t any plant names in Yiddish - YIVO Institute for Jewish Research

XIV
˘È„”È Ôȇ ËÏÚÂÂ≠ÔÒ˜ÈÂÂÚ‚ È„ Ÿ ¯ÚËÎÚ˘ È΄¯Ó
have all referred countless times to Yiddish plant names, especially
those with halakhic relevance. Among the Yiddish lexical items
in rabbinical responsa (Bar-El 1977) we find a variety of cherry
(amaréln), 'leek', 'melon', 'pomegranate', 'anise', etc. The five species
of grain of ritual importance, for example – wheat, spelt, barley,
rye, oats – have had Yiddish terms all through the history of
Ashkenazic Jewry (Kosover 1958: 16-17).
Yiddish terms for the five vegetable species that are halakhically appropriate
for the Passover ceremony have been documented at least since
the 12th century (Kosover 1967: 243 ff). The Yiddish terms for 'charlock',
'wormwood', 'leek', 'lettuce', 'horseradish', 'parsley', 'chervil', 'chicory', 'cherries',
'sour cherries', 'apple', 'pear', 'plum', and 'nuts' are many centuries old.
Turning to modern Yiddish literature: the poet Nokhem Yud (1932:
131-132) depicts in loving terms nine species of mushroom in just one
poem: kézerl, mókhever, buravík, talstúkhes, rízhikes, vólvenkes, vórtslshvémlekh,
híntishe shvémlekh, púlvershvom. An average reader reminisces
in a letter to the editor 2 about seven species of mushroom in his native
town.
Morphophonemic changes
The age-old Yiddish botanical terms, of course, underwent the morphophonemic
changes that occurred in the Yiddish language through the ages.
1. *Vermut 'wormwood' suffered the unstressed vowel reduction so
common in Yiddish, turning into vermet, attested in the writings of
Wertheim (1736), Khay-Odem (Bernstein 1955), Sotenever (1851).
The word for 'carob' (Ceratonia siliqua) has developed from the
German Bockshorn through bókshorn >bóksor >bókser >boks >boksl,
all stages well attested in the literature and in the spoken language
(the last two in Central Yiddish, especially in Transcarpathia).
2. The international term Fuchsia (in Polish: fuksja) is rendered either
as fúksye (Golomb 1922; Horovits 1929; Yunin 1974), or as fuks
(Abelson 1915), or as fuksl (Hirshbeyn 1916). But while fuks and
fuksl are recent literary attempts at morphophonemic integration,
probably consciously done, the same cannot be said of (a) nílebárlekh,
yenkíper-bárlekh, kol-nídre-bárlekh, (b) shíkse-bárlekh or
of (c) ertsisról-épelekh, reshkhóydesh-rétekhlekh, shíker-níslekh.
a. At first blush the Southeastern Yiddish (henceforth SEY) series
níle-bárlekh, kol-nídre-bárlekh, yenkíper-bárlekh, is inexplicable.
Folk etymology has interpreted these terms to mean 'pears that
mature around Yom Kippur' or the Day of Atonement. As a matter
of fact, however, most varieties of pears mature in the fall,
around that time of year. The correct explanation must be sought
2) Louis Garber, in Forverts, New York, November 15, 1972.