Cuacha

Matthew Montchalin mmontcha at OREGONVOS.NET
Fri May 21 00:19:32 UTC 2004


butlerpe at PURDUE.EDU wrote:
|Subject: Cuacha
|
|I never write anything on this list but I thought I would on this one.
|In my family, cuacha means "shit" too.

Okay, but is it really a technical 'scientific' sort of word (indicating
a European origin, I will take it) or is it more of a 'taboo' sort of
word (indicating some kind of original Nahuatl sort of word).  Can you
make a guess about its etymology?  If you have studied Classical Latin,
you naturally know about stercus and fimum, neither of which have the
slightest similarity to the Spanish 'caca.'  Sometimes two words tend
to merge if their pronunciation is similar. (For instance, compare
the improbable English 'meld' from German 'meld' "announce" and English
'melt' "mush together.")

Could the Nawatl kwacha represent a fusion of some kind of early
mesoamerican (?) root with a taboo word in Mediaeval Spanish?



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