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yato

ya

masc abl sg of ya (letter); masc abl pl of ya (letter); masc abl sg of ya (pron); masc abl sg of ya (cs); …

1. ya (pron): whoever; whatever; whichever
2. ya (letter): (gram) letter y; 34th letter of the alphabet; palatal semi-vowel
3. ya (cs): (gram) ya; suffix used to form impersonal and passive verbs
4. ya (cs): (gram) ya; conjugational sign of group 3 divādigaṇa verbs
5. yata (pp): controlled (wrt); restrained (in); in check
6. yati (aor): exerted oneself, strived
7. yato (ind): from where; from which; wherever
8. yato (ind): since; because; due to the fact that; on account of which; lit. from which
9. …

Built from

• ya — root · who, which, what
  Ancient relative pronoun; cognate with Sanskrit ya-, Greek hós, English who. Introduces relative clauses and conditional reasoning.
• -to — ending · from, ablative marker
  Ablative suffix from Indo-European *-tod, marking source, cause, and reason. In yato it anchors the sense "from which" → "since/because".

Analysis. From ya (relative pronoun/conjunction) + -to (ablative suffix). Yato combines the relative sense of ya with ablative force: "from which" → "since" (causal), "wherever" (locative-ablative extension).

Etymology. Ya is the ancient relative pronoun, cognate with Sanskrit ya-, Greek hós (Latin quī from *quo-i-), Gothic hwas, English who. The ablative -to derives from Indo-European *-tod (seen in Latin istud "that", Sanskrit tad "that"). Together they build the causal and locative-relative adverb central to Pali narrative and doctrinal prose.

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

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