In many Yiddish stories, there is a local (Russian/Eastern European) landowner/aristocrat known as the "poritz" - who were they?

by seeasea

There are hundreds of Yiddish stories (maisehs) or legends from the shtetl. Many of them feature a local landowner as a villain or sort of good guy known as a poritz. What would that be in Russian nobility parlance?

Many of them would have Jewish estate managers invariably called "Moishe" or "moshke"

Often they'd have on their land an inn/tavern known as a "kretchme" as well.

Any explanation of these terms would be helpful.

Thanks

Sergey_Romanov

Porits is the Yiddish term for a landlord (Russian: pomeshchik, помещик), usually a lower-tier noble whose land was originally granted for state or military service. Source: http://chassidus.ru/zichroynoys/dictionary.htm

Initially the pomeshchiki would have owned serfs that worked on the land, which would differentiate them from mere land-owners without peasants; after the 1861 reform it was the term specifically for the land-owning nobility.

Krechme is the Yiddish derivative of a Slavic word meaning a drinking establishment (Rus./Ukr. korchma, корчма; Pol. karczma; etc.), sometimes with a cheap hotel function. So a tavern or an inn.

Moshke/Moisha is of course the name Moshe/Moses.