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jiṇṇo

jiṇṇa

masc nom sg of jiṇṇa (pp); masc nom sg of jiṇṇa (noun)

1. aged; old; ancient; lit. worn out
2. worn out; spent; old; decayed
3. old man; senior citizen; lit. worn out
4. (of a building) dilapidated; broken down; lit. worn out

Built from

• jiṇṇ — root · grow old, wear out
  From √jṝ, with reduplication and vowel shifts typical of Pali past participles. The concrete image is of material wearing thin through time and use.
• a — ending · masculine nominative singular
  Marks the masculine nominative singular of the -a stem adjective class, used attributively (aged man) and predicatively (he is old).

Etymology. From √jṝ (to grow old, wear away), cognate with Sanskrit jīrṇa, Latin serere (to sow, scatter seed — the primary sense of scattering extends to wearing away), Greek gē̂ras (old age). The root shares Indo-European ancestry with English gear (worn equipment) and German gar (done, worn through). The semantic field moves from physical wearing-down to the passage of time and old age.

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

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