Proverbs 20.26 allegorizes the optimal method of scattering the wicked by likening it to the wind-driven separation of chaff from grain. Since the word ʾôpan denotes the tool used for this process, it is proposed here that this term evokes a tuyere, a nozzle through which air is forced in a furnace, rather than a cartwheel, used for the threshing of grain. Functional affinities between ʾôpan and ʾap (= nose), the organ of blowing, together with the lack of a satisfying etymology for ʾôpan as a wheel, suggest that tuyere is the primary meaning of this noun in ancient Canaanite languages. Moreover, the similarity of ancient furnace nozzles to spokeless wheels suggests that the use of ʾôpan to denote a wheel is derived from the primary denotation of the word, a tuyere.
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