Dear Nina, Everett and friends,

thanks. This is tricky, first let me quote from Duroiselle §603:

(i) When a noun or pronoun in the Locative is used with a participle
in the same case as itself, the construction is called Locative
Absolute.

(ii) The Locative Absolute, may often be translated by "when, while,
since" and sometimes by "although": tesu vivadantesu bodhisatto
cintesi, while they were disputing, the Future Buddha thought; suriye
attha'ngate, when the sun had set, after sunset; gavisu duyhamaanaasu
gato, he went when the cows were being milked; asaniyaa pi siise
patantiyaa, although the thunderbolt was falling on their head.

(iii) sati, the Locative singular of santo, Pres. part of the verb
atthi, to be, besides having the above meanings may also often be
translated by "if, such being the case": atthe sati, if there be
need: eva.m sati, such being the case; payoge sati, when there is
occasion. With Feminine words, sati is also used, although it should
be, satiyaa (Fem.): pucchaaya sati, if the question be asked; ruciyaa
sati, had he the desire, if he had the wish.

Here, we have "eva.m vutte", vutte is the past participle of vadati
in the locative case (as we agreed): was said, spoken. However, to
qualify as a Locative Absolute, vutte has to be with a noun or
pronoun in the same case. The problem here is whether eva.m can be
used in place of a noun/pronoun just like 'sati' in (iii) above. I
doubt so, but I am wondering if we can assume that a pronoun is
absent from the construction (as it is common in other Pali
constructions), and eva.m is just part of the construction. If so,
then, Everett's "when it had been said thus" and PTS's "when he had
thus spoken" are both right.

metta,
Yong Peng

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, nina van gorkom wrote:
> I was wondering if it was a kind of a locative absolute.... to put
it a bit awkwardly: 'when it had been said thus'.