Splendid thread.
I’m a new student of Arabic, and was wondering about the origin of burtuqal.
I would submit that the use of the term “Portugal” (or burtuqal) to mean “orange” is simply a case of semantic broadening, wherein a once very specific term, is substituted for a more generic term. This is a commonly occurs among and across all languages.
In modern English I would cite as examples:
kleenex, xerox, and fridgidaire (the last a dated reference)
Once these were brand names, but they’ve come to represent the generic category for the product / process.
Citrus fruits have been cultivated in the Mediterranean basin since at least Roman times. Probably of Chinese origin (whence “Apfelsinen” and similar European names) what we commonly refer to as the orange, arrived in the Iberian Peninsula before the millennium, bearing its Persian moniker, “naranja”.
Google orange origin 976 citron bitter patio for this reference:
The origin of the orange, following the work of the foremost botanist on the genus Citrus, Professor Tyozaburo Tanaka, is an area in southeast China around the provinces of Yunnan and Guangxi. The date of domestication of the orange is not known, and its taxonomy is quite confused. It is known that the orange arrived in the Mediterranean with the Arabs, and by A. D. 976 the chamberlain al-Mansur planted the Patio de los Naranjos (courtyard of the oranges) in Córdoba, this being one of the earliest mentions of the orange in Spain. The only citrus fruit cited in the anonymous agricultural treatise the Cordavan Calender written in 961, is the citron, larger than a lemon and used for perfumes, medicines, and liqueurs. By the twelfth century, oranges were being grown in the courtyards of palaces, mosques, and many houses in Spain. This was the sour or bitter orange, the sweet orange came later, although some sour oranges are relatively sweet.
There were many varieties of oranges, including “bitter orange”. The “sweet orange” is also known as the “Portugal orange”. I’m surmising here, but it’s likely that this superior “Portugal” variety came to dominate the marketplace, and became the “standard”. (Like VHS.) Microeconomics explains a lot in language. The Greek and Turkish preference for “portokal/portokalli” is nicely explained by Mediterranean trading routes.
Search botanical.com "orange" for the "Portugal" reference. (I can's post URL's yet.)
In a similar manner, the word for “peach” arrived in English. Derived from malus Persica, or “Persian apple”, The ‘r’ was lost – probably by regressive assimilation into Italian (cf. “octo” to “otto”) to likely “pessica”. (Need help from an Italian linguist.) The French adopted as “peche”, whence “peach” en Anglais. Note that the German “Pfirsche” and Serbocroatian “breskva” retain the ‘r’ from <pers/pars>, though affricating and voicing the initial vowels respectively.
In Spanish, “naranja” means orange, but “jugo de china” means “orange juice”, preserving the China moniker. Germans can buy either “Apfelsinensaft” or “Orangensaft”, it’s the same juice.
I’m a fan of a branch of linguistics dealing with naming & especially place names:
The origin of the name “Portugal” is from Porto-Galicia. The <gal> means “Celt”, the previous tenants of the Iberian peninsula. Ditto the old name for France “Gaul”, “Galicia/Halych” in Poland/Ukraine, Galat,a, Romania, and Galatae in Asia Minor. (Letter from Paul to the Galatians).
In the Gallegos region of Spain, they still wear kilts (there’s Celt again), and play bagpipes at traditional ceremonies. The Greeks called the northern tribes “keltoi”. The Roman alphabet, lacking a ‘k’ spelt it “Celt”.
