“Tvrbvl bothers me considerably. I am hunting in vain for some known epithet of Venus which might help me. Let us see, what do you say to TVRBVLENTA? Venus who troubles, agitates?... You see that I am always possessed by her wicked expression. TVRBVLENTA, that is not at all a bad epithet for Venus,” I added in a modest tone, for I was not very well satisfied myself with my explanation.
“Venus the Turbulent! Venus the Rowdy! Ah! Then you believe that my Venus is a tavern Venus, do you? Not at all, sir; she is a well-bred Venus. But I’ll explain this TVRBVL ... to you. Though you must promise not to divulge my discovery before my paper is printed. Because, you see, I am proud of this find.... You might as well leave us poor devils of provincials some ears to glean. You are so rich, you learned gentlemen of Paris!”
From the top of the pedestal, where I was still perched, I solemnly promised him that I would never be so dishonourable as to rob him of his discovery.
“Tvrbvl ..., sir,” said he, coming nearer and lowering his voice, for fear any one besides me might hear him, “read TVRBVLNERAE.”
“I am still no wiser.”
“Listen! A league from here, at the foot of the mountain, there is a village called Boulternère. That is a corruption of the Latin word TVRBVLNERA. Nothing more common than these inversions. Boulternère, sir, was a Roman town. I always suspected so, but I never had evidence for it. The evidence is here! This Venus was the local deity of the city of Boulternère; and this word Boulternère, of which I have just demonstrated the ancient origin, proves a thing more curious still, namely, that Boulternère, before being a Roman town, was a town of the Phœnicians!”
He paused for a moment to take breath and enjoy my surprise. I managed to repress a strong desire to laugh.
“In fact,” he continued, “TVRBVLNERA is pure Phœnician; TVR, pronounce TOOR.... Toor and SOOR, the same word, are they not? Sur is the Phœnician name of Tyre; I need not remind you of its meaning. Bvl is Baal; Bâl, Bel, Bul, slight difference of pronunciation. As for NERA, that gives me a little trouble. I am inclined to think, failing a Phœnician word, that it comes from the Greek νηρός, moist, marshy. The word would then be a hybrid. To justify νηρός, I’ll show you at Boulternère how the streams from the mountains form pestilential marshes there. On the other hand, the termination NERA might have been added much later in honour of Nera Pivesuvia, wife of Tetricus, who may have rendered some benefit to the city of Turbul. But, looking to the marshes, I prefer the derivation from νηρός.”
He took a pinch of snuff with a satisfied air.
“But let us leave the Phœnicians and return to the inscription. I translate, then, ‛To Venus of Boulternère Myron dedicates at her command this statue, his work.’”