Sunday, January 30, 2011

Etymology-1

Here is the first attempt to satiate an inquisitive endeavor to discover a connection between etymologies of words used in English, Hindi, Sanskit and Marathi:

A beautiful Sanskrit verse in the praise of Devi Saraswati goes like this:

या कुन्देन्दु- तुषारहार- धवला या शुभ्र- वस्त्रावृता
या वीणावरदण्डमन्डितकरा या श्वेतपद्मासना
या ब्रह्माच्युत- शंकर- प्रभृतिभिर्देवैः सदा पूजिता
सा मां पातु सरस्वती भगवती निःशेषजाड्यापहा

The last word of this prose is निःशेषजाड्यापहा which has a सन्धि विग्रह as: निःशेष + जाड्य + अपहा
which translates to the destroyer(अपहा) of Indecision (निःशेष) and lethargy (जाड्य).
My curiousity revolves around the word 'जाड्य'. This word has roots in Marathi in the form of जड meaning 'heavy'. A noun derived from जड is 'जाड्य' which means heaviness, which in turn is the essence, in which the word is used here, that is 'Inertia'.
The more curious take on this etymology comes in the form of the English word 'Jade' which, according to m-w, translates to " to wear out by overwork or abuse ", which is in substance, is the very meaning of 'जाड्य'.

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