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nigacchanti

nigacchati

pr 3rd pl of nigacchati (verb)

1. (of something bad) suffers; experiences; undergoes; falls (into); lit. goes down

Built from

• ni — prefix · down, into
  Concrete sense of downward motion, here applied to falling into suffering or a bad state of being.
• gacchati — stem · goes
  3rd person plural present of √gam (go); cognate with English come, Latin venire. The verb expresses motion downward into a condition.

Analysis. ni- (down, into) + gacchati (goes); lit. 'goes down into', hence to fall into a bad state or experience suffering.

Etymology. ni- (down, into; cognate with English nether, German nieder) + √gam (go; cognate with English come, Latin venire). The spatial sense of descent into a lower state becomes the sense of falling into suffering or a bad destination.

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

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