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sālarājamūle

sālarājamūla

nt acc pl of sālarājamūla (noun); nt loc sg of sālarājamūla (noun)

1. root of a mighty sal tree; lit. sal tree king root

Built from

• sāla — root · sal tree
  A large Indian timber tree (Shorea robusta); Sanskrit and Pali borrowed term from an indigenous Indian language. Used as a location in canonical narratives.
• rāja — root · king, mighty
  From PIE *reg- 'to rule, direct'; cognate with Latin rex, English 'right'. Here used adjectivally to mean 'pre-eminent' or 'mighty'.
• mūla — root · root
  From PIE *mul- 'to grind, turn'; cognate with Latin molere, English 'mill'. Literally the underground part of a tree; figuratively foundation or source.

Analysis. sāla-rāja-mūla, a compound of three elements: sāla (the sal or shala tree, Shorea robusta), rāja (king, mighty), and mūla (root). The compound denotes the root of the preeminent sal tree, often a significant location in Buddhist narrative (e.g., in the Mahāparinibbāna Sutta).

Etymology. sāla is a Sanskrit loanword from an indigenous Indian language (likely Dravidian or Munda origin, related to modern Hindi śāl); rāja derives from PIE *reg- (rule, direct—cognate with English 'right', Latin rex); mūla derives from PIE *mul- (turn, grind—cognate with English 'mill', Latin molere), with the sense 'that which is ground down' or 'foundation'.

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

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