Dear George,

> Yong Peng, Jim, Nina and all,
>
> I think Jim's interpretation of the pariccheda 1 title is correct. For
> the line:
>
>> Sakattham-pi dhaaretii-ti dhaatu,

>> own way - too / understands / dhaatu

>> 'Understands in one's own way' is dhaatu
> ,
Jim: 'it contains its own meaning'
>
> I would suggest:
>
> A 'root' is what has meaning by itself.

'has' (also 'possesses') for 'dhaareti' sounds good. Nina's 'bears' is fine
too. I also think 'carries' could be another possibility. I'm not so sure
about your 'meaning by itself ' for 'sakattha.m'. The first definition is
paired with the second one which has 'parattha.m' and this might pose a
problem if you translate it (in keeping with the former) as 'meaning by
another'. For my own translation, I would change 'contains' to 'has',
'possesses', 'carries', or 'bears' and stick with 'its own meaning'. Another
possibility might be 'a meaning of its own'.

> This is the first of several definitions of the term dhaatu. One question
> (which I don't
> know how to answer) is whether the definitions are intended to identify
> different senses of
> dhaatu, or whether they are to be understood as (together) defining a
> single notion.

I'm inclined to go with the latter. Each of the five definitions has a 'pi'
either within the definition or just outside so I would think they should be
taken together in understanding how the linguistic term is applied. It
doesn't try to define all the senses which would include bone, the four
great elements, the 18 elements, metals, etc. although bone and metals are
alluded to in the explanation. Interestingly, Kacc 671 has: "attha.m
dhaaretiiti dhaatu, gamanapacanaadika.m kriya.m dhaaretiiti vaa dhaatu."

I think that in reading 'bhuu sattaaya.m' on p. 4, sattaa (being, existing)
is the 'sakattha' of the root 'bhuu' but it can have another meaning
(parattha) like 'va.d.dhane' (increase, growth) which I came across in the
4th pariccheda (p. 29). I still need to learn more about how 'dhaatu' is
used and Aggava.msa's five definitions is a good place to start.

Jim