Yiddish Given Names: A Lexicon

"This volume in onomastics, the study of names, presents a listing of Yiddish first names from 1750 to the present day. Yiddish Given Names: A Lexicon collects, documents, and corrects the available body of research on Yiddish given names. It establishes the modern corpus and provides the origins of the names therein. Rella Israly Cohn has amassed and preserved a number of names that have become extremely rare, almost to the point of extinction, and correctly identified their sources using a number of works both commonly available and difficult to find." "The book begins with an explanation of technical terms and classifications, and a description of the evolution of Yiddish names throughout history. Following is the lexicon itself, comprised of more than 250 names with variant forms and alphabetized according to the English transliteration. Each entry relates the Yiddish name to its source language, shows a source form, and gives the attestations of the name in its various forms in the earliest written works. Concluding with several appendices that offer additional information and assist in reference and accessibility, this significant work will serve scholars in onomastics, linguistics, and Yiddish, and will be of interest to both scholars and laypersons researching their family history or the cultural legacy of the Jewish community worldwide."--BOOK JACKET.