Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Money; cash.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun US, slang Cash, money.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Yiddish mazume, mezumen, cash, from Medieval Hebrew məzummān, fixed currency, from Mishnaic Hebrew, fixed, passive participle of zimmēn, to arrange, invite, from Hebrew zəmān, appointed time, from Aramaic zəmān, zəman, from Akkadian simānu, season, time, from wasāmu, asāmu, to be fitting; see wsm in Semitic roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Yiddish מזומן (mezumen, "cash"), from Hebrew מְזוּמָּן (m'zummān, "prepared, ready; cash"), passive present participle of זִימֵּן (zimmēn, "to prepare, appoint").

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Examples

  • They can sure shed mazuma, but they can't work, or turn out of bed in the morning.

    THE MEAT 2010

  • Oh, they are real hummers, your boss and mine, when it comes to sheddin 'the mazuma an' never mindin 'other folks' feelin's.

    THE MEAT 2010

  • They can give orders an 'shed mazuma, but, as you say, they're plum babes.

    THE MEAT 2010

  • What concerns me is despite all the evidence of falsehood being out there, certainly in the blogoshere, concerning yellowcake, alluminium tubes, mobile biological weapons laboratories, Sadam Hussein's sponsorship of al Qaeda etc, the goverment and the opposition apparently fell for, which frankly has brought me to the conclusion that the real scandal is the sale of our foreign policy by politicians, turning their heads away while crasping mazuma in their palms.

    Things Can Only Get... Or Lest We Forget 2007

  • Punch and Go, of the North; he taught them to work in factories, to wear Klassy Kollege Klothes, and to shout, “Oh, you baby doll, watch me gather in the mazuma.”

    Main Street 2004

  • If "yours truly" ever gets a large bunch of the mazuma

    Love Letters of a Rookie to Julie Barney Stone

  • "What aire we goin 'ter do with all this yere mazuma?" asked Bud, looking over the stacks of fifties, twenties, tens, and fives that lay on the table around which they were sitting in the living room, and which was flanked by piles of gold and a few hundred-dollar bills.

    Ted Strong's Motor Car Edward C. Taylor

  • What I'd like to know is how a man who couldn't pay you a tenner collected all that mazuma.

    The Saint in Action Charteris, Leslie 1937

  • It's all settled, if only I can connect with the mazuma.

    The Little Nugget 1928

  • I should worry, 76 In its way, is correct English, but in essence it is as completely Yiddish as kosher, ganof, schadchen, oi-yoi, or mazuma.

    Chapter 6. Tendencies in American. 4. Foreign Influences Today Henry Louis 1921

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