Cant or thieves' argot, spoken by covert groups primarily in southern Germany and Switzerland
This article'slead sectionmay be too short to adequatelysummarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead toprovide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article.(October 2015)
You can helpexpand this article with text translated fromthe corresponding article in German. (April 2020)Click [show] for important translation instructions.
View a machine-translated version of the German article.
Machine translation, likeDeepL orGoogle Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
Consideradding a topic to this template: there are already 1,760 articles in themain category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization.
Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
Youmust providecopyright attribution in theedit summary accompanying your translation by providing aninterlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary isContent in this edit is translated from the existing German Wikipedia article at [[:de:Rotwelsch]]; see its history for attribution.
You may also add the template{{Translated|de|Rotwelsch}} to thetalk page.
Rotwelsch was first named byMartin Luther in his preface ofLiber Vagatorum in the 16th century.Rot means "beggar" whilewelsch means "incomprehensible" (cf*Walhaz): thus,rotwelsch signifies the incomprehensible cant of beggars.[1]
Rotwelsch was formerly common among travelling craftspeople andvagrants. The language is built on a strongsubstratum of German, but contains numerous words from other languages, notably from various Germandialects, and other Germanic languages likeYiddish,[3] as well as fromRomany languages.Rotwelsch has also played a great role in the development of theYeniche language. In form and development it closely parallels the commercial speech ("shopkeeper language") of German-speaking regions.
Peter Feraru:Muskel-Adolf & Co.: Die ›Ringvereine‹ und das organisierte Verbrechen in Berlin [Muscle-Adolf & Co.: The ›Ring-Clubs‹ and Organised Crime in Berlin]. Argon, Berlin 1995.
der Bau = the prison or penitentiary (literally 'the lodge')
Bauer = a stupid simple-minded person (literally 'peasant' or 'farmer')
begraben sein = to be hunted for a long time (literally 'to be buried')
bei jom = by day (Hebrewyom = day)
bei leile = by night (Hebrewlaila = night)
der Bello = the prison toilet
beramschen = to swindle
berappen = to pay up or fork over money (literally 'to plaster a wall'); also possibly from Malayan through Dutch: berapa means 'how much?' (what does it cost), now integrated in Dutch asberappen: to pay.
betuke = discreet or imperceptible (perhaps from Hebrewbetokh = within)
die Bim = the tramway
bleffen (oranbleffen) = to threaten. Possibly from Dutch:blaffen: to bark (like a dog).
der Bock, from Romanibokh = hunger, coll.Bock haben = to be up for something.
brennen (literally 'to burn') = Extortion, but also to collect the "thieves' portion" with companions. The analogy betweendistilling spirits (Branntweinbrennen) and taking a good gulp of the portion (Anteil) is obvious.[5]
Variants of Rotwelsch, sometimes toned down, can still be heard among travelling craftspeople andfunfair showpeople as well as among vagrants and beggars. Also, in some southwestern and western locales in Germany, where travelling peoples were settled, many Rotwelsch terms have entered the vocabulary of the vernacular, for instance in the municipalities ofSchillingsfürst andSchopfloch. Some Rotwelsch- and Yenish-speaking vagrant communities also exist in Switzerland due the country's neutral status during World War Two.[1]
A few Rotwelsch words have entered the colloquial language, for example,aufmucken,Bau, andberappen.Baldowern orausbaldowern is very common in the Berlin dialect;Bombe is still used in German prison jargon.Bock haben is also still used all around Germany. TheManisch dialect of the German city ofGießen is still used, although it was only spoken fluently by approximately 700-750 people in 1976.[6]
Josef Ludwig Blum from Lützenhardt (Black Forest) wrote from war prison:
"[E]s grüßt Dich nun recht herzlich Dein Mann, viele Grüße an Schofel und Bock. Also nochmals viel Glück auf ein baldiges Wiedersehen in der schönen Heimat. Viele Grüße an Mutter u. Geschwister sowie an die Deinen."
The censors allowed the passage to remain, apparently believing that Bock and Schofel were people. They were instead code words,Schofel ("bad") andBock ("hunger"), which hid the message that the prisoners weren't doing well, and that they were starving.[7]
A variant of Rotwelsch was spoken by some Americancriminal groups in the 1930s and the 1940s, and harpistZeena Parkins' 1996 albumMouth=Maul=Betrayer made use of spoken Rotwelsch texts.[8]
An Beindel von Eisen recht alt. An Stranzen net gar a so kalt. Messinung, a' Räucherl und Rohn, und immerrr nurr putzen. Und stoken sich Aufzug und Pfiff, und schmallern an eisernes G'süff. Juch, Und Handschuhkren, Harom net san.
^abcdPuchner, Martin (2020).The language of thieves : my family's obsession with a secret code the Nazis tried to eliminate (1 ed.). New York: W.W. Norton & Company.ISBN978-1-324-00591-9.OCLC1137818284.
^Feraru, Peter (1995).Muskel-Adolf & Co.: die "Ringvereine" und das organisierte Verbrechen in Berlin [Muscle Adolf & Co.: Ring-Clubs and Organised Crime in Berlin] (in German). Berlin: Argon.ISBN978-3-87024-785-0.
^Lerch, Hans-Günter (2005) [1976].Tschü lowi...Das Manische in Giessen [Tschü lowi ... The manic in Giessen] (in German) (reprint ed.). VVB Laufersweiler Verlag. p. 22.ISBN3-89687-485-3.
^Efing, Christian (2005).Das Lützenhardter Jenisch: Studien zu einer deutschen Sondersprache [The Lützenhardter Jenisch: Studies on a special German language] (in German). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. p. 74.ISBN978-3447052085.
Puchner, Martin (13 October 2020).The Language of Thieves: My Family's Obsession with a Secret Code the Nazis Tried to Eliminate (First ed.). New York.ISBN978-1-324-00591-9.OCLC1137818284.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Sobota, Heinz. 1978.Der Minus-Mann, Verlag Kiepenheuer und Witsch.
Wolf, S.A.:Wörterbuch des Rotwelschen. Deutsche Gaunersprache, 1985/1993, 431 pp.,ISBN3-87118-736-4
