"Cannot open termcap database file"

[kj]

The Emacs port provided by MacPorts (Emacs 23.2.1) won't start on
OS X Snow Leopard.

The error message is:

emacs: "Cannot open termcap database file"

This error has already been reported to MacPorts, but there's no
activity on fixing the problem, so I want to try fix it myself.

The first thing to figure out is where is Emacs looking for this
termcap file?  I want to determine whether it is missing altogether,
or is there but is inaccessible to Emacs for some reason.

Can someone tell me what filenames and directories to search for
this file?

Second, supposing it is missing, where can I find a suitable termcap
database file?  Alternative, is there a way to circumvent this
requirement?

Thanks!

~kj

P.S. The Emacs that comes with OS X starts up, but it is version
22, but I installed the MacPorts port of Emacs because I needed 
version 23.