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nāssa

opt 3rd sg of nāssa (verb); opt 2nd sg of nāssa (verb)

1. would not be
2. not to him; nor for him
3. nor his

Built from

• na — prefix · not, no
  Plain negation, cognate with Sanskrit na, Greek and Latin negations, English no. Here it negates the optative of 'to be'.
• assa — stem · would be
  Optative of atthi 'is', from the root *h₂es- (Indo-European 'to be'). Cognates: Sanskrit as-, Latin esse, English is. The optative marks hypothetical or conditional mood.

Analysis. na (negation) + assa (optative of atthi, 'to be'). The contraction shows sandhi: final -a of na drops before initial a- of assa, leaving nāssa.

Etymology. na is the ancient negation (Sanskrit na, Greek oa- in oudeis 'no one', English un-); assa is the optative stem of atthi 'is', from Indo-European *h₂es- 'to be' (Sanskrit as-, Latin esse, English is). Together they express conditional non-being or negation of possession.

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

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