Date: Sat, 17 Feb 1996 23:11:56 -0700

From: Rudy Troike RTROIKE[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU

Subject: Mea culpa: schlubby it is.



My thanks to Seth Sklarey for coming up with a quote from Leo Rosten "The

Joys of Yiddish", which clearly identifies the source of the word in zhlob .

Also to E.W. Gilman, for correcting my erroneous recollection of "schluppy"

(a lesson to check my sources!) as properly schlubby .

A couple of questions for E. W. Gilman: what are the earliest citations

on this, and is there a possibility that zhlob could be the source of slob

rather than the putative Irish source in slab "mud"? I infer from the

meanings of zhlob that schlubby means essentially someone who is a slob.

Would this be a valid guess?



--Rudy Troike (rtroike[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]ccit.arizona.edu)