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bupkis

noun
/ˈbʌp.kɪs/

Etymology

Borrowed prior to 1931 from Yiddish באָבקעס (bobkes), plural of באָבקע (bobke, “goat or sheep dropping”), from באָב (bob, “bean”) + ־קע (-ke) calquing Polish bobek (“oval-shaped turd”), ultimately from Proto-Slavic *bobъ (“bean, fava bean”). Popularized by American Jewish writer Sam Denoff in mid-1960s The Dick Van Dyke Show.

  1. derived from *bobъ✻ — “bean, fava bean”
  2. borrowed from באָבקעס

Definitions

  1. Absolutely nothing

    Absolutely nothing; nothing of value, significance, or substance.

    • We searched for hours and found bupkis.
    • But we did nothing, absolutely bupkis that day / And I say, what the hell am I doing drinking in L.A. at 26?
    • She answered her own question. “Without the connection to other people,” she said, “you have bupkis.”

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for bupkis. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA