‹ Back to the text

gacchati

pr 3rd sg of gacchati (verb)

1. goes; walks; moves; wanders around; travels
2. becomes; lit. goes

Built from

• gacch — stem · go, walk
  Present stem of √gam with -ch- infix characteristic of the second conjugation. The root √gam (to go) is ancient, shared with Sanskrit gam- and Indo-European cognates like English "come" and Latin "venire".
• a — ending · 3rd singular
  The thematic vowel and person-ending marking third singular present indicative active voice.
• ti — ending · present
  The present marker completing the 3rd singular present indicative form.

Etymology. From √gam (to go), cognate with English "come" and Latin "venire". The present stem gacch- shows the characteristic -ch- infix of Pali's second-conjugation class; the Sanskrit cognate is gacchati with identical formation. The root *gem- in Indo-European yielded English "come" (from Germanic *kwem-), suggesting the shared semantic field of motion. Pali gacchati is used both literally (for physical movement) and figuratively (for becoming, undergoing a state).

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

Lite mode — plain HTML for e-readers and old browsers. Full version