Eteocretan isalabre, isaluria

Eteocretan is a non-Greek language attested in a few alphabetic insciptions of ancient Crete, some of which are bilingual¹. This is the case of Dreros 1, where we find the forms isalabre, isaluria, interpreted by Van Effenterre as variants of a compound word translated as 'goat cheese' upon an apparent resemblance of its first member with Greek íksalos '(castrated) male goat', of Pre-Greek origin², as well as a presumed match to the forms turon, turo- (presumably 'cheese') in the Greek text³.

However, I think this interpretation is highly questionable, and in my opinion the fragment et isalabre komn could be translated as 'in/to the town of Isalabre' (Greek kó:mê 'village'⁴). Also the form isala-bre would be an unstressed variant of isal-uría, whose second member can be identified with Thracian -bría 'town' < *wrijā (Tocharian A ri, Tocharian B riye 'town')⁵, a femenine form corresponding to the Greek masculine rhíon 'mountain top, promontory' (Mycenean RI-JO) < *wrijo-.

 

Interestingly enough, in the ancient Kingdom of Urartu (9th-6th centuries BCE) there was a fortress named Ispilibria, Ispilabria, Ispallure⁶ in Assyrian documents and whose resemblance to the Eteocretan forms is amazing: *Ispili-bría, *Ispila-bría, *Ispall-ure, also with an alternance between stressed -bría and unstressed -ure. It's then possible for isalabre, isaluria to be derived from Urartian if we assume a shift -sp- > *-sf- > -s- happened in Eteocretan⁷, so the original forms would be *Ispala-bre, *Ispal-uría.

The first member is possibly reflected in the ancient toponym Ispal/Spal (modern Sevilla), whose possible Phoenician origin hasn't been established.
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¹ It's quite possible, alhough not certain, that Eteocretan is a descendant of Minoan, the Pre-Greek language of Crete attested in Hieroglyphic Cretan and Linear A. 
² There's also a femenine iksalê 'goatskin', with variants isálê, itthélê, ittélê, issélê, isséla, isthlê, itthéla, etc. See R.S.P. Beekes (2010): Etymological Dictionary of Greek, p. 593.

³ See Ray Brown's web page.
⁴ A Pre-Greek word with cognates in Baltic *keĩm-/*kaîm- 'yard', Germanic *xaim- 'home' and Sino-Tibetan *qim (~ *q^wim) 'house'.
⁵ V. Georgiev (1981): Introduction to the History of the Indo-European Languages, p. 112. 

⁶ V. Sarkisian (2007): Onomástica vasco-armenia: comparación a través de reconstrucción.
⁷ But otherwise p > f (φ /ph/ in the Greek alphabet), as in Praisos ~ Fraiso-.

Basque mahats 'grape' (updated)

Basque mahats 'grape' derives from an earlier *baka-tś related to Latin bāca 'berry'¹, with nasalization of the initial labial and lenition *-k- > -h- as a consequence of Martinet's Law, by which Paleo-Basque fortis (i.e. voiceless) stops became h or zero (mostly at word-initial but in the case of the velar stop also medially)². The second member of the compound is a phytonym suffix *-ts found in other words such as e.g. isats 'broom'.

The Latin word has no IE etymology, but Boutkan-Kossmann have proposed a link to Berber *bqā 'blackberry, mulberry'³. In my opinion, this would be a Wanderwort also found in Kartvelian *maqˀw-/*muqˀw- 'blackberry' (Georgian maqˀv-al-, Megrel muʔ-, Svan muqˀw, Laz muqˀ-)⁴ and possibly also Burushaski *maɣar- 'unripe mulberry', Lezghian *niwqˀ:a(j) and Lak qˀul-nuqˀi 'strawberry'. 

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¹ There's also Hispanic Latin bacca 'wine' (Varron). Also Galician-Portuguese bago 'grape' (also found in parts of Leonese) derive from an unattested masculine variant.

² Unfortunately, academic Vascologists think the only source of -h- can be a nasal *-n- (Mitxelena's Law), so they reconstruct a protoform *banatś. See R.L.Trask (2008): Etymological Dictionary of Basque (unfinished).

³ D. Boutkan & M. Kossmann (1999): Some Berber Parallels of European Substratum Words, §3.1, in JIES 27, p. 87-100.

⁴ Borrowed into Akhvakh muqˀ:ali.

Spanish chocho (slang) 'vulva' (updated)

Due to its phonetic features, Spanish chocho /tʃótʃo/ (slang) 'vulva'¹ (with regional variants chocha, chucha) is considered to be of "expressive origin"² by Spanish linguists. However, to me it's a loanword from Basque txotxo /tʃótʃo/ (B, G) 'penis' (child word), a variant of tutu (B) 'vulva', (L) 'spout (of a jar)', (Bazt, L), ttuttu /cucu/ (Bazt, L) 'feeding bottle'³. 

 


This etymology refers to the labia ('lips' in Latin), and thus I'd link the above words to Germanic *tut- 'to project' (Dutch tuit ‘spout, nozzle’, Middle Dutch tute ‘nipple, pap’, Middle Low German tute ‘horn; funnel’), Kartvelian (Georgian) čˀočˀ- 'peak, tip, spout (of a jug)', East Caucasian *t(t)ʃot(t)ʃV 'tip, spout' (Chechen cˀuzam 'spout (of a tea-pot, jug)', Lezghian cˀucˀ 'spout (of a tea-pot), Kryz cˀɨcˀ 'clitoris; ring-stone'), and Tungusic *tʃitʃu- 'penis, spout (of a tea-pot)'.
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¹ The homonymous chocho 'white lupin' is a loanword from Mozarabic śóś < Latin salsu- 'salted'. See F. Corriente (2003): Diccionario de arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance, p. 287. 

² It must be remarked that expressiveness (a goal which can be achieved by mimicking children language, as in e.g. expressive palatalization, extensively used in Basque for conveying an affective or diminutive meaning) doesn't necessarily implies a phonosymbolic (i.e. onomatopoeic) origin.

³ There's also the homonymous tutu, ttuttu 'tube, pipe; horn, bugle', conflated by Bengtson.