Thanks to everyone who replied to this question. The general consensus is that
the ending is actually -skomu and that it is the "dative case" of the name used
in addresses. Briefly, the dative would be the equivalent of "FOR So-and-So" in
English. >from what I am told, this particular form of the dative occurs across
Russian, Ukrainian, and even Polish, it being a broadly Slavic form. Just
another twist to be aware of when transcribing your ancestors' names.

There is another variation on this particular type of confusion that I have
noticed. The Yiddish form of the name of a town (shtetl) is sometimes taken from
the genitive case of that town name and not the nominative case. The genitive is
what one might find on the window of a store in that town. The example that
comes to mind is Vievio, in Lithuania, which is actually the genitive of Vievis.
Thus one might find the "Vievio Hardware Store" in the town of Vievis, the
equivalent of the English "Hardware Store OF Vievis." I'm sure there are
examples >from across the Pale of Settlement.

Steve Franklin
Baltimore
http://www.lordbalto.com/
If my email ever bounces,
you can always contact me
at my website.

| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Just a thought, but the -u/-onu suffix looks Romanian to my eye!
|
| Brian Neil Burg
| Researching KHARATZ (CHARATZ in th U.S.) and BIK >from Chmielnik & Staraya
| Sinyava, Podolsk Gubernia
|
| In a message dated 8/14/2005 11:29:26 PM Pacific Standard Time,
| ukraine@lyris.jewishgen.org writes:
|
| "My great grandfather, Eudel SCHEFCZINSKY of Gorodische, went by many variati
| ons
| of his name over the years, but the one that fascinates me the most is from
| an
| entry in the Blitzstein Bank Passage Order Book records, where his
| son-in-law,
| my grandfather Samuel (FRENKEL) FRANKLIN, has him as Judku SCHEFCZINSKONU. I
| am curious if anyone recognizes the orthography of this name, that is, where
| would
| this particular rendering have come from? What country--what language--would
| the -u/-onu endings indicate? I realise Judku is a variation on Judke, which
| Eudel also used.