Supposes my toeses?

September 9, 2009 5:32 PM

Can someone help me figure out the meaning of this toe-based Eastern European nursery rhyme?

This was a favorite one with my grandmother; she was Ukrainian/Austrian in lineage, so I'm guessing the language is Ukrainian, but it might also be a borrowing from Polish/Slovak/Russian/etc. neighbors.

It worked a little like the Five Little Piggies rhyme in English. Phonetically, it went:

Hodick (or "hodig"??),
Bubbick,
Chichinitchka,
Kookawitchka,
And staaatty chook, chook, chook!

As she said the first line, she squeezed the big toe, then onwards across the foot, until at the last line she grabbed the pinkie toe and shook it violently back and forth (much squealing ensuing from the child).

I'd love to know what these lines might actually mean, and if anyone else has heard of this rhyme. Oh, and apologies for my horrible, horrible transliteration-- I'll be happy to answer any follow-up questions about specific sounds, if it might help. Thanks!!

posted by gallusgallus to Writing & Language (8 answers total)

Maybe this will help - people searching for a Scandinavian similar idea. It looks like several languages have the same rhyme, so the translation might give you somewhere to start.
posted by Solon and Thanks at 5:57 PM on September 9, 2009

for what it's worth that doesn't sound Russian or Ukranian to me
posted by pyro979 at 7:04 PM on September 9, 2009

Seconding what pyro979 said. I'm going to guess Polish or possibly even Yiddish?
posted by chez shoes at 7:49 PM on September 9, 2009

I found a this thread about Polish nursery rhymes, and none of them look like what you wrote. It's not anything I remember from my Polish childhood, and those don't seem to be Polish words.
posted by capsizing at 8:29 PM on September 9, 2009

Definitely not Polish word sounds there, according to a native speaker of that language reading over my shoulder here.
posted by Listener at 9:43 PM on September 9, 2009

I can tell you 'Kookawitchka' might mean 'cowardly'. 'Kukavica' in Serbian means cuckoo (literally), or coward (figuratively) - the 'c' is pronounced 'ts'.
posted by Dragonness at 9:45 PM on September 9, 2009

I have been wondering about my mom's family's "Stow-toe, titilla, teleroast, monkey-fruit, KUBGUSS!" toe rhyme for years. We're pretty much pan-European mongrels, so I don't even know what language it could be bastardized from. I now think it was just made up by somebody.
posted by Methylviolet at 9:14 AM on September 10, 2009

Looking at the Polish Wikipedia article for "finger", it's worth noting that "kciuk" ("kCHOOK") is the thumb. Might this be your big toe, and you're remembering the rhyme backwards?

"Hodig" also sounds a lot like "hallux", the Latin name for your big toe. In Polish, it's called "paluch", but could sound like "hodig" if the voice was being overly infantilized/baby-spoken.
posted by mdonley at 7:42 PM on August 29, 2010