On mushrooms and lips in Spanish: Etymology and semantics of seta and jeta

The paper suggests a solution to an old unsolved problem concerning the origin of Spanish seta ‘mushroom’. A critical analysis of the existing theories, including those of the Spanish academicians J. Corominas and V. Garcia de Diego, is held. The author uses data from Classical languages, some Germanic, Slavic, Romance languages and dialects, and Basque. Seta is studied along with hongo ‘mushroom’ and jeta ‘prominent lips, snout’. These three words are analysed in parallel with Russian grib ‘mushroom’ and guba ‘lip’. It is concluded that seta is related to gilled mushrooms, and Latin saepta ‘dividing walls’ is proposed as its etymon. This idea was mentioned by Corominas but it was firmly rejected by him.