Talk:куркуль

RFV discussion: November 2013–June 2014

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куркуль

Rfv-sense "immigrant". Is it individual?

I think, the Ukrainian original sense "miser, moneygrubber, penny pincher, cheapskate" (which I have added) gave rise to the second - "kulak" (a prosperous peasant) after the October 1917 revolution, when the campaign against kulaks was in full swing.--Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:47, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

This is after Mel’nyčuk v 3, p 155, which glosses куркуль as «багатий селянин-власник, на якого працюють наймити; [переселенець з іншої місцевості]». Looking at the introduction, I now see that square brackets denote діалектні слова або значення слів (“dialactal terms or senses”). I am adding a label. —Michael Z. 2013-11-23 19:01 z

Technically RFV is supposed to supply three non-mention citations. But I think that definition is believable. --WikiTiki89 19:24, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

This sense sounds quite weird to me, even though Ukrainian is not my first language. Still need citations, otherwise it should be deleted. I can't find anything but mentions, no uses. Just a hint: this pejorative sense for migrants, resettlers may be related to Polish masters, if existence is proven. There's not enough old Ukrainian literature on the web to search for book examples. --Anatoli ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:06, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

Regardless validity of the comments above, the translation as 'immigrant' is invalid; at least inconsistent within wiktionary, where "immigrant" specifically refers to comers from other country. I'd rather suggest a more generic 'migrant'. Altenmann (talk) 22:05, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

A confirmation from another uk dictionary:

Куркуль, -ля́, м. Пришлый, захожій изъ другои мѣстности человѣкъ, поселившійся на постоянное жительство. Екатер. г. Залюбовск. Слов. Д. Эварн. Въ Чигир. у. — прозвище, даваемое въ насмѣшку мѣщанами казакамъ черноморцамъ. / Source: Словарь української мови / Упор. з дод. влас. матеріалу Б. Грінченко : в 4-х т. — К. : Вид-во Академії наук Української РСР, 1958. Том 2, ст. 330.

Here "г. Залюбовск.: is a reference to the dictionary of the ethnographer w:uk:Залюбовський Григорій Антонович. Altenmann (talk) 22:30, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

However I'd mark this meaning as rare. Altenmann (talk) 22:30, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

It is pretty clear that both О. С. Мельничук (1982) and Грінченко (1958) may source their wisdom only to Залюбовський (19th century), since 20th century firmly sees only one meaning of the word. And I can readily imagine that in some localities the colonists were called kurkuls: it is well-known that in Russian Empire many lands of modern Ukraine were devoid of population and Russian tsars invited new settlers from foreign lands, most prominently Germans. There colonists were hard toilers, rich, and used hired labor. So I can readily imagine a Kangaroo-legend-type situation when an enthographer Залюбовський came to some poor steppe village, asked "Who lives over there?" - to get a disgruntled answer "These are kurkuls. They came from Serbia to get rich here. Altenmann (talk) 22:55, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

Failed. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 21:27, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Turkish

I don’t know why Ukrainian etymological works derive it (Mel’nyčuk “obviously” literally) from Turkish korkulu (“frightful or dangerous one”), from korkmak (“to fear”). Looks like Soviet historiography; and often if a word in East Slavic is claimed “from Turkish” then it is a 19th-century etymology nobody has revised since and it is not from Turkish but from Kipchak. But here, @PUC, Lambiam, Brutal Russian, am I retarded to believe it is just the name of the character Curculio, “a stock parasite character” in a Plautus play? From curculiō (“Kornwurm”) supposedly, I don’t know why the length now given at Curcūliō differs. Fay Freak (talk) 19:28, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

It is easier to see how the sense “parasite” would transfer to куркуль than the sense “scary”, “frightening” (primarily an adjective). The phonemic match is also better; is there a reason why korkulu would not give rise to *коркулу? But before we can embrace a Latin origin (whether from the Plautine character or, more directly, from the common noun) as more than possible, more evidence is needed. Are there earlier uses with a less specialized sense of “parasite”? Gaffiot has the same length patterns for both: curcŭlĭo, -ōnis and Curcŭlĭo, -ōnis.^[1] BTW, the Ukrainian Wiktionary offers a second theory of a Turkish origin: from kürklü (“bearing fur”; also a surname^[2]).  --Lambiam 21:45, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

I thought this sense is there already in the gloss “penny pincher”. Because one way to save money is to eat from other people’s tables, especially in Ukrainian conditions, formerly a frequent thing – we have a thesaurus “one who lives off others” which sounds like a hypernym. Fay Freak (talk) 22:05, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

@Fay Freak: I was able to find such a mention in Google books: Заинтересовавшись словомъ „куркули“, я пытался узнать на мѣстѣ его значеніе, но объясненія были различны. Одни говорили, что это насмѣшливое прозвище, данное старожилами вновь пришедшимъ поселенцамъ; „куркули“ — значитъ самые сѣрые, закоренѣлые хохлы; другіе объясняли названіе „куркули“ промысломъ. Это значитъ ското- (perhaps, скотоводством). The kulaks were called "bread spiders". Curculio is a "bread worm"? Could there have been any contamination? Stress on the second syllable, non-trivial, flectional… Of course it looks more like borrowing, but I cannot prove it. Gnosandes (talk) 23:51, 6 June 2021 (UTC)