Initial labials in Basque

Unlike what we've seen in last post, the native result of Latin and Romance f- in Basque is /p/, lenied to /b/ in the standard variety at word-initial: 

Latin fāgu- 'beech' > romance *fago > Basque pago, bago id. (but also fago)

Latin fīcu- 'fig' > Romance *fīco > Basque p(h)iko, biku id. (but also fiko, fiku)

Germanic *fīlō 'file' > Spanish filosa 'sword, knife' > Basque piruxe 'scissors'
Latin fīlu- 'thread' > Basque p(h)iru, biru id. (but also firu)
Latin fōnte- 'source, spring' > Basque ponte, ponde 'baptismal font' 

Latin fōrma- 'mould' > Basque borma 'wall'

Latin fortia- 'strength' > Romance *fortsa >  Basque bortxa 'force, violence'
Latin fortis 'strong' > Basque portitz, bortitz 'hard, strong'
Romance *freca 'stroke' > Basque p(h)ereka id. (but also fereka)  

Latin fronte- 'forehead' > Basque boronde, boronte id.
Latin furca- 'pitchfork' > Basque urka 'pitchfork, gallows'

Also *w from Latin v- (and in some cases also b-) became /p/:

Latin bēstia- 'animal' > Basque piztia, pisti(a) 'beast, pest'
Latin brāca- 'trousers' > Basque prakak (plural)  'trousers' (but also frakak)
Latin gaudiu- 'joy' > Romance *got^s [wot^s]¹ > Basque poz, bo(t)z 'joy, happiness'
Latin vēsīca- 'urine bladder; blister' > Basque pu(t)xika 'urine bladder'
Latin viride- 'green' > Romance verde> Basque p(h)erde, berde id. (but also ferde)
Latin voluntāte- 'will, desire' > Basque borondate, boront(h)ate id.
Latin vulture- > Romance *wutre² > Basque putre id. (but also futre)

By contrast, a minoritary set of words has a nasal /m/ instead:

Celtic *bakko- 'hook, (curved) stick' > Basque mako 'hook; pitchfork, prong; walking-stick, shepherd's staff', mak(h)ila, mak(h)illa 'stick' (diminutive)
Romance barca 'boat' > Basque marka id.
Late Latin persica- 'peach' > Basque mertxika 'apricot, peach' 
Latin pīca- 'magpie' > Basque mika id.
Latin portu- '(mountain) pass' > Basque mortu, maurtu 'desert' (but also portu)
Latin vāgīna- 'sheath' > Basque magina, magiña 'sheath, pod'
Latin vascellu- 'little glass' > Basque maskelu, maskillo 'little cauldron'

Even more oddly, in some dialectal words the initial labial becomes a dental /d/ (/l/ in the standard variety):

Romance banca 'small bench' > Basque lanka, lanke id.
Romance *pendiolu- 'hanging'³ > Basque dindullu 'earrings'
Latin verberāre 'to whip, to hit, to beat' > Basque dirdira 'sunshine reflection'
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¹ Spanish gozo < *got^so.
² Asturian utre &lt.
³ Catalan penjoll.

Initial pl-,fl- in Basque

As it's well known, Basque abhors "muta cum liquida" clusters and thus we've got boronde, boronte < Latin fronte- and p(h)ereka, fereka 'stroke' from Romance *freca < Latin fricāre 'to rub'. 

There's however a number of words where Latin pl-, fl- have given Basque l-: 

Latin plācet 'it pleases' > Basque laket 'pleasure'

Latin plānu- 'flat' > Basque lau(n), leu(n), legun 'flat, smooth'
Latin plūma- 'feather' > Basque luma id.

Latin flamma- 'flame, fire' > Basque lama 'flame, heat'
Latin flore- 'flower' > Basque lore id.

The evolution fl- > l-¹ can also be found in Spanish words such as lacio < *flaccidu- 'flacid' and the personal name Laín < Flavinus. IMHO this could be explained if these labials were realized as a voiceless bilabial fricative [φ] like in Proto-Celtic², where IE *pl- became *φl- and later l- in Celtic languages. Of course, we should expect the same evolution in genuine Celtic loanwords in Basque³:

Celtic *φlāro- 'floor' > Basque larre 'meadow'

Celtic *φletro- 'hide, leather' > Basque larru, narru 'skin'

IMHO, the realization of /f/ as [φ] (which in fact is the usual pronounciation in most of Northern Spain (also including Basque-speaking areas) would explain the aspiration of Latin f- as h- in Gascon and Spanish⁴.  

In Basque, this consonant disappears at word-initial, mostly before back vowels, where also /p/was realized as [φ]:

Romance *fīco 'fig' [φiko] > Basque iko id.

Latin fīlu- 'thread' [φilu] > Basque iru id.
Romance *fondo 'bottom' [φondo] > Basque ondo 'side, bottom' 
Romance *fongo 'fungus' [φongo] > Basque onddo 'mushroom'
Latin fōrma- 'mould' [φorma] > Basque horma, orma 'wall'
Latin frāga- 'strawberry' [φ(a)raga] > Basque arraga, araga id.⁵
Romance pollo 'chicken' [φoλo] > Basque oilo 'hen'
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¹ However, in most words the cluster fl- became assimilated to pl-, then palatalized in Spanish and Portuguese, as in flamma- > Spanish llama, Portuguese chama. 
² In Proto-Celtic, PIE *p became a voiceless bilabial fricative *φ (then lost in the daughter Celtic languages) at word-initial and intervocally, but *b in other contexts.
³ In fact, there's ample evidence of Celtic toponymy in the Westernmost part of the Basque country, suggesting the area was previously inhabited by Celtic speakers. 

⁴ Unlike Gascon, Spanish never aspirates clusters fl-, fr- (see note 1). Also Castilian alone doesn't aspirate f- when followed by /w/ (resulting from diphtongation of Latin short /o/), hence fonte- > fuente. However, this doesn't happen in Cantabrian and Eastern Asturian varieties, where we find /xwénte/ instead.

⁵ In the variant arraga, [φr] evolved to a trill [rr], which then adquired a prothetic vowel. Compare Gascon ahraga. 

Dwellings

Latin colō 'to inhabit, to dwell' (hence in-cola 'inhabitant', in-quil-īnus 'tenant') is derived by Indo-Europeanists from PIE *k^wel- 'to turn', assuming the original meaning was 'to turn up soil'. However, this explanation strikes me as a bad one, so I searched for a better etymology.

I see here a PIE A root *k^wel- 'to dwell' (homonymous with the above one) cognate to PAltaic *gù:lí 'dwelling, cottage'.  This is in turn related to PNC *qəlV 'house, hut', which gives also Kartvelian *xl- 'to dwell' (hence *sa-xl- 'house' and PIE B *sel- 'dwelling, settlement' (Latin solum, PGermanic *sala-), an instance of Fournet's Law¹.

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¹ See my earlier post for more information.