"beyond the pale"

Joel S. Berson Berson at ATT.NET
Thu Dec 30 22:01:02 UTC 2010


Does the OED need a quotation for "beyond the
pale" that specifically connotes the Russian Pale
of Settlement?  The meaning there is "outside or
beyond the bounds (of)", not "outside the limits
of acceptable behaviour; unacceptable or
improper".  The only quotation (August 2010)
associated with the Jews is "1974    A. Goddard
Vienna Pursuit ii. 60   The Jews were shown to be
beyond the pale—untermenschen who had murdered
Christ.", which unfortunately does have the negative connotation.

There are 13,600 raw GBooks hits for "beyond the
pale" + Jews, going back to perhaps the 1870s in
the context of the Russian pale.
      Perhaps this, from 1884: _The Jewish
question in Russia_, Pavel Pavlovich Demidov
(principe Di San Donato): "Lastly, frequently
expelled and driven from country to country and
treated as being beyond the pale of the law, the
Jews found that money served them as the only
means of salvation and enabled them to purchase their right to existence. ...")
      Or this, from 1871:  _HISTORY OF THE WOROD
FROM THE EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE PRESENT TIME_,
EVERT A. DUYCKINCK: "In 1850 an equally
oppressive ukase forbade altogether the practice
prevalent among Jewish women in Russia of cutting
... of the Inquisition over them should cease,
and their position beyond the pale of civil society otherwise amended. ..."

Joel

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