Thursday word: afikomen

[prettygoodword.livejournal.com]

Sorry for missing last week's post, but I was so wrapped up in the last day of preparations for Passover that I completely forgot. So in honor of the holiday:


afikomen (ah-fee-KOH-muhn) - n., a piece broken off from a matzo during a Passover Seder and put aside to be eaten at the end of the meal.


This is then eaten as the desert, after which nothing more can be eaten that night -- though there's still two more glasses of wine to consume. Among Ashkenazi Jews (I can't speak for Sephardim here) there are two traditions: that the leader of the Seder hides it for the children to find, or that the children steal it from the leader -- either way, the leader "ransoms" the afikomen with a toy or other gift, as the service cannot continue without eating it. Then it's broken up for all eat a piece, after which the Seder goes on. The word entered English around 1890, though it's not used much except by Jews, from Yiddish afikoymen, from Hebrew aphīgōmān, from Greek epikṓmion, a revel (according to the Jerusalem Talmud) or dessert (according to the Babylonian Talmud).

This year our daughter was old enough to search for the afikomen, and ransomed it for a toy plane.

---L.

Comments

[deborahkla.livejournal.com]

This is lovely. I remember hunting for the afikomen as a kid and really enjoying it, so the word caught my eye right away. Thanks for providing the Yiddish, Hebrew and Greek roots.