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purohito

purohita

masc nom sg of purohita (noun)

1. chief priest; royal adviser; lit. placed in front

Built from

• pu — prefix · forward, forth
  From pura, related to proto-Pali pu-; spatially means ahead. No clear European cognate, but cognate with Sanskrit puras 'before', Greek pro- 'before'.
• ro — stem · front, forward
  Locative or directional sense of pura; the form puro in compounds.
• hita — stem · placed, set
  Past participle of √dhā 'to place, put'; shares the ancient root with English 'do', Latin facere via Indo-European *dheh₂-.
• a — ending · nominative singular
  Masculine nominal ending; marks the citation form and nominative singular.

Analysis. puro (in front, forwards) + hita (placed, set) — a person placed in front, i.e. in the chief position.

Etymology. Compound of puro (from pura, forward) and hita (past participle of dhā, to place). The spatial sense 'placed in front' becomes the social sense 'placed first in rank'. Sanskrit puro­hita; no direct European cognates, but the prefix puro- and root dhā are ancient Indo-European.

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

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