‹ Back to the text

kulle

kulla

masc acc pl of kulla (noun); masc loc sg of kulla (noun); masc acc pl of kulla (adj); nt acc pl of kulla (adj); …

1. boat; raft
2. belonging to the family; part of the home
3. name of an arahant monk; lit. belonging to the home

Built from

• kul — root · family, gather
  From *kuel-, meaning 'to gather or assemble'; found in Sanskrit kula, suggesting a core sense of 'group, household'.
• -a — ending · adjectival
  Forms adjectives from noun stems; here makes 'of or belonging to the family/home'.

Analysis. kulla as adjective derives from kula (family, home) + -a (adjectival suffix), meaning 'of or belonging to the family/home'; as noun, kulla denotes a small boat or raft, possibly from a root meaning 'to hollow out' (related to kavaṭa 'door', suggesting wood-working and hollow vessels).

Etymology. From kula (family, household, group) with adjectival suffix -a; kula cognate with Sanskrit kula, Gothic hairus 'army', Lithuanian šeima 'family', suggesting Indo-European *kuel- 'to gather, assemble'. The noun kulla (boat) may be distinct, from a root meaning 'hollow' or 'to dig', related to Old Norse höll 'hall' (a hollow building).

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

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