Is the Tocharian Mule an “Iranian Horse” or a “Turkic Donkey”? Further examples for Proto-Turkic */t₂/ [ts]

Tocharian B etswe ‘mule’ is a newly attested word. It has been identified as a loan from Iranian *atswa (< Proto-Indo-European *h₁ék̂wos ‘horse’). The present study proposes a Turkic etymology for the Tocharian word in question. It has been suggested that the Proto- Turkic form *ät₂gä [ɛtsʰˈɣɛ] ‘donkey’, the origin of the Common Turkic äšgäk and Khalaj äšgä, is the source of the Tocharian B etswe. Tocharian /w/ is a substitution of the Proto-Turkic phoneme */g/. An etymology has also been proposed for Proto-Turkic *ät₂gä. According to this, the form *ät₂gä originally denotes ‘eared (animal)’ and derives from the root *ät₂i ‘ear’, which is also the root of the verb *ät₂id- ‘to hear’ (> Common Turkic äšid-, Chuvash ilt-). The Proto-Turkic root *ät₂i ‘ear’ is related to the Akkadian ḫasīsu(m) /hatsītsu(m)/ ‘ear; wisdom’ and further Akkadian loanwords in Turkic are discussed.