külək

Has been compared to dialectal Azerbaijani tülex (“wind”),^[2] for which senses “brisk, lively; sly, cunning” have been recorded too (in the form tüləx).^[3] These forms are, no doubt, related to Upper-Kondoma variety of Shor тӱйлек (“mad, crazy; storm, whirlwind”)^[4] and Kondoma Shor тӱӱлек (“storm”) (ib. 388). Levitskaja compares Azerbaijani tülex (“wind”) (seemingly unaware of the senses “brisk, lively; sly, cunning”) with külek and proposes a sound change /k/ -> /t/, deriving the former from the latter.^[5] However, this is implausible, since Azerbaijani tülex has a well-explicable etymology (ultimately ← *tül- 'to be mad'), whereas külek itself is yet unexplained. The sound change of the initial /t/ -> /k/ is rather unprecedented, too, in absence of any visible assimilatory factor, suggesting that tülex is not related, unless reshaped by analogy or re-interpretation.

Compare also dvandva-compounds in Turkmen kül-talkan, Karakalpak kül-talqan, Tuvan хүл-далган (xül-dalgan), Turkmen kül-uşak and dialectal Turkish kül-ufak all meaning “to pieces, into smithereens”, as in “to knock to pieces, to smash into smithereens, to shatter'.^[6] The first element in these compounds corresponds to Azerbaijani kül (“ashes”) (compare e.g. German Schutt und Asche (“wrack and ruin, lit. “rubbish and asches””)). Compare also the second part of the several of the compounds, e.g. Tuvan далган (dalgan, “flour, powder”), which resembles the Oghuz words for 'wave', cf. Azerbaijani dalğa, Turkish dalga and Turkmen tolkun (compare the sea-related senses in Chaghatai), whereas the terms for 'flour' and 'powder' in Oghuz languages go back to other roots. Külək might have originated in such compounds, although this is speculative.