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apucchi

aor 3rd sg of apucchi (verb); aor 2nd sg of apucchi (verb)

1. asked; enquired (somebody about)

Built from

• ā — prefix · toward (the speaker)
  Reverses motion verbs to center on the speaker; no common European cognate. Here it reorients √prach 'reach out to ask' into 'ask toward' (completed action).
• prach — root · ask, inquire
  Sanskrit pṛcchati 'asks'; cognate with English preach, Latin precari 'pray'. The root's concrete sense is reaching out to request information.
• i — ending · 3rd singular present stem
  This ending marks the thematic verb stem in present and aorist formations; in the aorist context here, it builds the stem for the aorist forms.

Analysis. ā + √prach, with ā reversing the motion sense of √prach ('reach out to ask') into 'ask toward the speaker'; the prefix ā- turns the root's sense of reaching outward into a completed inward orientation.

Etymology. √prach 'ask, inquire' (Sanskrit pṛcchati 'asks'; cognate with English preach, Latin precari 'pray', Greek prassō 'do, accomplish'). The prefix ā- reverses the root's spatial sense from 'reaching out toward' into 'toward the speaker', giving apucchati 'ask (directing toward oneself)', hence 'ask about, inquire'.

Meanings from the Digital Pāḷi Dictionary; morphology and etymology by Claude.

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