Re: [tied] Re: IE cockroach / kakerlak

But could that have been a folk or naive etymology? Or
maybe even a euphemizing etymology < kaka-lekker
"dookie-licker" (vel sim)?

--- Francesco Brighenti <frabrig@...> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen"
> <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> > Du., Ger., Da. kakerlak (spelled variously),
> supposedly a loan from
> > Spanish.
>
> I found an interesting etymolgy for kakerlak etc.
> (cf. French
> cancrelat) mentioned in Henry Yule's _Hobson-Jobson_
> under the
> assumption that these terms for cockroach are
> derived from the
> Portuguese word "caca-lacca", whose tentative
> etymology is provided
> in Jacobus Bontius' _De medicina Indorum_ (1631):
>
> http://tinyurl.com/35m22z
>
> "Scarabaeos autem hos Lusitani caca-laccas vocant,
> quod ova quae
> excludunt, colorem et laevorem laccae factitiae...
> referant"
> (tentative translation: "But the Portuguese call
> these beetles, caca-
> laccas because the eggs they hatch resemble the
> colour and
> polishness of sealing-wax").
>
> Portuguese caca = excrement; lacca (actually this is
> the medieval
> Latin form -- in Portuguese it should be laca) =
> lac.
>
> Thus, caca-lacca = 'lac-like excrement'?
>
> Photo of cockroach egg-cases:
>
> http://tinyurl.com/2mzd8l
>
> If this etymology proves true, kakerlak etc. aren't
> cognate to
> Spanish cucaracha / English cockroach etc.
>
> Best,
> Francesco
>
>
>
>
>
>

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