Dear Ong Peng and group,

I've been looking for examples in the literature
to help resolve a question which has come up
earlier, namely whether the following sort of
sentence is correct: so tassa putta.m posi / he
raised his (own) son.

To me the use of tassa there makes it sound like
the man indicated by 'so' raised someone else's
(tassa) son, not his own. If words like 'his' and
'hers' are meant in the sense of 'his own' or
'her own' it might be necessary to find another
solution when translating from English into Pali.
This might be a hard and fast rule, or it might
only be a question of style. That's what I'd like
to try and find out.

Some alternatives would be saka (own) and attano
(of himself). One risk with these alternatives is
that they may at times be meant to _emphasize
ownership_ i.e. mean 'his very own' 'her very
own' rather than just meaning 'his own' or 'her
own'. Other alternatives involve forming various
compounds and participles.

I've found a number of relevant examples while
skimming through the Mahaava.msa, and no
conclusive case where tassa or its equivalent has
the sense of 'his own'. (that is to say where
tassa or tassaa refers to the agent of the
sentence) However I have not looked at every
tassa because there are hundreds of them in this
text alone. And the Mahaava.msa is just one text
among many. So it's still worth keeping an eye
open for these forms.

If anyone finds this interesting, please post
further examples from your reading, especially if
you find what might be counterexamples. This
could turn out to be wrong. Or if what I'm saying
is unclear, don't hesitate to ask me to clarify.

Here are my culled samples which I hope can be
helpful for correctly translating the exercise
sentences in recent lessons.

Mhv III 29

nisiidi thero aanando attano .thapitaasane

The elder Ananda sat down in his (attano) prepared seat.

Mhv XXII 20-21

so tu bhuupati attano dhiitara.m ... lahu.m nisiidaapiya

however that king, having caused his (attano) daughter to sit down in a boat


Mhv X 74,
attano raajageha.m so tassa datvaana ayyako
aññattha vaasa.m kappesi

that grandfather (so ayyako) having given
(datvaana) his palace (attano raajageha.m) to him
(tassa) arranged a residence elsewhere (aññattha
vaasa.m kappesi).

Mhv IV 15

yaacitvaa anuduuta.m so saha tena pura.m gato
attano dhammavaaditta.m sa.mñaapetvaa va nagare

having requested a companion (yaacitvaa
anuduuta.m) he (so) together with him (saha tena)
gone to the town (pura.m gato) having made known
(sa.mñaapetvaa) his
state-of-being-a-speaker-of-dhamma (attano
dhamma-vaadi-tta.m) in the town (nagare)...


The following looks at first like an exception,
but on closer examination turns out to probably
still follow my proposed rule:

Mhv XII 33

kumaarikaa idhaaniitaa tassaa maataa ca aagataa

The princess has been led (aaniitaa) here (idha)
and her (tassaa) mother is come.

Note that in the second half, it is the mother
(maataa) who is the subject of the coordinated
clause. Now that there is a new subject, it's
okay to use tassaa referring to the princess.

The following also appears ambiguous at first,
and perhaps like an exception to my proposed rule

IX 25

cittaa sahassa.m daapetvaa tassaa putta.m saka.m pi ca

Cittaa, having given (daapetvaa) to her (tassaa)
a thousand (pieces of silver), and even her own
(saka.m) son (putta.m) ...

In this case it might be possible to read 'tassaa
putta.m saka.m'. (Her own son). That would
contradict my proposed rule. But the context
tells us that the thousand pieces of silver were
given to another woman, so tassaa here is
actually the dative object of giving.

XXII 6-7

uparaajaa tato yeva sadaarabalavaahano
rakkhitu.m saka.m attaana.m roha.naabhimukho agaa /6/

the viceroy (uparaajaa) right then (tato yeva),
together with his wife, troops and
horses(sa-daara-bala-vaahano), departed (agaa)
for roha.na (roha.naabhimukho) to save his (saka)
life (atta/self).

Note here the compound with sa- (with). This
could perhaps be a good option for the exercise
which came up previously:

>4. She went to school with her sister.
> saa / agami / paa.thasaala.m / bhaginiyaa saddhi.m
> Saa tassaa bhaginiyaa saddhi.m paa.thasaala.m agami.

Here 'tassaa' is probably unidiomatic, if my
guess is correct. Perhaps we could follow the
above example and just say: saa sabhaginii
paa.thasaala.m agami.


ya.t.thaalaayavihaaramhi mahesii tassa gabbhinii
putta.m janesi so tassa bhaatunaama.m akaarayi /7/

In ya.t.thaalaaya-closter (ya...-vihara) his
pregnant wife (mahesii tassa gabbhinii) gave
birth to a boy, he (so = uparaajaa) named him
(tassa = puttassa) after (his) brother.
(literally he arranged for him (his) brother's
name).

Note here again the use of tassa in the first
line, but here the subject has changed. It's a
new sentence where the wife is the subject.

Tassa in the second line refers to the boy, not
the viceroy who is indicated by 'so'. I believe
Geiger didn't understand this, or several similar
cases when editing and translating this text.
Geiger appears to have read: so (uparaajaa) tassa
(uparaajassa) bhatu naama.m. He, his (own)
brother's name... Geiger is probably wrong there.

Hope this is of interest,

/Rett