אלונקה (alunka) — stretcher

Etymology

The modern Hebrew word אלונקה (alunka, "stretcher") has a convoluted origin involving a Talmudic hapax legomenon, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, a misread Russian-Hebrew dictionary, and Yosef Haim Brenner — all in a chain that produced the right word from the wrong chain of meanings.

The story begins in the Talmud. The word אלונקי (alunki) appears in exactly one Talmudic passage, in tractate Beitza (22b), in a discussion of whether it is permissible to arrive at a holiday celebration carried in a sedan chair borne on the shoulders of others. The decisor Rav Yosef gives his ruling with the single word אלונקי, and Rashi explains it as a chair borne on the interlocked arms of two carriers. The word's etymology was debated: Marcus Jastrow proposed a Hebrew/Aramaic derivation from על ענקא ("on the neck"), while Alexander Kohut suggested it was from Persian avrang ("royal throne"). The linguist Shaul Shaked later proposed a more convincing derivation from an unattested Old Persian compound meaning "that which is carried."

In 1896–1897, Ben-Yehuda translated Victor Hugo's "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame" into Hebrew in installments in his newspaper HaTzvi. At one point he needed a word for a palanquin — a carried chair — and coined the form אַלַנְקָה based on the Talmudic אלונקי. He defined it strictly as a palanquin. He then included this word in his 1903 pocket Hebrew-German-Russian dictionary.

Abraham Kahana used Ben-Yehuda's dictionary as a source for his 1907 Russian-Hebrew dictionary, but listed אַלַנְקָה as the translation for the Russian носилки (nоsilki) — which means primarily "stretcher" (though historically it also meant "palanquin"). When Brenner, writing his 1908 story "שנה אחת," searched for the Hebrew for the Russian word "stretcher," he found אַלַנְקָה in Kahana's dictionary and used it in that sense. The form was written אַלַנְקָה or אַלְנָקָה in the earliest appearances.

The final shift to the modern vocalized form אֲלֻנְקָה is attributed to the lexicographer Yehuda Gur, who included it with this vocalization in a supplement to his 1907 dictionary. By 1914, Menachem Poznansky's Hebrew translation of Tolstoy's "Sevastopol Stories" already used the form אלונקה. The earlier אלנקה quickly disappeared from use.

Key Quotes

"בעונג מיוחד היה נוטל את האַלנקה והולך אל ׳השורות האחרונות׳" — Yosef Haim Brenner, "שנה אחת," 1908

"הבקשה שבקש, בשעה ששכב פצוע ע״ג האלונקה" — Menachem Poznansky, Hebrew translation of Tolstoy's Sevastopol Stories, 1914

Timeline

• Talmudic era: אלונקי appears once in tractate Beitza 22b meaning a carried sedan chair
• 1896–1897: Ben-Yehuda coins אַלַנְקָה for "palanquin" in his translation of Notre-Dame de Paris
• 1903: Ben-Yehuda includes אַלַנְקָה in his pocket dictionary
• 1907: Kahana lists אַלַנְקָה as the Hebrew for Russian носилки ("stretcher"); Gur vocalizes it אֲלֻנְקָה in his dictionary supplement
• 1908: Brenner uses אַלנקה in "שנה אחת" to mean "stretcher" — first attestation in this sense
• 1914: Form אלונקה already standard in Poznansky's Tolstoy translation
• 2013+: The phrase "להיכנס מתחת לאלונקה" ("to get under the stretcher," meaning to share a burden) becomes a political cliché

Related Words

• אפריון — palanquin; the word Ben-Yehuda originally intended אלנקה to translate
• נושילקי — Russian word (носилки) for stretcher, the inadvertent source of the meaning shift