[12] To cite one example out of many: In the Journal of American Folklore, Vol. VII. pp. 72-74, there appeared a short appeal, by F. S. Krauss, to the folklorists of America, to collect whatsoever of Jewish lore may be found here ere the German Jews become entirely Americanized. It seems that Krauss had in mind the German language; but, for some reason, R. Andree, editor of the Globus, thought of Judeo-German, whereupon he made a violent attack upon it in an article, Sprachwechsel der Juden in Nord-America, in Vol. LXV. of his periodical, p. 363. Lenz, in his Eindringlinge im Wörter-und Zitaten-schatz der deutschen Sprache (Münster, 1895, 8vo, 28 pp.), caps, however, the climax in his antipathy for the Jargon by making it the subject of antisemitic propaganda!
[13] Even Frug, who is a master of the dialect, and who wields it with more vigor than the Russian language, thought it necessary to devote a whole series of poems to the reluctant defence of his vernacular, in Lieder vun dem jüdischen Žargon, in Jüdisches Volksblatt, Vol. VIII. (Beilage) pp. 881-896; also reprinted in his Lieder un' Gedanken. Cf. p. 108 of the present work.
[14] Witness the frequent dogmatic statements and attacks on it by the historian Grätz. These finally brought forth a rejoinder by J. Dienesohn in the Jüd. Volksblatt, Vol. VIII. (Beilage), pp. 33-43, entitled Professor Grätz un' der jüdischer Žargon, oder Wer mit wās darf sich schāmen? and this was followed by a similar article (ibid. pp. 65-68, 129-133) from the editor of the Volksblatt, in which Grätz's dogmatism is put in no enviable light. Even Steinschneider has no love for it; although he has written so much and so well on its literature, he knows nothing of its nineteenth-century development, and nearly all his quotations of Judeo-German words that in any way differ from the German form are preposterously wrong. Karpeles, writing the history of its literature, confessedly knows nothing of the language. M. Grünbaum, in his Jüdisch-deutsche Chrestomathie and Die Jüdisch-deutsche Litteratur, displays an ignorance of the dialect which would put to shame a sophomoric newspaper reporter of a scientific lecture. What wonder, then, that D. Philipson, devoting a chapter to The Ghetto in Literature (pp. 220-255 in Old European Jewries, Philadelphia, 1894), should not even suspect the existence of an extensive and highly interesting literature of the subject in the language of the Ghetto itself! Among the few memorable exceptions among German scholars are Güdemann and Strack, who approach Judeo-German in a fair and scholarly manner. See M. Güdemann, Quellenschriften zur Geschichte des Unterrichts und der Erziehung bei den deutschen Juden, etc., Berlin, 1891, pp. xxii, xxiii, and, by the same author, Geschichte des Erziehungswesens und der Cultur der Juden in Frankreich und Deutschland, Vol. I. note iii. pp. 273-287, and Vol. III. note vii. pp. 280-297. Still fewer are those who have subjected Judeo-German to a thorough philological investigation. All efforts in that direction will be found catalogued by A. Landau, Bibliographie des Jüdisch-deutschen, in Deutsche Mundarten, Zeitschrift für Bearbeitung des mundartlichen Materials, herausgegeben von Dr. Johann Willibald Nagl, Vienna, 1896, Heft II. pp. 126-132. To those mentioned by him must be added A. Schulmann's Die Geschichte vun der Žargon-literatur, in Jüdisches Volksblatt, Vol. II. pp. 115-134, which is very rich in data, and A. Landau's Das Deminutivum der galizisch-jüdischen Mundart, Ein Kapitel aus der jüdischen Grammatik, in Deutsche Mundarten, Vol. I. pp. 46-58. This is, outside of Şaineanu's work (mentioned in Landau's Bibliographie), the best grammatical disquisition on Judeo-German that has so far appeared.
[15] Cf. Zunz, Die gottesdienstlichen Vorträge der Juden, historisch entwickelt, Frankfurt a. M., 1892, pp. 452-463, and Güdemann, as above.
[16] Cf. M. Steinschneider, Die italienische Litteratur der Juden, in Monatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judenthums, Vol. XLII. p. 74.
[17] Naturally, words belonging to that stage of the language have survived in the cheeder (school), where the melamed (teacher) is frequently compelled to fall back on the old commentaries for translations. Abramowitsch has, in his Dās klēine Menschele, the following passage (p. 49) bearing upon this point: "Die Talmudtōre hāt mir äuch gegeben a Bissel Deutsch vun die Teutschwörter in Chumesch, wie a Stēiger (for example): wealoto un' a Nepel, wesaadu libchem un' lehent unter euer Harz, jereechi mein dich, machschof entpleckt, boochu auf'n Gemeesachz, been hamischpessoim die Gemarken, wetchalelo un' du hāst sie verschwächt, kōmmijōs hofferlich, uchdōme noch asölche Teutschen."
[18] An example of this style is given by Linetzki, in Dās chsidische Jüngel, p. 32: "a Stēiger wie er hāt mit mir geteutscht: ischo an Ische, ki sitmo as sie wet tome weren, wessakriw un' sie wet makriw sein, korbon a Korben, wehikriw soll makriw sein, hakōhen der Kōhen, al hamisbeach zum Misbeach, beōhel mōed in'm Ōhel-mōed."
[19] Cf. A. B. Gottlober, Sichrōnes über žargonische Schreiber, in Jüd. Volksbib., Vol. I. pp. 250-259.
[20] On the various dialects and styles, see Die jüdische Sprache, in Hausfreund, Vol. V. pp. 60-64; cf. also Rabnizki, Hebräisch un' Jüdisch, in Hausfreund, Vol. V. pp. 38-48.
[21] An excellent satire on the widely different styles of Judeo-German in vogue by their writers is given by S. Rabinowitsch, in his Kolmewasser (q.v.), under the title of Korrespondenzies (cols. 26-31).