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vacchakañca

vacchaka

masculine nominative plural with ca enclitic

1. young calf; small calf

Built from

• vaccha — root · calf
  From PIE *wet-s- 'year-old'; cognate with Sanskrit vatsa and Latin vitulus. The concrete image is the young animal, fit for weaning.
• ka — ending · diminutive
  Pali diminutive suffix forming small or junior instances. Here it emphasizes youth and smallness.
• ca — prefix · and
  Enclitic conjunction. In sandhi, final -ṃ of vacchakaṃ is dropped before the vowel-initial ca.

Analysis. vacchaka (young calf) + ca (and); nominative plural vacchakaṃ becomes vacchaka before ca by loss of final nasal.

Etymology. vaccha (calf) is cognate with Sanskrit vatsa and Latin vitulus (calf, weanling); the -ka suffix is a Pali diminutive forming small or young things. The root vats- may be related to vatsati (grows old, ripens), suggesting the 'ripened' or 'grown' offspring; compare Sanskrit vayaḥ (age) and English 'wax' (grow).

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

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