שסק (shesek) — loquat; medlar

Etymology

The Talmud twice records Rabbi Yehuda's (2nd century CE) ruling that a shopkeeper may not distribute roasted grains and nuts to customers' children as a marketing device. Both times, the rabbis overrule him, and their counter-argument includes the Aramaic phrase "I distribute walnuts, and you distribute שִׁיסְקֵי" (Bava Metzia 60a; Bava Batra 21b). Beyond the fact that שישקי was some kind of food, the context gives no further information. The earliest commentators — all from the 11th century, working in different parts of the Jewish world — disagreed sharply: Rabbenu Chananel (Kairouan, Tunisia) said peaches; Rabbenu Gershom (Mainz, Germany) said almonds; Rashi (Troyes, France) contradicted himself, saying almonds in one passage and plums in another; and Nathan of Rome's dictionary Ha-Aruch gave two options: almonds or peaches.

Because the identity of שישקי had no legal or practical implications, the question gathered no scholarly momentum until the late 19th century, when Emmanuel Löw wrote his Berlin doctoral dissertation aiming to identify all plant names in Aramaic. Löw ultimately concluded, on the basis of comparison with Syriac Aramaic, that שישקי referred to jujube (what Hebrew calls שיזף). But along the way he noted that a possible alternative identification was the fruit of the tree known in German as Mispel and in English as medlar — a less popular relative of the almond, plum, and peach.

Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, who already had a perfectly good Hebrew word for jujube, seized on Löw's secondary suggestion and in his 1903 pocket dictionary introduced שֶׁסֶק as the Hebrew name for the medlar (Mispel). The word was redundant — the medlar does not grow in the Levant — and its only traction was among other lexicographers who copied it into their own dictionaries, including Yehuda Gur in his 1913 supplement.

The word's real career came through a botanical accident. When 18th-century German naturalist Carl Peter Thunberg, the first Western scientist to describe the Japanese loquat (Eriobotrya japonica), was struck by its resemblance to the familiar European medlar, he named it Japanische Mispel (Japanese Medlar). The link between the two trees — European and Asian — persisted. When Hebrew-speaking writers in early 20th-century Palestine needed a word to replace the Arabic-Turkish loanword אסכדניה (itself a corruption of Turkish yenidünya, "new world," reflecting the loquat's recent arrival from Japan), they reached for שסק, using it for the loquat. In 1930 this dual usage — one name for both the European medlar and the Japanese loquat — was ratified by a Language Committee decision when teachers Pesach Auerbach and Mordecai Azrachi published their plant-name list. The name שסק stuck for the loquat; the old name אסכדניה (often spelled אסקדיניה) still appears occasionally in speech and writing.

Key Quotes

"אֲנָא מְפַלֵּיגְנָא אַמְגוּזֵי, וְאַתְּ פְּלֵיג שִׁיסְקֵי" — Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 60a ("I distribute walnuts, and you distribute שיסקי")

Timeline

• 2nd century CE: שישקי mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud (Rabbi Yehuda's ruling)
• 11th century: Medieval commentators disagree on what שישקי means (peaches? almonds? plums?)
• Late 18th century: Carl Peter Thunberg names the loquat "Japanische Mispel," linking it to the European medlar
• 1870s: Emmanuel Löw's doctoral dissertation proposes שישקי may refer to the medlar as a secondary hypothesis
• 1903: Ben-Yehuda introduces שֶׁסֶק in his pocket dictionary as Hebrew for medlar
• 1913: Yehuda Gur copies the word into his dictionary supplement
• Early 20th century: שסק adopted in Palestine for the loquat (replacing אסכדניה)
• 1930: Language Committee ratifies שסק for both medlar and loquat in Auerbach-Azrachi plant list

Related Words

• שִׁיזַף — jujube (the fruit Löw ultimately concluded שישקי referred to)
• אַסְכִּדְנִיָּה / אסקדיניה — former Hebrew-Arabic name for loquat (from Turkish yenidünya)
• מֶדְלָר — medlar (English); Mispel (German)
• Eriobotrya japonica — scientific name of the loquat