I recently finished a wonderful story, Leah’s Choice by Marta Perry. It’s a story about the Amish and it contained some Pennsylvania Dutch words. Fortunately, the author provided a good glossary at the back of the book. Pennsylvania Dutch is verbal German. Many of the terms were familiar to me because of my German ancestors. For instance, I knew befuddled (mixed up), blabbermaul (talkative), denki (thank you) and schnickelfritz (mischievous child). But I also learned a couple of new (to me) words that I can share with you.
1. ferhoodled: “I hoped it would make a difference — that Anna would change once Daad talked to her. And then she goes and does something ferhoodled like this.”
Ferhoodled means upset or distracted.
2. rumspringa: Anna shrugged impatiently. . . “You and the boys did what you liked during your , ain’t so?”
Rumspringa means the running around time for Amish teens when they can taste the outside world before deciding to be baptized into the church.
Thanks to Kathy (Bermuda Onion’s Weblog) for sponsoring this weekly meme. Visit Kathy today for more new words.
The funny part about these meme is that I only ever recognize 1 maybe 2 ENGLISH words but you post Amish words and I know the meaning of them both right away!! LOL!! Good choices!!
What great, fun words! The only one I knew was befuddled! I knew that Amish teens had a rumspringa, but I never knew what it was called. Thanks for participating!
What an interesting post! It’s always fun to know word origins.
I used to love driving through Pennsylvania and stopping at the Penn. Dutch places along the way. Not only because of all the interesting words, but the great food too!
Hi Margot,
Haven’t actually heard the words, but I do know of the ritual by the Amish of going out into the normal world. Have a safe and happy holiday season.
Sherrie
Just Books
Merry Christmas Margot!
There’s a documentary called The Devil’s Playground all about Rumspringa. We haven’t watched it yet but it is in our queue!
Great words Margot! I knew the custom of rumbspringa but never knew it had an actual name. Thanks for sharing these.
I haven’t heard of either of those. Cute words!
Ferhoodled! I’m going to have to use that. Merry Christmas Margot!
I love ferhooled!
Here is my Wondrous Words Wednesday post!