‹ Back to the text

loko

loka

masc nom sg of loka (noun)

1. world; universe; cosmos
2. world; plane of existence
3. people (of the world); population
4. world of experience; (comm) world of aggregates, sense spheres and elements

Etymology. From Indo-European *lok- 'open space, clearing', cognate with Latin locus 'place', English lea 'meadow' (as in lea-land, open ground), and Greek leukos 'bright, light' (originally 'open, cleared'). The sense evolved from 'open space' to 'inhabited world' to 'universe'. The spatial imagery of openness and clearing remains at the root: a loka is fundamentally a delimited, perceivable space — the world as what lies open to experience.

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

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