From: benlizro@ihug.co.nz   
      
   On 25/08/2025 8:08 a.m., DDeden wrote:   
   >   
   > Camphor, a white crystalline tree resin, from PMP qapuR : lime from burnt   
   coral/shell, for betel chewing, also a white crystalline powder, used around   
   SEA but not at Vanatua where kava2 usage originated (kava <~ qapuR?).   
   >   
   > https://groups.io/g/1WorldofWords/message/630   
   >   
   > Camphor sounds similar to camp, kampong, kampf, xyuambuatl; perhaps derived   
   from use of calcium for cement or ceramic?   
   > Was powdered limestone mixed with mud or manure in house (mortar, brick,   
   adobe?) construction?   
   >   
   > QapuR distinct from kapu = taboo   
   >   
   > Camphor was burnt at Batu Caves, M'sia during Thaipusam Indian festival   
   which I attended.   
   >   
      
   Camphor sounds to me like a product of medieval technology, hence not   
   likely to be of any great antiquity in Austronesian cultures or   
   languages. Blust has a PAN *dakeS for the camphor laurel (Cinnamomum   
   spp.), but attested only in Formosan languages.   
   Otherwise nothing.   
      
   OED traces English "camphor" and the other European words through Arabic   
   kāfūr, and kāpūr in Old Persian, Hindi and Malay. They also cite a   
   Sanskrit karpūram, but don't say how early that form is (they never do),   
   or whether there is any evidence whether it's a local formation or a   
   borrowing. I would see the Malay word as a straight borrowing from India   
   or Persia, particularly given the long vowels in both syllables.   
   My 1960s Eng-Indo dictionary doesn't even give a word for camphor. (It's   
   not as common a household product as it used to be.)  However, Winstedt   
   says it's Malay kapor Barus. I don't know what "Barus" is supposed to   
   mean there, but "kapor" is defnitely lime or lime-kiln. So clearly   
   somebody saw a resemblance with that other white crystalline substance.   
      
   PAN *qapuR, PMP *kapuR for lime (calcium carbonate), made by burning   
   shell or coral limestone, used in betel-chewing, have reflexes all   
   through AN as far as the Solomons. And, as you say, that's where the   
   betel stops and kava begins. I don't think the name of Piper methysticum   
   is related to the lime words. Proto-Oceanic *kawa is based on   
   Polynesian, southern Vanuatu and a scattering of other cognate forms.   
   (In most of Vanuatu it's called *maloqu.) John Lynch's conclusion was   
   that it was a metathetic variant of *wakaR 'root'.   
      
   The word *qapuR is still around in Vanuatu, often with adjacent senses   
   such as "ashes" or "dust". Lime itself had other uses -- notably for   
   bleaching hair (or even a head-covering when out fishing -- Buck, Samoan   
   Material Culture) -- so the making of it never disappeared. In Fijian   
   and Polynesian it's called *lase -- originally the coral rock from which   
   it's derived.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)