The Mystery of Hebrew Words

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The criminal jargon of Russian crime is based on a mixture of Hebrew words from Yiddish and Hebrew. Thug Fenya comes from the jargon of Jewish organized crime, the capital of which was considered to be Odessa even before the revolution.

Thieves' jargon "Fenya" came into the Russian language from the Jewish language after ethnic (in this case, Jewish) organized criminal groups were formed in the places of compact residence of Jews in the Russian Empire. Jews spoke Hebrew and Yiddish, but the police did not understand them, since Jews were not taken to serve in the police in Tsarist Russia. Therefore, these terms, incomprehensible to the police, gradually turned into a stable Russian thieves jargon. Here are some of them:

Bot- בטא (bot) express. ביטוי (beat) expression.

Fenya- אופן (ofen) way. ביטאי באופן (Beatuy beofen) - to use a hair dryer - to express yourself in a special way, incomprehensible to others.

Fraer- Frej - freedom (Yiddish) Fraer is not in prison, has no prison experience.

Thieves … Die Blatte (Yiddish) - sheet, piece of paper, note. The one who got a job by pull, who has a piece of paper from the right person.

In thieves' jargon, a thief is his own, belonging to the criminal world.

Shaher-maher … סחר מחר Hebrew (saher meher). "Maher" means to sell, and "shaher" means a product.

Hevra- a criminal community, a gang. Hebrew חברה (hevra) - company

Ksiva- note. Hebrew כתיבה (ktiva) - a document, something written (in the Ashkenazi pronunciation of Hebrew (t) ת often changes to "s". For example, "shhabes" instead of "Shabbat").

Clift - jacket. Hebrew חליפה (khalifa) - costume.

Raspberries (thieves') - an apartment, a room where thieves are hiding. From מלון (malon) - a hotel, a shelter, a place to sleep.

Hana - the end. חנה - Hebrew. khana - to make a stopover, halt. This root is very widespread in Hebrew (hanaia - parking lot, hanut - warehouse, shop).

Hence the word "Taganka" derived from the word תחנה (tahana) - station, stop, parking lot. So, at first unofficially, and then officially, the prison was called, to which prisoners were brought from all over the country (the European part of the country) before being sent to Siberia.

Marviher - a highly qualified thief. מרויחר Marviher (Yiddish) - earning money from Hebrew. מרויח marviach - earns.

Hipesh - search.

Hypocrite - a thief. Hebrew חיפוש (hipus) - search, search.

Parasha - hearing. The Hebrew word פרשה (parasha) means commentary (or foul-smelling story).

Ban - railway station. In Yiddish, the word "ban" has the same meaning.

Keif - כיף Hebrew, Arabic. - Keyf with the same value. (From the same root in the Arabic language "coffee". When they drank it, they drank it. In general, Hebrew and Arabic are two Semitic languages that have a lot of common roots. Who knows one, it is enough to simply learn the other.).

Freebie - for nothing, for free. Hebrew חלב halav (milk). In the 19th century, the Jews of Russia collected for the Jews of Palestine the so-called דמי חלב “dmei halav” - “money for milk”.

Ball, ball - is free. Hebrew (שאר, שארים shear, shearim) - remnants.

What is left with the seller is not marketable, and he leaves it on the counter for the poor. According to Jewish tradition, it is necessary to leave an uncompressed strip of שאר - shear - a remnant on the field so that the poor can gather ears of corn. This is the gospel parable that tells that Jesus and his disciples were gathering unharvested ears of grain on Saturday, and this caused the discontent of the Pharisees.

Slut - slut, prostitute. שילב, לשלב (shilev) combine (several men at the same time).

Mastyrka - a fake wound, cloak it up - hide it. In Hebrew מסתיר (master) - I hide, I hide.

From here to steal - to steal. And סתירה - (satire) concealment. Hence the satire (hidden mockery). And the mystery. Ancient Greek satyrs are also from here, and not vice versa.

Nix … Stay on the naughty side. This means that the one standing on the naughty guards the perpetrators of a crime (usually theft) and warns of the appearance of law enforcement officers. Shukher comes from the Hebrew word shahor שחור, which means black. The uniform of the police in tsarist Russia was black.

To hustle - search, search. In the prisons of the Russian Empire, it was accepted to do searches in cells at 8 o'clock in the evening. Eight in Hebrew is מונה מונה, hence “shmonat”.

Sidor - a bag with the prisoner's personal belongings. This bag must contain a strictly defined set of items. For their absence or the presence of foreign objects in this bag (sidor), the prisoner was punished. Or not punished if the set of items in this bag was in order. The order in Hebrew is seder סדר. The Jewish "seder" has become familiar to the Russian ear …

Words potsan (on wikipedia Poz (Yiddish פּאָץ) -), chiksa, like all thieves' jargon in general, also have Jewish roots.