A few more entries

Rebetiko Glossary Discussion about the Rebetiko Glossary
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víla (feminine)

the police station

Heard in the song: “He Caught Him Red-Handed” (1936)

Lyrics, music by M. Chrysafakis, performed by Perpiniadis

“…he’s dragging me to the víla

as if Giagkoulas had gone there…”

Brăila (also Vraïla) (feminine)

A city in southeastern Romania and a port on the Danube. It is located approximately 200 kilometres northeast of Bucharest.

Heard in the traditional song “Brăila” (1928)

With M. Papagika

“…take us to Vraïla

come on, so we can ease our longing

come on, where will we find dervishes

ah, so we can smoke some hashish…””

[ETYMOLOGY: < Romanian Brăila ]

parasangs away (ἀπέχει) (phrase)

The phrase “to be a parasang or parasangs away” means “to be a long distance away” or “to be very different”.

[literally, the parasang was an ancient unit of length equivalent to 30 stadia, that is, approximately 5,500 metres.]

Heard in the song: “The Rebetis” (1934)

Composer: K. Roumeliotis [:Faltaits], performed by Perpiniadis

“…the rebetis is a μάγκας and a passionate lad

and is parasangs apart from the dapper boys…””

[ETYMOLOGY: < Persian farsang]

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I would suggest the reverse, “Vraïla (and Braïla) (f.)”, so that one can find it under the form one would search for—the form heard in the song.

Would it be worth adding a note that this is not pure rebetiko slang, but a borrowing from the learned language?

(Incidentally, borrowings from the learned language—sometimes intact, sometimes corrupted [as here, “απέχει εις παρασάγγας”]—are an important component of μάγκικη slang. I cannot remember whether we have many similar examples in songs, but we certainly do in texts such as “mangiko” newspaper sketches, Stavrakas in shadow theatre, and so on. And “antilevomai” could also be included as a headword: come on, don’t you have a nose? Can’t you tell?)

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Well, he dropped an s… I’d transcribe it as “απέχει (ς) παρασάγγας” rather than “εις”, since it doesn’t sound like that to me.

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Well, perhaps. Elsewhere, though, we clearly do have mangled Katharevousa as an element of μάγκας-style slang. I just don’t remember whether we come across it in songs. (The “Haven’t you got a nose? Can’t you smell?” line appears in a recording of a spoken theatrical dialogue accompanied by an instrumental rebetiko tune, not in a song proper.)

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<Persian farsang

Oh man, what are we supposed to write/Daveli? They’ll catch us.

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There’s Anthimos too, waiting around the corner to discover my «mistake» …

«Persian» instead of «Persian» (the word) As if (even official dictionaries) do not sometimes indicate the origin of a word and the language it comes from, using the corresponding foreign term.

Relax, Anthimos, I’ll say it again.

And the «collective effort» mentioned in another post turned the corner too…

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No one is waiting for you around the corner, so don’t worry :upside_down_face:

You put an entry up for discussion, and everyone — even me — has the right to comment, for the good of the entry and the community.

Likewise, any comments I make about the glossary aren’t about individuals, but about what’s best for the entries and about not making the community look bad :slightly_smiling_face:

Just like markers correct students’ work with their names hidden — that sort of thing.
Relax, Eleni!

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I don’t know in which Greek dictionaries this happens, since I haven’t come across it; however, in the case we’re discussing, not only is there no reason for “Persian”, but the dictionaries write <Pers. farsang

What can we do now…

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Of course, as the glossary entry I would choose the Greek spelling, although—as I repeat—the other spelling is not wrong.

Is this really within the framework of a constructive discussion for the good of the collective effort in the Glossary?

Because to me, it sounds like disparagement coupled with irony.

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In case you didn’t get it (!), it’s just filler—whatever came to mind—so that the system would accept my message.
Ah, riiiiight…

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Is this variant common? I don’t think I’ve come across it before…

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Well then:

α. I really don’t remember generally coming across this style of tough-guy expressions in songs. As I said, I mainly know it from other kinds of texts, prose. Of course, I may simply be forgetting some examples. In any case, as for the specific example, «αντιλήβομαι», although I don’t remember whether I’ve seen it or not, the most likely thing is that I haven’t seen it in a song.

β. In the other texts I’m referring to (Tsiφόρος, old newspaper columns in a tough-guy style [which may of course also contain mistakes made out of ignorance, or deliberately satirical exaggerations], Karagiozis, etc.), I’m still not sure that I’ve seen this particular one. But it sounds very familiar to me, very apt and convincing, because it follows the general rule: «we take a Katharevousa form, misunderstand it, and create a tough-guy one». Specifically, here someone probably knew «αντιλήφθηκα» and from that fashioned a new present tense, «αντιλήβομαι» (which would work, if it existed!). Elsewhere we find other kinds of mistakes which—I don’t know—may even have been made deliberately by the toughs, for stylistic effect, regardless of whether they knew the correct form. (We’re talking about periods when even the least educated person had heard more Katharevousa than people do today, whether they understood it or not: Katharevousa was circulating everywhere around them.)

γ. Therefore, even if no other occurrence of «αντιλήβομαι» can be found, I find it convincing that it existed. We only need to find it in a proper song—the «Σταύρακας μες στον τεκέ» is probably a theatrical dialogue.

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P.S. Apart from distorted Katharevousa, in the texts we’re discussing we also encounter distorted French: η μανδάμ, η μαμαζελίτσα and things like that.

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Guys, I can’t quote it. Mangled Katharevousa in a song? And if you don’t like all those things I’d told you..

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Dear Evodios, when it comes to the quick solution for a rhyme that will fit with Christos, the fact that the adverb pro̱tístōs happens to be in Katharevousa doesn’t bother the songwriter one bit! Markos was the only one who had such sensitivities too—and not always, either—mainly because he usually preferred ready-made hemistichs from the “folk” basket (e.g. “your eyelashes shine”) which, being already polished, rarely contained such little mistakes.

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That it is Katharevousa-like certainly doesn’t bother him. What is noteworthy is that it doesn’t bother him that it means something else either (primarily, it means ‘previously’!). So one wonders: did he simply not pay attention to the details, or was it something people said anyway?

I wouldn’t be surprised if it were said.

But it isn’t really representative of the style I was talking about (streetwise, battered Katharevousa). More representative—though always from prose texts—is Tsiforos’s classic ‘to opoion’, which, when it means ‘that is’, doesn’t make much of an impression, but is sometimes used in utterly surreal ways, for example right at the very beginning of a text: ‘So, Vaggelas is sitting in his courtyard, staring vacantly at the sky, which is drizzling fat drops like old-style five-pieces…’ (It isn’t authentic; it’s an improvised imitation, but he writes things like that).

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Would you look at that—I’d never noticed this before! But it’s precisely this mangled Katharevousa.

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It was good, but to be honest, before you explained it, I’d understood it differently…

18

Well, Lacan said it, my friend, so I won’t add my two cents after such a titan: the unconscious is structured like a language.

19

Well, this is an interwar “vlamiko” style:

«they took it upon themselves as if they had awarded us the Grand Cross, which, that is, foreign policy, the other bloke tells you, and a load of old waffle on the spit. Comprenez-vous?» (1924)

«Which, that is, in the end we got blind drunk and slept all day until evening. Hence, today, I appear here again and greet you from one end to the other» (1935)

«and whoever steps in front of me, that is, and tries to act tough, finds it hard going, which, that is, means trouble by the sackful for him, so you know» (1936)

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I don’t know how wrong Tsitsanis is.
“Πρωτίστως” also means “first of all” and “first things first”, so…

Another issue that affects speakers today as well is that “πρωτίστως” is…wrong, instead of “πρώτιστα” :slightly_smiling_face: