Adreidel, alsodreidle ordreidl,[1] (/ˈdreɪdəl/DRAY-dəl;Yiddish:דרײדל,romanized: dreydl, plural:dreydlech;[a]Hebrew:סביבון,romanized: sevivon) is a four-sidedspinning top, played with during theJewish holiday ofHanukkah. The dreidel is a Jewish variant on theteetotum, a gambling toy found inEurope andLatin America.
Each side of the dreidel bears a letter of the Hebrew alphabet:נ (nun),ג (gimel),ה (hei),ש (shin).
These letters are represented inYiddish as a mnemonic for the rules of a gambling game possibly derived fromteetotum played with a dreidel:nun stands for the wordנישט (nisht, "not", meaning "nothing"),gimel forגאַנץ (gantz, "entire, whole"),hei forהאַלב (halb, "half"), andshin forשטעל אַרַײן (shtel arayn, "put in"). However, according tofolk etymology, they represent the Hebrew phraseנֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה שָׁם (nes gadól hayáh sham, "a great miracle happened there"), referring to themiracle of the cruse of oil. For this reason, most dreidels in Israel replace the lettershin with the letterפ (pe), to represent the phraseנֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה פֹּה (nes gadól hayáh poh, "a great miracle happenedhere");[2] however, manyHaredi communities insist thatshin be used in theLand of Israel as well, because the reference to "there" means in theTemple in Jerusalem and not in Israel.
As a result, five-sided dreidels were invented in 2022 to represent the Hebrew phraseנֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה שָׁם פֹּה (nes gadól hayáh sham poh, "a great miracle happened here and there" or "a great miracle happened everywhere").[3] Twenty-sided dreidels are unique as they are not spinning tops but twenty-sideddice instead.[4]
While not mandated (amitzvah) for Hanukkah (the only traditionalmitzvot are lighting candles and saying the fullhallel), spinning the dreidel is a traditional game played during the holiday.[5]
AstronautJeffrey A. Hoffman spun a dreidel made by Israeli silversmith Gideon Hay for an hour in outer space.[6]
The dreidel possibly developed from an Irish or English top introduced into Germany known as ateetotum,[7][8][9][10][11] which was popular around Christmas time[10] and dates back to ancient Greek and Roman times.[9]
The teetotum was inscribed with letters denoting the Latin words for "nothing", "everything", "half", and "put in". In German this came to be called atrendel, with German letters for the same concepts. Adapted to the Hebrew alphabet when Jews adopted the game, these letters were replaced bynun which stands for theYiddish wordנישט (nisht, "not", meaning "nothing"),gimel forגאַנץ (gants, "entire, whole"),hei forהאַלב (halb, "half"), andshin forשטעל אַרײַן (shtel arayn, "put in"). The letters served as a means to recalling the rules of the game.[10]
This theory states that when the game spread to Jewish communities unfamiliar with Yiddish, the denotations of the Hebrew letters were not understood. As a result, there arose Jewish traditions to explain their assumed meaning. However, in Judaism there are often multiple explanations developed for words. A popular conjecture had it that the letters abbreviated the wordsנֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה שָׁם (nes gadól hayá sham, "a great miracle happened there"), an idea that became attached to dreidels when the game entered into Hanukkah festivities.[12]
According to a tradition first documented in 1890,[8][11][13][14][15] the game was developed by Jews who illegally studied theTorah in seclusion as they hid, sometimes in caves, from theSeleucids underAntiochus IV. At the first sign of Seleucids approaching, theirTorah scrolls would be concealed and be replaced by dreidels.[16][17] The variant namesgoyrl (destiny) andvarfl (a little throw) were also current inYiddish, untilthe Holocaust.[12] In the wake of Zionism, the dreidel was renamedsevivon (Hebrew:סביבון; from the Semetic root s-b-b, meaning 'to rotate') in modern Israel and the letters were altered, withshin generally replaced bype. This yields the readingנֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה פֹּה (nes gadól hayá po, "a great miracle happenedhere").[12]
TheYiddish worddreydl comes from the worddreyen ("to turn", compare todrehen, meaning the same in German). TheHebrew wordsevivon comes from theSemitic rootSBB ("to turn") and was invented byItamar Ben-Avi (the son ofEliezer Ben-Yehuda) when he was five years old.Hayyim Nahman Bialik used a different word,kirkar (from the rootKRKR – "to spin"), in his poems,[18] but it was not adopted into spoken Hebrew.
In the lexicon ofAshkenazi Jews fromUdmurtia andTatarstan the local historian A. V. Altyntsev utilised several other appellations of a dreidel, such asvolchok (Russian:волчок, "top"),khanuke-volchok,fargl,varfl,dzihe andzabavke (Russian:забавка, "entertaining piece", "toy").[19]
Some rabbis ascribe symbolic significance to the markings on the dreidel. One commentary, for example, connects the four letters with the four nations to which the House of Judah was historically subject—Babylonia,Persia, theSeleucid Empire andRome.[20] Agematria reading yields the number 358, identical to the value of the four letters used to spell "Moshiach" (Messiah).
Each player begins with an equal number of game pieces (usually 10–15). The game pieces can be any object, such aschocolate gelt, pennies, raisins, etc.
These rules are comparable to the rules for a classic four-sidedteetotum, where the letters A, D, N and T form amnemonic for the rules of the game,aufer (take),depone (put),nihil (nothing), andtotum (all). Similarly, the Hebrew letters on a dreidel may be taken as a mnemonic for the game rules in Yiddish. Occasionally, in the United States, the Hebrew letters on the dreidel form an English-language mnemonic about the rules:hei or "H" for "half";gimel or "G" for "get all";nun or "N" for "nothing"; andshin or "S" for "share".
Thomas Robinson and Sujith Vijay have shown that the expected number of spins in a game of dreidel isO(n2), where n is the number of game pieces each player begins with. The implied constant depends on the number of players.[24]
Robert Feinerman has shown that the game of dreidel is unfair, in that the first player to spin has a better expected outcome than the second player, and the second better than the third, and so on.[25]
Dreidel is now a spoof competitive sport in North America. Major League Dreidel (MLD), founded in New York City in 2007, hosts dreidel tournaments during the holiday of Hanukkah. In MLD tournaments the player with the longest time of spin (TOS) is the winner. MLD is played on a Spinagogue, the official spinning stadium of Major League Dreidel. Pamskee was the 2007 MLD Champion. Virtual Dreidel was the 2008 MLD Champion.[26] In 2009, Major League Dreidel launched a game version of the Spinagogue.[27]
In 2009,Good Morning America published a story on Dreidel Renaissance reporting on the rising popularity of the dreidel.[28] Dreidel games that have come out on the market since 2007 include No Limit Texas Dreidel,[29] a cross between traditional dreidel andTexas Hold'em poker, invented by aJudaica company called ModernTribe.[30] Other new dreidel games include Staccabees[31] and Maccabees.[32]
Childhood enjoyment of dreidels has led to a growing interest in collecting them in adulthood.[33] Jewish institutions such as theSpertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership, Yeshiva University Museum andTemple Emanu-El in New York, house dreidel collections, as do museums such as the Spinning Top and Yo-Yo Museum in Burlington, Wisconsin.[33]
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Antique dreidels are of increasing value and interest: different styles of dreidels are to be found across the world. Exemplars include dreidels fashioned in wood, silver, brass and lead.[34][35] One particularly rare dreidel is cast from an ivory original byMoshe Murro from theBezalel Academy inJerusalem in 1929.[36] Rare collectible dreidels fromCochin are made fromiron; they are black in colour decorated with silver markings, made by an intricateBidriware style process.
The Guinness World Record for Most Valuable Dreidel[37] was achieved by Estate Diamond Jewelry in November 2019 and was valued at $70,000 ($86,090 in current dollars, adjusted for inflation).
The design of Estate Diamond Jewelry's dreidel was inspired by theChrysler Building in New York. Previous holders of the title were Chabad of South Palm Beach with a dreidel valued at $14,000 ($18,595 adjusted for inflation).[38]
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