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gopayato

gopayanta

masc dat sg of gopayanta (prp); nt dat sg of gopayanta (prp); masc gen sg of gopayanta (prp); nt gen sg of gopayanta (prp)

1. guarding; watching; protecting

Built from

• go — root · cattle, herd
  Originally the animals tended; as a nominal element in gopayanta, it narrows the verbal meaning to protecting livestock. Cognate with Sanskrit gau, Greek bous (cattle), English cow.
• p — root · guard, protect
  Part of the verbal root √gup; the p marks causative action. Cognate with Sanskrit gopāya (causative of gup) and English keep.
• aya — stem · causative
  The causative suffix, making the verb transitive: 'cause to guard' > 'guard actively'.
• anta — ending · present participle
  The -anta ending marks the present participle, agreeing here in dative or genitive case to modify a noun.

Etymology. From √gup (to guard, protect), cognate with Sanskrit gopāyati and English "keep" (both from Indo-European *gew- to bend, curve — originally "to tend, care for"). The sense of guarding animals (go- "cattle") sharpened the root's meaning from general care to vigilant protection.

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

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