passāso

passāsa

masc nom sg of passāsa (noun)

exhalation; breathing out; lit. breathing forward

Built from

pas — root · breathe out
The root √pas means to blow or breathe out. Sanskrit vas- (wind, blow) is a cognate from the same Indo-European family.
āsa — ending · agent
The suffix -āsa nominalized the root into a noun denoting the agent or product of the action—here, the exhalation itself or the act of breathing forward.

Analysis. pas- (breathing) + -āsa (agent suffix); the forward breath exhaled by a living being. Often paired with assāsa (inhalation) to denote the natural breathing cycle.

Etymology. From √pas 'breathe out, blow' (related to Sanskrit *pasyati, *vas 'blow'); the suffix -āsa (like Latin -āx in audax) nominalized the verb. The prefix sense 'forward' (pa- < proto-Indo-European *pro-) appears in the imagery: breathing out and forward, away from the body.

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

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