioned above are the words בעט and פֿײַער ("bed" and "fire"), with the...
  9. B

    Yiddish: heyn

    The second line of the refrain in 'Bei mir bis tu scheyn' reads 'bei mir has tu heyn'. The closest etymology I can (maybe?) find is 'chen', indicating 'grace' in Hebrew (?) Any other possibilities? Am I missing an obvious German equivalent?
  10. K

    Yiddish: Enola Gay

    Hi. I came across an old book supposedly be written by a Jewish author, Mordecai Mose. The book is categorized as the Jewish conspiracy book, and it's said that the actual author is the Japanese translator and there is no such person as "Mordecai Mose". There is no original version of the...
  11. S

    Yiddish: Löw, Lœw (surname)

    Hi, how do you write Löw / Lœw in Yiddish? Or better: does anyone know how was it usually written in registers in 19-th century? Thanks a lot!
  12. C

    Yiddish: shtendik

    Hello Do you guys happen to know the etymology of "shtendik" ("always")? I wonder if German has any word that may look like this. Thank you
  13. Inquisitive_Inquisitor

    Yiddish: Oishe geveine lech

    Hello there! I am reading a book with some phrases in Yiddish (I hope I'm not too wrong) which are transcribed in English. The first one is "Oishe geveine lech". Could anyone help me guess what it might mean? The book is Jan Eliasberg's Hanna's War.
  14. B

    Yiddish: a gezunt dir in pupik

    Hi, mentors, Thank you for reading my thread! I came across this sentence in a book that I am translating and I really tried to find what this sentence would mean, but I couldn't. In the book, it implied that this is from Yiddish, but I don't think this is Yiddish.(May be German?) The full...
  15. JuriTerreni

    Yiddish: halten kreykitz

    From tv series<The Deuce>, Harvey - This business is set to make three hundred million dollars in retail next year, I want a taste. Candy - Okay, so why don't you lower the prices for the convention? Harvey - No profit, we make it up in volume. Candy - Hey, halten kreykitz already. Harvey -...
  16. T

    Yiddish: דאַנאַ

    In a folk-singing group this morning, people were wondering about the meaning of the repeated word/sound "dona dona" in the song, Dona Dona--sometimes rendered Donna Donna, but originally transliterated Dana Dana. The sound in question is rendered דאַנאַ in Yiddish. The song was originally in...
  17. H

    Yiddish: Unknown text

    Heavy-duty Yiddish/German talent required! The attached photograph is from a beautifully crafted bible that was given, in 1845, as a wedding present to a young couple in Vöhl, Germany and was later rescued from the garbage on the day after Kristallnacht. This bible was given to my mother in...
  18. G

    Yiddish: Unknown text

    I am enquiring on behalf of a friend who came across an old family photo with a handwritten Yiddish script inscription on the back. Some of the lettering is stained and unclear and many of the letters are hard to identify. I have tried working out words letter by letter but have not been able to...
  19. Cerros de Úbeda

    Yiddish: schtunk

    Hi, In Sergio Leone's film 'Once Upon a Time in America' there's this term used, 'Schtunk'. It is to be supposed to be a yiddish term, I gather. The film is about a band of gangsters in New York City, in the context of Jewish neighbourhood youths/criminals during prohibition. They use the term...
  20. C

    Yiddish: Warf die katz wie du willst bleibt si als steyn auf di fis

    Please help me with the correct notation (in the Jewish script) of two Yiddish proverbs I heard from my grandmother when I was a kid. I never learned to read or write Yiddish or Hebrew, but my grandparents spoke Yiddish, so I can remember some words and phrases. Among them, there are two...
  21. C

    Yiddish: Di katz hot lieb fish ober zi wil nit di fis aynetzn

    Please help me with the correct notation (in the Jewish script) of two Yiddish proverbs I heard from my grandmother when I was a kid. I never learned to read or write Yiddish or Hebrew, but my grandparents spoke Yiddish, so I can remember some words and phrases. Among them, there are two...
  22. B

    Yiddish: באשערט

    Does anyone know what that means in Hebrew? I took it from a youtube video using screen capture. I've looked at a bunch of different alphabets but none of the letters seem to match these symbol for symbol. Moderator note: This thread has been moved from the Hebrew forum, since the word is...
  23. aefrizzo

    Yiddish(?): Bardash

    Hello people. I am reading "La famiglia Karnowski" (I.J.Singer, Di Mischpohe Karnowski, 1943) directly translated into Italian from Yiddish (2013). In the first pages of chapter 8 we meet a minor character, a young Jew, sort of wanderer student with Russian roots, extensive wandering all around...
  24. S

    Yiddish: אָ

    Why is אָ pronounced [oː] here? In the video below: Yiddish Alphabet Video | Yiddish Book Center At least, that's what I hear... I can't find a rigorous source that says אָ is pronounced [oː] by either the Litvaks or the Poylisher Chassidim...
  25. S

    Yiddish (Ukrainish): Pronunciation of יי

    Sources disagree about whether יי is pronounced [ej] or [aj] in "Ukrainish" (Southeastern) Yiddish, but no source I checked says that both pronunciations are used (in SEY that is). Note that I'm only talking about יי, not ייַ.
  26. L

    Yiddish: פאלשׁטענדיגע אויסנאבּע

    Hi, So I am attempting to cite a Yiddish poem found in a Yiddish book that was scanned and put online in a database. I've decided to include the original Yiddish (in Hebrew characters) and a translation of the title, publisher, etc. Here is the title: עדעלשטאט'ס פאלקס-געדיכטע. נייע...
  27. S

    Yiddish: אָ ,ע pronunciation

    אָ as [o] in an open syllable and [ɔ] in a closed syllable but ע as [ɛ] consistently? From the alef-beys video here: Yiddish Alphabet Video | Yiddish Book Center Am I hearing that right? If so, is it a mixture of Western and Eastern traditions? If not, is it Western or Eastern, and how come...
  28. airelibre

    Yiddish: Meesa Meschina

    Hi there. In the recently released film The Limehouse Golem there is a part where the actress is tricked into saying what she believes to be "enjoy the show" to a Victorian London audience consisting mainly of Jews. It apparently means "die quickly" (or "die soon", can't quite remember). I'd...
  29. N

    Yiddish abbreviations: K"H

    Good day, On the "Special Thanks" page of a book, the author lists the name of his wife and children, mentioning their names one by one, then the last of his children's name is followed by these two letters written this way: (K"H). I posted the question on the English Only forum and was...
  30. R

    Yiddish: menufelshe

    Hello everybody, This is a question in yiddish, so that I hope I am in the right Forum. I remember that my parents used this word to describe a bad looking girl/woman. One theory is that the word comes from the hebrew מנובל (with a distorted meaning). Can you please confirm? Thanks in advance
  31. Gruszenka

    Yiddish: reading ו as י

    According to one native speaker from New York 'where are you from' is 'fin vi bisti', 'and' is 'in' and so on. Is this how people speak today? Would 'fun vu bistu' be obsolete?
  32. V

    Yiddish: שיידן

    Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet Some symbols/letters might not be written accurately. I tried to look at a Yiddish alphabet reference, and couldn't identify some of them.
  33. Matthew Chriswood

    Yiddish Dialects

    Sholem! My question is on Yiddish dialects. The thing is that I'm very interested in learning Yiddish but it seems like there are multiple - very different - dialects. The study material I've used so has, for instance, claimed that there are three definite articles (that might change depending...
  34. S

    Modern Hebrew/Yiddish/Arabic: Pronunciation of /a/, /aː/, /i/, /iː/

    Can anyone who is well-versed in Modern Hebrew, Yiddish, and Arabic explain to me how to pronounce the a-type and i-type vowels in each? Whether they're "ih" and "uh", "ee" and "ah", or some other combination?
  35. C

    Yiddish: af der bine gezungen

    Hello, Is there anybody who could tell me about Yiddish? I want to use the words in bold in the Yiddish sentence (1) to make a sentence that corresponds to the English sentence (2). (1) Maks hot af der bine gezungen. (Max sang on the stage.) (2) The song sung on the stage (by Max) is my...
  36. Drink

    Yiddish: אָן אַ שיר (on a shir)

    What does the Yiddish expression אָן אַ שיר (on a shir) mean? I have seen it used in a few songs to as an intensifier for love and other things and I imagine it has to mean something more than the literal "without a song". Examples: מײַן האַרץ טוט מיר וויי גאָר אָן אַ שיר (mayn harts tut mir...
  37. Francioski

    Yiddish: we will live forever

    I'd like to know if " מיר וועלן לעבן אויף אייביק " is grammatically correct and if not what should be the correct form. It should mean "we will live forever" but unfortunately I'm not so sure. Can anyone help me, please?
  38. E

    Yiddish: B'SHEVER

    Hi. :) I've been listening to a song by a group called 'THE CHEVRA', called 'CHAI'. I know what that means... but there's a Hebrew word in there when singing a certain verse to HaShem in English, & I'd like to know what that word means. The verse goes... Oh, High & Mighty... forever...
  39. Tamar

    Yiddish: אויסגירכנט הייטע

    Hi everyone, I'm reading S.Y Agnon and ran into this - אויסגירכנט הייטע. It's from his story פנים אחרות. "עכשיו רואה אותי טוני בניוולי. הרהר בלבו, אויסגירכנט הייטע, דווקא היום ריגן בין שפתיו" Does anyone know what that means?
  40. F

    Yiddish: lyrics in sheet music

    I am using music software to format a version of the song טום־באַלאַלײַקע for a balalaika club. I need to put in the lyrics to help me keep track of where I am in the song, but I would like to do it in some sort of universal way. Is there a standard way for putting Yiddish lyrics into sheet...
  41. Pajapatak

    Yiddish: plotke

    Hi everybody! I am translating a book from French and there are some words in hebrew in it, as the family of tha main character is Jewish. I am not sure if that is also the case with the word "plotke", and therefore I'm asking you to help me. Is it hebrew? Or Yiddish? According to the context...
  42. W

    Yiddish: נחת

    Hey everyone, So I was listening to this video (<<link removed by moderator>>) and he said that there is a yiddish word for when you deeply care for someone that their success feels like your success. He said it was "naa khiss"...Anyone know the etymology as well as how to properly say/write...
  43. D

    Yiddish: איר גייז שמעק

    Hello, My friend does not speak Hebrew but when he went to Google Translate he put in some unknown text, translated it and then said this to me: "איר גייז שמעק". I have no idea what this means, but when I went to Google Translate and went from Hebrew to English, it said "Air GAY Ongoing" and...
  44. M

    Yiddish: testimonial literature

    Hi all, I'm doing something about "testimonial literature" (literatura testimonial, Zeugnisliteratur), notably the literature written by eyewitnesses or survivors of terrible events like the Nazi camps or Gulag camps. I'm trying to do a little artwork with the term in different languages...
  45. L

    Yiddish: Meine Yidishe Mit beerger fun der Shtot New York

    Hi all, I am working on a stage play about Mayor LaGuardia, and there is a short Yiddish passage in the text that I think was written phonetically, only to be pronounced. We think the rough translation is as follows: "My Yiddish friends from the state of New York, your support for Fiorello...
  46. S

    Yiddish: matzoh-punim

    Hi there, Am reading The Three Weissmanns of Westport by Cathleen Schine. One passage is about Joseph and Betty meeting a mediator (as they are getting a divorce). Here it is, "The mediator did not smile. But she did hold out her hand and introduce herself. Her name was Nina Britsky. A...
  47. B

    Yiddish: Different kinds of Yiddish?

  48. B

    Yiddish: Different kinds of Yiddish?

    Shalom to everyone, First of all, excuse me if probably my question is odd. I've been talking to Sefardis from different places in Europe and Asia and they have a common Spanish tongue sprinkled with local words from the lands where they live (or lived) and it's rather the same old Castilian...
  49. F

    Yiddish: אַ שטיין/פֿאַרשטיין קען וואַקסן

    Yes, this is from the song טום־באַלאַלײַקע. I have two questions: 1. What does it mean? (The stones in caves grow only with water, so what kind of shteyn is meant?) 2. Would פֿאַרשטיין make sense here, or would it need to be something like פֿאַרשטענדעניש?
  50. P

    Yiddish: Oy Gevalt, Buhbie, Bubeleh

    Hi everybody! I wonder if the expressions "OY Gevalt!", "Buhbie" and "Bubeleh" are in use among Italian Jews too. I checked their meaning on Urban Dictionary, so I just need to know if they are used in Italy too and if not, if there's a similar expression in use among Italian Jews. Thank you!
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