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avaca

masc voc sg of avaca (adj); nt voc sg of avaca (adj); imperf 3rd sg of avaca (verb); aor 2nd sg of avoca (verb)

1. avaca (adj): low
2. avaca (imperf): said; told; spoke
3. avoca (aor): said (something to)

Built from

• ava — prefix · down, away
  The prefix ava- originally meant 'downward, off'; here it modifies the sense of speaking to 'speak away, speak out, say'.
• vac — root · speak
  √vac is the root for all speaking; cognate with Latin vox 'voice' and English voice. The same root underlies vacana 'utterance' and vattabba 'should be said'.

Analysis. ava- (away, down) + √vac (speak), 'speaks away from', hence 'says, tells'; as adjective avaca means 'low' from the downward sense of ava-.

Etymology. ava- 'down, away' (Latin au- in aufero 'carry off') + √vac 'speak' (Sanskrit vac-, cognate with Latin vox 'voice', English voice). The root √vac appears in Pali vattabba 'should be said', vacana 'utterance'. The prefix ava- in compounds often loses its downward concreteness to become merely 'away' or 'forth', here shaping the sense to 'speak out, say'.

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

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