Cuitlahua vs. Cuitlahuac: Etymological problems

[Gordon Whittaker]

Dear Roberto,

Both names present great difficulties, perhaps insurmountable ones.

The place name Cuitlahuac defies all attempts at finding an etymology, I
think. The final -c has to be the postposition -c(o) 'in, at, by', but the
rest is a mystery. I don't know of a text that gives the vowel lengths of
the personal name or the place name, but the place name seems to require a
noun *cuitlahua(tl), which is unknown to me. It cannot be a compound of
cuitla- and huac-, since among other things we would expect -co after a
consonant. Of course, both the personal name and the place name are often
written with cuitla (excrement), but this could just be a phonetic device.

As for the emperor's name, the variant Cuetlahua suggests that we may not
be dealing with a derivative of cuitla- 'excrement'. Hassig renders the
name Cuitlahuah 'Excrement-Owner' (!), which I find extraordinarily
unlikely although morphologically not unreasonable. Simeon renders
cuitlatl as 'llaga, tumor, abceso' in addition to the standard 'excrement'
definition. I do not know what his source for the additional meanings is.
A meaning 'one who has sores' for Cuitlahua would be an ironic case of
nomen est omen, considering the fact that he fell victim to smallpox.
There are no few instances of Nahuatl names, even those of rulers such as
Moquihuix, that are less than flattering to their bearers. Still, I think
there is a chance that the name relates to an as yet unidentified term,
given the fact that Cuitlahuac the town name must go back to cuitlahua- +
-c.

Perhaps one of our lexical experts lurking in the background has some
input here! I hope so.

Best wishes,
Gordon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gordon Whittaker
Professor
Linguistische Anthropologie und Altamerikanistik
Seminar fuer Romanische Philologie
Universitaet Goettingen
Humboldtallee 19
37073 Goettingen
Germany
tel./fax (priv.): ++49-5594-89333
tel. (office): ++49-551-394188
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


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