All Portuguese etymological dictionaries
quote a Hispanic Latin *apopores for abobora.
It's intriguing that all
cucumber/gourd/pumpkin words seem to fall into a *kW-kW/*p-p scheme. Just
coincidence? Greek pepon < *kWekWo-, sikyon < *some Pre-Greek <
*kWiKuWo- ?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ishinan: No coincidence!
Since the word originates in Ancient Egyptian as "qwqw": Referring to a wild gourd belonging to the family of the cucumber-like plants,
some of which are poisonous. The species here referred to is probably
(Cucumis prophetarum).
In the Bible the Cucumis prophetarum, is the gourd
which "the sons of the prophets" shred by mistake into their
pottage.
FYI: The LXX. render the word by "wild pumpkin."Heb.
"pakkuoth" cf. Ar. Khiyar
"Faqquws." It abounds in Syria, Egypt, and
Arabia. With more probability also regarded as the cucurbita
the al-qar3 of the Arabs, a kind of pumpkin peculiar to the
East. It is grown in great abundance on the alluvial banks of the Nile in
Egypt and theTigris in Iraq (on the plain between the river and the
ruins of Nineveh.)
Click the Url below for definition and source:
All the best
Ishinan